They had barricaded the streets, their bamboo rickshaws laden with stolen sacks of cement and rubber and coffee beans. They were defying the curfew, the government’s sudden and draconic declaration of martial law, which lay over Singapore like a blanket of lead. The streets were the army’s now. And the skies, too.... Tall monsoon clouds over the morning South China Sea, a glamorous tropic gleam like puffed gray silk. Against the clouds, the dragonfly cutouts of police helicopters.