Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 56, No. 5, May 2011

The Calculator by Mithran Somasundrum

“I am a calculator.” That was the first thing he said to her. Can you imagine? The two of them in the McDonald’s at Chidlom, central Bangkok. The place so crowded on a Saturday afternoon that when they took adjacent tables at the far wall they were effectively sitting next to each other. Atiya thought he was asking for a calculator and passed her Nokia across. He looked at it sadly (“Like he felt sorry for it,” she said.) and shook his head. “No, that’s not a calculator.” Pointing to himself. “Me, I’m a calculator.” And he could prove it. The cube root of a six-digit number? No problem, rattling off the answer to ten places when the Nokia could only reach nine. Or how about picking a random seven-digit number and then doubling it continuously? He could get further in fifteen seconds, in his head, than she could furiously keying the numbers into her phone. After that she laughed and conceded. “Okay, you’re a calculator.”

Was he trying to pick her up? I wondered aloud. Atiya was in her mid twenties and had the classic heart-shaped face, dark eyes, and full lips that brought men to Thailand. Or if her looks didn’t, they were at least responsible for keeping them here. She shook her head. No, definitely not. She knew all about displays of male plumage. She’d come to our Chinatown office directly from work and was still in the light purple blouse and dark purple skirt of Siam Commercial Bank. When they put her at a counter it happened all the time: Some rich, middle-aged guy who thinks she must be impressed by the stack of cash he’s just handed over decides she’ll make the perfect mia noi (minor wife). She was used to requests for her phone number and used to batting them away. But The Calculator (Anthony, apparently) wasn’t like that.

“So what was he like?”

“Very thin, very white, very lost.”

It really did seem to her that he just needed to talk, and so she listened while he told her he came from London, was unemployed, had been in the kingdom four days. It’s got to be said, there are more ambitious pickup lines.

As a reward for not hitting on her, she suggested they meet the next day, same place, and she’d take him to see the Temple of the Emerald Buddha. I raised my eyebrows at that. “Because?”

“He needed a break. Stop thinking about his competition.” This was the World Human Calculator Championship — what else? I’d never even heard of it, but apparently it was going on in Bangkok right now. He’d showed her the events page of The Bangkok Post (she hadn’t heard of it either) and said, “That’s what I should be doing.” Anthony looked so stressed that she said, “No, you need to relax.” Atiya shrugged. She was the one putting her younger sister through college. It was her doung[1] to be responsible for other people. So the next day she turned up at the McDonald’s, took a corner table, sucked her way through two vanilla milkshakes, and after an hour realized he wasn’t coming. “I have a feeling about these things. When my mother died, I knew. It was the same stretch of road she took every month, here to my uncle in Rayong. But that evening, suddenly I knew. I sat by the phone and when it rang I thought, ‘I have to look after Fon now.’ It’s the same. Something bad happened to him.”

Not surprisingly, the police didn’t see it like that. “They just laughed at me and said, ‘He’s gone to Pattaya to look for girls.’ They think I’m some Thai woman who’s lost her farang[2] boyfriend.” She crossed her arms under her chest. “I have a good job, I have my own car. I don’t need a farang to look after me.”

I looked across to Doi’s desk, caught her eye, and shrugged. “I’ll be honest, it’s not a lot to go on. But if you’re really willing to pay for this, then it’s two thousand baht a day, two days in advance. Okay, look... make it one thousand five hundred, one day in advance.” After Atiya went out I said, “As it’s for a good cause.”

Doi made a face. “A good cause with good legs.”

Atiya didn’t have Anthony’s phone number or the address of his guesthouse, which left me only the Calculator Championship itself. They were holding it in Pantip Plaza, the computer geek Mecca of Thailand. Six floors of motherboards and CPUs, memory sticks and hard drives, LAN cables and webcams, and basically anything else guaranteed to make a geek drool, not to mention pirate CDs of all the most up-to-date software, newest films, and the latest porn.

The floors of Pantip rise around an internal courtyard, the first half of which was devoted to Pantip’s particular brand of miscellaneous tat: alarm clocks, binoculars, hair curlers, laser pointers, megaphones. The space beyond this had been cleared out to make way for a small stage covered in red velvet, set in front of four rows of chairs. Up on the stage were two tables, each with two chairs facing each other. A large whiteboard, currently blank, loomed behind the tables. Nothing was happening on the stage, while of the chairs below, about half (thirty-odd) were taken. I would like to report that the audience for the World Human Calculator Championship represented a true cross-section of Thai society: dark-skinned manual laborers, middle-aged professorial types, hi-so women dripping jewelry, young girls in low-rise jeans... I’d like to report that, but I can’t.

Yup, they were all guys under thirty. Everyone had left his girlfriend at home, possibly on his hard drive. Well, they do say clichés exist for a reason.

