The Night Tiger(46)
Ren doesn’t like this story. It’s too much like the ramblings of Dr. MacFarlane in his last days, when the old man would rouse himself from his fits, giving fragmented accounts of where he’d been and what he’d done.
“I went far this time,” he said to Ren once, his pale eyes wandering. “I killed a tapir six miles away.”
“Yes,” Ren said soothingly. “Yes, I know.”
“I’m afraid,” he muttered, clutching Ren’s small square hand. “One of these days, I won’t return to my body.”
Ren doesn’t like to remember Dr. MacFarlane like that, all rheumy-eyed and shaking, his pink scalp visible through the strands of grey hair. He wants to remember him cradling a sick baby, taking apart a wireless to explain how the batteries work. It was malarial fever, that was all. Soon Dr. MacFarlane would recover, take large doses of quinine, and all would be back to normal. But two days later, a local hunter stopped by to show off the tufted ears and tail of a tapir. He said it was a tiger’s kill, partly eaten, that he’d found six miles away and Ren had stiffened at the news, glancing at Dr. MacFarlane, who was silently writing in his notebook.
“Is that so?” the old man had said, his eyes placid and hooded. But Ren, remembering his remarks, had wondered.
Now, Ren regards Harun with a worried expression. “Is that a real story?” he asks, “About the tigers with human souls?”
Harun exhales; a thin stream of smoke drifts out of his nostrils. “My grandmother would never say if it was true or not. She used it to frighten us into going to bed.” He stubs the cigarette out. “I think Tuan will go to the Club next for dinner. If you want to go home, I’ll give you a lift. Better not walk until after the hunt.”
“Will there be a tiger hunt?”
“Tonight. There’s a goat tied up in the rubber plantation and a local hunter, Pak Ibrahim, will lie in wait for it with Tuan Price and Tuan Reynolds. The others will sit up late at the Club, waiting for news.”
Spotting William’s lanky figure, they both scramble to attention. He’s deep in conversation with another foreigner, a man with a toothbrush mustache. Ren listens covertly as they mention tigers.
“Apparently Rawlings had a bee up his bonnet at the inquest. Wanted to make it a suspicious death,” says the man.
“Yes, I heard,” William says. “The magistrate overruled him.”
“What else could it have been except a tiger? Farrell hasn’t any patience for tall tales.”
Ren’s heart sinks. They’ve decided it was a tiger after all.
Harun opens the car door as William folds his legs into the back of the Austin, and just as Harun predicted, tells him to drive to the Kinta Club at the top of the hill in Changkat.
“Harun can send you back after he’s dropped me at the Club,” he says to Ren as an afterthought. “Or do you want to stay to hear if they catch a tiger tonight?”
Ren explains that he forgot something at the hospital, but yes, he’d like to wait. In the mirror, he sees William and Harun exchange an amused glance. It’s the indulgent look that grown-ups give to children’s whims, and it makes Ren feel hot and embarrassed, though he tells himself he has a task to complete.
* * *
Ren finds himself back at the Batu Gajah District Hospital at that odd hour when late afternoon is turning into evening. The sky beyond the covered walkway is powdery pink, the sun burning low between spectacular clouds that float like cream cakes. But Ren has no time to admire them; the fizzing tingle he sensed this morning at the hospital is still there, running like a live wire. Who or what can be sending him a signal, if it isn’t Yi?
First, he must check the pathology storeroom. Near the outbuilding, now striped with the long shadows of trees, he hesitates. The door that was ajar this morning is closed. Ren tries the handle softly; it gives way under his hand.
Inside is a large, high-ceilinged space with windows that open onto the other side of the building. From William’s offhand remark about storerooms and moving boxes, Ren imagined a warehouse piled with relics, but this room is very orderly. Late shafts of sun slant in, although there’s a growing dimness in the corners, as though tiny unseen creatures are gathering in the shadows.
Ignoring the faint buzzing in his ears, Ren steps farther in. This is the room he imagined, when the task of finding Dr. MacFarlane’s missing finger fell upon him. This room, with its rows and rows of specimens in every conceivable kind of glass container. Next to the tall windows is an empty box and a step stool, as though someone has just left it. The impression is so strong that Ren can almost see a slim figure unpacking the last box. No, the way the stool is positioned makes him think that it was used to place something high up on a shelf.
The finger is definitely here; he only has to close his eyes to feel the tingle. High on that shelf. He pushes the stool closer and climbs up. Past the bigger containers with their hideous, floating contents, past a jar with a two-headed rat in it. It’s hard to feel with his cat sense now, there’s too much static. He never imagined there’d be so many specimens. Straining precariously on tiptoe, Ren’s eyes are barely level with the shelf he wants.
He moves a few of the bottles, peering behind them. The light is fading fast now, lavender and grey. Ren has the feeling that he isn’t alone. “Yi,” he says aloud. The sound of his voice hangs in the air and there’s an expectant hush, as though fine pale grains of silence are trickling through a giant hourglass.