me to help carry?”
Fung Cheung waved his hand. “Whatever. Just make sure you get us chicken. I’m sick of eating musang.”
Tet Sang waited till the men had dispersed to their various tasks to say to Fung Cheung: “Was that a good idea?”
They’d stayed away from inhabited areas precisely to avoid the mata, and Kempas was the heart of the Protectorate’s domain in the Southern Seas, the centre from which they administered the affairs of the peninsula and its neighbouring islands.
“Ah Yee is getting jumpy. Better to give him face than have a problem,” said Fung Cheung. “Kempas is the last place the Protectorate will be hunting for bandits. You’ve seen the mata here. They all look like clerks.”
Tet Sang gave him a doubtful look, but Fung Cheung sighed.
“Don’t nag me, Ah Sang,” he said. “I’m doing the best I can.”
“What happens when all the men want money and a trip to town?”
Fung Cheung raised his hands in a gesture of helplessness. “We’ll have to ask your deity then. Maybe Sister Guet Imm can intervene with the goddess on our behalf.”
Your deity was a slip, a sign of Fung Cheung’s state of mind. He was the only one of the men who knew about Tet Sang’s past—the only one who had an idea of the circumstances in which Tet Sang had left his tokong—and he would not usually have been so tactless.
Tet Sang suppressed his wince. It might have been Fung Cheung who had decided to let Guet Imm come with them, but it was Tet Sang who had said she should stay—he who had endorsed her plan to approach Yeoh Thean Tee directly. He felt responsible for their position.
Guet Imm was conscious that she was under a cloud. She made herself scarce for most of the day, reappearing only in the evening with a basket of herbs and vegetables. When Ah Yee was predictably late returning to camp, she insisted on cooking dinner as a peace offering.
The men had not lost all their affection for her. It was testament to their good nature that they allowed this, and ate the results with minimal apparent disgust.
They were partway through dinner when Ah Yee and Ah Wing reappeared. Tet Sang glanced at them and put down his bowl.
Fung Cheung only took notice of others’ moods when it suited him. He raised his eyebrows. “No chicken, Ah Yee?”
Ah Yee’s expression was thunderous. Ah Wing said, glancing nervously at him, “We had to give it to the mata.”
“Ah,” said Fung Cheung gently. He had already been regretting the indulgence he had shown Ah Yee. Tet Sang could tell that this new turn aggravated him. He would shortly grow scathing.
“What happened?” said Tet Sang.
Ah Yee wouldn’t answer. He put down the provisions they had bought, sitting heavily on a log.
“Ah Yee bumped into a man outside the broth—outside the shop,” said Ah Wing. “Turned out to be a mata. He got angry, started threatening this and that. Said he wanted to arrest us. We had to give him the chicken to get him to let us go.”
“Should have given him Ah Yee,” said Fung Cheung.
“Why did the mata want to arrest you?” said Tet Sang, speaking over him. “Did he recognise you all?”
It seemed unlikely. Ah Yee and Ah Wing had not appeared on the wanted posters identifying Lau Fung Cheung and his men as enemies of the Protectorate. It was true both Ah Yee and Ah Wing had been convicts before they had joined the group, but they had done their time.
Ah Wing shook his head. “The mata wanted to pick a fight only. He was drunk.”
“He wasn’t the only one,” said Fung Cheung, looking at Ah Yee.
Ah Yee did in fact smell of beer, as did Ah Wing, but Fung Cheung could have expected nothing else when he gave them money and permission to go to town. It was injudicious of him to take out his displeasure about his own bad decision-making on Ah Yee. Tet Sang shot him a warning look.
“Maybe we were not so polite before we realised he was a mata,” conceded Ah Wing. “But it was okay in the end. He was very happy about the chicken.”
Fung Cheung was evidently not done making jibes. But before he could think of any more, Ah Yee spoke.
“The girl saw from the window,” he said. He must have had more to drink than Ah Wing; his voice was thick. “She laughed at me.”
“So what?” said Fung Cheung. “Can’t be the first time