One
The accused, Chelsea Liew, was in court. She sat on a wooden bench in a wooden box, handcuffed to a police woman.
The prosecutor, a large, shiny Malay man, marking time until his own elevation to the Bench, watched the court official read out the charge in a slow, ponderous voice, ‘That you, Chelsea Liew, on or about the eighteenth day of July, committed murder by causing the death of Alan Lee.'
The judge said, ‘How does the accused plead? Guilty or not guilty?'
The shrivelled old man with large, yellow, herbivorous teeth and a thick head of implausibly black hair managed to inject a wealth of disbelief into the possibility of a not guilty plea. Many of the judges in Malaysia were drawn from the civil service, which meant they had previously been public prosecutors themselves. Their instincts were conservative and their sympathies rarely with the accused in criminal trials.
Chelsea's lawyer, a tall, thin Indian man with a large Adam's apple bobbing above his white, winged collar, struggled for diplomatic words that would not involve criticising any party for whom the judge had sympathy – basically, everyone except his client. ‘My Lord, the evidence is circumstantial. The police and prosecution have rushed to judgement because this is a high profile case. The charges should be dismissed outright.'
Teeth were exposed in a parody of a smile. The judge, hunched over his elevated table, black gown bunched about his shoulders, looked more like a vulture than a member of the Bench. He said, ‘Guilty or not guilty?'
The lawyer recognised a lost cause. He stole a quick nervous glance at the woman in the dock. At last the accused muttered, ‘Not guilty.' Her lawyer sighed with relief.
The judge rapped his gavel. ‘Accused to be remanded in custody until trial dates fixed.'
Her defence lawyer made one last attempt to assist his client. ‘My lord, this is an unusual case involving a mother of three. Although bail is not usually granted where the charge is murder …'
He was interrupted. ‘Application for bail denied!'
The judge stood and the lawyers, members of the public in the gallery and court staff rose hastily to their feet. No one was permitted to sit in the august presence of the law. Even, thought the lawyer angrily, if it was personified by an incompetent, semi-senile old man with a stunted sense of justice. Gown billowing, the judge walked out – his work done for the day.
Chelsea's lawyer slumped back into his chair, shoulders bowed. The prosecution team looked pleased. Only the accused did not react. Her anger and emotion had been spent long before her marriage had culminated in the murder of her husband. She stared at the ground between her feet. When a policewoman took her arm and led her out, she went without resisting.
Inspector Singh was wedged into a small plastic seat at Changi Airport. Hunched up, his belly compressed his lungs. His fleshy, sweaty knees were pressed together chastely to avoid inadvertent brushes with the people on either side. Inspector Singh had a strong dislike of physical contact with strangers. Unfortunately, his girth made it difficult for him not to encroach onto their seats. His shirt was wilting and his shirt pocket, full of pens, was tearing slightly at the corner. Patches of damp were visible under his armpits and just above his belly. Only his white sneakers looked as fresh as when he had put them on before setting out for the office – blissfully unaware that he was about to be assigned to the case that he had, only that morning, been reading about in the newspapers. He remembered feeling sorry for the policeman who had the dismal task of finding the murderer of Alan Lee. He felt much sorrier now that he knew it was himself.
Inspector Singh was waiting for a flight to Kuala Lumpur. He sighed, a breathy, wheezy sound; a heavy smoker, his breathing always sounded strained. He needed a cigarette but smoking was prohibited indoors and pretty much everywhere else in Singapore. He wondered whether he dared nip outside for a fag. As much as he viewed his assignment in Malaysia with trepidation, he did not want to miss his queue number. Singh knew he would not be on the case if he was not the unofficial ‘most likely to be forced into early retirement' entry in the Singapore police yearbook. He sighed again, causing his neighbour, a middle-aged white woman, to glance at him surreptitiously. Singh knew what she was thinking. A dark man in a turban who seemed worried and preoccupied? She was hoping not to be on the same flight as him. Singh had neither the patience nor the inclination to explain to her that the six metres of cloth that he had wound around his head expertly that morning into a black, pointy turban reflected his heritage as a Sikh. It did not indicate terrorist proclivities and neither, for that matter, did anyone else's turban.
