3

I spent fifteen fruitless minutes walking up and down the vast approach to the Star Ferry without seeing Leila, then with a feeling of uneasiness mixed with irritation I took a taxi back to the hotel. The old reception clerk was dozing behind his counter.

“Did Leila come back?” I asked him.

He opened one heavy eyelid, stared blankly at me and said, “No speak English,” and the eyelid snapped shut.

I went to my room. Leila’s door was shut. I turned the handle and the door swung open into darkness. I groped for the light switch and turned it on. I looked into the clean little room: no Leila.

Leaving the door open and the light on, I entered my room, also leaving the door open. I sat on the bed, lit a cigarette and waited.

I waited a little more than an hour. Then because it was more comfortable, I stretched out on the bed. In half an hour, lulled by the heat and the heavy eating, I went to sleep.

I woke, feeling hot, damp and uncomfortable. The early morning sun was filtering through the shutters. I raised my head and looked at my strap watch. The time was twenty minutes to eight. I sat up and stared across the passage into Leila’s empty room. A creepy sensation moved icily up my spine. I had a sudden feeling that something bad had happened to her. She hadn’t run away from me. I was sure of that. She had been spirited away and I could guess why. Someone had decided she not only knew too much but she had been talking too much. I considered what to do. I got off the bed, closed my door, shaved and washed as best I could in the cracked basin. I put on a clean shirt, then feeling slightly better than a dead man, I stepped into the passage, locked my door and went to the head of the stairs.

A Chinese boy sat behind the counter: probably the reception clerk’s grandson. “Leila hasn’t returned to her room,” I said. He giggled with embarrassment and bowed to me. I could see he hadn’t understood one word I had said.

I went down the stairs, waved away an eager rickshaw boy and signalled to a passing taxi. I told the driver to take me to police headquarters.

I was lucky. Chief Inspector MacCarthy was getting out of his car as I arrived. He took me to the police canteen where we were served with strong tea in thick white mugs. I told him the whole story.

I found his attitude infuriating. This was the first time I had ever done business with a British cop. His calm stolid don’t-let’s-panic manner made my blood pressure rise.

“But something’s happened to her,” I said, trying to keep from shouting. “I’m sure of it! One moment she was right with me – the next she had vanished and she hasn’t returned to the hotel.”

He produced his Dunhill pipe and began to fill it.

“My dear chap,” he said, “you don’t have to get worked up about it. I’ve had fifteen years’ experience handling these girls. They are here today – gone tomorrow. She probably saw someone she thought had more money than you. It is a well-known dodge with these girls. They get what they can out of you – then they disappear.”

I drank some of the tea and fought against grinding my teeth.

“This is different. We were going back to the hotel – oh, the hell with it! Someone thinks she’s talking. She’s been kidnapped.”

“Talking about what?”

“I’m trying to solve a murder case,” I snarled at him. “She was giving me information.”

MacCarthy blew expensive-smelling smoke at me. He smiled the way a parent smiles when his first-born has said something cute. I could see he regarded me as just another American screwball.

“What information could she give you to solve a murder that happened in America?” he asked.

“She told me Herman Jefferson rented a luxury villa at Repulse Bay. She told me he suddenly began to make money three months after he married and because he was making money he left his wife.”

He smiled that bright Britannic smile that has even fazzed the Russians.

“My dear chap, you shouldn’t pay any attention to what a Chinese prostitute tells you – you really shouldn’t.”

“Yeah. I guess I’m simple. You think she was kidding me and was staying out of her room just to give me an uneasy night?”

He blew smoke at me. “It’s part of a prostitute’s job to stay out all night.”

“Do you know of any Americans living out at Repulse Bay?”

“I believe there are quite a few.”

“Would you know if Jefferson had a place out there?”

“If he had, I would have known, but he hadn’t.”

“So she was kidding me?”

He smiled his diplomatic smile. “That of course could be the explanation.”

I got to my feet. I knew I was wasting time. “Thanks for the tea. I’ll be seeing you.”

“Always glad to help.”

