I shrugged. “For all I know about Thai, it’s pronounced Chuck Smith.”

“Male or female?”

“I’ll assume male. Records show that CS bought the place a dozen years back, which dovetails with the upsurgence in Thai shrimp fishermen moving into the area.”

“Address? Phone?”

“No listed address. Phone disconnected five years back.”

“Probably switched to a cell and stiffed the phone company.”

“Wonderful,” I said. “A name we can’t pronounce, a phone we can’t call, an address that ain’t listed.”

“It’s an immigrant community,” Harry mused. “Extremely close-knit, I expect, the protection of the tribe. We have to assume that somewhere in the area is a Thai who has knowledge of his kinsman’s – CS’s – whereabouts.”

“So where from here, Mr Anthropology?” I asked.

“Let’s go to lunch and see if we can dig up some family Thais.” He grinned at me, the first time in days he’d looked happy about anything but Noelle. “Pun intended.”

We ended up at a tiny Thai restaurant and grocery in Harry’s neighborhood. We’d eaten there a few times, always a delicious experience. We sat in the eight-table dining area, the walls green and embellished with posters of Thai temples. Paper lanterns gave a soft light. The room was fragrant with garlic and ginger and chilis. The owner, a man in his early sixties, came out to meet us. Harry pulled him aside and spoke for a few minutes, and the man gave a half-bow and returned to the kitchen.

“Well?” I asked.

Harry said, “Mr Srisai thinks he speaks English worse than he does. He’s calling someone who might help us. It’ll be a few minutes.”

We ordered pad Thai and pad see yew, trading halfsies. Harry doused his with nam pla, I went heavy on the chili paste. We ate and watched visitors to the adjoining grocery select from a variety of vegetables that were unfamiliar to me, save for ropy knots of ginger and fragrant sprays of cilantro. I saw a blue beamer pull from the street to the rear of the restaurant. I listened for the back door and heard it through the potwash din of the kitchen.

Two minutes later, the kitchen door opened to reveal a short, slender man in his mid twenties. He wore sandals, unpressed khakis and a T-shirt from the University of Alabama. His short black hair was arrayed in abbreviated spikes, like being hip, but having to temper it for the office. The soft angles of his round face were further softened by owlish eyeglasses. We did introductions, shook hands. Kiet Srisai was the owner’s eldest son.

“You a student at the U of A?” I asked, nodding at the shirt.

“A recent graduate. Architectural engineering. I’m working for a firm a couple miles from here. Father tells me you have questions about Thai fishermen down the coast.” His English was excellent and musical.

“The shrimpers near the border. The ones hit by the recent ‘caines.”

He nodded. “I knew the community, small, maybe a dozen families. They came here to the restaurant and grocery when in town. Very close-knit. They were scattered like leaves by the hurricanes. Some blew off to Texas, others to Louisiana. Others as far as California. Most will be near water, that’s all I can say. All they know is fishing.”

I again studied the name on the note page, handed it to Srisai. “Such a long name,” I said. “Is that common?”

“It’s the Chinese influence. Native Thais tend toward simple, short surnames, like Srisai. Immigrants from China had to register a name with the government, a minimum of ten characters. But favored combinations of letters got taken. No duplication is allowed, so the names are increased in length to be unique. Many are over twenty characters long.”

Harry said, “And I’ve been trying for decades to get folks to spell Nautilus right.”

Srisai’s face went from affable to apologetic. “Also, and perhaps this will add to your burden, Thais often change their names. In Thailand, names have mystery and meaning. Thais are very superstitious. If bad luck befalls a person, they might change their name to change their luck.”

Harry frowned. “Getting blown out of job and home by a series of hurricanes might be interpreted as pretty bad luck. So the person we’re looking for under this name…”

Srisai nodded. “Might not be using that name. At least not fully.”

“Can you help at all, Mr Srisai?” I asked.

“The fishing community is very inwardly focused, Detective. They’re also viewed with suspicion by the locals – many look on them as interlopers and stealers of jobs. The fishing people have sometimes been the focus of overzealous law enforcement.”

“The kind that says, ‘We don’t need you here’?” Harry asked.

Srisai nodded, sadness in his eyes. “Yes. Thus your, uh, police ties might be a difficulty in getting people to come forward.”

I looked Srisai in an owlish eye. “Someone killed a man with a shark spear, Mr Srisai. A harpoon straight into the belly. The death was neither immediate nor pretty. A fire was started to hide the body. All we want is information.”

Kiet Srisai studied the name I had handed him. He folded the paper and put it in his wallet.

“I’ll put out the word. Our family is known and respected. People may respond if they know anything.”

I reached to the table and picked up the fortune cookie that had accompanied the meal. “So fortune cookies are in Thailand as well as China?” I asked Srisai.

“The cookie idea actually originated in San Francisco years ago, in Chinatown. It’s not a Thai tradition. But the, uh, natives seem to like the concept, so we…” Srisai smiled sheepishly, spread his hands.

“Give ‘em what they want,” Harry finished. He looked at me. “What’s it say, Carson?”

I slipped the paper strip from the broken cookie. Stared at the tiny writing.

Small steps will eventually take you a great distance.

Chapter 18

Back at HQ, Tom Mason saw us as we walked into the detectives’ room with steps neither small nor large, and gestured us into his office. Tom was behind a metal desk as file-laden as ours, though he lined up the file edges better. Tom was in his mid fifties, rail-skinny, with a face as wrinkled and lugubrious as a basset hound. He was totally unflappable and spoke in a country drawl so slow that waiting for words was like watching cold molasses drop into a biscuit.

“You’re off anything with the baby snatcher involved, Harry,” Tom said. “You had direct involvement in the case, and killed the chief suspect. It’s over on the kid case for you.”

“Come on, Tom,” Harry complained. “I can still work the edges.”

“Procedure says it ain’t gonna happen, Harry. Anyway, here’s the case I need you guys to put to bed,” Tom said, holding up the morning New York Times. The biggest headline read, Rev. ScalerFound Dead in Church Camp. Details Pending Autopsy.

“The Scaler case?” I said. “It’s not a murder. The guy died of a heart attack while wearing panties upside-down.”

“First,” Tom said, “we don’t know anything for sure, right?”

I turned from the blinds. “Not a hundred per cent. Maybe ninety-nine point –”

“Secondly, it’s high-publicity, gonna get higher. You guys are the first team, and the city council and chief are gonna want me to tell them the first team’s on the case, right?”

“That’s just diddle-squat politics,” I groused.

“Playing diddle-squat politics is what keeps me in the corner office. Scaler’s yours for now. Find out who was with the Rev. in his final moments, get all this ugliness figured out.”

“Why?” I continued to protest. “It’s all gonna be kept under wraps. Half the politicians in Washington attended Scaler’s services and prayer breakfasts. Everyone knows Scaler’s support put Senator Custis in office and kept him there. You know what’ll finally come out: Scaler died of a heart attack while writing pietistic sermons at his church camp. The dom who beat Scaler’s butt will be threatened by one of Scaler’s lawyers and offered money by another. Stick and carrot. She’ll clam tight. Richard Scaler’s reputation will stay pure as the driven rain.”