The Assassin on the Bangkok Express Read online

  ‘Do you know any martial arts—Muay Thai?’

  ‘Only Korean karate, which I learnt in my early twenties. Couldn’t fight my way out of a paper bag now.’

  ‘Some modern paper bags are unbreakable,’ Ted said with a knowing look, and then changed the subject to the ongoing presidential election.

  ‘Are you following it?’ he asked.

  ‘I watch CNN in the condo. I covered the last month of three elections as a journalist—Carter in 1976; Reagan in 1980 and 1984. After that I lost a deep interest although all the presidents since then have in some way fascinated me—Bush Senior, Clinton, Bush Junior and Obama.’

  ‘What’s your take on Trump?’

  Cavalier smiled. ‘America has become the love child of the man and Kim Kardashian,’ he said.

  ‘Pardon me?’

  ‘They are the product of reality television. The more outrageous they are, the more people tune in to watch them.’

  ‘They appear so dumb!’

  ‘Reality stars aren’t supposed to lift us or add to our knowledge. They are there to entertain. Candidate Trump doesn’t have to understand the fine detail of foreign policy. He only has to say he will make American great again, just like Reagan did with an actor’s skill.’

  ‘You don’t think he can win, surely?’

  ‘It’s like that Jim Carrey movie The Truman Show. We’ll all tune in to find out.’

  A few days later at the cafe, Ted said with a slight quiver in his voice: ‘I have been hiding something for forty years. About time I told somebody.’

  Cavalier waited.

  ‘I trust you, although I am guessing you are hiding things yourself.’

  Cavalier smiled without acknowledging the veracity of the remark.

  ‘I killed a man,’ Ted said, blinking several times. ‘It was the Austrian lover of my second wife, a Cambodian woman. It happened in Saigon near the end of the Vietnam War. Have been running from the incident ever since.’ Ted blurted out the circumstances and how he had got into an altercation with the man before shooting him, ‘before he shot me’.

  Cavalier listened with a sympathetic ear.

  When Ted finished his tale and dabbed his eyes, Cavalier touched his arm. ‘About time you forgave yourself,’ he said. ‘It was self-defence.’

  ‘I suppose you won’t want to associate with me any more?’ Ted said, his voice unsteady.

  ‘Noscitur a sociis,’ Cavalier said with a smile.

  ‘I know that Latin expression—“a man is known by his associates”.’

  ‘And I am pleased, no, honoured to be associated with you.’

  Ted began to cry. Cavalier comforted him, paid the bill and wheeled him back to the condo.

  ‘That is why I acquired a false passport,’ Ted said when they reached the elevator. ‘They were really easy to obtain forty years ago. I’ve kept them both up to date. In the States, I use the false one, just in case. But no one has ever come after me.’

  ‘Did your wife know you killed the man?’

  ‘No. We split soon after the incident. I haven’t spoken to her since.’

  ‘Have you told anyone else?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then I doubt anyone will ever come after you.’

  This revelation made Cavalier think again on his own situation. He felt uneasy and vulnerable, just at a point when he was beginning to consider himself safe.

  9

  BACK TO SCHOOL

  ‘Would you be interested in some easy money?’ Gregory asked Cavalier over the phone.

  ‘Thanks, but no thanks. I am trying to avoid …’

  ‘I don’t mean using your usual expertise, only part of it.’

  ‘You know I don’t take commissions.’

  ‘I thought now you had left the paper, you might be more open to offers.’

  ‘No, but what’s the project?’

  ‘We know of two probable terrorists living in Chiang Mai. They are Indonesians who planned to bomb the MCG. We were onto them but they escaped Australia via a boat from Darwin to Timor two years ago. We suspect they are involved in something big in Thailand. Not sure what. They have been based there as sleepers for a couple of years, most likely ready to be activated for something. They are going to the trouble of learning Thai.’

  ‘What would you want me to do?’

  ‘Go to school with them.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘They have enrolled for an intensive high-level three-week course in the Thai language at the Pantip School in Chiang Mai. They have been on two other such courses in the last year.’

