The Half-Child (32 page)

‘They checked out already,' the receptionist said.

‘When?'

‘Early this morning.'

‘Shit,' Jayne muttered under her breath. ‘I don't suppose they left a forwarding address?'

An embarrassed laugh told her no.

Jayne glanced at Mayuree perched on the edge of a chair, shredding a wad of tissue in her hand. She punched Rajiv's number into her phone.

‘Jayne, I have been waiting on your call. I managed to hack into Maryanne's account and—'

She cut him off. ‘Rajiv, I'm in trouble. I'm at the Suriya Hotel with Mayuree, but the Kings checked out this morning.

Alicia must've been spooked.'

‘Do you want me to start checking for them at other hotels in the vicinity? They still have to take the child to the US Embassy tomorrow, isn't it?'

‘Would you?' She made no attempt to hide the gratitude in her voice. ‘I'm not sure how much more Mayuree can take.'

‘And you, Jayne. Are you okay?'

‘I'm okay,' she said. ‘Thanks for this. And Rajiv, I'm sorry about—'

‘We do not have time for that,' he said. ‘I must be hanging up so I can make the inquiries.'

She turned to find Mayuree hovering behind her.

‘Where's Kob?' she hissed. ‘Where's my son?'

‘He's not here,' Jayne said. ‘The Americans have changed hotels. They won't be far away. That was my assistant on the phone. He's going to call back in a few minutes with their new location.'

Mayuree shook her head. ‘
Dichan pai mai dai
.'

‘I'm not going,' Mayuree said. ‘And I don't want you to go after them either.'

‘What do you mean?' Jayne said. ‘Without you, we have no case.'

‘You don't understand, Khun Jayne. I tried explaining when we were in Kanchanaburi.
Laew teh duang
. It is my boy's fate to go and live in America. He is lucky. It's his karma. It's my fate to have lost him.'

Jayne put a hand on Mayuree's arm.

‘Look, it's been a long day. Let's go back to my place, get some sleep, come back early tomorrow and—'

Mayuree shrugged off the hand. ‘You're not listening to me. I'm telling you, my son is better off without me.'

‘
Mai khao jai
.' Jayne shook her head.

‘I don't expect you to understand.'

‘But you're his mother.'

Mayuree stared into the distance. There was a bronze Buddha on a shelf behind Jayne, pointing the fingers of his right hand to summon the earth goddess to wring a flood of water from her hair and engulf the demons sent to tempt him. Mayuree looked into the face of the Buddha and knew she'd been a mother only in name. She'd placed her son in an institution when he was six months old and had barely seen him since. She was too proud to send him to her family in Kanchanaburi where he'd have had a better life, even under her mother's disapproving glare. She even let herself be duped into believing he was dead. A good mother would have stood up to the doctors, nurses and farangs and refused to believe it without proof. But not Mayuree.

‘How can you say that, Khun Jayne, when you know nothing about me?'

There was venom in her tone. It wasn't just about Jayne.

It was about all the times she'd failed to stand up to farangs who'd pushed her around. John who made her turn tricks to get him out of debt. Curtis who deserted her when she was pregnant. Frank who pressured her to relinquish her son then lied to her about him being dead. And Maryanne, who brought such promise into their lives, only to ruin it all with her foolishness.

If it wasn't for Maryanne, she and Sumet could have kept Kob out of institutional care. They'd managed all right before Maryanne came along. Mayuree should have known that once she lost Sumet it was only a matter of time before she'd lose Kob, too. Maryanne's ghost would never let Mayuree keep her baby when she'd been robbed of her own.

‘Go to hell,' she told them all.

Jayne's cheeks flushed red. ‘I'm sorry you feel that way, sister.'

‘Not half as sorry as I am for letting you talk me into this. I should've known better than to trust a farang.'

‘But—'

‘I've wasted enough time. Don't follow me.'

Ignoring the hurt on Jayne's face, Mayuree straightened the bag over her shoulder, turned and strode out the door of the hotel. Her heart ached for the loss of her son, but she could not fight fate. He'd been given a chance at a better life, far from the reach of vengeful ghosts. And this time Mayuree would do the right thing by him.

