A Most Peculiar Malaysian Murder Page 6

  The young man of mixed parentage looked at himself in the mirror. It was a full-length, teak-bordered mirror set in the lightest part of the room. Ravi liked what he saw. His stone-washed jeans were moulded across his thighs and artistically frayed at the knees. He had bought them like that, of course. He’d never worn a piece of clothing long enough to wear it out. He wore a black T-shirt firmly tucked into low-cut, hip-hugging denim jeans and a broad belt with a square, masculine buckle. His hair was cut close to a well-shaped head. He looked good, he thought. He took care of himself. He exercised daily at a big, glass-enclosed gym. He looked after his skin and his hair. But he made sure to keep his look natural. Only he knew the effort that went into his careless good looks.

  Looking at his reflection with admiration, he could not understand why Chelsea had refused to see him. After all, he had taken a big risk asking for her. Nobody knew about him. About them. He had been willing to take a chance on being found out but she had rebuffed his attempt without even the courtesy of seeing him first. A policeman had broken the news to him, the smirk on his face suggesting he was being laughed at because a woman in jail, whose options for company were limited, did not want to see him.

  Mind you, she had rebuffed his early efforts to get to know her as well. But he had played his cards well. He, Ravi, was experienced in the ways of rich, lonely women. He had maintained a physical distance. He had treated Chelsea with studious, old-fashioned courtesy, listening to her stories with a sympathetic ear. He had never once put himself first in his dealings with her. Finally, she had started to open up, unburden herself. Really talk to him. As he had guessed from the start – it was the same with the other abused women he had targeted – she was only too willing to sleep with him the moment she started talking to him. For women like Chelsea Liew, the commitment was communication. Sex was a reward to men who had earned her trust.

  They had managed their relationship very well. The husband had never suspected. Alan Lee had been a little bit too confident that he had beaten his wife into submission. It was easy to arrange assignations. Interludes between shopping trips while the kids were in school. He had Chelsea precisely where he wanted her – dependent on him for emotional solace and physical pleasure. The small gifts she gave him had turned into cash handouts.

  But to his intense annoyance, she had broken off all contact the minute the custody battle for the children had begun. He had protested that they were discreet, nobody need find out about their liaison, but she was firm. She was not going to give her husband any ammunition in the battle for the children. She, who was alleging adultery as grounds for divorce and custody, did not intend to be caught, literally, with her pants around her ankles. Ravi had hoped to go back to the well a few more times. But if it was not possible, he could live with that. He knew when to cut his losses and walk away. There were plenty of other rich, lonely women in Kuala Lumpur.

  But then Alan Lee had been killed. What a euphoric moment. He smiled at the recollection of his own short-lived delight. He had sent her a letter immediately, professing undying love, predicting a future together, talking about his willingness to be a father to her children. She did not respond but he had not been worried. He knew she had been too busy and careful during the divorce and custody hearings to have replaced him. With the husband out of the way, he would soon insinuate himself back into her good graces, her bed and hopefully marriage – his ticket to the good life.

  He could not believe it when Chelsea was arrested for murder. His golden goose was about to be hanged from the neck. And to add insult to injury, she would not even see him. He kicked the bed in frustration and scuffed one of his ankle boots. Taking a piece of cloth, he sat on the bed and started polishing the spot with neat circular movements.

  Sergeant Shukor’s mobile phone rang. He extricated the phone with his left hand. His right hand was still soiled from tucking into his lunch of roti telur and dhal curry. He was sitting across from Inspector Singh, the table so small that they were generating static between their trousered knees. The inspector ignored the contortions of his Malaysian colleague as he tried to answer the phone with one hand. He wiped his plate clean with his last piece of thosai – an Indian bread made with rice and lentil flour. He had eaten three without pausing for conversation. The sergeant was nodding his head, listening to the man at the other end of the phone. He waved his hand in the air, signalling for the bill. Inspector Singh glared at him, indicating with a curt shake of the head that the sergeant was being premature, the older policeman fancied some dessert.

