Spirit Tiger (21 page)

‘Wait!' he told them. ‘Just wait a minute. I can't do that. It's wrong.'

‘Wrong? Rubiah asked him, feigning astonishment. ‘I'll tell you what. You talk to
Cik
Azrina about it. And then you can come to the market tomorrow and let's all talk. Maybe your lovely wife can talk sense into you.'

She marched majestically out of the room, and could be heard ordering Rahman to fetch the car. Osman looked up at Maryam for help.

‘It's difficult, I know,' she sympathized. ‘But sometimes you have to apply the law to do what's fair and what's right. ‘
Tanak dalam periok
,' that's what we say. Cook rice in a cooking pot: do things the right way. It should be justice too, not just law.'

She was proud of herself for that speech. Who could have thought, years ago, that a
Mak Cik
with a
kain songket
stall would be lecturing the police about justice and law like that. It was very satisfying. Then she, too, drew herself up to full height, picked up her handbag, and walked slowly out of the room.

Rahman already had the car running and the air conditioner blasting, and she slid in next to Rubiah and reported what she had said to Osman.

Chapter XXIX

Yi stood before his father, clearly uncomfortable, casting longing glances toward the door and the outside, to which he yearned to escape. Manfully, however, he forced himself to do what Aliza had instructed him, more afraid of what she would do to him if he weaseled out of it than of the misery he felt approaching his father on this topic. But he had his orders, as Azmi would say, and he meant to finish his mission or die trying. All three of his older siblings agreed Yi would be the most unthreatening emissary to deliver the message, and Aliza was nominated to make sure he completed his task, and she was not unthreatening at all.

Mamat watched Yi with rising interest, unsure of what he wanted, but ready to give it his full attention. Finally, after much squirming and lip-chewing, Yi squared his thin shoulders, sighed deeply, and began.

‘Ayah, we all think … that is, we all want to tell you that we know …' Now he began to rush, and speak as quickly as he could to get it over with, ‘That you're angry with
Mak
and that you still blame her, but we think you should try to not be angry with her, and to forgive her, and make our family like it was before. We don't want you to get divorced, and people are saying you will, but I hope you won't 'cause I'd be so unhappy if either of you weren't here, and I would be all alone and even Azmi and Ashikin would be unhappy, really unhappy.'

He had done it. Whatever happened now, at least the worst was over, and Aliza could not claim he had failed. He let out a long breath.

Mamat was shocked into silence. The thought of his four children gathering together and planning this, and then dragooning Yi into doing this nearly brought him to tears. They must have chosen Yi because it would be hard for him to dismiss him, as he acknowledged to himself he might have done with the two eldest, and told them shortly it was none of their concern. But with Yi, his baby, he couldn't say that. And he looked up at his father with such questioning eyes, Mamat was ashamed to have done this to him. He reached out a hand and placed it on Yi's shoulder.

‘Yi …' he began, finding, to his surprise, his voice was clogged with tears and he was having trouble speaking, ‘Don't worry. I love you all.'

‘Even
Mak
?'

He nodded. If he spoke, he would cry. He cleared his throat. ‘All of you. I don't want to leave you. Don't worry.' He tried to smile.

‘But you never talk to her …'

‘Yi, this will be alright.'

‘Not if you don't talk to her,' Yi pleaded. ‘Don't you see …'

‘Yi,' he said gently, ‘you'll have to leave it to me. But don't worry,' he assured him.

Then he walked slowly into his room so he could cry in private.

Yi was debriefed by his sisters, while Ashikin cared for Zakaria, who was a healthy and already sturdy baby.

‘He looks like you,' Ashikin told him. ‘His ears stick out.'

‘Tell me,' she ordered, while Aliza straightened out the room.

‘He started to cry,' Yi reported.

‘Cry?
Ayah
cried?'Ashikin asked in amazement. ‘I didn't expect that.'

‘You must have done a good job,' Aliza complimented him. ‘Very moving.'

‘And what else did he say?'

‘He said he loved us all, even
Mak
, and he wouldn't be leaving.'