I took a taxi back to the hotel. The old reception clerk had taken up his position behind the counter. He bowed to me. I would have liked to have questioned him, but the language barrier was too much of a handicap. If I were going to get anywhere, I would have to find an interpreter. It was then I remembered the English-speaking guide, Wong Hop Ho, who had given me his card at the airport. He might be able to help me.

I went to my room. I saw Leila’s door was closed and I paused to knock. There was no answer. I tried the door handle, but the door was locked. I knocked again, listened, hearing nothing, then shrugging, I went to my room.

It was too early to do anything constructive so I took off my jacket, tie and shoes and stretched out on the bed. I did a little thinking that got me nowhere, then I dozed off. It was after ten o’clock when I woke to the sound of gentle tapping on my door. I swung my legs off the bed and opened the door.

The Chinese boy bobbed, smiling, pointing down the passage. I put on my shoes, then followed him to the reception desk. The old clerk offered me the telephone receiver. It was Chief Inspector MacCarthy calling me.

“This girl you were telling me about,” he said. “You did say you bought her a jade ring last night?”

I stiffened. “Yes… it was imitation jade.”

“Would you take a taxi to the Chatham Road police station? It’s on the Kowloon side. They have a girl there – could be this girl you’re talking about. She is wearing an imitation jade ring.”

“Is she dead?” I asked, aware my stomach muscles were tight.

“Oh, very.” I could almost smell his expensive tobacco smoke coming over the line. “It’d help if you would identify her. Ask for Sergeant Hamish.”

“Another Scotsman?”

“That’s right. Lots of Scotsmen in the police force.”

“Probably a good thing for Scotland,” I said and hung up.

Forty minutes later, I walked up the steps leading to the Chatham Road police station. Just inside the large lobby was a big frame hanging on the wall containing a number of gruesome morgue pictures – photographs of some fifty dead Chinese men and women who had been found in the Straits or in the streets with an appeal both in English and in Chinese to identify them.

The desk sergeant showed me into a tiny office where a hard-faced young man with blond wavy hair and a cop stare was examining a file. He nodded to me when I introduced myself. He said his name was Sergeant Hamish.

“You have a body for me to look at,” I said.

He took from his pocket a battered briar pipe. The Hong Kong police seemed to be pipe-smoking types. I watched him fill it as his cold, green eyes considered me without much interest.

“That’s right. The Chief Inspector seemed to think you could identify her. She was fished out of the Straits last night around two. Not much of her left. She must have been caught by one of the ferry steamers from the look of her.”

I felt sweat sticking my shirt to my back. He got to his feet. “These damn people are always killing themselves,” he said conversationally. “Every day we collect half a dozen bodies. The Chinese just don’t seem to take their lives seriously.” We went down a passage, across a yard and into the morgue. From the number of forms under the coarse twill sheets, business seemed pretty brisk this morning.

He led me to a table, covered with a thick rubber sheet. He lifted a corner of the sheet, groped under it and produced a small amber-coloured hand on which was an imitation jade ring.

“I’ve had eggs and bacon for breakfast,” he said chattily. “If you can identify her by the ring, it’ll save me risking a throw-up.”

I looked at the ring and the small, slim fingers. It was the ring I had bought Leila. “That’s the ring,” I said, and I felt really bad.

He put the hand back out of sight. “Okay, I’ll tell the Chief Inspector.”

I reached forward and lifted the rubber sheet. I looked for a long moment at what was left of Leila. I wished I hadn’t, but I had to say goodbye to her. I dropped the sheet into place. I remembered her sighing with happy contentment after we had eaten that memorial meal. I saw again her sturdily-built little back as she had walked ahead of me. I hadn’t known her for long, but her personality had impressed me. I felt I had lost someone important.

There was a detective waiting for me on the other side of the ferry. He was a large red-faced man who said his name was MacPherson: there seemed no end to these Scotsmen. He took me back to the hotel in a police jeep.

He talked to the reception clerk in haltering Chinese, then took the key of Leila’s room.