I spent some time scanning the audience, looking for — I don’t know — the Least Geek Geek. Or the Most Geek Geek. Then two white guys came up onto the stage and took seats facing each other. The one on the left was in his late twenties, had a shock of unruly red hair and a flinty, unhappy face. He stared down at the table, as though forced onto the stage against his will. The guy on the right was about ten years older, slightly podgy, wore a Hawaiian shirt, a black goatee, and an air of quiet toleration, like a film star who was used to being noticed. He looked at his opponent, looked out at the crowd. Then a Thai woman in a tight black bodysuit joined them, tossed her hair a couple of times, and told the crowd via a microphone how excited she was to begin the last match of round one. She placed a sheet of paper and a pencil in front of each competitor, paused, and said, “Go,” into the microphone. Each man snapped over his paper and sat staring. Redhead looked angry, Goatee looked blank. On the whiteboard the woman wrote 4 (square root) 9648573. For a beat nothing happened. Then Goatee snatched up his pencil, stabbed an answer onto the paper and dropped the pencil as though it had burned him. Redhead made a despairing noise, pushed his chair back and stared up at the ceiling. The woman took Goatee’s paper and wrote 55.733 on the board. Below that she wrote the true answer, demonstrating what the crowd, with its calculators out, could already tell. The man had been right to the first five figures. There was a scatter of applause and the two men shook hands. As the audience drifted off I reflected that while it wasn’t the most compelling spectator sport in the world, the more you thought about what you’d seen, the more special it became.

Redhead jammed his hands into his trouser pockets and slouched off to the escalator. I wondered what he was thinking. Unlike a physical competition, he couldn’t blame luck or the bad bounce of a ball. The loser was stuck in his own mind. As I watched, he went up to the second floor and, once there, ambled over to the booth selling coupons for the food court. Meanwhile, Goatee had gone, disappeared into the crowd.

Off to one side of the stage there was an organizers’ table. The emcee in the black bodysuit was there, chatting with the woman behind it. I went over. “Excuse me, a friend of mine is competing here. His name’s Anthony.”

“Mr. Ann-tony.” The woman behind the table nodded as though she’d been expecting me. She wore a businesslike white blouse and dark blazer, the effect offset somewhat by a pair of shocking pink spectacles. Turning an A4 list towards me, she pointed, “Care-wen-dish?” I scanned the list of names. Anthony Cavendish was the only Anthony there, so presumably it had to be him. “You have a number?” the woman asked.

“No, sorry. Actually, I came here trying to find him.”

She took on the frowning, reluctant look of someone about to be drawn into an argument. “We can’t give a refund. I’m sorry. It said in the rules.”

“Right, and that’s because...?”

She waved a hand at the stage. “Round One already finish. It’s too late.”

“You mean he never turned up?” She shook her head. “Oh well, don’t worry. I mean, I’d explain that to him if only I could find him.”

“You try his friend?”

“That’s a Thai woman, right?”

“No, a Thai man.” She craned her neck to look over my shoulder. “He was here asking as well, but I can’t see him now.”

I thanked her and left, thinking: This is what I should be doing.

I decided on lunch for myself, bought a plate of grapao moo at the food court, then went looking for Redhead. He was sitting by the railing overlooking the courtyard, toying with a bowl of noodles. He glanced up, saw me by his table, and said in one of those Birmingham accents that always sounds querulous, “Eh, mate, d’you know what this is?” He was holding a wobbling brownish red cube between his chopsticks.

“It’s coagulated chicken blood.”

“Oh well, that’s all right then,” he said taking a bite. “Can’t be too careful in the tropics, can you?”

“Hey, by the way, sorry about losing down there. It’s amazing you can even try something like that.”

He shrugged. “Blown out before I got started.” He took in the fact that I was still standing in front of him. “Have a seat, if you want.”

We shook hands and introduced ourselves. He was Colin Krasinsky (“Me dad’s Polish but I don’t speak it”), worked for the DHSS, and was going to use his remaining time here as a holiday. “I’m owed some leave.”

“And you seemed close to getting it.”

“Mate, you’re always close to getting it. It’s brutal, this game.” He sighed. “Heinrich’s a piece of work.”

“Guy you were playing?”

“He’s a motivational speaker, y’know. That’s where the money is. It’s not in the calculations, it’s in being the person who can do them.”

“Why not try it yourself?”

“I would... but I’m not very motivational.” He looked out across the food court. “Can’t believe they had it here. Computers everywhere you look. It’s like they want to tell us we’re obsolete.” He raised his head and intoned, “You are the discarded fag ash of the electronic world.” I decided he was probably right about the motivational speaking. “There’s a contestant here I’m trying to find. Bloke called Anthony Cavendish.”

“Yeah, I was wondering why he didn’t show. Lucky ol’ Enrico got a bye.”

“You know him then?”

