Adventure of the Blue Carbuncles 5

By : Jim Blossom
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“So tell me Officer Dang,” hissed Sorkan as he arched his neck back in the manner of a cobra poised to strike, “when you were inside pilfering opium from thisss...sealed crime scene...” He gazed up to the third floor where Lastradisomp’s officers were trying to fend off curious onlookers scrambling in from adjacent balconies. “...are you certain you didn’t notice an envelope?”

“I didn’t touch any opium,” croaked the officer with a nervous sway of his eyes. “There wasn’t any in there...when I got there.”

Sorkan chuckled. “Oh, Officer Dang, I think there was.”

“What you know about it?” spat Dang.

Unconcerned, Captain Sorkan withdrew one of his strange cigarettes and lit it. He savoured a puff as the chilly grip of fear took hold on the officer. By the time Sorkan spoke, the snide little puke looked ready to crap out an ice cube.

“I recall a faint hint of opium smoke on your personage at our previous meeting,” began Sorkan, masterfully as always. “Your droopy eyelids and pin-point pupils, even now, betray your burgeoning habit. You have discovered, I would guess, that finding your pleasure in ‘the pipe’ is—as Conan Doyle put it—‘a practice easier to attain than to get rid of’.”

Officer Dang shifted uncomfortably.

“Now, as to your felonious fingers—that you so kindly drew attention to just now with your nightstick—they bear fresh traces of tobacco that has been soaked with an opium laudanum, yet the odour tells me that it is tobacco that has not yet been fired. So where would an officer of the Bangkok National Bureau get stains like that on his fingers?” He drew the question out with an extra long hiss. “Why in there, of course-sss.”

Dang looked like he’d swallowed his tongue as Sorkan pointed past him into the building.

“Now as a detective, your boss is, shall we say, dogged, or at the very least dogmatic...” He grinned at me. “...however I doubt very much that he condones his officers pawing the evidence. And evidence, it most assuredly is...or should I say was.” Dang looked ready to flee. “This third victim appears to have recently hit the financial ‘skids’, as it were. I suspect the reason for his abasement is the very addiction from which you now suffer. How convenient for you eh? --when dead men leave aliment for your hunger laying about.”

“What proof you got of any of this?”

“Absolutely none, Officer Dang, it’s merely conjecture,” hissed Sorkan.

“Then you go to hell, Sorkan! You got nothin’! Accusations, nothin’ more.”

“Officer Dang,” purred Sorkan, “That’s your squad car parked over there, isn’t it?” Dang’s mouth snapped shut. “Oh, I’m certain that it is, I observed you stowing personal items in it at the second murder scene. That one...” He pointed. “...with the hairline crack across the top of the windscreen.” Dang stiffened. “Perhaps, Mr. Spanner here and I will take a quick peek beneath the driver’s seat. That was were you stowed those other items, I believe. Yes, it was, beneath the driver’s seat.” Dang was shaking like a leaf. “What a shame, Officer Dang, that your duties will retain your person here, defending that yellow tape. It’s not far to yon squad car, but I doubt if you’d even be able to get out of there while I showed Chief Inspector Lastradisomp the evidence of your, shall we say, sticky fingers.”

Dang glanced fearfully at the threatening crowd.

“If, on the other hand,” hissed Sorkan as he toyed with his fingertips, “we were to know for certain whether or not an envelope was present at this sight, then I for one would be happy to be on our way back to the civil comforts of Pattaya, our curiosity satisfied. Wouldn’t you agree Mr. Spanner?”

“Absolutely, Captain Sorkan,” I said grandly, “I do concur.”

Sorkan raised an amused eyebrow in my direction. Meanwhile the terrified officer started blathering.

“Yes! Yes! There was envelope found! Just like one at second murder. I saw it myself!”

“Same markings?”

“Yes. A set of numbers and the word ‘gouda’.”

“What were the numbers?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Mr. Spanner, what say we go take a little peak in that cruiser.”

“No! No! I can’t remember, honest I can’t! I never even got good look at it! I only worry how I can sneak out opium!”

Captain Sorkan frowned. “Alright Officer Dang, I believe you.” He began to puzzle out-loud. “The presence of another envelope certainly does suggest that the victims were all in the hire of smugglers...but without knowledge of those numbers, how can we tell what they were smuggling?”

“Cheese of course,” said the officer. “It’s no secret that that’s what they doing.”

I almost started to snicker.

“Oh yes of course,” hissed Sorkan, “Cheese. But what more can you tell us then of this third victim?”