  But his subordinate tapped the phone suggestively. Whatever the message was, it could not wait. As the bill arrived, Inspector Singh took a handful of grubby ringgit from his pocket and tossed them on the table. With a nod to the old Punjabi man with a snowy white beard to the middle of his chest, Inspector Singh followed Shukor out into the blazing sunshine and blinked as his eyes watered in the unexpected light. They were standing close to Masjid Jamek or Jamek mosque, built at the confluence of two rivers. The rivers themselves, small and muddy brown with concrete embankments, looked like large drains. Any romance attached to their presence in the heart of Kuala Lumpur had been ruined by the need to shore them up to prevent landslips. But the mosque itself was an exquisite building, Moorish in design and perfectly proportioned.

  Sergeant Shukor stood with pursed lips and hands on hips.

  ‘What’s the matter? What’s happened?’ asked the inspector.

  ‘There’s been a confession.’

  ‘A confession? Chelsea has confessed?’ Singh’s heart sank. He had been quite wrong about her.

  ‘No. Not her. The brother! Jasper Lee has just confessed.’

  ‘Confessed to what?’

  ‘His brother’s murder!’

  ‘But why? Why did he kill Alan Lee?’

  ‘No idea, lah!’ exclaimed the young policeman. ‘Let’s go and find out.’

  The Malaysian police now had two people in jail for the murder of Alan Lee and Inspector Singh was incensed.

  ‘Why can’t you just release her?’ he asked angrily.

  ‘You should understand, Inspector. We cannot release her until the prosecutor drops the charges or the judge dismisses the case. The prosecutor won’t dismiss the case yet because he doesn’t know the details of this new confession – maybe Jasper Lee and the widow were working together?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ snapped the inspector.

  Inspector Mohammad shrugged.

  ‘OK, why doesn’t the judge order her release?’

  ‘Holiday, I’m afraid,’ he said laconically.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The judge is on holiday.’

  Inspector Singh kicked the table. It was the height of rudeness to his Malaysian counterpart but he could not bottle up his frustration. Chelsea Liew was innocent but they would not let her go.

  ‘What about another bail application?’

  ‘Her lawyer is working on it, I believe. I wouldn’t worry, Singh. She’ll be out soon enough.’

  The fight went out of him. Singh, of all people, knew the bureaucracy of a police force. He, who always found himself swamped by paperwork. The Malaysian police were not going to come out of this smelling of roses having incarcerated the beautiful mother of three children while a murderer roamed free. They were not going to compound any errors by acting hastily at this late stage. He would have to bide his time. More importantly, Chelsea Liew would have to bide her time until her release.

  Inspector Mohammad was looking at his Singaporean colleague with interest. ‘You were convinced she was innocent, weren’t you? I mean, even before this confession from the brother.’

  Inspector Singh nodded.

  ‘Why? On what grounds?’

  Singh thought hard, understanding that the policeman was asking him a serious question, genuinely wondering why the Singaporean had been so sure that Chelsea was innocent, when all the facts pointed the other way. Finally, he said, ‘I’m not sure I was convinced,
to be honest. But she had so much strength and what looked like . . . integrity, I thought I’d take her word for it and look around for another possibility. And there seemed to be a few about – although I never suspected Jasper.’

  Mohammad nodded ruefully. ‘Well, I owe you an apology, I suppose. I was sure she’d done it. Didn’t look under many rocks after that . . . ’

  It was handsomely said and Singh’s respect for the man increased. He shook the Malaysian’s hand and realised there was nothing to prevent him catching a taxi to the airport and hopping on a shuttle back to Singapore. His work was done albeit without any actual input from himself. He had been sent to see that Chelsea got a fair deal. The outcome was even better than that. She would walk free. His superiors in Singapore would have to find some other way of forcing him into early retirement. He debated asking Shukor to take him to the airport and then thought better of it. He had a curiosity to see how things turned out. He would hang around for a few days.

  Inspector Mohammad, with that perspicuity that Singh was beginning to recognise, must have guessed his reluctance to leave just yet.

  He said, ‘Would you like to sit in on the interview with Jasper Lee?’

