Half pay

For four Saturdays, Arif copied the dictionary. It was still tedious work, but the money was real, and by the fourth week he had reached the letter B.

On the fifth Saturday, the door on the third floor was locked. A small card was taped to it.

No phone number. No Mr Lim.

"So your eccentric millionaire just disappeared?" Maya asked. They were sitting in the school canteen, sharing a plate of roti canai.

"I have to tell you something," Arif said. He looked apprehensive, worried about what she would say. "My uncle has a small photocopy shop on the ground floor of that building. I usually help him on Saturday mornings."

"And who looks after the shop when you are upstairs?"

"His new assistant, Ken. Ken works for a meagre salary, about half of what anyone else would ask. My uncle thinks he is the luckiest man in Kuala Lumpur."

"Who showed you the advert?"

Arif paused. "Ken did."

Maya put down her fork. "Be candid with me. Tell me everything, even the parts that seem silly."

"Ken is very quiet, almost inconspicuous. You forget he is in the room. He spends hours in the basement, fixing old machines, he says. And he keeps the basement door locked."

Maya did not want to speculate. Guessing was easy; proving was hard. Still, Ken's story sounded dubious, and she did not trust it at all.

As they left the canteen, Arif added one last detail. "Yesterday Ken came up from the basement with a furtive look, like a boy hiding a phone in class. When he saw me, he shut the door very fast."