With a hateful pout, Dang spoke: “He was into the stuff deeper than me, I’ll tell ya that! Smoking a little while I’m off-duty is nothin’! This guy was using a needle, that for sure. Have to—to live in that place! I saw the tracks in his arm, myself. And what a wreck he was too. All skinny like damned skeleton, and his skin all pasty and yellowish. Wasn’t much left of his face, but I bet he already have look of death on him when the murderers got to him.”

“Sorkan!” came an angry cry from within the building.

“Ah, Mr. Spanner, I see that Chief Inspector Lastradisomp has, himself, spotted us. You will finally get to meet the charming fellow.”

With squinty resentful eyes, the man marched toward us. Red-faced with fury, he spat orders to his men left and right as he passed. He was a blustery little piglet of a man with glasses. He was short, bossy, and—with the top of his bulging belly blending smoothly with his puffed-out chest—there was little doubt that he suffered from a complex or two. In a vain attempt to improve his stature, he wore a pair of cowboy boots that looked ridiculous with his tight brown police uniform. They made a clip-clop sound like a tiny pair of cloven hoofs as he wiggled toward us. His pug nose was twisted in disdain. I noticed just then that he had a small stain on the front of his shirt.

“We have no need for you here Captain Sorkan,” he announced, sneering the rank as though to remind my friend of his subservience, “As you know this is a Bureau matter. If assistance from your rural police is required, we’ll let you know...traffic patrols, that sort of thing.” When he leaned back to address Sorkan’s towering figure, I had a direct line of sight straight up his nostrils.

“Chief Inspector Lastradisomp, what pleasure it is to see you. May I present my colleague, Mr. Rich Spanner of San Francisco.”

“Never mind that Sorkan! What the hell are you doing here?”

“I was just curious what you make of the sets of numbers on the envelopes containing the victims’ bribe moneysss?”

Lastradisomp’s mouth fell open then squished itself into a scowl. “How do you know of these envelopes?” Officer Dang looked away. “What sort of monkey business have you been up to Sorkan? Have you been trying to subvert my authority!”

Sorkan just hissed a quiet chuckle. “As you know, I often cannot help my deductive instincts. But I see that you are eager to get back to the delicious phat-prik-neua that your, shall we say, ‘lady friend’ has prepared for you tonight. So Mr. Spanner and I will be going.” With a polite nod he started to walk away pretending that Lastradisomp’s angry shouts were being lost in the din from the crowd.

“Phat-prik-neua! How do you know she made phat-prik-neua? I’m warning you Sorkan, stop meddling in this case or I’ll see that the only thing you get to investigate is missing parts off lepers!” Sorkan just smiled. “...And you Spanner, you should mind who you associate with! Foreigners shouldn’t meddle in Bureau matters! ...And, damn it Sorkan! ...how do you know my wife didn’t make it!”

The satisfaction in my companion’s mischievous grin was obvious. After we were out of sight, Captain Sorkan took a hard left into the courtyard.

‘Where are you going?’ I was about to ask, and then I saw the mounds of household garbage piled there, completely ignored by Lastradisomp’s lackeys. “You crafty son of a bitch!” I laughed. “No matter what country he comes from, there’s nothing a PI likes better than rooting through someone else’s garbage!”

Sorkan worked his brow up and down mischievously.

We set to work on the rubbish heap, probing one refuse-stuffed grocery bag and soggy cardboard box after another. We were trying to find anything that indicated it may have been discarded by the victim.

As we dug, heavy black clouds slowly replaced the twinkling starlight above us. We were searching a communal refuse pile for the entire building so it was no small task.

The mob near us grew larger and more raucous and Lastradisomp’s men struggled to hold them back. I was glad that Captain Sorkan was not in uniform.

“So...Lastradisomp is married then?”

“Yesss,” replied Sorkan with a smirk.

“It was clever how you deduced what he’d been eating just from that little spot on his shirt, but how on earth did you sort out all the rest of that? Like the fact his wife hadn’t made it for him?”

“You have a keen eye Mr. Spanner, to have picked up that tiny spot, but Lastradisomp presented to us more clues than just that one. Phat-prik-neua is stir-fried peppers with beef. He still had traces of the beef stuck in his teeth I’m afraid, and, woefully, identifying the sauce from his breath was a simple matter.” I laughed. “As far as who prepared the phat-prik-neua?...well, I sort of guessed at that. I figured it possible that even a fellow like Lastradisomp, despite his limited charm and aforementioned eating habits, might manage to maintain a mistress on the side. From the fresh sauce on his shirt and the hint of perfume on his clothes, we must assume that he had only just departed the company of whoever had prepared his meal. Not only did he smell of perfume, I detected a smudge of lipstick atop his upper lip; for it seems this was a rather amorous dinner indeed. And finally, he was clean shaven though it was late and he bore other clues of having already put in a hard day at work.” Sorkan chuckled. “Now Mr. Spanner, wouldn’t you agree that all these facts point to a mistress in the wings for our adulterous friend Lastradisomp, eh?”

