by Nick Seeley
A cleaver-faced Japanese man pours my beer as I sit. Kara raises her glass, and we drink together.
Tastes like heaven.
* * *
By our third lunch together—oysters on the half shell, probably flown in by helicopter; chicken Caesar salad, Sapphire martinis—we’re tired of talking about how nice the weather is in Battambang. I don’t know what Kara wants from me, but I’m going to make the most of it.
“When are you going to tell me who Luke and Chua were moving heroin for?”
Surprisingly, I get an answer.
“I don’t suppose the names of West Coast triad overlords mean much to you?”
“Nah.”
“Well, it was one of the major ones. He got tired of dealing with the Mexicans, and decided to reopen the Eastern Pipeline.” It makes more than a little sense: the Golden Triangle, where Burma, Laos, and Thailand meet, used to be the biggest source of heroin for the US. After the Burmese bought out Khun Sa in the early nineties, the flow dropped to a trickle. If the triads could start it up again, they could carve away the Mexicans’ territory with a better product.
“So Cambo is just the tip of the iceberg,” I say.
“Oh, yes. This was a sophisticated operation. They saw how the South American cocaine cartels worked and figured they could start the same thing up here. They were playing a long game, working Burma, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam . . .”
She lets it sink in: how very much I should be dead. I think about it as I freshen my drink.
“I don’t understand why you’re telling me this.”
She doesn’t answer, just swirls her glass like she’s enjoying herself. Her eyes say: You’re mine.
* * *
The rest of the story comes in bits and pieces. While we hide up here drinking martinis, Kara’s guys are crawling the country. Every day brings some new update. One morning, she tells me they’ve found a bunch of customized boats hidden in a Cambodian port: tugs and trawlers with cleverly disguised compartments, the kind that could carry tons of product through US customs undetected. Another day, they’ve turned up two more aid organizations with plants in them: guys like Luke, scouting out the kind of desperate, isolated communities where refining and smuggling would seem like good business to the locals.
Turns out the Koh Kong governor really did order the break-in at Luke’s office: not because of the damn assessment, but because he guessed about the smuggling and wanted his cut. He thought he was dealing with a few rogues, not a major international operation. Chua got him straightened out somehow, and that blew over.
Mostly, the triads had been able to co-opt or bully existing outfits into working with them. But here, General Peng and his army buddies weren’t interested in new partners. So Chua and the other lieutenant in charge, a guy Kara called Tan, got the bright idea to turn the police against the army. Hok Lundy went for it: saw a chance to expand his operation and get Peng out of his way. Maybe he thought he’d be prime minister someday. He came up with the idea of using the international advisers as cat’s paws: he knew a hand-picked police unit to root out the drug runners in the security services would appeal to guys like Steve. The police could harass the competition and everyone would think it was just standard foreign interference—really, they were figuring out how to take over. When the Sydney bust made waves, Hok Lundy just blamed the Australians, made some payoffs, and everyone calmed down.
Peng didn’t see the trouble coming until he wound up in the back of a police van. Then he struck back hard, taking out officers, friends and family members of task force officials—including Charlie. But he was in a vise: his bloody payback made Hun Sen look weak, and that couldn’t stand, not with the political deadlock.
Now Kara’s seen an opening, and she’s taking it. I don’t ask what her endgame is—figure the yakuza has its own reasons to worry about the triads getting too much power.
I worry about what comes next.
Do I ever get to leave this hotel? It’s packed with Japanese now—a tour bus full of young, middle-income couples from Kobe, looking for peace and quiet and natural healing. Their stories check out, long as you don’t look them in the eye. I can’t get from my room to the elevator without one of them latching onto me, wanting to talk in broken English about how beautiful the backcountry is.
I don’t see much of Keihatsu—I think mostly he babysits Chua, whose leash is even shorter than mine. But Kara is always around. She keeps me close. At any hour, Miss Eyre or one of Kara’s crew of young, female “personal assistants” might show up to summon me to the suite. There are usually drinks, and always questions. Kara pumps me on Cambodian politics, on various officials and their roles, on who’s who in the criminal underworld. Other times she just appears, unannounced. I might wake to find her working at the desk next to my bed, or sitting on my balcony to watch the sunset. On these occasions, she says nothing at all.
It frightens me that I am becoming used to her presence.
One thing we never talk about. Kara is taking apart Chua’s organization piece by piece, but there’s been no sign of her sister. Chua says he never saw her: I believe him. It’s possible Luke killed her without telling his boss and dumped her body in the water somewhere, but it doesn’t seem likely: they were all too disciplined for that.
