sarong,” he said. “We have to get to the main road and get out of town. Right now, people will be going to market. We need to blend in. There’ll be plenty of men looking like me. Men escorting a nun, not so much.”
He looked at Guet Imm’s head, frowning. It had sprouted a thin fuzz since she’d joined the group, but it would still single her out in the market-going crowd. Then he had an inspiration.
“You stay here and change,” he said. “I’ll be back.”
He wasn’t gone for long. Guet Imm was knotting her sarong by the time he returned. She might have worn a sarong before, but her fumbling hands suggested it hadn’t been often. It wasn’t likely her ikat would hold.
“Let me do,” said Tet Sang.
He retied the cloth, focusing on the print. It was a colourful patterned import from the islands south of the peninsula, of the kind popular among Tang matrons. The style was a little old for Guet Imm, but it wasn’t like he’d had the luxury to pick and choose.
He’d never seen Guet Imm’s shoulders before. She smelt of sweat, but there was no trace of the scent of fear. Tet Sang would have recognised it.
He tried to touch her as little as possible.
When he was done, he set on her head what he’d picked up from the rattan shop—a wide-brimmed farmer’s hat, casting all beneath it into shade. It looked a little strange—farmers didn’t go around in sarongs with their arms exposed to the elements—but it would stand out less than Guet Imm’s bare head. He put another hat on his own head and shoved Guet Imm’s votarial robes into a rattan basket.
“Did you pay for these?” said Guet Imm, touching her hat.
“If you sleep in your shop,” said Tet Sang, “you can’t complain when people steal your wares.”
In fact, he had left some coins as payment. But he’d already betrayed too much about himself to Guet Imm that day.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“Eight hundred cash down the drain,” said Fung Cheung. “Eight hundred cash!” He ran his hands through his hair.
Tet Sang sat erect with his hands on his knees, trying to ignore the pounding at his temples. It had been a long, hot march from the sundry shop, where they had picked up Rimau and Ah Boon, to their camp. As if baking in the blistering midday sun wasn’t enough, now he had to deal with Fung Cheung throwing a tantrum while the others packed up around them.
Guet Imm was uncharacteristically quiet. He found himself wishing for once that she would talk—cajole Fung Cheung out of his foul mood with her quicksilver charm. Lacking charm, Tet Sang fell back on common sense.
“Ng’s boss won’t want to make trouble,” he said. “He’s close to the Protector. Any rumour he’s working with people like us would cause problems for him. If he’s smart, he’ll leave us alone. He risks more by chasing us.”
“Not if he tells the Protectorate we stole one thousand six hundred cash from him,” said Fung Cheung.
Tet Sang’s head was swimming. It was hard to focus on what Fung Cheung was saying. It took a moment before he understood.
“You mean the deposit,” said Tet Sang. “But that was only eight hundred cash.”
“And where do you think the balance went?” said Fung Cheung witheringly. “You think this Mr Ng took the chest with the rest of the money back to his boss? Even if he split with Mr Tan to keep him quiet, that’s four hundred each. All he has to do is tell his boss we ran away with it.”
Tet Sang’s headache was getting worse.
“Okay,” he said. “Maybe you’re right. But the buyer is a fair man. If we go to him directly and explain, he’ll understand. He of all people should know there was always a risk of interference from the mata. Even if we can only pay back half, that’s better than nothing. There’s no reason for us to give back the deposit if we were really trying to steal from him.”
“That’s not an option,” said Fung Cheung.
Tet Sang stared, but Fung Cheung wouldn’t meet his eyes. A sickening certainty descended on him.
“We said we would keep the money until the job was done,” said Tet Sang.
“We had to pay for the rice. Nobody gives credit for rice these days.”
“You didn’t spend eight hundred cash on rice. We were going to use the takings from the last job. What happened to that?”
Tet Sang would have been more tactful