THE BROWN TOYOTA slowed. Then it pulled to the curb on North Bridge Road and stopped. Tay glanced around to see if anyone was watching him. He knew he didn’t actually have a clue whether anyone was or not, so he just walked over to the Toyota and got into the passenger seat.
“What’s going on, sir?” Kang asked.
“Drive to that place I asked you to find.”
“The Buddhist Center in Geylang? The one called Karma something?”
“Yes. But just drive by. Don’t stop. Don’t even slow down.”
It took ten minutes for them to get there, which was just long enough for Tay to tell Sergeant Kang about Mei Lin, about Vince Ferrero, and about the whorehouse with the red door.
***
When they turned off Geylang Road into Lorong 22, nothing immediately caught Tay’s attention. There was a Chinese temple on the left and rows of narrow three-story shophouses lined both sides of the street, some of which had apparently been converted into small hotels. The Kim Tian Hotel, the Min Wah Hotel, the Char Yong Hotel all sported large neon signs stretching the width of the buildings. Tay assumed these were not the sort of hotels that were listed in tourist guides.
“Where’s this Buddhist center?”
“The other end of the street, sir. On the right.”
After a few moments Tay saw it. It was a two-story cream-colored building behind a low wall with a small parking area in front. He examined it for a moment, then swiveled his head to check the other side of the street for a shophouse with a red door. By then, Kang had already reached a T-junction where the street they were on dead-ended into a much busier street.
“Turn around somewhere, Sergeant, and drive up the block again.”
Kang turned into a Shell station, swung around the pump island without stopping, and headed back up Lorong 22 going in the opposite direction.
The shophouse Tay was looking for wasn’t directly across the street from the Buddhist Center, but close enough. It was no more than twenty feet wide and three stories tall, and it was painted an unattractive institutional green with dirty white grill work around all the windows. An open carport with a red plastic roof and a closed metal gate stood in front of it. Next to the red front door was a white box about a foot square with the number 38 painted on its glass front. It looked to Tay like the box was probably illuminated at night so the number could be read from the street.
Tay saw no sign of life at number 38. The door and windows were all closed and the carport was empty.
“What now, sir?” Kang asked as they rolled by at a steady rate of speed.
“Drive around to the street behind. I want to see if there’s any other way in or out.”
***
There was.
The next street to the east was Lorong 24 and a narrow alleyway ran out from between two green metal garbage bins from a narrow rear door to number 38.
They drove around the block again and Kang pulled into an Esso Station and around to one side where they could stop the car without blocking the pumps. Tay looked at his watch. Just after four o’clock.
“Put the car over on the other side of the station so you can see the alleyway that runs up to the back of number 38. Where are those glasses I asked you to bring?”
Kang pointed at the glove compartment and Tay opened it and fished out a pair of field glasses not much bigger than a paperback book.
“I’m going around to the front and find a hotel where I can watch the other side of the building. We’ll sit on it for a while and see what happens. Call me if Ferrero shows.”
“Who, sir?”
Tay pulled out his phone and found the picture of Vince Ferrero he had taken the day Ferrero came to Emerald Hill to intimidate him into abandoning his investigation into the dead man at the Woodlands.
“You remember what Ferrero looks like, don’t you, Sergeant?”
“Yes, sir. But what makes you think he’s coming here now?”
The answer to that, of course, was Tay had no reason at all to think so.
But he was full of hope.
“Just do it, Sergeant.”
***
A half hour later Tay was seated in front of the partially-opened drapes of a room on the third floor of a place called the Hotel Compass that was just a few doors down from the Buddhist Center. He had an almost straight-on view of number 38 and he lifted the glasses and examined its windows one by one without seeing any sign of life. He hit the speed dial on his telephone.
“Are you in position, Sergeant?”
“Yes, sir. I can see almost the entire alley.”
“Call me if anyone at all goes in or out of number 38, whether it’s Ferrero or not.”
“Will do, sir.”
Tay lit a cigarette and settled back to watch.
***
Except for one quick trip to the toilet, Tay stayed in front of the window, smoking and glancing occasionally into the field glasses for the next several hours. By seven it was dusk, and by eight it was dark.
No lights came on in number 38 and Tay had seen no one come near the place.
He hit the speed dial on his phone again. “Nothing at all, Sergeant?”
“No, sir. It’s too dark in the alley to see the back door any longer, but there’s no way anyone could go in or out of it without walking through the alley and I’d see them then.”
“Then just stay on it.”
“How much longer are we going to do this, sir?”
“Until I tell you we’re through, Sergeant.”
Tay cut the connection and lit another cigarette.
***
When he saw it, he first thought that his eyes must be tired. But he rubbed them and looked again and it was still there.
A dim glow from somewhere in the back of the carport.
But even as Tay stared at it, it was gone.
Had he been mistaken?
No, it was a light. He was sure of that. Not the full-on illumination from someone flipping on a light switch, but something dimmer. Something like a flashlight that had been flicked on, then quickly flicked off again.
Tay telephoned Kang again.
“Sergeant, were your eyes ever off that alley?”
“No, sir.”
“No breaks to get coffee? Nothing like that?”
“No, sir. I haven’t even been to the bathroom, but now that you mention it—”
That was when Tay remembered he had gone to the bathroom. He had been away from the window only a minute or two, but it was at least possible someone had approached number 38 while his eyes had been off it even for just that short a period of time.
“Never mind, Robbie. I want you to walk up the alley and cover the back door. Have your weapon ready and hold anyone who comes out.”
“What are you going to do, sir?”
“Just do what I tell you, Robbie.”
Then Tay hung up and headed for the street.