One day, Kara asks for details about the body in the mangroves. She seems particularly interested in the marks Bun My found on the bones: “I’d like to see them.”
“Lon can take you there.”
“Lon?”
“The boatman. He’ll remember.” I’m not hiding the bitterness in my voice. “It had to be him who told Luke what we were up to. Best guess, he was paid to report on who was moving around that bit of coast. He can take you right to the spot.”
“Yes.”
I catch her look and realize what I’ve done, but it’s too late.
* * *
In the dream, I’m back in Koh Kong. It’s just before dawn, the main street empty and black. I walk down to the marina. For a little while, Phann walks with me, still in silence.
This always happens at the beginning.
I find Lon tying up his boat. When he sees me, his eyes go white and he starts to babble, then turns like he’s going to run. I show him Phann’s pistol and he stands still, not sure whether to look at my eyes or the gun.
“Relax,” I say. “We’re just going to the island.” I start up the little engine, guiding us out of the harbor.
The sea is charcoal, the sky is ash. Clouds like mountain ranges hang overhead. The land recedes behind us.
“Just to the island?” Lon asks.
“Yeah.”
“What you want see?”
I don’t answer. Finally, we come far enough out that we see nothing at all: dark water extending to a dark horizon. I cut the motor and we sit there awhile, both of us waiting for light.
“You have to answer for Phann,” I say at last. He starts to protest, to say he doesn’t know what I’m talking about. I cut him off. “You sold us out to Luke, and Phann ended up dead.” He doesn’t say anything, just stares straight ahead, his head hanging slightly. I’m undoing my belt. “He wasn’t a good guy; he probably had it coming. But I liked him. And I got him into this, so I can’t let it go.”
He nods slightly, still looking out at the horizon. I loop the belt over his neck and pull the buckle tight. It’s slow work, choking a man. He claws at the leather a little—not much. His eyes never leave that thin line in the distance. The sky does its magic thing, changing from ugly gray to brilliant blue so subtly that you can’t quite say when it happened. Finally, it’s done. I stand up, carefully, and lay the body back against the motor. Lash him down with the belt. I have Mr. Chua’s knife in my pocket, and I use it to make two deep slashes in his abdomen, so the sea will keep him.
I expect to feel something, but I don’t. I have plenty of blood on my hands already. Doing it myself doesn’t feel any different.
There’s a dark shape in the distanc
e now. I wait, standing, as it grows closer. After a while it pulls up next to us: a small commercial tug. Keihatsu waves down at me from the deck and lowers a rope. I climb up.
When I’m standing next to him, I pull Phann’s gun from my waistband and empty the clip into the bottom of the little boat. It fills with water shockingly fast, and in less than a minute it’s gone, along with the body, down into that warm, gray nothing. Keihatsu laughs and claps me on the back. Job well done. You made your bones, kid. Come on, she’s waiting.
I put the gun back in my belt. When I turn around, though, I see who’s driving.
It’s Dead Charlie.
Behind him, the whole damned crew: the Aussie and Bunny, and the dead Afghans, and more. They fill the boat there are so many. Lon clambers over the side to join them, seawater pouring from his sliced-up guts.
“Where are we going?” I ask.
“Just to the island,” says Charlie. “She’s waiting.”
“Who’s waiting?”
He just laughs and spins the wheel. The boat starts to sink.
* * *
I claw my way out of the sheets, gasping for air.
Light a cigarette. I can’t drink anything—still expecting to wake up, my lungs full of warm water. It takes a while to believe I’m really in my hotel room, and not out there, sinking slowly into the Gulf.
* * *
Walking through the hotel lobby, backpack slung over my shoulder.
This is a test.
No one stops me as I head for the door. I’m outside and halfway to the row of motodops when I feel someone at my elbow—recognize the driver of the tour bus.
“Sir, I hope we have not offended you with our presence in your hotel. As an honored guest, I offer you free ride in our tours limousine.”
“No thanks. I prefer the bike.”
Big smile, deep bow.
“Of course, sir.”
One moto has nosed out of the pack and pulled up in front of me. I ignore him, slinging myself up behind the third guy in line and telling him to take me downtown. There’s a bar I know from before, in an old Khmer house overlooking the Sangker River.
I don’t see anyone following us on the ride down, but when I arrive, Miss Eyre is sitting at a table in the corner. She doesn’t move as I find a space and order a drink. She doesn’t even seem to be watching.
I know better.
I’m not getting out today—but that’s not why I came here. It’s afternoon, and getting on to hot. I order an Angkor. Drink it; order another. From my table on the balcony, I watch the Sangker creeping by below, sticky and slow as maple syrup. Clouds of midges and mosquitoes whirl over its surface. Finish the second beer.