‘He said that?'

Yi nodded. The sisters conferred. That was good news; at least, he had actually said he wouldn't.

‘Did he say he would speak to her again?'Ashikin asked.

‘He said he had to do it his way, and that's all he said. There's nothing more to tell. But then he cried, so maybe he'll forgive her.'

‘I hope so,' Aliza prayed.

‘Me, too. I don't know what I'd do if they separated while I have a newborn. Really, I can't handle everything alone.'

Mamat could not sleep that night, plagued by the memory of Yi taking his courage in his hands to speak to his father about this. His children must have been talking about this non-stop, and it touched him that they'd orchestrated this in an attempt to make things better. As a father, he believed he could not disappoint them, though as a husband, he was still embarrassed and perhaps, he admitted to himself, sulking.

It wasn't Maryam's fault, he knew that now, but it was so hard to make a formal declaration of his mistake. He was hoping that Maryam would apologize to him. For what exactly. he couldn't say, but if she did, he could graciously accept her apology and make things right. Now it seemed he'd have to act first, and it was awkward.

Yet, if he wanted to keep his family together, if he wanted to preserve his marriage, then he had to say he was sorry, difficult as it was for him. He would try. He wasn't sure what to do, but he would force himself to speak with her and not bring it up, and knowing Maryam, she in turn would force herself to be as nice as she could and cater to him for the foreseeable future, which might not be so bad. And she would know, somehow, that his speaking to her again meant he was very sorry for blaming her and would not doubt her again. She would realize that's what he meant when he asked her what was for breakfast and smiled at her, and when she smiled back and said, ‘
nasi kerabu
', that would mean she'd forgiven him and understood how he could make such a huge mistake. He rose from the steps, though it was closer to morning than midnight, and went back into his bedroom.

Noriah was allowed to leave her cell and return to her home, with strict instructions not to leave Kota Bharu. ‘We'll find you,
Mak Cik
, if you leave,' Rahman warned, more comfortable with lecturing her now that he thought of her not as a
Mak Cik
, but a criminal – and those were two completely separate and unrelated categories. He watched with satisfaction as she left.

Noriah dragged herself back to her house. Her son came to the police station to bring her back home, but his face remained slack and blank, his greeting perfunctory and without emotion. Though she was hurt by this welcome, she also knew her own greeting was hardly more animated, and wondered dully how they became such an uncaring family, and if they had always been so. She didn't think so, but was no longer sure she remembered anything with accuracy.

She deposited her purse on the living room floor and retreated immediately to her bedroom to peer into her mirror, where she saw an exhausted and disheveled woman, looking far older than when she had left only a few days earlier. Then she was a bustling
Mak Cik
, full of plans and confidence, scheming to avoid the police and primarily concerned with ensuring the construction moved along as quickly as possible.

And now? Was that new gray in her hair? Her clothes were a disgrace after all that time in jail, fit only to be thrown away, the better to forget the entire experience. Her face looked tired and reflected the gray in her hair. She reached up to touch her cheeks, pulling at them anxiously as though she could instill some colour in them. She turned away wearily, trudging down to the well to bathe, wrapped in an even more faded sarong. She hated everything about herself.

Osman slouched home from work that evening, uncomfortable with the afternoon's work and unable to take one side or another. He was anxious to discuss it with Azrina, who he believed had more respect for his intellect than either Maryam or Rubiah. They were of an age to be his mother, he told himself, and therefore would also look on him as somewhat less mature. He shook that off. Now he would talk to his wife.

‘I need to talk to you about something. Something at work,' Osman told her at the dinner table. She was all attention.

‘This case about Yusuf. It seems we've found the murderer.' Although Azrina quivered with anticipation, it did not pay to hurry Osman. In fact, that would only slow everything down. She sat rigidly, only her nose twitching, but Osman was looking out the window and not at her.

‘It was Khatijah,' he said softly. ‘She killed him. We never suspected her, but it was her. She swears that Yusuf wanted her to work as a prostitute in the gambling hall, and she said no. She told us Yusuf would never let it go, she knew him, knew she'd never escape him. She claimed this was the only way she could get out of it.'Azrina sat silent.

