(Roy frames Srikanth, Edwin’s protégé, for rape)
Christine Tan walked into the meeting room of the police lockup in Queenstown. She introduced herself – “Your boss, Edwin has retained my services to defend you.” – unbuckled her leather case and threw a question. “How do you two communicate?”
She spoke with a crisp voice, a slight nasal twang. A white shirt with one undone button teased without shocking.
Srikanth took one look and snapped, “By cell phone, of course!”
“Hey! Don’t get pissed with me. You got yourself into this shit hole,” she retorted. “Look, I’ve to ask you all sorts of questions over the next few sessions. Some of these will be very personal. So, what’ll it be? Play ball with me or you’d rather have your balls nailed to the wall?”
She slapped the file on the table. “That’s what they plan to do. They’re going for sodomy.”
“I don’t understand, we’re lovers.”
“Doesn’t count, not if you played leap-frog.” She completed unpacking her briefcase, pulled up a chair for herself and invited Srikanth to take his seat. He ignored her.
“Suit yourself.” She was brisk and continued. “I know what you’re thinking, every son of a bitch in that courtroom has probably screwed arses and yet they’ll be sitting in judgement of you. You think that’s strange, chew on this. You look across into an apartment; see a woman undress, you’ll be charged with peeping. You undress in your room with windows open, a woman looks, and they charge you for indecent exposure. Why? Because you’re a man and our women are sugar and spice. Didn’t you know? Now stop frigging around and work with me.” She threw her pencil on the table, folded her arms and waited.
“It’s not fair is it?” Srikanth choked.
“You’ve been banging another man’s wife and you complain about fairness?”
(An Extract from Beck And Call, A Business Thriller Set In Singapore)
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That last line told another story in and of itself! Yeah, he’s in a load of trouble, all right.
Well, Srikanth was set up but the law has a way of muddling through.
For many policemen and prosecuting attorneys, it’s more of a check box exercise. As long as enough boxes are checked off – throw it to the courts and let the courts sort it out. That’s the impression one sometimes gets here in Singapore – especially since the system is skewed heavily against the accused.
All good wishes,
Eric
You have truly captured the essence of the hard-boiled lady lawyer determined to be a bigger hard-ass than any of her male cohorts! Wonderful, realistic dialogue here. It also reveals so much about the sexual hypocrisy in our societies, doesn’t it?
Many of Singapore’s laws are a legacy of the old British laws > key word “old” – make that ‘very old’ – and had not kept up with the times, I reckon.
I’m glad the character of Christine came through in this short episode – you’re so right, she is a hard one.
I like the tone and imagery of this writing – bold and direct…in your face kind of flavor.
Thank you.
As you probably noticed, it touches on several social issues and the state’s approach.
With all the raw emotion of the real world.
Thank you Ian,
“teased without shocking” — paints the picture!
Thank you Dee.
It is easy to be explicit and raw but challenging to keep it subtle without losing impact. Glad you feel it came through okay.
Thank you, Eric