The Thai Amulet by Lyn Hamilton

States. I fell in love with Thailand, everything about it, even the heat. So when the time came to go back, I quit and got the job with the travel agency. I manage two of their offices. It’s not the best job ever, but it’s not bad, and it allows me to stay here awhile longer.”
    “So what is this film about?” I asked. “The one you need the sword for.”
    “I can’t tell you that,” she said. “It’s all very hush-hush.”
    “I see,” I said. “It will be difficult for me to convince my client to lend you this if I can’t tell him what it’s about. I’m sorry to have to say that a card with Tatiana Tucker, Producer, on it is not very reassuring in terms of lending an exceptionally valuable antique.”
    “You really would talk to him?”
    “Sure. I have no idea what he’d think of the idea, but yes, of course I would as him. So is this a historical drama of some sort? Sixteenth-century Siam or something like that?”
    “Sixteenth century!” she exclaimed. “Who cares what happened that long ago?”
    “I do,” I said. “Perhaps I delude myself, but I can’t help feeling there are others like me.”
    “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve offended you again.” She looked about as if she thought someone might be hiding in the trunk with a listening device, or that the driver might be a spy. “Helen Ford,” she whispered.
    “What?” I said.
    “Helen Ford,” she repeated. “You probably never heard of her, but you will.”
    “Isn’t she the one who… ?” I paused, searching through my memory to the newspaper clippings Will had sent Natalie.
    “Chopped her husband into little bits? That’s her. Don’t you think it’s a fabulous idea? I’ve pitched it to a major studio, and they’re interested, but they need more before they make a final decision. Docudramas are huge right now. I’m thinking I might even be able to find her.”
    “But she’s dead,” I said. “She was executed March 1, 1952.”
    “No, she wasn’t. There was an appeal, and the sentence was commuted. She was supposed to serve life in prison, but I think she was only there a couple of years, maybe three, and then she just disappeared. I think this is really interesting, don’t you? I mean normally when a
farang
is charged with something and found guilty, they are simply deported to their home country to deal with, particularly when the crime is against another
farang,
if you see what I mean. But the whole expat community was up in arms about this crime, and it really was horrendous. So how did she get off, and where did she go?”
    “Back to the States?” I said.
    “Maybe, but there is no record of her doing that.”
    “That was fifty years ago. She could be long gone.”
    “Yes, but if she’s alive, she’s only seventy-eight. That’s not impossible.”
    “So what gave you this idea?” I said. “I went to an Independence Day party,” she said. “At the apartment of an antique dealer, just like you. He told me all about her, or at least I managed to extract the information out of him after a few drinks and a lot of eyelash batting. He was writing a book. He gave me a copy of the first chapter. He had an agent and everything, Rowland, some name like that. The agent was at the party, but I didn’t like him. Will said that what was really interesting was not the murder but the fact that she’d been able to just disappear. He said somebody must know where she went, even if they hadn’t talked in fifty years, and he had a pretty good idea who might know, even if she wasn’t saying. I told him it would make a fabulous documentary, and he agreed. I sent an E-mail proposal off to a couple of studios right away, and got a semipositive reply. I was hoping Will—that’s his name—would be a consultant and help me out a bit, but I haven’t been able to get in touch with him since. I don’t want you to think I was just stealing his idea, or anything.”
    “Will Beauchamp,” I said. “You know him? No