‘
Mak Cik
Maryam wants me to let her go. She says it was self-defense and we shouldn't prosecute her for it. There was a lot said.' He sighed. ‘But Yusuf didn't actually
do
anything to her. He just threatened to, you know. So where's the basis for self-defense?'

Azrina gave him a look he had recently come to recognize, a look in which forbearance with his faults was mixed with a wry amusement about just how wrong whatever he had just said could be. Women, he found, seemed to specialize in it, particularly older, confident women, and it was his first inkling that Azrina was a likely candidate for
Mak Cik
-hood, a most promising novice really, who might someday grow into a Maryam. He wasn't sure how he felt about it, but leaned toward relieved.

His wife composed herself in order to deliver her opinion. ‘
Sayang
,' she began, sugar-coating whatever she planned to say, ‘I think you need to look at it from Khatijah's perspective. It isn't just physical threats. I know you know it, but it's, well …

‘He did threaten her.' She pursued the logic in a nearly mathematical way. ‘He really threatened her life: what kind of a life would she have had if he'd made her do … that. It would be terrible.

‘So really, he did threaten her life, and it was self-defense. That's what I think.' She was quiet for a moment.

‘It sounds like a horrible family. What kind of a man would try to force someone into that? And Noriah's no better.' And Noriah had also disparaged the great state of Perak, and that irritated more than Azrina cared to admit. Though it was, she acknowledged, childish on her part.

‘You can't blame Khatijah for doing whatever she had to do to get out of it. I would do the same,' she said with finality, thereby putting her own stamp of approval on the deed. ‘I don't say it's good, I don't say it's … praiseworthy. I just say I think she was fighting for her life, and more important, her daughter's, and it can be self-defense even if he hadn't actually raised a hand to her. Yet,' she added darkly. ‘I'm sure it would have come to that.'

Osman considered what she had said, and how the three people he admired most in Kelantan all agreed. If only his mother in Perak had weighed in on Khatijah's behalf, it would constitute a quorum of those he considered wisest.

‘I think almost any woman you asked would understand why she did it, whether or not they thought she should be prosecuted. They'd know how helpless she felt.'

Azrina rose and began making coffee to bolster Osman's possibly flagging energy. ‘You know,
sayang
, I think you need to temper justice with mercy.'

She wasn't sure where she'd heard that. Perhaps studying for her exams in English Literature. She really liked the way it sounded, and made a note to herself to remember it. It would no doubt come in handy later, when discussing police business.

Osman sat quietly, and Azrina did not interrupt his thoughts. Finally, he approached her again.

‘Na,' he began. ‘I can't make the decision. Not alone. I'll talk to the prosecutor tomorrow and see what can be done. I'll give him my opinion that it was self defense.'Azrina smiled broadly at him. ‘But I'll let him decide.'

Chapter XXX

Ah Pak walked into the Police Station, his arm tightly around his son's shoulders. Both were pale and a little drawn, and Ah Pak had clearly dressed for the occasion by donning pants, which he wore with his signature undershirt. He asked quietly for Osman when he arrived and propelled Kit Siang into the Chief's office.

Osman smiled and tried to put them at their ease, but they both looked tense and frightened. ‘Tell me,' Osman instructed them. ‘Whatever it is, it can't be that bad.'

Kit Siang continued to stare at the floor, until prodded by his father.‘I just wanted to tell you … I mean, I want to confess.'

Osman sat quietly, if somewhat confused.

Kit Siang gulped. ‘I had gambled in Yusuf's place,' he began his preamble. ‘I lost a lot. My father asked me not to, but …' Kit Siang seemed at a loss to explain it in more detail, but Osman immediately understood.

‘So when I lost the first time, it was big, and he went to talk to my father. He told me it would be alright, my father would never let anything happen to me. I was so stupid,' he moaned. ‘I never even thought about what he meant by that, even though I knew how he collected gambling debts. The other guys talked about it sometimes.