“We all know each other. There aren’t many people in the world who can do this. In fact, I was talking about it to Anthony one time.” He leaned over the table. “Take your footballer. Top zero point one percentile in the country will probably be enough to get you a flash house, a Porsche, and a lingerie model girlfriend.” He sat back and pointed to his chest. “Me, on the other hand. I am in the top zero point zero zero one percentile of human calculators. Not to be coming it, but I am. We all are. And I’m on peanuts from the DHSS, Anthony was in a sub-post office last I heard—”

“I think he’s unemployed now.”

Colin shook his head. “Never lasts long. Calculating on work time. I’ve told the lad.”

“The reason I’m looking for him is there’s someone who thinks he might be in trouble.”

“Someone who?”

“A Thai woman.”

Colin grinned. “The sly old dog.”

“But why would he come all the way here and then not show?”

“Beats me.” He frowned. “I wonder if Heinrich knows? He’ll be pissed.”

“Because?”

“He was going to help Anthony pay for his plane ticket, that’s what I heard. Always a bit on the brassic side is our Anthony.”

“That was nice of him. Heinrich, I mean.”

“We’re brothers. I know that sounds wet, but... it’s only other calculators who understand you. Say you get the seventh root of a nine-digit number in under thirty seconds, who are you going to tell?”

“You could tell me, I’d be impressed.”

“Yeah, but can you see how it’s so much harder than the fifth root?”

“Fair point.”

“Poor ol’ Anthony. And he could have been the Man here.”

“You mean he could have won it?”

Colin nodded. “If you’re talking brain power, yeah. I’ve seen the lad do ninth roots for fun. But it’s never just that. People like me and Heinrich, we’re not the greats but we know how to compete.” He pointed his chopsticks at me. “You’ve got to bring your game to the table. Whereas Anthony... he’s a dreamer. I can be talking to him about football and he’s looking out the window multiplying license plates. Then he comes to a championship like this and while everyone’s getting their head together he’s thinking about football.”

“So what are your plans now?”

“Ko Samet, I reckon. I’ll have a word with Heinrich probably. Get the gen.”

“Heinrich knows Thailand then?”

“Comes every year. That’s motivational speaking for you, that is.” He sat back and put his hands behind his head. “Have you noticed how some people sort of do, and some people sort of don’t?”

“Do?”

“Life, you know. They sort of get it.”

I gave Colin my card, copied down his mobile number, and asked him to call me if he heard from Anthony. Then I wised up and asked if he’d given his Bangkok address to the organizers. He had.

Back at the organizers’ table I had a chat with Pink Spectacles and learnt her name was Malinee. She told me Anthony had done the same.

“So you must have talked to him?”

“No, it’s by the Internet. Have a Web site.” She clicked at her mouse while staring at the flat screen monitor. He pay for an entry fee by the Internet as well.”

“Can you tell me when?”

“It’s the twenty-third,” she said, the white screen reflecting off her glasses. Today was the thirtieth, so he’d paid from England. Then she said, “It’s the same as Bausch-man. Mr. Heinrich. Same card.”

“You mean Heinrich paid Anthony’s entry fee? The guy on the stage just now?” She nodded. “You know, I could really do with finding out where Anthony’s staying.”

“I’m sorry, we can’t give the addresses.”

“It’s just that a friend of his thinks he might not be well. She wants me to check on him.”

Malinee tilted her head to one side, considered me in a friendly, interested way, and relented. It was the Orchid Guesthouse in Banglampoo, a low-budget area where all the backpackers go. I borrowed a pen and scribbled the address on the palm of my hand. Then I checked on the Championship schedule. Heinrich would be appearing in the quarterfinals in two days’ time.

“He left,” shrugged Mr. Wen, owner of the Orchid Guesthouse. He was a large Chinese-Thai man, sitting in his office bare chested below a ceiling fan. A small portable TV balanced on a filing cabinet was showing a Thai boxing match, the reception from the indoor aerial waxing and waning. Mr. Wen was behind his glass-topped desk, bills and receipts visible under the glass. On the wall behind him was a commercial calendar and above that a picture of the king. The tiny office had no windows and the ceiling fan really did very little in the way of breeze.

“So we’re talking two days ago?” I asked. Mr. Wen nodded. Before his chat with Atiya then. “And he didn’t say where he was going?”

“Yes, he didn’t say.”

“How did he seem?”

“Seem?”

“Happy? Sad? Worried?”

Mr. Wen shrugged. “He seem like he want to leave. Why don’t you ask his friend?”

I thought, not again. “Is this a man or a woman?”

“It’s both.”

“What did they look like?”

“The woman.” He put up his thumb. “Suey.” Beautiful. “The man... he’s a man. They want to know where he go.” He added in Thai, “And don’t ask me if they’re happy or sad, I’m not a fortune-teller.”

I left Mr. Wen a business card for good measure and went off to get a bus back to Chinatown, reflecting that Atiya’s sense for things gone wrong was turning out to be pretty good.