  Cavalier was silent. Then he said: ‘I was thinking of doing a refresher course now I’m here for a while. What would you want?’

  ‘A report. Anything you can discover about them.’

  ‘Bit risky, given my …’

  ‘You don’t have to become their new best friend. If you were to learn any travel plans they have, that sort of thing.’

  ‘I’ve only been here a few months. I was hoping to stay out of circulation for another three or four weeks. Are the Thais aware of them? Are you collaborating with the Thais?’

  ‘No way. I wouldn’t ask for your help if they were. It’s our project. The fact that they are lying low in Chiang Mai was too good an opportunity, seeing you are there.’

  There was another pause.

  ‘How did you know they were enrolled at the school?’

  ‘It’s run by an American, Pedro. He told our American cousins who, knowing of my particular interest, informed me. I’ll buy you a beer if you do this.’

  ‘This must be important to you.’

  ‘We had them cold in Melbourne. Yet they slipped the net. They shot and wounded one of my people.’

  ‘Hmm. Don’t tell anyone—Pedro or the cousins—that I will go back to school.’

  *

  The Thai class was held on the fourth level of the Pantip building, a department store on the Chang Klan Road, and a few kilometres from Cavalier’s apartment. The complete floor was given over to language schools and nurseries.

  There were just seven students apart from Cavalier, who was acting as the Australian Bert Trumper, but without shaving his head to look like the passport photo: an attractive Scottish woman, Rebecca, in her early thirties; two big men in their mid-forties—an Englishman, Paul, and a bearded German, Joachim; an eighty-year-old Welshman, Anthony; and a fit, bespectacled man in his early fifties, Geoff, who had a broad Alabama accent. The two Indonesians, Irina and Doug, wearing American baseball caps, were in their early twenties. Even within the confines of the small classroom, they somehow managed to keep to themselves, except when exposed to the directness of the exceptional Thai teacher, Wee. She was a tiny, energetic twenty-three-year-old, with a lively sense of humour.

  Aware that most of the class had more than basic Thai, she asked them to explain, in English and Thai, the reasons they were doing the course, and why they were in Thailand. Cavalier and Anthony claimed they were retired and just wanted to improve their language skills. Paul told the class he was the part-owner of a bar with a Thai girlfriend. They were in the process of opening a cafe. Joachim was married to a ladyboy from Bangkok and wanted better communication with her; Rebecca had a Thai boyfriend. She brought a roar of approval from the class when she said in her slight Scottish brogue, ‘He is so handsome and lovely and I will do anything to keep him.’

  Only the Indonesians were less forthcoming. They claimed they were from Bandung, Java.

  ‘How long have you lived here?’ Wee asked in Thai.

  ‘Eight months,’ Irina replied.

  ‘What work do you do?’

  The Indonesians glanced at each other before Irina said, ‘We are computer programmers.’

  After a week, Cavalier, who had made an effort to charm Wee, took her aside before class and suggested she ask each student what travel plans they had.

  ‘Very good; that’s a good idea,’ Wee said.

  ‘I have heard them all talki
ng about where they are going,’ he said with a relaxed smile. ‘I think you could really push us for explanations.’

  Wee questioned each student. Most gave clear answers, except the Indonesians who fumbled responses and looked at each other for support.

  Wee pressed them with her usual smiling yet incisive style: ‘Okay, you are going to Bangkok and then Malaysia and Singapore, but how?’

  ‘By … by train,’ Irina said. She was the couple’s spokesperson. Doug rarely made eye contact and always seemed shy, or nervous.

  ‘Very good,’ Wee said with a lilting Thai upward inflexion, ‘which train into Malaysia and Singapore?’

  Irina pulled a face and opened her hands.

  ‘We don’t know yet,’ she said, nervous at this unexpected round of queries.

  ‘There’s a real good one,’ Geoff from Alabama drawled in Thai. It’s called the Bangkok Express. Is that the one you all have in mind?’

  The Indonesians frowned and indicated they couldn’t understand the question, or Geoff’s sharp accent. Wee repeated the query. They said they weren’t sure.