As we went down the passage, he said, “The old coot’s cagey. We would close up this hole. He isn’t admitting she was a tart – can’t say I blame him.”

I hated him for sentimental reasons. Leila, I felt, deserved something better for an epitaph than being called a tan by a Scotch cop.

MacPherson unlocked her bedroom door and moved into the tiny room. I remained in the passage, looking in. With professional thoroughness, he began to search the room. There were only three dresses hanging in the cupboard and only one set of underwear in one of the drawers. Leila’s belongings were pathetically small.

MacPherson gave a sudden grunt as he peered into the bottom of the cupboard.

“I thought as much…” he muttered, bent and came up with a small strip of tinfoil. He smoothed the foil out carefully. It appeared to come from a pack of ten cigarettes.

“Know what this is?” he asked, showing me the foil. In its centre was a black smoky smudge.

“You tell me,” I said.

He bent once again and peered into the cupboard and this time he came up with a tiny, half-burnt candle: the kind you put on birthday cakes.

He sat on the side of the bed, holding the tinfoil and the candle and became expansive.

“She was a heroin addict,” he said. “Something like a dozen drug addicts kill themselves every week.”

“What makes you so sure?” I asked.

“Anyone having these two little gadgets is an addict,” MacPherson said. “Know how it works? They put heroin in the fold of the foil. They hold the lighted candle under the foil and then sniff up the fumes. It can be done in a few seconds. You know something? The stupidest thing the Government ever did was to wage war on opium smokers. They thought it was the easiest thing in the world to stamp out. Opium smokers have to have a room, a bed and the apparatus for smoking which is not only extensive but expensive. We never have any trouble in finding the room and smashing up the apparatus. An opium pipe costs quite a lot of money, and after a while the smokers got fed up with us breaking up their beds and their pipes and chasing them over the roofs. We kidded ourselves we were putting a stop to the drug traffic, but how wrong we were.” He pushed his hat to the back of his head while he looked at me. “The addicts found they could get heroin from opium and all they needed was a piece of tinfoil and a candle. They can inhale this poison anywhere: in the movies, public conveniences, trams, buses, taxis – anywhere. You keep your eyes open and you’ll see bits of candle grease in most unexpected places. That’ll tell you, as it does us, someone has been inhaling heroin. Opium smoking is an addiction, but it isn’t a killer. But make no mistake about it: heroin kills. If we had let the Chinks smoke their opium, we wouldn’t be trying hopelessly to cope with heroin addicts.”

I rubbed the side of my jaw.

“Thanks for the lecture,” I said, “but I don’t think she committed suicide and I don’t think she was a heroin addict. I think she was murdered and these two little gadgets were planted for you to find.”

MacPherson’s stolid face showed no change of expression. He produced the inevitable pipe and began to load it.

“Think so?” he asked, an amused note in his voice. “The Chief said you were a private investigator. I’ve read Chandler and Hammet – they wrote fiction. This happens to be real life.”

“So it does,” I said. “Well, never mind. I don’t suppose it is very important.”

“What makes you think she was murdered?” he asked with no show of interest.

“Nothing that would convince you. What are you going to do with her things?”

“I’ll take them to the station. Maybe someone will claim them. The old coot doesn’t know if she had any relations. I’ve talked to him before – he never knows anything about anything.” He got to his feet. “I wouldn’t worry your brains about her.” He tossed Leila’s belongings into a cheap fibre suitcase he found at the top of the cupboard. “If you had to deal with as many cases as we do like this, you wouldn’t give it a second thought.”

“I’m sure. That’s the idea.”

He looked thoughtfully at me, “What idea?” he asked.

“The men who killed her would want you not to give a second thought, wouldn’t they?”

He suddenly grinned.

“Oh, come off it. We handle hundreds of these suicide cases…”

I was sick of him.

“I heard you the first time.” I crossed the passage to my room. “I’ll be here for a few more days if you should want me.”

He peered at me, losing some of his confidence. “What makes you think I’ll want you?” he asked.

“Well, we could read a detective story together,” I said and shut the door in his face.