Bill Pronzini - The Jade Figurine

“What are you going to do if you can’t get help from this man Shannon?”

“There’s another way. Not good, but then not too bad either.”

“What is it?”

“It’s better that you don’t know what it is. For your sake as well as mine.”

“Where will you be going?”

I shrugged. “As far as I can get on the money I’ve got.”

Tina folded and unfolded a paper napkin between her long fingers. “Are you sure you’re doing the right thing? I mean, wouldn’t it really be the best thing to just turn yourself in to the police? Innocent men don’t go to jail in this day and age.”

“Don’t they?” I asked sardonically. “You’ve got a lot to learn about life, little girl. Listen, I’m doing the only thing I can do under the circumstances. I don’t like the idea of it, but I’ve got no alternative. I want to keep on living, and if I have to run to do that, I’ll run.”

She sighed and pushed her chair back again. “I won’t try to change your mind,” she said. “It wouldn’t do any good anyway. Shall I go and buy those clothes for you now?”

“I think you’d better,” I told her. “Get me a gaudy sports shirt and one of those cheap jungle helmets and a pair of sunglasses. If you don’t want to attract attention in Singapore, the safest way to dress is like a tourist. Nobody pays any attention to tourists.”

Tina had removed my wallet and the few other things I had had in the pockets of my khakis and bush jacket. She produced them for me. There were one hundred and forty Straits dollars in the wallet-more than I usually carry, as a result of my two days of coolie labor at Harry Rutledge’s godown. I gave Tina thirty of that, and my clothing sizes, and she left for the small shops which line Geylang Road.

I propped myself up on the settee, wrapped in the goddam towel, and thought about Wong Sot.

A shriveled Straits Chinese with a face like a yellow prune, he was the owner of a small godown on Singapore River; and for seventy-five or a hundred dollars-depending on how well you bargained-he would hide you among the cargo on one of the small junks he serviced, bound up the coast of Malaya, or across the Straits of Malacca to Kundur Island or Rangsang Island or the coast of Sumatra. That was the extent of his aid; you were on your own once the junk put you ashore. But Wong Sot was a careful man-the inscrutable Chinese-and his operation was unknown to the Singapore authorities; they would have closed him down immediately if they had been aware of his lucrative sideline. And Wong Sot didn’t ask questions. If you had his price, he would smuggle you out. Period.

There was nothing in Sumatra for me, and yet, what was there anywhere else? In any place I would be an alien without valid identification. But I could get by in Sumatra; there are ways. Construction or road crews working the jungle hire men regularly, without demanding background or identification. I could get by-and I could live with myself, knowing that, essentially, Inspector Tiong had been wrong about me all the way down the line.

I got up after a while and had another of Tina’s cigarettes, then slowly paced the hot and silent room to keep the weakness from settling in my body. What I really wanted to do was to lie down, to sleep; my wounds and infirmities needed more time to heal. But time was something I didn’t have just now. Time was something I had not had in the past eighteen hours. I kept on pacing the room in slow cadence. You can endure a considerable amount of pain and discomfort if the situation warrants it; it’s surprising just how much you can endure..

Tina returned twenty minutes later carrying a large shopping bag. She had bought an ostentatious yellow-and-red batik shirt, the kind of white jungle helmet I had asked for, white duck trousers, and a pair of dark wraparound sunglasses. I went into the bedroom to change. The shirt had medium-length sleeves, and as long as I didn’t stretch my arms the bandaged wound above my right elbow was covered. The helmet, cocked low to one side, hid the patch above my temple.

“You really do look like a tourist,” Tina said when I came out again.

“I hope so.”

“Are you still feeling all right?”

“Sure. I’m fine.”

“Do you have to leave now? Wouldn’t it be better if you waited until dark?”

“It would be, but I can’t. I’ve got to make a telephone call as soon as possible.”

“Then-I guess you have to go.”

“The quicker I’m out of here, the better it is for you.”

“I suppose so.”

We went to the door. “Be careful,” she said, and it was one of those trite old lines that seem humorous seen in films or read in books but which are something else again said in earnest parting.

“Sure.”

“We won’t see each other again, will we?”

“No.”

“I’m sorry for that,” she said, and she moved up against me, with her hands gently on my shoulders, and kissed me — soft, moist, warm. “Goodbye, Dan.”

“Goodbye, little girl. Take care of yourself.”

I turned away from her and went out and down the stairs. All the way down I felt an odd sense of regret at the finality of our parting-and a feeling of having used Tina Kellogg without giving anything of substance or importance in return, the way you feel after spending the night making love to a nice girl you care nothing about at all…

The city lay within an enfolding canopy of heat, like stones and sand dabs imprisoned under the smothering weight of a transparent jellyfish. As soon as I stepped from the vestibule of Tina’s building, into the glare of the sun, sweat formed and ran on my face and under my arms, and the weakness made my legs begin to ache again.

I walked slowly, west toward Geylang Road. I felt conspicuous in the bright sports shirt, even though I knew that I wasn’t, and I wondered if passers-by could detect enervation in the way I moved. But no one seemed to look at me. Recogition was still a definite threat; I knew Tiong would have a picture of me on the front page of the morning edition of the Straits Times under one of those scare heads-and while apathy and disinterest are prevalent in Singapore, there are always those who read and observe. Even dressed as I was, I could be spotted at any time, by anybody from an old Chinese nona to a fat British tourist from Liverpool.

The thing I had to do, and quickly, was to get off the streets and into a safe house somewhere. Going to Wong Sot directly and immediately seemed like the answer, but it wasn’t. Tiong would have regular patrols along the river, for one thing, and for another, Wong Sot’s godown was a place which saw hundreds of people in and out every day, rendering it useless as a safe house. Too, he dealt only in the relatively uncomplicated service of smuggling human cargo in a cheap and efficient manner, and for the prices he charged, you couldn’t expect much more than a hollowed-out burrow beneath sacks of rice in the hold of an ancient junk.

No, Wong Sot was out as an immediate destination-but I would have to call him as soon as possible so that he could make arrangements. There was never any waiting period. You called him and told him you wanted passage to Sumatra or Kundur or Bintan or Mersing; then you haggled over the price and settled on a figure, and he gave you a time and a place the same night. Assembly-line smuggling. Guaranteed only as long as it lasts.

A safe house in which to spend the remainder of the day was no real problem. Both North Bridge Road and Victoria Street were lined with movie theaters, showing British imports, American imports, West German imports, Japanese imports. Air-conditioned anonymity. And most of the houses had public telephones, which meant I could make the call from one of them without running additional risk.