Singh felt his need for a cigarette sharpen. To hell with it. He would have to risk missing his flight. He felt in his trouser pocket for the reassuring rectangle of his cigarette packet and hauled himself with difficulty out of his seat. He wiped his forehead along the band of his turban with the back of his hand. It itched when he was hot.
He lumbered towards the exit and was brought up short by the sound of raised voices. He looked around with mild curiosity. It did not take him long to identify the source and cause of the altercation. Two men squaring-off. One white, the other Chinese. On the First Class carpet. It seemed that they had converged on the desk at the same moment and were now disputing right of way.
Singh really didn't feel like interfering. He took a step towards the exit and then glanced back. He saw the long-suffering expressions on the faces of those queuing up to fly ‘cattle' class and made up his mind. He moved silently towards the men, his sneakers muffling his approach. Not that they would have heard him anyway. They were so engrossed in shouting each other down. The white man was beefy and red-necked, his nose a mosaic of broken veins. The Chinese man was slim and fit, wearing the yuppie uniform of polo shirt and chinos, his expensive matching luggage in a heap by his side.
Singh walked up to the men standing almost toe to toe, placed a fat-fingered hand on each man's chest and shoved. They parted like the Red Sea. The white man tripped over the edge of the deep blue First Class carpet and barely avoided falling over. He said angrily, ‘Who the hell do you think you are?'
The Chinese man nodded to second the question, his face contorted with rage. Singh was amused to see this united front between the erstwhile combatants.
He smiled pleasantly and said, ‘Inspector Singh, Singapore Police Force.'
Both men looked disbelieving. Singh didn't blame them. He was an overweight, sweaty, hairy, unconvincing example of a policeman.
He asked, ‘So what's this about?'
‘He took my place in the queue!'
‘No! He cut in front of me.'
The pretty woman behind the check-in counter rolled her eyes at Singh.
Singh looked at the two men, one eyebrow raised thoughtfully.
Then he turned his back abruptly on them and walked over to the Economy queue. He counted out the first ten and beckoned to them imperiously. The passengers looked doubtful but succumbed to Singh's air of authority and followed him. He gestured to the First Class check-in and they lined up quietly, one tiny woman in a saree saying sheepishly, ‘But I only have an economy ticket.'
‘Not to worry, madam,' said Singh politely.
He turned to the two men, ‘You two – at the back of this line.'
‘What do you mean?' blustered the Caucasian.
‘You heard me, get in line here.'
‘Behind all these people?'
‘Yup.'
‘You can't do that!' It was the Chinese man.
‘I've just done it …'
‘I'll have your badge for this!' he stammered angrily.
Singh grinned, suddenly happy. He said, ‘There's a long queue for that too!'
He waddled back towards his seat, ticket stub between clammy fingers. There was no time left for a cigarette. But it had been worth it.
Forty-five minutes later he was on the plane, sitting next to an elderly Malay man wearing a white shift, open sandals and a neat, white, round turban on his head. The Malay man grinned at Singh as he sat down, baring sparse, long teeth clinging to red, receding gums. But after a brief inquiry had elicited that his companion was Singaporean, the older man lost interest and slumped back in his chair.
The plane juddered and Singh looked nervously out of the window. He could see the coastline of Peninsular Malaysia. Singapore, a small island separated from the Malaysian mainland by a thin strip of water, the Straits of Johor, and connected by two bridges, had disappeared from view.
He forced his mind back to the matter at hand – the reason for this unexpected trip to Malaysia. He had the file in his briefcase but he did not take it out. There was no privacy on board the aircraft to be reading the details. Besides, he knew the skimpy facts by heart. It was the depth of passion running beneath the surface that had occupied the newspapers in Malaysia and Singapore for the last couple of weeks and promised to make the case a nightmare. Inspector Singh's superiors had decided that the poisoned chalice would be his. From their point of view it was a splendid choice. If he managed to find a way through the thicket of politics overwhelming the case, they would claim the credit. If he failed, they would hang him out to dry, pleased to get rid of one of the last mavericks in the Singapore police. His was not an organisation that appreciated instinct over method, results over means, footwork over paperwork. He was the elephant in the room that no one talked about but everyone hoped would do the decent thing and take early retirement. As he had not done it so far, he was on a small plane, enduring a bumpy flight, to a town up in arms.