It was about half past two by the time I got back to our office. The fiery March sun was slanting in between the slats of the venetian blinds, throwing bars of shadow onto the wall behind my desk. A standing fan was rattling through a half circle. It wasn’t much cooler than Mr. Wen’s office. Doi was busy translating the documents of a farang who was applying for a resident’s permit. It was the only work we had. So I resorted to my usual strategies when there was nothing to do: drummed my fingers on my desk, set about clearing out the drawers of said desk, considered rereading today’s Khao Sod, drummed my fingers some more. Doi looked up and said, “Vijay, why don’t you go if there’s nothing for you?”

“You never know, we might get a client.”

She pouted. “Whenever you say that no one come.”

And sure enough no one did. But at close to five my phone rang. “Vijay, now what are you up to?” It was my police captain friend, Mana. “At the moment, drumming my fingers on the desk to help Doi concentrate.”

“Don’t joke about, I’m serious. Who you annoy?”

“No one as far as I know.”

“Your work was supposed to be helping farangs with gem scams. You’re not supposed to trouble big people.”

“I didn’t think I was.”

“Someone phone my boss and make him nervous. Now he wants to know all about you. I’m supposed to check you have a work permit. You have one, right?”

“Not a totally up-to-date one.”

A heavy sigh came down the line. “Please tell me you at least have a visa.”

“Yup, that bit’s okay. But look, the only case I’ve got is finding a farang who’s gone missing. He’s no one special. Just some unemployed guy from London.”

“Who wants to find him?”

“A Thai woman.”

“The girlfriend?”

“No, it’s not like that. Just... someone who thinks he needs finding.”

“Vijay, look, I’m going to tell my boss everything’s okay. You’re lucky you live in my precinct, you know that? Remember, this is Thailand. You don’t make trouble for people at the top.”

I told Mana I wouldn’t, which was easier said than done considering I didn’t even know who this person was. All I did know was that I’d only given out two business cards, and it was for damn sure Colin Krasinsky did not have a hotline to the rich and famous. Which meant the man and woman who’d visited Mr. Wen had come back, and he’d told them about me. Or possibly, they’d told him to get in touch if anyone came asking. Either way, it had only taken a few hours for Mana’s boss, a chief inspector, to be at someone’s beck and call. The secret life of Anthony The Calculator was getting stranger and stranger.

The next morning I made it to Pantip Plaza before ten o’clock and hung around outside the tinted glass doors, waiting for them to open. When I got inside I found Malinee already there setting up her computer. Again she was in a serious business outfit — navy blue trouser suit — topped off by her dippy pink specs. I wondered if that particular look was supposed to say something about her, and if so, what.

She saw me and smiled. I decided to play the farang-in-trouble card, which among ordinary working people succeeds surprisingly often. It’s a part of Thai national pride and a part of Thai kindness to want that foreigners come here, enjoy themselves, then go home and speak well of the country. So I told her how Anthony was still missing and how people in England were worried. Perhaps if I could speak to Mr. Heinrich, that might help. I knew she wasn’t supposed to give away addresses, but this was an emergency. And he was Mr. Anthony’s friend, had paid for his registration, remember?

Eventually she agreed and searched it out. No backpacker hangouts for Heinrich, he was in the Amari Watergate, a short walk from Pantip. Very convenient and very expensive.

At the Amari reception desk I asked for Mr. Baushman’s room and phoned up. When I told him it was about Anthony, Heinrich said he’d come down immediately. I sank into a deep lobby armchair and enjoyed my surroundings — polished marble floor, high, chandeliered ceiling, bus-boys and waiters padding through the calm, air-conditioned hush. When Heinrich arrived he was in Bermuda shorts and a bright yellow silk shirt of Indonesian design.

I waved him over and introduced myself. Taking a seat opposite, he said, “This is strange. To my knowledge Anthony has never been in Thailand before. Who is this woman who takes an interest in him?”

“Just someone he met, someone who thinks he’s in trouble. What do you think?”

He sighed. “With Anthony, how can we know? But it is a pity.”

“And a waste of money, I’d have thought. Colin said you were going to help him with the plane ticket?”

“I paid half, two hundred and thirty-seven euros.”

“And what about the competition? Is there an entry fee?”

“I paid with my credit card. But if you have taken my address from the organizers, then perhaps you already know this fact.” I opened my hands and grinned. “Anthony did not have a card. In some ways he is not wholly of the modern world. But he promised to return something to me.”

“You believe him?”

Heinrich shrugged. “I do not care. I help him as a friend, and I help him for the realization of potential. He has the ability to be a great calculator, another Nakamura. But he must learn to compete.”

“Colin was saying something like that.”

Heinrich fingered his shirt. “This was not purchased from calculations. Neither my hotel room. I am a motivator, I liberate human potential. And you know, I am good at this. I have held seminars for Siemens, Mercedes, Beh-Meh-Veh. All these people I can motivate, but I cannot motivate Anthony.” He sat back. “What do we conclude from this?”

