The Night Tiger(69)

He turned and walked out of the kitchen. Frozen, I stood waiting to hear his footsteps go upstairs again, but instead I heard him walk all the way to the front of the shophouse and pull open the front door, with its telltale creak. Then the spell broke. I ran down the hallway, that long, narrow passageway through the dark bowels of the shophouse.

“Shin!” I said, “Where are you going?”

“Back to the hospital.”

“I thought you were staying over tonight.”

“I have to work tomorrow.” The way he said this, with weary patience, broke my heart.

“There aren’t any trains or buses right now.”

“I know. I borrowed Ming’s bicycle.”

“But it’s so far.” It would take him more than an hour on dark, unpaved roads, and towards Batu Gajah, the road climbed steeply.

“Then I’d better get started.” He gave me the ghost of a smile. “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”

Shin wheeled the heavy black bicycle, which had been standing in the front of the shop, out into the street. I followed after him, helplessly.

“Go back inside,” he said softly, glancing up at the darkened windows of my stepfather’s room. “Please.”

“Shin—I’m sorry.” I put my arms around him from behind, burying my face in his lean back. I could feel his chest rise and fall

“Don’t cry,” he said. “Not in the street. Or Auntie Wong will come out and there’ll be even more strange rumors about our family.”

This attempt at humor only made me sob harder, though I tried to muffle the noise. Crying silently was a skill that both of us had learned in this house. Shin sighed and propped up the bicycle. After a long moment, he turned around. Even then, I wouldn’t let go. I had the feeling that something terrible would happen if I did. It was a silly thought, but it made me feel so dreadfully lonely that I hugged him tighter.

“I can’t breathe,” he said.

“Sorry.” We were talking in whispers, mindful of standing in the street though all the neighbors must have gone to bed by now. The moon shone down, sharp shadows in silver and black. Shin looked exhausted.

“Let me go with you. I’m worried about you riding on such dark roads.”

“And how?” he asked, stroking my hair. He’d never done this before and to hide my confusion, I buried my face in his shoulder. Tomorrow he would be someone else’s again, but tonight he was mine.

“I’ll ride on the back. We’ll take turns to pedal.”

“You’re too heavy. I’d fall over.”

“Idiot,” I said, jabbing him. He grabbed my wrists, pulling me closer. Breathless, I raised my face. I was almost certain he’d kiss me now, but he paused. Lowered his hands. In the moonlight, I couldn’t read the expression in his eyes.

“You should take care of your mother,” Shin said.

He was right, of course. Mortified, I tugged my wrists free. What had I been thinking, hoping that my stepbrother would actually kiss me?

“Be careful,” I said, stepping back. I watched as he struck a match and lit the kerosene bicycle lamp. Shin swung on, an easy fluid movement, and rode off into the night.





25

Falim

Tuesday, June 16th




Of course, the first thing I did was to go straight back into the kitchen and open Pei Ling’s brown paper package. Shin had mentioned that she still hadn’t regained consciousness from her fall. A shudder traveled through me. I was almost certain she’d been pushed and that Y. K. Wong had something to do with it. Never mind that I didn’t have any proof. It was just a feeling, a twitch in the air.

As I unwrapped the double layer of butcher’s paper, there was a rattling clink. I held my breath as a glass specimen bottle and a packet of papers slid out onto the kitchen table. I knew the shape and size of that bottle well by now. It contained a thumb. Not dried and withered, like the finger I’d taken from the salesman’s pocket, but preserved in a yellowish fluid like most of the other specimens from the storeroom. I stood the bottle upright next to the lamp. Strangely, it didn’t frighten me as much as the salt-cured finger with its blackened crook. Perhaps because it had an unreal air, like a scientific wax model. I was sure it came from that missing list of specimens we’d compiled.

The packet also contained some papers. Pei Ling’s girlish handwriting had addressed the envelopes to Mr. Chan Yew Cheung, the salesman. It didn’t seem right to read other people’s correspondence, but Shin’s warning about doing favors for strangers rang in my ears. A quick glance confirmed my suspicions. They were love letters—pages and pages of infatuated yearning. My eyes skipped over them, though not before picking up fragments like when will you tell your wife, and even more embarrassingly, your lips on my skin. In any case, the letters were genuine. And extremely indiscreet. No wonder she’d wanted them back. If they’d been sent anonymously to Matron, Pei Ling would have been dismissed.

At the bottom of the pile was a sheet of paper, torn from a notebook. The handwriting was different from Pei Ling’s—a more masculine hand. On the left side was a list of thirteen names, all locals. Chan Yew Cheung was the second-to-last one. There was a check mark next to it, a bold slash as though someone had marked it off. On the right side of the paper was another, shorter list. This one had only three names on it: J. MacFarlane, W. Acton, L. Rawlings.