  ‘Very good,’ Wee said. It was her ‘tick’ remark to take back control of the class or move it on.

  ‘Is your real name Doug?’ Geoff asked harmlessly. The Indonesian looked flummoxed.

  Irina responded, ‘We both have Western nicknames. Our real ones are too long for Western consumption.’

  That drew a laugh from the class and diffused a tense moment after Doug seemed angry at the light grilling.

  ‘Very good,’ Wee said. ‘I have a name that is both Thai and Western.’

  This drew more laughter, even a smile from Doug.

  Their mirth was short-lived after class when Cavalier insisted on taking photographs. He snapped them all in a group before the Indonesians could protest.

  That night in his apartment, Cavalier made a report for Gregory, with photos attached, suggesting that the Indonesians could well be preparing for an assignment of some sort.

  ‘I would not discount their intention to commit a terrorist act,’ he concluded.

  ‘This is brilliant work!’ Gregory texted him. ‘I suppose a passport copy or two would be out of the question?’

  ‘Yes, it would.’

  ‘There are more beers in it for you.’

  ‘You are so persuasive! I thought my schooldays were through.’

  It had nagged Cavalier that he could not secure their real names and so Gregory’s request resonated with his own sense of what was lacking from a complete report. He had made a note of the staff office equipment and filing system in the room next door to the classroom. At 10 p.m. he returned to the Pantip building and had a late meal in the canteen on the fourth floor, forty metres from the school. Cavalier hid in the toilet and waited until the lights were out. Cleaners were working their way up the building, floor by floor. Cavalier put on a face mask and, wearing the glasses Gregory had given him, moved to the school office. Using his special laser key, he opened the lock. Cavalier shut the door and searched in drawers for the handwritten information on students. Within three minutes he found the four pages of files, including passport copies, for the two Indonesians. He used his phone to photograph all the information, and was careful to replace the files as he had found them.

  Cavalier slipped out of the office just as the lights went on. Two cleaners were coming up the escalator. He scurried out of sight, and made a quick circuit of the floor to a back service elevator. He still wore his glasses and mask as he moved out of the building into the hot night. An hour later he had emailed Gregory attachments with the files and passport details.

  ‘You’re terrible, Muriel!’ Gregory said, which was his usual comment to express astonishment at Cavalier’s exploits. ‘Terribly efficient.’

  ‘It wasn’t my toughest assignment, but thank the Buddha I won’t be going back to school,’ Cavalier said. ‘A week was enough.’

  10

  DARK SECRETS

  The more concerning moments for Cavalier were at night. If he ventured back to the condo late, he would be vigilant just outside the entrance, in the foyer and in the corridor to his apartment. This caution made him think about obtaining a weapon. He had his disassembled high-powered rifle inside Big Betty, the hollowed-out oversized cricket bat, but it was for his other professional work, which he had stepped away from while in hiding. He thought about the Glock 17, which he had placed in a safety deposit box so long ago. He still had the key and the receipt for the box at the Bangkok Bank, but under his real name. After some research, he discovered that the bank branch he had used had been moved to the Airport Plaza, along with all the deposit boxes.

  He found the bank’s new address, but was apprehensive about entering it as Victor Cavalier. To his surprise, he did not have to show a passport or any ID to visit his box. All he needed was the receipt and the key. He took the package from it and later, in his apartment, unwrapped the weapon.

  Cavalier took it to a firing range in south-west Chiang Mai, but was not allowed to use a private gun. A day later at dawn, he rode up Doi Suthep mountain to near a bend in the road three-quarters of the way up and found a secluded spot in the rainforest evergreens, He walked well into the wooded area, marked two thick tree trunks and fired off six shots from twenty paces.

  At first, Cavalier was unsure if his aim was off or the gun needed calibrating. After some adjustment with a screwdriver and knife, he judged that the plastic had deteriorated a fraction, enough to spoil a perfect shot. Six shots more at the second attempt were satisfactory and he was pleased with his aim and the gun’s proficiency. He carried it from then on in his brown valise, and felt more secure.