“Perhaps it’s because those people were competitors, like yourself, Heinrich.”

He nodded unhappily, and then said, “I want to know, who is this woman who wishes to help him?”

Walking back to Pantip past the mats on the pavement (plastic toys, children’s clothes, mobile-phone cases) and the food carts (fried chicken, gelatin sweets, freshly squeezed orange juice), I was starting to wonder about Atiya myself. After I finished with Heinrich I’d phoned her at work. She agreed to pay for a couple more days searching, which was pretty decent, all things considered. But I doubted she’d go much longer without some concrete results.

Inside the mall an audience had gathered. On the whiteboard it said quarterfinal. The stage was still empty, but off to one side a pear-shaped Chinese man was pacing like a boxer, his chunky fists clenching and unclenching. The emcee was there, again in high heels and another tight black body suit. I had a feeling that, for this particular audience, she was as much of a draw as the competition itself.

As soon as she saw me, Malinee waved me over. “You just miss Mr. Anntony’s friend.” She came out from behind her desk and walked me down past the stage. “He went... there.” She pointed to a guy in light blue jeans, sneakers, and a dark blue cotton shirt. As he turned, I saw a pair of aviator sunglasses hooked onto the front pocket. The Least Geek Geek competition had a winner. “Thanks, I’ll go and have a word. Just right now. Thanks.” I waited till she’d gone back to her desk, then followed him up the escalator to the second floor. He ignored the food court and took a brief, incurious stroll past the shops. When someone offered him a packet of porn CDs he grinned and patted the man’s shoulder, as though to say, you don’t think I can’t get the real thing? At the end of the corridor of shops he went out to the car park. I followed and watched him click his key fob to pulse the headlights of a black Toyota Fortuner. I scribbled the license plate on my palm and went back inside to phone Mana.

“Vijay, this had better not be the same case.”

“No, no, quite different. It’s the usual thing, this one. You know, forty-something guy, young wife. He thinks she’s playing away from home and instead of doing the sensible thing and talking to her about it, he hires me. Anyway, I saw her getting into this Fortuner and I know hubby wasn’t driving.”

I could hear him tapping keys. “That’s good to know, you don’t want to... this guy’s even older. She left her husband for a sixty-five year old?”

“Oh well, you know how it is. Trading up sugar daddies.”

“His name’s Boonchai Wongsawat and he lives out in Tungkru. The address is Phutta Bucha Road, Soi forty-four and the house number is... Vijay, it’s a triple nine, if this guy can—”

“Great, just what I needed. Bus coming, I’ve got to dash. Bye, Mana.” I wrote the address on my forearm and looked at it. Thought: Why am I never carrying a notebook when I need one? Then thought: It was a triple nine address.

In countries where people believe in fate they also believe in luck, and in Thailand nine is a lucky number. The Ministry of Transport auctions off license plates containing only nines, and the highest possible combination — two Thai characters followed by 9999 — goes for around ten million baht. The same fetish applies to house numbers. If you have enough pull you can see to it that your house gets a big nine combination, irrespective of the street’s number sequence. Which made Khun Boonchart old money and serious influence.

I left the air-conditioned cool of Pantip to get an expressway bus that would take me across the river, out to the suburbs of Tungkru. But “express” was the wrong word for the caravan of hot, exhausted metal we joined, and by the time we’d come off the toll road it was three p.m. I was starving. So I had lunch at a curry shop and asked which bus would take me to Phutta Bucha.

By the time I’d got there it was almost three thirty. Soi 44 was a narrow, straightish lane. At its entrance there were a couple of motorbike taxi guys sitting at a stone table under a tree, playing draughts with bottle tops. I waved away their offers and strolled down, keeping to the right-hand side where the shade was. The mouth of the soi was all shops — hairdresser, general store, pharmacy, then further in it was residential, houses behind high walls, and about a kilometer down, number 999. This wasn’t so much a house as a compound, with five saloon cars lined up outside. High vanilla-white walls were topped by cobalt blue metal spikes. The same shade of blue had been used for the ornate metal gates set at each end of the compound, almost twenty yards apart. It was hot and still and, away from the mouth of the soi, relatively quiet. I walked up to the gates and peered inside. In the center of a gravel courtyard was an oval fountain where two faux Roman cherubs were being cheerfully soaked. Behind that, white walls, white Doric columns, and broad white steps leading up to an entrance of black-tinted glass that revealed nothing. At either end of the courtyard was a covered area for cars. The black Fortuner was parked here, next to a silver Mercedes. And lots of free, shaded space.

The buzz of an engine came from behind me and one of the motorbike taxis swept past, a middle-aged woman on the back, seated sideways with her shopping in her lap. I looked up to where the bike had come from and saw the other taxi driver was looking down the soi. I had the idea he was watching me, and as I strolled back up to the entrance, flapping out my wet T-shirt, it seemed that was indeed the case. At least as far as I could tell, given I couldn’t see his eyes behind his dark glasses.