This guy was good! He was like a big thin snakey-lookin hissy-sounding Columbo-dude in tight brown wash & wear.

“Here we are! One of the victim’s pay stubs!” said Sorkan.

I rushed over and quickly and checked out the spot he’d found it. “That bag, at least, we know belonged to the victim...and it’s possible anything in this little grouping here is his as well!”

“Let’s see if we can find his name on any of this other stuff,” hissed Sorkan.

“I can check all these books,” I said with renewed enthusiasm, “They seem to be in English!” There were at least three dozen big thick textbooks on a wide variety of subjects. “If these were his, he sure did a lot of heavy reading, but I’m afraid I can’t find a name in any of them.”

“Hummm,” mused Sorkan, “A once very learned man, but caught in the grip of narcotics. Such a shame,” said Sorkan.

And for a moment I thought I detected a hint of irony in the set of his brow. but maybe he just had to fart.

“Hey let’s check out that bag!”

We picked through the contents carefully. The first thing we noticed was all the broken glass.

“Curious,” noted Sorkan, as he carefully spread the tiny particles onto a piece of paper, “There are so many rough pieces, very few with smooth finished surfaces.”

“Never mind that!” I exclaimed, “What’s this?”

A list—half in Thai, half in English.

“A most singular find, Mr. Sorkan.”

“Are they names?” I asked.

“I believe so. But not proper names.”

“Businesses maybe?”

“Possibly, but I can’t make much more from the words themselves. The writing however, provides much information about our victim. His Thai hand is elegant and crisp. As is his English. The characters are clear and non-deliberate, casual almost. This suggests that he was far more accustomed to writing English than most other Thais.” His eyebrows arched. “But the lines deteriorate near the ends. The hand became shaky, the mind unsure of its own control over it’s domain.” Darkly now. “He was addicted. Opium, and its more sinister form, heroin, I’m afraid.”

I watched him, trance-like, before my attention was captured by flashes on the western horizon. The clouds were throwing angry bolts of lightening at the earth.

“It’ll be on us soon,” said Sorkan, just as a distant rumble of thunder accented his words. “Let’s gather what we can of this now!”

We scrambled to decide which were the most telling bits of evidence—and if this piece or that, had even belonged to the victim—and stuffed them into soggy plastic bags. We weren’t very scientific about our evidence collecting but we both sensed that our time was running out. Sorkan carefully preserved the bag of broken glass as we had found it, and I hurriedly stuffed the strange list into my pocket, its contents still haunting me with a troubling familiarity.

A tropical wind began tugging at our clothes. It carried with it the first hints of moisture. The flashes of heavenly rage were blinding now when they struck; their accompanying thunder came just seconds behind them.

Like animals sensing the oncoming tempest, the crowd grew restless. The warding blows from the policemen’s night-sticks—at first answered by angry words—were now being countered with punches and vicious kicks from those at the front of the mob. Determined to hold their ground, Lastradisomp’s men swung wildly at the throng. They paid no heed to who was struck down by their swings. Their night-sticks were slick with blood. A middle aged woman was crumpled heartlessly by a blow, further enraging the indignant protesters around her who flung themselves at the offending officer like wild men. The officer’s comrades quickly dragged him back into the lobby and away from the front line.

I do honestly believe that it could have ended there. That if Lastradisomp’s men had fell back and let cooler heads in the crowd prevail, that could have been the worst of it. But what happened next erased all hope of a peaceful conclusion.

Overhead, young men had ascended the balconies. Caught up in the fervour of the moment, they were leaping into the third floor crime scene from the adjacent terraces. Lastradisomp’s men were driven to panic by what they had seen develop below them. The officers tried to stem the tide with one great stick swinging push against the youths, several of which were just then trying to straddle the distance. The force of the officers’ attack caught one young boy off balance. No more than eleven or twelve years old, the boy plunged three stories to the pavement below. He landed with a sickening thud. He lay awkward and prone amid a circle of shocked faces. It had all been in clear view of the front of the building, illuminated by the eerie glare of the police and media lighting.

