days since I’d danced with the ill-fated salesman Chan Yew Cheung. Rose had just finished telling us how she’d stayed up all night because her little girl had a bad cough, when she suddenly said, “Oh, he’s back!”
A customer was scrutinizing us. He had a narrow face with a crooked chin, as if his head had been caught in a vise. Guessing he was the man Hui had warned me about, I got up in alarm, but he was too quick for me.
“May I have this dance?”
I hesitated, but the Mama’s eagle eye was on me. I’d no reason to refuse, though my stomach twisted with dismay. Surprisingly, he was a good dancer. We went around the floor a couple of times; I was beginning to think my suspicions were unfounded when he said, “You must be Ji Lin.”
“I could be, if you wanted,” I forced a smile. “But I’m afraid my name is Louise.”
“I’m looking for a girl who picked up something last week. A family heirloom of mine.”
For an instant, I was tempted to come clean. I’d already fulfilled my obligation to the salesman’s family. But I no longer had the finger; if Shin had destroyed it, this man might be furious. Hedging, I said, “What does it look like?”
“It’s my ancestor’s finger from China that’s been in our family for generations. My friend borrowed it last week. He said he’d lost it here.”
“A finger?” I tried to look surprised, even horrified. He watched me carefully. I wondered if he was lying. According to the salesman’s wife, her husband had possessed the finger for the last three months. “I’ll ask around for you.”
“Let me know,” he said, staring intently. “You can leave a message for me here.” He scribbled down the address of a coffee shop on Leech Street together with a name: Mr. Y. K. Wong.
“If you find it, I’ll give you a reward. For sentimental reasons.” He smiled his sharp-toothed smile.
After that, he danced with several other girls, who later confirmed that he’d asked them the same questions: if they were called Ji Lin, and if they’d picked anything up, though nothing about missing fingers. I recalled the way he’d made a beeline over to me as soon as he’d entered and a shiver traced the back of my neck.
“I’m surprised you came in today,” said Rose, fanning herself vigorously during an intermission, while the band drank soda water and mopped their brows. Despite the face powder, her forehead was almost as shiny as the parquet dance floor, and I was sure that I was no better.
“I need the money.”
“If that’s the case,” said Rose, “want to make extra?”
I shook my head. “No call-outs.”
Call-outs were when a man would book a girl outside the dance hall, ostensibly to take her shopping or to eat a meal. They were lucrative, but everything came, of course, with a price. I’d explained to the Mama from the very first that I wouldn’t do them. The incident today with Mr. Y. K. Wong, if that was really his name, reminded me just how vulnerable I felt with a stranger. And we hadn’t even been alone—we’d been dancing in full view of dozens of people.
“It’s not a call-out. I have this client who asked me if I could find a few girls to dance at a private party. And he promised, no hanky-panky.”
“There’s no such thing as a private party with no hanky-panky.”
Rose smiled. “What a grandma you are! I wasn’t too keen, either, so I told him we’d have to get the dance-hall Mama’s permission—to put him off, you know. But he went and asked her and she said yes!”
“She did?” I had a hard time believing this.
“Well, she’ll get a nice commission, and she said she’d send one of the bouncers with us and hire a car. They want four or five girls because there are lots of bachelors and they want to dance. It’ll be in Batu Gajah.”
I paused. “At the hospital?” If it was, I couldn’t go. I’d no intention of revealing my seedy part-time job to Shin.
“No, a private residence in Changkat.”
I’d heard of Changkat, a prime residential area situated uphill of Batu Gajah. “Does that mean they’ll be foreigners?”
“Do you mind?”
Most of the customers at the May Flower were locals though there were always some Europeans in the mix. Not as many as at the glamorous Celestial Hotel, but a fair smattering on any given afternoon. They were mostly planters or civil servants, servicemen, and