I stopped in at the general store, bought two bottles of Fanta from their refrigerator, and carried them over to the taxi driver. He was a big, dark-skinned guy whose corded forearms were covered with blue protection-from-evil tattoos. I handed him one of the bottles, and he took it in a silent, matter-of-fact way, like a tribute that was owed to him. I sat where his friend had been.

It’s a given in Bangkok that any long soi will have a bunch of motorbike guys making a living from ferrying people down it. And it’s a given those guys will know far more about the life of the soi than the soi’s residents realize.

I said in Thai, “It’s really hot.”

“Really hot.”

We were agreed on that then.

I ran the cold bottle along my forearms.

“So, the house down there. Nine-nine-nine. What’s going on?”

“What do you think?” If I couldn’t make an intelligent guess, why should he help me?

“Lots of shaded parking space inside, but cars parked out in the heat. For a house a long way down a soi, away from nosy people, from the wrong kind of cops. Cops who haven’t been paid off. I think it’s a casino.”

His dark face split into a very white grin. “That’s what we all think.” He shrugged. “No one knows for sure. The visitors don’t use us; they all have cars.”

“But it’s the same people who keep coming?”

He nodded. “In the afternoon there’s older women. Hair up here and small handbags. In the evenings it’s mostly men. On Friday nights a Jaguar always comes, leaves very late.”

“I bet you can remember the license number.” He could as well and I keyed it into my phone, as it was just getting silly scribbling on myself the whole time. “What else stands out?”

“There’s a Chinese-looking guy, bald head, comes in an old red Mercedes. He left very angry one night, drove very fast. Almost hit my friend.” He glugged down some Fanta. “Have a young woman with him usually. Suey. But when he was angry he left by himself.” He shrugged. “Many of the cars have tinted windows. At night you can’t see much.”

“Think I could get a game there?”

He looked troubled. “Pii[3]... why would you want to do that? I’m not looking down on you, but I’ll speak straight. You can’t afford it. This game is for rich people.” I let him convince me and then we went on to other things, football and politics and how business was. Still concerned, he gave me his phone number and said if I wanted a game he could find a much cheaper one from his brother-in-law.

As I was walking back to the bus stop he called after me. “Pii. You thought it was a casino... just from the cars?”

“That wasn’t the only thing.”

“Twenty-one, right? That’s the game you can win at?” It was late afternoon. I was back in the office chatting with Doi. She frowned. “I don’t think you win at anything. The casino win.”

“Most of the time. But for twenty-one it’s different. I remember reading about this someplace. It’s the only game with a memory. They put four decks into the shoe. Every card that comes out changes the probability for the cards that are left. If you keep track of everything that’s been played and keep calculating the odds, you know when to bet against the house.”

“Vijay, I think it’s so difficult.”

“There’s a bunch of people in this city right now who could do it for fun.”

I thought about Colin Krasinsky, in the top zero point zero zero one percentile of calculators and still no lingerie model girlfriend. And unlike Heinrich, no motivational speaking to bring the money in. So what did he turn to? And then you had Atiya, who was apparently altruistic enough to hire a private detective to find someone she’d met just once, in a McDonald’s. Or in a different reality, had fallen out with her Mercedes-driving sugar daddy and now needed a new source of funds. I decided I wanted a chat with both of them, together.

First I phoned Colin and found that he hadn’t left for Ko Samet after all, but was still in the city. (“Just thought I’d check out Patpong, eh?”) I told him I needed his help in finding Anthony and as he let me convince him, the scales of my suspicion dropped in his direction. Then I phoned Atiya and told her the same thing, and when she let me talk her into phoning in sick at the bank and coming to meet me, the scales righted and were level again. I leaned back in my chair with my hands behind my head thinking about the two of them, and suddenly I realized that, while picking him out was going to be difficult, I did actually know where Anthony was.

At close to eleven in the morning Doi went to get him. She was supposed to stay in touch with me by phone and had her sister Lieng and her brother-in-law Oot along to help. It wouldn’t be easy, given that none of us had seen the guy, but I had an idea of what they should look for. Meanwhile, I was in the food court at Pantip, which was filling up fast. I was sitting with a glass of iced tea at a table for four and was constantly waving away people who wanted to know if the seats were taken.

Colin arrived first, carrying over a bowl of noodles. “I’m quite getting into the food here. And it’s like, sixty p. for lunch. So what’s the score with our Anthony?”

“Looks like he wandered into some sort of trouble. Or was led into it.”

“Yeah?” He looked mildly interested. “Poor bugger.” I like to think I’m good at spotting when people conceal things, mainly because I get so much practice. My clients hardly ever tell me the whole truth, and never in the divorce cases. Who can face the whole truth about a failed marriage? But it had to be said, Colin was very good at putting up a front. Or was completely innocent. “Someone convinced him to try and get rich.”

