Росс Томас - The Singapore Wink

“Us?”

“Don’t you want to sit in? We just play for matches.”

“I mean, did she say ‘us’ or ‘you’?”

“She said ‘you’ but I interpreted it as ‘us’ which reminds me; I’d better call Dangerfield.”

I crossed the room again, looked up the number of the Strand Hotel, and asked its operator for Dangerfield’s room. She rang the room for at least two minutes and then said she was sorry, but Mr. Dangerfield did not seem to be in and would I like to leave a message. I told her to tell him to call Cauthorne.

“Not there?” Trippet said.

“No.”

“What do you think of his numbers racket headquarters theory?”

“Not much.”

“Neither do I, but it’s probably better than sitting around some hotel room.”

“What isn’t?”

Trippet went back to his own room to write a letter to his wife and to call Lim Pang Sam, he said. I continued to lie on the couch and count the cracks in the ceiling. I could have spent the time more profitably by reading a newspaper or studying Chinese or working on my bird calls, but I didn’t. I just lay there and stared at the ceiling and counted fifteen major cracks and six probables which actually were hairlines. I was waiting, I told myself, for the man who was going to take me to Angelo Sacchetti. But that wasn’t true. What I really waited for was Sacchetti to fall off the Chinese junk for the last time. I was waiting for that final grotesque, obscene wink and it arrived at a quarter past six along with the usual measure of shakes and shivers and a river of cold sweat. When it was over I headed for the bathroom and my third shower for the day. I dressed slowly, killing more time. I wore a white Egyptian cotton shirt with a button-down collar, a striped tie from some long-disbanded regiment, a dark blue poplin suit, black socks and loafers and a.38 caliber Smith & Wesson Chief’s Special which I stuck in the left-hand waistband of my trousers so that it could remind me of how much my stomach hurt. By fifteen to seven I was sitting on the edge of a chair, neat if not natty, waiting for someone to guide me to the man who the Singapore police thought would do for the prime suspect in the Carla Lozupone murder case until a better one came along.

Trippet knocked on my door at ten till seven and joined me in a final gin and tonic. “Did you talk to Lim?” I said.

“For a few minutes.”

“Did you tell him about tonight?”

“I mentioned it.”

“What did he say?”

“Nothing,” Trippet said. “Nothing at all.”

The knock on the door came promptly at seven and I didn’t jump as much as I thought I would. I put my drink down, crossed the room, and opened the door. Mrs. Angelo Sacchetti had been right when she had said that I would know him. I did. It was Captain Jack Nash.

“I don’t have any choice in this thing, Cauthorne,” he said as he moved quickly into the room, flicking a brief glance at Trippet.

“What do you mean?” I said.

“Just what I said.”

“How much did she offer, since you and Angelo are both Americans and all?”

“Who’s he?” Nash said, jerking his chin at Trippet.

“I haven’t changed that much, have I, Jack?” Trippet said.

Nash turned for another look. A long one. “Hey, I know you.”

“You should.”

“Sure, I know you,” Nash said, more slowly this time. “It was a long time ago up in North Borneo. Jesselton. You’re — let me think a moment — you’re Trippet, that’s it. Major Trippet.” He turned to me again. “How come you brought in British Intelligence, Cauthorne?”

“He didn’t,” Trippet said.

“I think it’s nice that you two know each other,” I said.

“Your friend, Captain Nash, was Colonel Nash when I knew him,” Trippet said. “Actually lieutenant-colonel in the Philippine Guerrilla Army until he was court-martialed.”

“They wiped that out, friend,” Nash said.

“He was using his good office to run guns to North Borneo when I knew him,” Trippet said.

“You never proved it.”

“He was buying them on the black market in the Philippines, or so he said. Actually, we had quite a bit of evidence that he stole them from various American Army installations. It was just after the war, in 1946.”

“Ancient history,” Nash said.

“During the war,” Trippet went on, “Nash captured a Japanese vice-admiral and then set him free. That was on Cebu, wasn’t it, Jack?”

“You know why I turned him loose.”

“For one hundred thousand dollars, according to my information.”

“Bullshit,” Nash said. “I turned him loose because the Japs were going to wipe out every Filipino on the entire island.”

“It was an excellent story; even most of the Filipinos believed it,” Trippet said. “Jack was quite the hero. It seems that the admiral’s seaplane was forced down by engine trouble and he and nine top-ranking staff officers walked right into Jack’s arms carrying with them, curiously enough, a complete set of plans for the defense of the islands. So Jack made a deal with the admiral. In exchange for the defense plans and one hundred thousand dollars, the admiral could go free providing he arranged for the phony massacre threat.”

“It wasn’t phony and there wasn’t any hundred grand,” Nash said. He produced his tin box and began to roll a cigarette. “What the hell,” he said after he got his cigarette lit, “it all happened more than twenty-five years ago anyway.”

“Go on,” I said to Trippet.

“All right. It seems that when the American command in Australia learned that Jack was planning to release the admiral, they ordered him to ignore the alleged Japanese threat. But Jack disobeyed orders, managed to get the defense plans to Australia, somehow collected the hundred thousand, released the admiral, and got a citation from the Philippine government for gallantry, and a court-martial from the Americans.”

“You want a drink?” I said to Nash.

“Sure,” he said.

“Gin all right?”

“On the rocks.”

I poured the drink and handed it to him. “That’s a phony story,” he said. “The Flip government gave me a medal, not any citation.”

“Why tell it now?” I asked Trippet.

“Because I don’t trust the good ex-colonel,” Trippet said.

“They gave me my rank back,” Nash said. “They only busted me to major anyhow.”

“Back up to my first question, Nash,” I said. “How much is she paying you?”

He looked into his drink as if the amount were written on one of the ice cubes. “Five thousand bucks. American.”

“For what?”

“For letting Sacchetti cool off.”

“Where?”

“On my kumpit. That’s where I’m going to take you.”

“And Sacchetti’s there?” I said.

“He was an hour ago.”

“Where’s your kumpit? ”

“Across the island south of the naval base just off Seletar in the Johore Strait.”

“Why there?” Trippet asked.

“Look, this limey isn’t coming along, is he?” Nash said.

“He’s an American and all now,” I said. “He’s coming along.”

“Sammy was right,” Trippet said. “A hand does need to be lent.”

“What kind of crack is that?” Nash said.

I told him it was a private joke and he said that his kumpit, the Wilfreda Maria, was anchored in the strait because it had been “moving around.”

“Where’d she find you?” I said.

“Sacchetti’s wife?”

“Yes.”

“At Fat Annie’s.”

“When?”

“Yesterday morning.”

“And they’re paying you five thousand just to give him bed and board for a few days?”

Nash ground his cigarette out in an ashtray and then glanced at his watch. “Them? Not hardly. As soon as he’s through with you I’ve got to rendezvous with his yacht.”