  In his first few months, not even some of Cavalier’s long-term friends would see him before he became comfortable in the new environment, or heard that Cortez had been dealt with by the Americans. He considered writing a book about his life in the demi-monde of spies and his clandestine assignments. Yet every time he thought of a narrative in non-fiction, or even fiction, it covered terrain that he could never publish. Apart from the possibility of incriminating himself, Cavalier knew too many secrets about intelligence services in many countries, including Thailand. This left him with his freelance journalism, with outlets in France and Australia. He would use Chiang Mai as a base, as he had thirty years ago, with more and easier access to ten different cultures within three or four hours’ flight. He had applied for a long-term visa on his false passport and was using a precocious young English lawyer to obtain it for him. Technical help from among Gregory’s contacts had set him up so that he used an Internet server based in Russia. He could browse using an assumed Internet address that assigned his location to a country other than Thailand and Australia. Without any particular outlet for his writing, Cavalier had to be content with a false byline and the choice of mostly apolitical colour features. He knew the income stream would be meagre to begin with.

  He thought about contacting Pin, but they had been divorced several years and he had not been in touch, even when he believed their daughter, Pon, had been murdered in Mexico. She had always believed this anyway and he judged that telling her of the distressing video, which appeared to show Pon had been decapitated by Mendez, would only be bad for her bipolar condition. It had flared when she was under stress, and the video of Pon being dragged into a dungeon, having her head placed on a block and the guillotine coming down would have been too much for her.

  Pin believed that her special angel doll Serena, which she’d had for three decades, had protected Pon as she journeyed into the ‘next world’, as she called it. Soon after her disappearance, this had been a contentious subject between Cavalier and Pin. He stopped short of calling her more than ‘irrational’ for her faith in Serena, the ‘inanimate piece of hideous plastic’. He had grown to appreciate Thai culture, its beliefs and superstitions. He had studied its roots and had kept an open mind about the prevalent concept of ghosts and spirits, mainly because of two inexplicable experiences he’d had
, decades earlier in England. Yet he could not justify the doll worship as anything beyond mumbo jumbo. And he could not understand why his exceptionally intelligent wife had such faith in it.

  Cavalier had kept contact with his stepdaughter Far, who was a thirty-four-year-old doctor married to an American television talk-show host and living in New York. She and Cavalier had a good relationship, and he felt an unspoken bond with her because of his effort to save her from her father. Cavalier had made sure she had a good life and education through university. Far had been unaware of the extreme step Cavalier had gone to on her behalf. He couldn’t even foresee himself making a deathbed confession about killing her biological father Kun, whom she hated even as a toddler. Cavalier did not see the point.

  *

  Dwelling on Pon’s fate, along with Ted’s disclosure, had caused more sleepless nights. He’d had intermittent nightmares in the last year over the video depicting his daughter’s murder, even after he had himself disposed of her apparent killer Mendez. There was always a different dream version that had not been appeared in the actual video. In one, Mendez held up the severed head of his daughter, who pleaded for help. In another the head smiled at him and he woke up thinking instantly that she wasn’t dead. In a third horror reverie, he saw the guillotine slam down and blood everywhere. But instead of his daughter’s severed cranium being lifted from the floor, it was that of Serena the doll. It also spoke, but not to him and without saying anything intelligible. After that he awoke in a terrible state of shock at 3 a.m. and could not go back to sleep. Instead, he poured himself a strong double malt whisky and sat alone on the balcony trying, and failing, to make sense of what his inner mind was regurgitating.

  11

  THE PROPOSITION

  The next morning was not the best moment to be flying into Myanmar for an interview with Aung San Suu Kyi, three decades after they had first met. Yet the need for him to be alert sharpened him. The daily routines of exercise and two cups of black coffee at the airport helped him submerge the subterranean-mind horrors of the night as he prepared for a meeting with a person for whom he had the highest admiration. Suu Kyi had reached her aim to ‘bring democracy’ to her country as leader of her National League for Democracy party, which seemed on the surface to have dislodged the military in running Myanmar. He kept the story as colour rather than political, and the experience made him temporarily forget his nightmares.