The crowd was enraged to a murderous pitch. The vanguard of the mob at ground level threw themselves on the front line of Lastradisomp’s men with fists and feet striking and flailing wildly. Lastradisomp’s men panicked. They retreated into the lobby and up the staircase to where Lastradisomp himself cowered in gaping shock. With the onrush almost atop him, he blustered indignant orders up to the men on the second floor. Just then an unearthly crack of thunder reverberated through the hollow concrete structure and a flash of lightening like the wrath of God Himself crashed to the earth not a hundred feet away. The flash blinded everyone. Sheets of water started plunging from the angry sky. Hollow cracks of gunshot rang out from the second floor balcony. As some in the crowd fell to the ground in pain, tear gas canisters spewed out choking clouds of poison.

All hell was breaking loose. People were running around in blind confusion, unable to see neither building nor street in the toxic fog. Women screamed in terror. Others screamed in agony as the gunshots continued to strafe the helpless crowd.

Sorkan grabbed my arm and dragged me toward the street just before the frantic crowd engulfed us. The ground had turned to instant mud and the rain that ran into my eyes and mouth carried with it the stinging bite of tear gas. By the time we reached the street, my clothes were sodden.

“They’re firing rubber bullets up there!” yelled Sorkan to his men. “Any of you in plain clothes, see if you can retrieve some of the injured. But for the sake of your own lives, don’t let anyone know you’re a police officer! The rest of you set up a first aid station here in the street; there is going to be injured people coming out of there. See that you have a supply of fresh water...the bastard’s are using tear gas! Sargent, call for ambulances.”

“Already on their way, sir!”

“Good work, Sargent.”

“Getting used to cleaning up Lastradisomp’s messes, sir.”

“Mind your tongue, Sargent. The Chief Inspector is in charge of a major investigation. We have to help him where we can,” whispered Sorkan, but the words were empty and despondent. He wasn’t fooling anybody.

“We’ll tidy this up, sir,” said the Sargent, resting a compassionate hand on Sorkan’s shoulder, “Go home and get some rest, sir.”

“Thank you, Sargent. I will if I can.”

We walked back to Sorkan’s squad car in silence. The rumble of thunder blended strangely with the screaming and yelling behind us.

On the drive back to Pattaya we were sombre and reflective. The scenes of mayhem we had just witnessed played out in our minds.

“You sure threw a curve at old Lastradisomp with that fried beef thing,” I said, trying to lighten the mood. My effort earned a mischievous grin from Sorkan, so I continued: “But how did you know Dang smoked opium?”

With this, his eyes grew dark and an eerie silence passed like a wave through the little car’s moist air. “Because I too, succumb to the lure of the pipe from time to time Mr. Spanner.”

I remained uncomfortably silent.

“At times...I find...(how shall I say this?)...the pipe, slows my mind down.”

I gazed at him in puzzlement.

“Sleep, I’m afraid, is beyond reach for me without it. How can I sleep when my mind is racing over facts and theories?”

“So do you smoke it every night? Last night for example?”

“No. When I wish for my deductive faculties to work at full capacity, this unfortunate opium habit I have developed (albeit a mild one) forces me to substitute...other...vices.”

“Alcohol,” I said.

“Yes, that in combination with these.” (He nodded to his strange smelling cigarette.) “They don’t satisfy the hunger completely, but they allow my mind to remain active.”

“So you have to drink yourself into a comma.” I chuckled. “Hell, I do that every Tuesday and Saturday.”

“No Mr. Spanner, real sleep is impossible for me without the pipe. Alcohol and clove cigarettes merely permit me a heightened state of relaxation.”

“But if you need—” My eyes grew wide with realisation. “When was the last time you slept then?”

“Two nights ago. I was forced to indulge in the pipe as the particulars of this very case were tormenting me in the night. Yet I had no hope, nor purpose for solving it, so I permitted myself the oblivion of the pipe to overcome my instincts.”

“But...why then--?”

“It was my conversation with you, Mr. Spanner. It gave me new hope, new inspiration. Your unbridled enthusiasm showed me that there is purpose to me considering this case: two men had been murdered, and, the Sacred Buddha has given me the ability to bring their murderers to justice. It would be a sin (would it not?) to not apply my deliberations to this case. ...I don’t believe I will sleep again until we solve it.”

“Shit man! When I can’t sleep, I just jerk-off.”

“I’ll try to remember your advice.”

“I didn’t say that out loud did I? I didn’t mean jerk-off, I meant...ah... lurk-off.”

“Lurk-off?”

“Yeah. You know, like lurk-off to the toilet for a-- ...no, wait a minute. I don’t mean that either.”

Sorkan just chuckled. “Don’t worry Mr. Spanner. The nice thing about Pattaya is that a man doesn’t have to lurk-off by himself very often.”

Adventure of the Blue Carbuncles will continue next week.

jim_blossom2001@yahoo.com

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