Atiya came over. She hadn’t bought any food and was again in her tight purple skirt and purple blouse. “Vijay, I have to go back this afternoon. If I miss a whole day I need a doctor’s note.” Colin was looking at her with interest and obviously wondering what she’d said. I introduced the two of them and explained why she was looking for Anthony. He leaned over the table. “I’m a calculator as well, y’know. Tell me any five digit number.”

She gave him a tight smile. “It’s okay, I believe you.”

I said, “So about Anthony. I think he was card counting in a casino.” I added for Colin’s benefit, “This is a gambling-mad country where gambling is illegal, other than the state lottery. So basically, you get underground casinos everywhere. I think he won big in one and they put the frighteners on him. And I think one of you already knows this.” Colin and Atiya looked at each other. Colin put up his thumb. “Nice one.”

My mobile went. Oot said, “Vijay, I think I saw him. A guy with binoculars. But then I lost him.”

Atiya said, “What nice one?”

“Oot, tell Doi and Lieng, maybe he’s heading their way.”

“Figuring out about the card counting.”

“I don’t know what’s card counting.” She looked genuinely puzzled. I said to Colin, “How’s it go, zero point zero zero one percentile but still no Porsche?”

“So?” He looked genuinely puzzled as well. There’s usually a point where I figure people out, but it didn’t seem to be happening. I went back to Atiya and said in Thai, “It’s good of you to pay me to find Anthony. I just wonder what you get out of it.”

“I get to know he’s safe. What’s wrong with you?” Colin’s phone rang and he answered it. While he spoke into the phone she said, “I don’t know about counting.”

Colin looked up from his phone and said, “Eh, mate, Anthony’s just called me. He says there’s someone following him.”

“Tell him not to worry.”

“Ant, don’t—” Colin put the phone down. “He’s rung off. What was that about?”

“Why was he phoning you, I wonder?”

“Remembers my number, doesn’t he? He’s a calculator.” He grinned at Atiya. “Like I am.” Then he said to me, “But he doesn’t have a mobile, if that’s what you mean. Must have been phoning from a call box.”

I dialed Oot, bent under the table, cupped my hand over the phone and whispered in Thai, “Find the public phones. That’s where he is.”

Atiya said in English, “What are you doing? Why you being so strange?”

“I’m being strange?” I asked, straightening up.

“You are a bit actually, mate,” said Colin.

My mobile rang. Oot asked, “Where are the public phones?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I asked you to find them. Try Doi.”

Atiya said, “Doi from your office?”

“I think you should both know, my life has contained many people who’ve tried to deceive me.”

“See, this is a bit weird as well,” said Colin.

I said to Atiya in English, “He went to a casino in Tungkru. Phutta Bucha.” She looked blank. “You fell out with your previous source of funds.” She was looking at me as though I was mad. “Then a guy in a McDonald’s tells you he’s a human calculator and the baht signs go up in front of your eyes. Why else would you come to me?”

“I came because my friend tell me. She live in Chinatown. She said you work hard and don’t charge much.” She crossed her legs and gave me a haughty, triumphant look. “And you know what else? She said if I wore this skirt you’d give me a discount.” This is what you get for being a good Samaritan.

Colin leaned across the table and said, “I can vouch for her.”

“You’ve only just met her.”

“Yeah, but I know about people. DHSS, innit? We get all the scams.”

Atiya smiled at him. “Thank you.”

I decided to raise the stakes. “The reason I called you both here is that I already know which one of you set up Anthony.” They both turned to me, then Colin looked over my shoulder, waved his hand, and frowned. I turned back. “What is it?”

“Heinrich. I thought he’d seen us. Never mind.”

“What would Heinrich be doing here? He’s competing tomorrow.”

“I told him what you said, about finding Anthony. I thought he’d want to know.” Damn.

“So, Vijay,” Atiya put her chin on her palm. “Which of us is it?”

“Neither, now that I come to think of it. It’s Heinrich.”

My phone rang. Oot was panting. “Vijay... I found the phones... no one there.”

“Okay, keep looking.” I stood up. “Come on, we’re going to get Anthony.”

“But we don’t know where he is.”

“Of course we do. He’s here, where else would he be? He doesn’t know this city and besides, he couldn’t keep away. He’s up on one of the higher floors with a pair of binoculars, watching the whiteboard for the next set of numbers.” I said to Colin, “You and I will try and find Heinrich. I think he’s figured that out.” To Atiya I said, “You try and get to Anthony, you’re probably the one person he trusts.”

“So I pay you to find Ann-tony and now I’m finding him.” She stalked off. Colin watched her hips sway down the food court and said, “I’d have given her a discount as well.” Then his phone rang. He answered and said to me, “Anthony. Says there’s still someone after him.”

“Tell him not to worry. It’s a friend of mine.”

“Ant, relax, it’s a mate.”

“Big guy, sloping shoulders?”

