The dragon was coming. Scarlet and gold, its mouth as wide as an open window, it swayed down the centre of the road. The crowed cheered. Low Hee cheered. This was why he'd waited all morning in the sun.

Low Hee and some of his mates from school were messing around in the crowds, scooting between legs, laughing when people nearly toppled. Because it was the last day of the New Year celebrations, their victims laughed back. Old women handed them laisee envelopes, red packets stuffed with coins, and everyone tossed sweets at everyone else.

Now, he realized, he was too far back. Cymbals and bells, tumblers and jugglers came first in the procession, but the dragon would soon be in vew. All Low could see were the heads in front. He dropped to his knees and wriggled his shoulders between two sets of silk-draped legs. He would be at the front in seconds.

'Come here!'

Low Hee's grandmother had him by the sleeve. Her face was grim. He stopped wriggling.

'I wasn't doing anything,' he mumbled, swallowing a mouthful of chocolate bar. 'And the dragon is coming!' He was longing to see it. But his grandmother's hold on his sleeve was as tight as her expression. There was nothing else he could do but follow her through the wide portals of the temple.

The gigantic statue of the Buddhu dominated a whole wall of the temple. It smiled down with a mocking leer. Low Hee longed to poke its huge stomach. He could almost believe that his finger would not hit hard, cold metal, but disappear into the softness of fat and skin.

Just by the entrance, a fortune-telller sat behind a small table of ornate ivory. He was so ancient, the skin of his hairless head was as pale and smooth as his table. Behind him, hangings dangled from the wall proclaiming his skills in divinatation. A cluster of people had gathered round him, plucking out straws of differing lengths from vases decorated with gilded serpants.

Low's grandmother, Ee Tsang, was talking to the wizended old man. She always had her fortune told when she had any important decision to make, but she did not usually include her grandson. Low moved closer, fascinated despite his longing to see the dragon.

'What is the boy's age?' the fortune-teller was saying.

'He is nearly twelve years old,' Ee Tsang replied. She seated herself comfortably, at the request of the teller. Low stood beside her, his lips half parted and warm breath moving fast through his teeth. They were talking about him. His future.

'What is the problem that besets him?'

'I wish to know if my gandson will take a long voyage.'

'Grandmother...' Low Hee began. But he was quicly silent when Ee Tsang gve him a sharp look. Low knew it would be disrespectful to ask her for an explanation. He was only a boy; he had no right to question why his grandmother wanted his fortune told. He stayed quite still until Ee Tsang raised a silk-covered arm and motioned for him to pick a straw.

Low Hee's finger's hovered over the porcelain vase. His gaze caught the old man's and for just a moment, Low looked into his rheumy eyes. It was as though he could see his own destiny in their wet depths, without ever hearing it spoken out loud. He let his fingers rest on a single straw. He drew it out and passed it to the man.

'The journey is a certain one,' squeaked the soothsayer. 'The journey is a long one. He will not return.'

Ee Tsang's head suddenly bobbed down onto her finely embroidered New Year clothes. She shut her eyes tightly, but not before the wrinkled skin around them had become wet. Low saw her fingers work around themselves in her lap. The knuckles were white. He'd never seen his grandmother lose her self-possession in public.

Embarrassed, he turned his attention to the grinning Buddha. Now he knew whey that grin mocked him. His head swam with new thoughts. His lips silently formed the words, 'my father'.

Low knew he ought to be able to remember his father's face. He'd been four and a half when his parents had left Malaysia and he could remember plenty of things that happened when he was four, including the trip across the Straits to the orang-utan enclosure. He kenw he'd been taken by his parents as a last treat before they left for England, but although he could clearly picture the apes as they chased each other over the ground and into the high trees, he couldn't remember his father at all, or much about his mother. If he struggled, however, he could bring an image into his mind of an almond lady. An almond-shaped face with almond-coloured skin. Even the smell of her was almond. He could recollect bringing his lips to a soft, sweet-scented cheek, and words, coming through a mist, the last words she must have spoken to him.

'Your honourable grandmother is to be your mother now. Esteem her highly, Low Hee, and carry yourself with pride while we are away. We will fetch you just as soon as we can...'

Seven years. At first he'd waited every day for them to return, but bit by bit, he'd given up waiting. He didn't even know what he was waiting for. It was impossible to imagine where his parents had gone, and what they were doing now.

It only took Ee Tsang a moment to compose herself. She rose, passed the fortune-teller his fee and shuffled off in search of candles and prayer-papers, for now she had an important petition for the Enlightened One.

I should go with her, Low thought, make her tell me what it all means. As if I can't guess.

But voices were floating in througb the open temple portal. 'The dragon is coming! The dragon is coming!' and Low ran out into the sunlight, choosing a friendly red monster against a nameless, shapeless one