She'd become a good enough mother to let him go.

41

Jayne's face burned, she could hardly breathe. Like the time decades earlier when instead of swinging out on a rope into a river, she'd lost her grip and landed flat on her back in the dirt.
You've had the wind knocked out of your sails, sweetheart
, her Dad had said, rubbing her back.
You think it's your body hurting, but it's mainly your pride
.

She had no idea how long she stood in Mayuree's wake. The next thing she knew Rajiv was at her side.

‘I found them,' he said. ‘I found where the King family is staying and—' She stopped him with a raised hand and shook her head.

‘Mayuree?' he said.

She nodded. ‘Let's get out of here.'

They found a coffee shop nearby. She let Rajiv order while she lit a cigarette. She smoked half of it trying to figure out what she said to trigger Mayuree's change of heart. She dialled the woman's number. No answer.

The coffee arrived and she looked up to see Rajiv watching her across the table. He raised his eyebrows and tilted his head, a delicately posed question.

‘Mayuree doesn't want us to get her son back,' Jayne said, tipping the ash from her cigarette.

‘I am guessing that much,' Rajiv said. ‘But why?'

Jayne sighed. ‘She thinks it's Kob's destiny to live in America, that he'll be better off. She doesn't think she's fit to be his mother.'

She drew back hard on her cigarette, her words spilling out with the smoke. ‘I guess Alicia and Leroy King feel the same way. Doesn't matter that the kid was stolen. He's better off with them. And behind the scenes is that arsehole Frank Harding and his lackeys at the centre in Pattaya, preying on women like Mayuree, telling them how much better off their children would be without them. It's no bloody wonder she feels unworthy. Mayuree would have no reason to believe people like her ever get justice. We've got to prove her wrong.'

She butted out her cigarette and started gathering up her things. ‘I need to call my friend Max at the Australian Embassy. Maybe he can come with us to confront the Kings to prove it's official.'

Rajiv cleared his throat. ‘You just said Mayuree doesn't want us to pursue the matter.'

‘Yes, but I can't believe she meant it. It's just symptomatic of how little control she's had over her life.'

‘And you think it would be helping matters to take control from her in this instance, too?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘By suggesting we ignore Mayuree's decision, we are giving ourselves the right to take the control away from her again.'

Jayne frowned. ‘Maybe we know better in this case.'

Rajiv leaned over and took her hand. ‘Jayne, have you considered that Mayuree might be right—that the baby
is
better off?'

She recoiled from his touch. ‘Are you serious?'

Rajiv held up his hand. ‘Please do not be jumping down my throat. As your assistant, I'd do everything in my power to assist you in pursuing this case if that is what the client wanted. But I come from a different world than you. And in my experience—' he paused to find the right words ‘—as someone raised in a country even poorer than Thailand, I humbly suggest the child may have a better life with people who have the means to shelter him from the sort of…strife that is beyond his mother's control. And I think Mayuree knows this, even if you don't.'

Jayne slumped in her chair. She had expected Rajiv to support her. As an Indian national, surely he'd take umbrage at the assumption a child was better off growing up in the West? Instead he was using his Third World credentials to suggest she was in the wrong—the exploiter, the one who failed to understand. That made it twice in an hour she'd had such an accusation levelled against her.

She'd longed for Rajiv to stand up to her. But not like this. Not to make her doubt her own judgment. She needed confidence to survive in a place where her values were at odds with the majority, and resist the pressure to assimilate or leave. She needed confidence to succeed in her work, too, to trust her instincts. Jayne hated Rajiv for undermining her.

More than that, she hated him for being right.

Jayne straightened her shoulders and signalled for the bill. Rajiv knew he had to act quickly.

‘I am sharing your frustration,' he said. ‘But we can still build the case against those people at the centre in Pattaya to prevent them from continuing to prey on women like Mayuree.'

‘We don't have much of a case without Kob,' she shrugged, taking out her wallet.

