Jimm Juree 01; Killed at the Whim of a Hat

Dad showed up.”
    “And he helped you stage the kidnapping?” I said.
    “Yeah. It wasn’t that hard ‘cause the constable had vanished and left the doors unlocked. Weird, that.”
    The last of our food order arrived, passing our hopes on the way which were heading at speed out of the window. The bodies in the VW were obviously not this couple.
    “Did you go back to the commune after that?” Chompu asked.
    “No. We weren’t game. We figured the police would have found out about it and raided the place. Dad told us to get out of town and lie low.”
    “Where did you go?”
    “Just drifted. Smartened ourselves up. Got casual work here and there and the whole love-child thing sort of got old in a hurry. It turned out me and Wee couldn’t get along in the normal capitalistic world. We drifted apart.”
    “Any idea what happened to the VW you’d rented?” I asked.
    “No. Last time I saw it, it was in the parking lot behind the Chaiya police station. I imagine they sent it back to the owner.”
    “No,” said Granddad, “he didn’t get it back.”
    “No? Probably got adopted by some kind law enforcement officer, then,” said Mayuri, out-eating us two to one despite all the talking. “I’d been thinking perhaps the one they found buried was the one we’d used.”
    “Any idea who rented the second van?” Chompu asked her.
    “No, like I say, we didn’t go back.”
    “Do you know the names of anyone else in the commune?” Granddad Jah asked.
    “Yeah, but it wouldn’t help. We were all Bread and Steed and Morning Glory. We discarded our decadent labels when we joined the farm. We didn’t know anyone’s real names. Wee wasn’t really Wee, you know? It’s English for urine. It’s full of nutrients. Indian fakirs drink it like orange juice.”
    “Nice,” said Chompu, putting down his glass. “Where did you drive your stolen…I mean, borrowed rental cars to?”
    “Tako.”
    Tako was about thirty kilometers up the coast. There were two routes from Surat. If you took the highway you’d pass through Lang Suan. The quiet back road that avoided police blockades would lead you along the coast almost to Pak Nam. Back then, there wasn’t a bridge so the detour would drag you way up-river almost past Old Mel’s land. We needed to find out who rented that second van. Tan Sugit still wasn’t in the clear.
    “Mayuri, you still aren’t very close to your father, are you?” I said.
    “Can’t think what gives you that idea. You’ve only met the old bastard once.”
    “Oh, just a hunch, I suppose,” I continued. “You’re implicating him in all kinds of illegal activities. You’re calling him names. You aren’t sitting by his bedside holding his hand.”
    She laughed and a noodle slipped out of her mouth.
    “He doesn’t need his hand held,” she said. “There’s nothing wrong with him.”
    “He was kidnapped and tortured,” I reminded her.
    “He was not.”
    “Do you know anything about last night’s events that you’d like to share with us?” Chompu asked.
    “The doctor I phoned said the only evidence of torture they could find was in his imagination. He broke his nose but with all the reconstruction I doubt he felt it. No, I bet he just got downright drunk with his whores and they got carried away in some prank. He doesn’t have a clue when he’s drunk. The terrorist story was just something to save his face.”
    “Why are you living with him?” I asked.
    “He took me in as an unpaid housekeeper. I was out of work. Out of men. Out of luck. I contacted him and asked him if he had any odd jobs I could do. He asked if I could cook. I’d never actually lived in his house before. Ha, don’t look so surprised. I’m child number four of twenty-eight or so. Seven different women. There was only one that he married. I had to remind him who my mother was. There isn’t a lot of, what you’d call, paternal affection going on here, although there are nights I have to remind him we’re blood relatives, if you know what I mean.”
    ♦
    We dropped Mayuri back at her house, and on the way back across town we admitted we’d come full circle with the VW case. Granddad and I sat in the truck while Chompu popped in to see the duty officer at Lang Suan police headquarters.
    “Granddad Jah,” I asked, “what do you make of it all? I mean, the kidnapping, the note to me?”
    “I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “The girl could have been right. It might have been S&M