  It was an olive branch to the Singapore police officer. Inspector Singh seized it at once. The men set off for the labyrinth of detention cells. It was not hard to believe that anyone incarcerated here would be prepared to confess to just about any crime. It was harder to see why Jasper Lee, a free man, had decided to subject himself to this place.

  It was an interview with Jasper Lee but he was not saying much. The Malaysian policemen were persistent, repeating themselves, demanding answers – pointing out that he was putting his head in a noose. The self-confessed murderer was indifferent. If anything, he seemed slightly amused by their efforts.

  He said again, ‘I’ve told you I killed him, shot him in the chest. What more do you want?’

  ‘What weapon did you use?’

  ‘What do you think?’ asked Jasper cuttingly. ‘A gun, of course.’

  ‘What sort of gun?’

  ‘How do I know? The kind you point and shoot.’

  ‘Where did you get it?’

  Jasper shrugged. ‘You can always buy these things if you really want to.’

  His insouciance was starting to visibly irritate the policeman asking the questions. Inspector Singh suspected that if he had not been there, they might have considered roughing him up by now. And he could see why they might be tempted. This man, voluntarily confessing to murder and somehow finding it amusing, was extremely tiresome. Or perhaps he was doing the Malaysian police a disservice. He could not picture the placid Sergeant Shukor beating up a prisoner. As for Inspector Mohammad, he was the most correct gentleman Singh had ever come across. The idea of him laying a finger on anyone was ludicrous. On the other hand, Singh reminded himself, this was the country where a top policeman had given the deputy prime minister a black eye. It would not do to be sanguine.

  Inspector Singh looked at Jasper curiously. He had, in all his experience, never met a self-confessed murderer who took such pleasure in his role. Jasper Lee was still in civilian clothing. Despite his confession he had not been charged yet. The police preferred to ask him questions first – so unexpected was his arrival on the scene. He was a small, plump man. Conservatively, but casually, dressed. Not handsome like his brother Alan had been. In fact, fate had rather cruelly made him a caricature of his good-looking younger brother. He was shorter and rounder, with receding hair and protruding ears – like the drawings done on the spot at tourist venues for easily amused visitors. Jasper had a mole on one cheek from which grew a couple of ‘lucky’ hairs. Traditional Chinese believed that a mole with hair brought luck. It was not uncommon to see older men twirling those strands of hair in the same way that men of other cultures twirled their moustaches.

  Despite his bravado, there were bags under Jasper Lee’s dark eyes and, behind his black, plastic frames, he looked tired. He was cheerful now but he had been losing sleep in the recent past, perhaps weighing up his decision to come in and confess. It took courage to face a mandatory death penalty.

  Inspector Singh asked, ‘Why did you kill him?’

  Inspector Mohammad’s lips thinned with displeasure that the inspector from Singapore was taking advantage of the situation to insert himself into the interview process. He did not, however, interrupt. He was curious to hear the answer to the question. None was forthcoming. Singh asked again, ‘Why did you do it? There must be some explanation! He was your brother.’

  Jasper Lee shrugged. ‘Any number of reasons actually. Alan Lee was cruel and corrupt. I despised him for what he was doing to the environment. He deserved to die for that alone.’

  ‘What?’ ejaculated Inspector Singh. ‘You killed your brother to stop him cutting down a few trees?’

  ‘Yes. It’s not just a few trees, is it? He and his cronies are cutting swathes through the jungles of Borneo. Bribing, or if that fails, intimidating everyone who gets in their way. Men like him are destroying the rainforests. Sometimes, if you want to protect something you care about, you have to take extreme steps.’

  Sergeant Shukor had the last surprised word in the face of the unexpected motive. He said, ‘You dah gila, ke?’ Have you gone quite mad?

  Eight

  ‘He’s lying,’ said Chelsea flatly.

  The inspector stared at her in surprise. He asked, ‘What do you mean?’

  She said again, ‘Jasper’s lying. He did not kill Alan.’

  ‘He confessed!’

