Osman repeated what Noriah had told him to a rapt audience of strong minded women: Maryam, Rubiah and Azrina.
‘I’m just not that surprised,’ Azrina averred. ‘She was so rude when I met her. “Perak?”’ She provided perfect mimicry of Noriah’s tone and inflection, packing a trunkful of surprise, contempt and distain into those two syllables. ‘I thought she was definitely hiding something.’
Maryam and Rubiah remained silent. No doubt the Thais were up to no good, but Noriah’s attempt to charge them with crimes they hadn’t been considered for was strange.
‘Why did Noriah feel she needed to suggest anyone for that?’ Maryam asked. ‘No one was questioning her about it. Do you think …’ here she hesitated, uneasy about articulating such a thing, ‘she killed her own husband? Or just that she got carried away with putting the blame on these Patani people?’ She turned to Osman again. ‘Do you think she planned to tell you this?’
He frowned. ‘No, I think she made it up then and there. Maybe she just got carried away with her story, or it came as inspiration to get these guys out of her hair. I’ve sent some people to pick them up and bring them in, but I’m not sure how much we’ll learn from them. At least,’ he added philosophically, ‘I can send them back to Thailand and get rid of them.’
‘What about Din? So brave??’
Osman rolled his eyes. ‘It’s such a stretch. Anyway, we had to let him go.’
‘He’s useless,’ Maryam interjected. ‘Though I think, as far as it went, he was telling the truth: they did come to see him to get the debt from him. Of course, he doesn’t have any money, so that didn’t work. I imagine they planned to beat him up as an example.’
Even to her own ears, she sounded calm about the prospect, and believed she ought to have been more indignant, but it was hard to get indignant over the Bull, as she thought of Din. ‘Do you think he might have killed Yusuf?’ Maryam shrugged. ‘He certainly benefitted from his death. He insists with Yusuf dead. his debt is erased. Even if it isn’t true – and it isn’t – it would still be an excellent motive. And he is big and strong; he’s capable of killing Yusuf.’
‘And stupid,’ Rubiah added, completing the catalogue of Din’s attributes. ‘Don’t forget that: it’s a major reason why he could have done it.’
Everyone agreed, but was it sufficient?
‘How was he when you spoke with him?’ Osman asked Maryam.
‘Busy eating. It’s hard for him to think and eat at the same time.’
Azrina laughed delightedly at this, reassured that detective work was also an art of making wisecracks. Maryam smiled at her.
‘He didn’t say too much, because he’s afraid he’ll get tangled up in lies. He’s telling the truth about being threatened, though. At least he came to you with that. Whenever I mentioned Yusuf, he just put his head down and glared at me. It wasn’t that helpful.’
‘And he’s a mess. Just look at him,’ Rubiah sniffed. ‘Really.’
‘He’s got no alibi for Yusuf’s death.’ Osman observed.
‘What about Ruslan?’ Maryam asked, determined to speak normally of the tiger. It would be more suspicious if she kept avoiding the topic.
‘Still nothing,’ Osman mumbled. ‘I just can’t accept this were-tiger thing.’
Maryam nodded while Rubiah watched her with frank appraisal. ‘Indeed. Why look to the spirit world when it’s a real murderer we’re looking for? It’s just a story.’
She was very proud of herself, feeling as though she’d talked about were-tigers in a disinterested way, even suggesting they didn’t exist. Totally rational. ‘Could the Thais have done that? It is close to Tak Bai. They could have come and gone and no one would have seen it.’
‘And torn out his throat?’ Rubiah asked.
‘Why not? Killing is killing, you know. What does it matter how they did it if they did do it.’
‘That’s interesting,’ mused Osman. ‘I’d never thought of that.’
Maryam looked smug: she’d turned the were-tiger theory on its head. She was now leading the speculation that no were-tiger existed, looking for a human agency in the crime. But even as she did so, she still treasured meeting her tiger in the night, in her dreams. And by late afternoon, her anticipation would grow, waiting to sleep, waiting to meet the tiger.