Inspector Singh was quite convinced there was absolutely no possibility of a successful resolution to the case he had just been handed. There never was when religion trumped rational behaviour and politics influenced police work. Malaysia and Singapore were both former British colonies, once part of the same country but now two suspicious and independent neighbours. For both countries, every act of state by the other was potentially a threat or an insult. The tabloid press and politicians in both countries were competing for airtime by issuing the most inflammatory statements. There was talk of ‘unwarranted interference in domestic affairs' by Malaysian officials. Singapore officialdom had adopted a superior tone about ‘justice being seen to be done'.
And yet, thought Inspector Singh, the historical and family ties that bound the two nations together were stronger than the disputes that divided them. But that just exacerbated every disagreement between the countries. Between Malaysia and Singapore, there was none of the polite distance and formal dispute resolution of strangers – every difference of opinion was a family feud. And there were all too many opinions being vented in newspapers and online about his new case.
The plane came in to land over undulating hills covered in neat grids of oil palm. Singh caught a glimpse of the Formula One racetrack – yet another project by the previous government to drag Malaysia onto the world stage. Mahathir, the previous prime minister, was convinced that as long as he built the biggest, the best and the most expensive of everything, Malaysia would be treated with respect by the international community. Predictably, Malaysia had instead become a byword for the funding and construction of white elephants.
Singh walked towards the trains linking the Kuala Lumpur International Airport terminal building and the arrival hall. The ceiling above was lit with hundreds of small lights intended to look like the stars at night. He had read somewhere that a computer program had been used to locate the lights randomly and so no pattern was detectable. He scowled. Programmed randomness struck him as an oxymoron. He caught the connecting train and was further irritated. It was automated – did not have a driver. Inspector Singh had spent a career exploring the fallibility of man but he preferred the risk of human error to the certainty of electronic indifference to his well-being. Moments later, he stepped out of the air-conditioned coolness of the terminal into the sweltering tropical heat.
Singh strolled to the massed ranks of Mercedes Benz and climbed into the back of the first one. The Malay driver – almost all the drivers on the authorised limousine service were Malay – had an unkempt, wispy, black beard. His car on the other hand was immaculate. A verse of the Quran was plastered on the rear window. Inspector Singh did not read Arabic but he knew the expression was ‘There is no God but Allah and Muhammad is his only Prophet'. Across the glove compartment there was another sticker with the words ‘You'll Never Walk Alone' emblazoned next to a logo of Liverpool Football Club.
Noticing the inspector looking at it, the driver asked, ‘You Liverpool supporter?'
Inspector Singh watched continuous cricket coverage on the cable cricket channel in Singapore. But he felt mischievous and said, ‘No, Manchester United.' He had forgotten that United was no longer the hate figure of the football world.
The driver nodded sympathetically. ‘Very hard now for other teams. Chelsea boss got all the money.' He guffawed, exposing two rows of gold fillings that Singh could see glinting in the rearview mirror. ‘Last time, what is important is who wins the game. Now what is important is who has the richest boss. Bagi orang kaya trophy sahaja!' Give the rich man the trophy right away!
Inspector Singh laughed and then pulled out the newspaper he had picked up on the plane and settled down to read the latest on the matter that had brought him to Kuala Lumpur.
Excerpted from Inspector Singh Investigates by Shamini Flint.
Copyright © 2008 by Shamini Flint.
Published in 2008 by A Thomas Dunne Book.
All rights reserved. This work is protected under copyright laws and reproduction is strictly prohibited. Permission to reproduce the material in any manner or medium must be secured from the Publisher.