  She shook her head angrily. ‘I don’t care. Jasper is not capable of killing anyone. He’s far too gentle. He wouldn’t know where to begin!’

  ‘Why would he confess then?’

  ‘How do I know? Maybe one of your chums beat him up.’

  Inspector Singh took a deep breath, trying to keep a lid on his temper. This woman was being incredibly obtuse. And he didn’t understand why. She might be a former model. But she did not fit the stereotype. She was far too smart not to see the implications of what she was asserting so forcefully.

  He said patiently, ‘For your information, I’ve just been with Jasper Lee while the Malaysian police interviewed him. No one laid a finger on him. They didn’t have to. I’ve never seen anyone confess to premeditated murder with such enthusiasm.’

  Chelsea Liew snorted. A derisive, disbelieving sound.

  The inspector continued, ‘You do realise what you are saying, don’t you? His confession gets you off the hook. Your lawyers are applying for bail again. The prosecutor is bound to drop the charges. Or the judge will dismiss them. You will soon be a free woman! ’

  Chelsea Liew looked at the inspector in disgust. ‘You think I’m better off because some other innocent goes to the gallows?’

  The fat man said indignantly, ‘Actually, yes – I do think it’s better that they hang the man who confesses to a murder rather than a battered wife and mother of three who has protested her innocence all along!’

  Singh was alone in the cell with Chelsea. The Malaysian police had left it to him to break the news of Jasper’s confession to her – quietly washing their hands of the Singaporean whom they had wrongly held in custody for one long month. He was more than willing to be the bearer of such good news to a woman who had given up hope. He had pictured her surprise as colour flooded back into her pale face. Instead, he had this unexpected, persistent denial. The worry lines between her eyes had deepened. He did not understand it. He tried again.

  ‘Nobody who’s innocent confesses to a murder where the penalty is certain death.’

  ‘In your experience?’ she asked, her voice tinged with sarcasm.

  He was stung by this and snapped angrily, ‘In my many, many years of experience, yes!’

  She was sitting on her chair, sunk slightly into it, knees higher than her lap with two arms around them. Now she uncoiled and stood, looking down at him from her greater height.

  She said, enunciating each
word carefully, as if talking to a child or an idiot, ‘Jasper Lee did not kill anyone.’

  He grabbed her arm. ‘There is only one way you could know that for sure!’

  She wrenched free angrily. ‘Now you are accusing me of murder again? No! I am not confessing . . . unlike the combined talent of the Singapore and Malaysian police force, I just know an innocent person when I see one.’

  He changed tactics. ‘Fine! What does it matter to you whether he did it or not? You get out and go home to your kids!’

  She sat down heavily on the seat again, adopting her previous upright, semi-foetal position. Defensive, tired but not quite defeated.

  She said, ‘I will. I will do that. I owe it to my children not to walk away from an open door. But then I will work to clear Jasper’s name!’

  Singh said tiredly, ‘That could land you right back in here.’

  ‘So be it.’

  ‘Jasper has confessed!’

  The man at the other end of the phone could hear the excitement in Kian Min’s voice. He asked, ‘That means we can go ahead?’

  There was a silence punctuated by static crackling on the line.

  Again the question was asked. ‘Mr Lee, are you there? Can we go ahead?’

  After a few more long moments of hesitation, ‘Yes, OK. You can go ahead!’

  Wai Ming, who preferred to be known as Bruce – after his boyhood idol, Bruce Lee – punched the air once. Then he walked out of his trailer and shouted in dialect, ‘The time for waiting is over!’

  For those among the band of ruffians lounging around outside who did not understand him the first time, he repeated himself in Malay. A muted cheer could be heard from the men. One or two stubbed out cigarettes, a couple of others went back to the job of oiling and cleaning their guns with extra care. Someone switched off the TV, powered by an outdoor generator that drowned out the sound of the Malay-dubbed Brazilian soap opera which was playing grainily. A native Iban sharpened his parang, a powerful blade ten inches long, against a stone. The metallic sounds and flying sparks scared away a pair of hornbills sitting on a branch overhead.