She was angry, readying herself to walk out on him again. Rajiv's experiment in standing his ground was falling well short of winning her over. He needed to change tack.

‘I do have something for you—'

He was cut off by the ringing of her mobile phone. She glanced at the screen.

‘Hello Police Major General.'

She turned her profile to Rajiv but stayed at the table.

‘The mother has decided not to pursue the case,' she said flatly.

‘No need to try and sound surprised, Police Major General,' she added after a beat. ‘You warned me it was a long shot. I guess all that leaves us with is the search for Frank Harding and—'

Something Wichit said stopped her mid-sentence.

‘You've found Khun Frank?'

She spun around to face Rajiv again.

‘Floating face down in Pattaya Bay,' she repeated.

‘
What
?' Rajiv gasped.

She held up her hand, frowned into the phone. ‘What do you mean
no leads
? What about Frank's involvement in the adoption scam?'

Rajiv strained to hear what the Police Major General was saying.

‘So they all get away with it except Chaowalit?'

‘…'

‘You're not thinking of dropping the charges against him?'

Rajiv's eyes widened.

‘…'

‘I'll get back to you.'

‘What was all that about?' Rajiv asked.

‘Frank Harding's dead and so is the case against the New Life Children's Centre.'

‘At least that means the adoption fraud stops, isn't it?'

Rajiv said.

Jayne shook her head. ‘I doubt it. Frank might have been the front man, but I strongly suspect Doctor Somsri and whoever's behind him were the ones pulling the strings.

Chances are they'll live to defraud another day.

‘Meanwhile, I'm trying to get a revised verdict into Maryanne Delbeck's death, but the only way I can do that without exposing Sumet is to allow the police to cut a deal with Chaowalit, which means he'll probably walk on the assault charges.'

‘Why not expose Sumet?' Rajiv asked.

‘I can't see anything would be gained by it,' Jayne said.

‘He knows he made a terrible mistake and he's trying to make amends. I honestly believe he'll do more good in the monastery than he would in prison. But then again, what do I know? I'm just an insensitive farang.'

Rajiv ignored the dig.

‘Besides,' she added, ‘bringing Sumet into it means going public on his relationship with Maryanne. And you can imagine what the press here and in Australia would do with that. This probably sounds stupid, but I feel like Maryanne was let down by everyone she loved, and I just want to do the right thing by her. I'm not protecting Sumet.

I'm protecting Maryanne.' She sighed. ‘I wish I knew what she'd have wanted.'

‘I may be able to help.'

Rajiv reached into his bag and handed her a sheaf of print-outs.

‘From Maryanne's email account, the contents of the inbox and sent items folder. Unfortunately, I could not retrieve deleted items as they had already been removed from the server. It's a common default setting and—'

‘Too much information,' she said, shuffling through the paper. ‘Did you find anything interesting?'

‘In the drafts folder.' He indicated the page at the bottom of the pile. ‘A message saved but not sent.'

She read through the text and smiled.

‘You're a genius.'

Rajiv nodded his head. ‘So you're no longer angry with me?'

‘I didn't say that.'

He shrugged and lit a cigarette, an emotional smoke–screen.

‘Jayne, I need to—'

‘Look, Rajiv—'

They both spoke at once. He nodded for her to continue.

‘I'm feeling crappy about the way I've treated you. To be honest this document—' she waved Maryanne's email in the air ‘—makes my life a hell of a lot easier. And I'd like to do something for you in return. Can you meet me tomorrow morning at seven-thirty at Bangkok Noi station?'

‘Bangkok Noi station? What will I be doing?'

‘Tell your uncle you've had a tip-off about a cache of war histories from a book dealer in Kanchanaburi.'

‘Kanchanaburi?'

‘Yes,' she said, smiling again. ‘Shouting you a trip there is the least I can do.'

‘Shouting?'

‘It means the trip is on me—I'm paying. Think of it as a bonus.'

Rajiv walked home through Pahurat's laneways with a spring in his step. He might not be hero material but he was smart and resourceful, just like Hanuman the Monkey King in
The Ramakien
, which he had finished reading that afternoon.