The Demon and the City

garbage entered. The only choice was to stifle or gag. Robin compromised, shutting the little window in the bedroom and turning on the kitchen fan, which after a minute started to limp around its central spoke. A single step took her back into the main room. She took off her overall tunic and bundled it into a ball so that the Paugeng logo was no longer visible, then stuffed it under the pillow of her futon. The last thing she wanted to think about was work, and if she glimpsed it out of the corner of her eye, the logo looked like a bloodstain. If she looked crumpled next morning, then so be it. She turned on the television, hoping for the news, but no sooner had she sat down than there was a bang at the door. Robin bounced up and flung it open.
    "Deveth—" she began, but there was only the empty air. Robin looked down. A small, resentful face was turned upward in reproach.
    "I got your noodles," it said sourly. "And your pak choi."
    "Good!" Robin said. She had forgotten that she had hired next-door's child to bring her a takeout. She forced money, evidently not as much as the child was expecting, into its grimy hand.
    "Is that all?" it said.
    "That's all you get," Robin told it, and shut the door.
    She carried the oily paper packet back to the television, eating absently with one hand. On the viewer, Malaysian screen idol Inditraya Samay held up a rosy pomegranate and moved her winsome head to one side. Revolting , Robin thought. What had happened to the news? She reached for the remote and Samay's pretty pout was ruthlessly intercepted. A long shot of bodies on stretchers was more promising: the news on Channel 8. Robin settled down grimly to watch. Tremors in Sengeng had collapsed a road, compressing its four parallel lanes into a grisly sandwich. The cause—either a grumbling fault line or excessive open-cast mining in Sengeng Paray—depended on political affiliation. No mention was made of the Feng Shui Practitioners' Guild who had, it seemed, failed to predict the disaster. One of the senior dowsers was featured, loudly protesting their blamelessness.
    Finishing her noodles, Robin took the greasy packet out to the kitchen. It was a mess. Normally, an old lady named Mrs Pa came in to do the cleaning, but poor Mrs Pa had been sick over the last few days, and the general chaos natural to Robin's apartment had mounted. A tower of takeout packets spilled over the sink and a stack of dirty plates sat precariously on the little work surface. Robin could barely see the floor of the main room for the clothes that were scattered over it. She piled them in a heap on the floor of the cupboard, then furiously attacked the kitchen, piling the rubbish into a bag and sealing it shut with a snap. She stacked the plates in the sink and hauled the garbage bag out through the small rectangle of the kitchen hatch onto the fire escape, which rose up from the side alley like an ironwork plant from its composting bed.
    It was still hot, a humid, reeking heat. The neighboring buildings were squat shadows against the taller buildings of Shaopeng, and the sky was a deep, clear crimson, unusual for the polluted port. As Robin stepped out onto the fire escape, the evening heat wrapped around her like polythene: a moist embrace of carbon dioxide, drains and the oily reek of the river. Another, more organic, odor insinuated itself into the air. Looking down from the top of the fire escape, Robin saw that the black garbage bags had accumulated at the bottom until they burst, spilling a mélange of rotten vegetables around the iron feet of the staircase. Through this bath of odors wound a thread of incense from the apartment below, a spicy breath out of the squalor.
    A rattling, scuffling sound arrested Robin's attention halfway down the fire escape. She stopped and peered into the dim alleyway. The sound was purposeful, determined, and came from the bottom of the fire escape. She leaned over the railing, and saw that the black back of the uppermost garbage bag was heaving. From her position at the fourth floor, and directly above, it resembled a seal; it rolled and wallowed in the filth that littered the alleyway. The bag spat tins, and a sheaf of old papers. Two floors down, a door was flung open and the voice of the occupant roared, "What's all that fucking racket? Get out of there! Bloody dogs!"
    The animal backed out of its larder and bolted down the alley. Robin caught a glimpse of an ungainly gait and a fat, spotted spine; it did