Colin repeated the description and said to me, “No, slim guy, polo shirt, aviator sunglasses.”

“In that case tell him to run like hell.”

Colin waved the mobile. “Gone already.”

We started pushing our way to the escalator. It wasn’t easy. I’d chosen this time because I wanted to be sure the Championship had started, but the problem was the place was now packed out. As we jostled our way up the steps I phoned Oot. “Where do they put the public phones here?”

“They fix them in the wall.”

“I mean where, Oot?”

“It’s out towards the car park. The corridor to the toilets.”

We ran around to the next escalator, dodging bodies and banging shoulders. “What was Heinrich wearing?”

“Light blue shirt, sort of patterned malarkey.”

We levered our way up the next escalator. On the corridor above I couldn’t see any such shirt. “Come on, we’ll go up again.” We ran around and my phone rang. Lieng asked, “Vijay, twenty-five thousand baht for a notebook computer, you think it’s too much?”

“Lieng, the guy with the binoculars? Remember? Could you concentrate on finding him for two minutes?”

“Well, excuse me for asking.”

Up on the next corridor Colin shouted, “There!” I looked and couldn’t see anything. Colin shrugged. “I’m sure it was.” We pushed our way down and such was the press of bodies I almost missed him. He was in the Apple shop looking at a MacBook, his phone in one hand. “Waiting for a call, Heinrich?” He glanced up and took in the fact that Colin had come in behind me.

“Always in the Apple product we find the superior design quality.”

“And poseurs buying them, but then, I’m an old Luddite at heart. We know about the casino in Tungkru and the card counting, so you can call off your henchmen.”

“I know nothing of henchmen, only of an opportunity I extend to Anthony.” He said to Colin, “Yes, it’s true. I arranged for this. Anthony phones me in Frankfurt and again he has no job and no money. I have learnt about the casinos here and so I apply this knowledge.”

I said, “In return for a percentage of the winnings, I presume?”

“It is standard business practice.”

“You must have known the casino owners would go after him.”

“For this reason I chose carefully. I know a woman who plays there.” He shrugged. “Okay, so someone visits him and points a gun of some description. This is just a bluff. It is not cheating to card count, it is only a higher understanding of probability.”

“Right, and the fact that he’s now got some psycho after him?”

“Again you are misunderstanding. This is not the owner of the casino, only the son. He wishes to hire Anthony to damage a rival casino.”

“My God, and you think he’d agree? He’s scared out of his wits as it is. Can you just phone the guy and call him off?” Heinrich gave me a heavy satirizing shrug and made the call, speaking in a mixture of English and German-accented Thai. “So are you happy? This is an opportunity he loses.”

“And so do you. But why do I think the casino’s served its purpose already? You must have known how they’d react to a card counter. And how Anthony would take it. But that removes some of the competition, right? After all, your motivational gigs are all about being a calculator. If you become the World Champion Calculator, I’m guessing your fee goes up. And Anthony’s good. Perhaps the problem wasn’t he couldn’t compete but that he was learning to.”

“You apparently forget I help pay for his plane ticket.”

“And by doing so gave him a sense of obligation. Whereas if you hadn’t paid there was a danger someone else would. Colin says you all stick together.”

“Pish, pish. This is a state of mind on which you are speculating. It is utterly unproveable.”

“Maybe, but like I say, calculators stick together. They can draw their own conclusions.”

Colin said, “Not classy, Heinrich. Not classy at all.”

“I am not to debate class with an untermensch.”

At that point a woman in denim hot pants and a pink spaghetti-strap top came in and ticked her way over to Heinrich. He put a hand on her hip and called her liebchen. Mr. Wen had been right, she was beautiful, although in a completely different way from Atiya. As for the owner’s son, I didn’t see him again. He must have just got in his Fortuner and driven off. And as for Anthony, after everything, I never did see him at all. Atiya phoned to say she’d found him on the fifth floor and that was that. I later heard they’d arranged again to see the Emerald Buddha, and Colin had somehow managed to wangle his way along. Lieng took Oot off to look at the computer she wanted and Doi left Pantip to go and shop for clothes at a mall nearby. Heinrich and his liebchen left together with her cooing about couldn’t he buy her an iPhone, ti-rak[4]?

On my own in the noise and bustle of Pantip, I felt oddly deflated for some reason. Everything had come together, and yet it felt like one of those divorce cases where no one wins.

With nothing better to do I went down to the ground floor to see how the Calculator quarterfinals were going. Between bouts I got chatting with Malinee. I decided those pink specs weren’t any kind of statement. She liked pink so she wore them to work. Why not? People don’t have to be more complicated than they first seem. I liked that thought and I liked chatting with her, and so I asked for her phone number. But this time I didn’t scribble it on myself or key it into my mobile. I just tapped the side of my head and said, “I’m a calculator, I’ll remember.” And you know what? Two days later when I called her up, I still could.

Copyright © 2011 Mithran Somasundrum