It takes a half dozen of them for the girls in this hick town to start looking good—but the state I’m in, I don’t mind the extra work. One keeps looking over at me: skinny as a twig, with a lopsided face and misplaced incisors that jut out like fangs. When she smiles, she looks half-jackal, and she smiles a lot—but she’s the best of the bunch. I wave to her and she comes up to my table.
“What’s your name?”
“Theary.” In Khmer, it means “helper.”
“Would you like to have a drink with me, Theary?”
* * *
It’s 3:00 a.m. by the time Theary totters out of my room. Good God, how she can bend—like fucking climbing ivy. I fumble through the glasses on the end table until I find one with some booze left in it—suck it through a twisty straw and hope to sleep, too tired to dream.
I must doze off, because when I open my eyes, Keihatsu is standing over me.
“Miss Koroshi requires your presence. Please put clothes on.”
We march downstairs and he bundles me into the back of the Range Rover. After a few minutes, Kara shows up. She and Keihatsu get in front, and one of the assistants climbs in next to me.
I’m wondering if this is going to be my last ride. But it goes on and on—after a couple hours, I don’t care enough to stay awake.
I open my eyes to see soldiers surrounding the car, and my chest seizes up: checkpoints are bad news at the best of times, and times now are pretty rough. I’m looking ahead for an exit, but there’s none—they’ve got the road blocked with rolling barriers. My heart rate slows a bit as I realize this is a real security check, not just a bunch of thugs collecting tolls.
Only a bit, though.
The others seem unfazed, and we file out to let the soldiers search us, then the car, then us again.
All around is broad, flat countryside; tall grass and rows of palms. Where are we? We left Battambang going north, then turned east—we’re past Siem Reap, most likely, but how far? Finally the soldiers seem satisfied and let us go. About 500 meters past the checkpoint, we turn off the road onto a narrow, well-paved lane, its entrance guarded by more soldiers, who make us go through the whole search business again. This happens about four more times before our destination appears: a mansion in shades of Pepto-Bismol, with pagoda tops in neon green, surrounded by heavy security walls and Jersey barriers.
Inside, a carefully manicured drive leads up to a grand main entrance, bordered by hedges trimmed like Christmas-tree ornaments. The ancien régime grandeur is spoiled by a pair of jeeps with mounted .50 cals lurking behind the topiary, inconspicuous as a gunshot wound on a wedding dress.
“They always this nervous?” I ask.
No one answers. Black-jacket security guys appear to usher us inside, down a bunch of hallways and into a courtyard that would go well at Versailles, if Louis had been into disco. We sit drinking iced tea for another half hour, until two men in suits come out and join us. The first is tall and angular, with a drawn, hungry kind of face. Reminds me a bit of Phann. Context being what it is, it takes me a second to recognize him as the prime minister.
Kara stands and bows deep, Japanese-style. Hun Sen gives her a brief Cambodian nop, then takes her arm. They walk around the courtyard, chatting like old friends.
The second man, a little fellow with a round face, sits next to me and offers a hand-rolled Russian cigarette from a gold case.
“Such is the life of a factotum,” he says, in faintly accented English. “Always in attendance. Still, it is good to have you and your friends here. We can bring this stupidity to an end quickly.” I nod like I know what he’s talking about. “Everyone thinks we are fools out here, just gangsters taking all the profit we can. But it’s not so. We are serious about change, but you know, with all our country has been through, it is difficult to move on.” He leans toward me. “Why should we want Americans using us to traffic their drugs? Everyone knows the days of smuggling won’t last.”
“Drugs last.”
The fellow laughs, gestures toward his boss. “His Excellency has bigger plans for this country. All our projections indicate that within two decades, the Western nations will give up the drug war. The cost is too high, and the benefits of legalizing and localizing the trade are too great. By 2025, New York will be getting its heroin from Colorado, not Cambodia. You’ll need the money for the real wars you’ll be fighting. The cash crops of the next century won’t be coca and poppies, they’ll be rice and wheat.” He smiles. “Banking, finance, development: these are things you can . . . sink your teeth into, you say?”
“In five years, Cambodia will be completely legitimate?”
He gives me a big, gold-toothed grin. “Five may be optimistic. Twenty. The prime minister would like to leave his children a country better than the one he saved from Pol Pot.” He pauses, still smiling at me, reading my face as I look over at the mad dictator, standing there laughing with Kara. “You have trouble seeing such a human emotion on our leader? Perhaps you don’t understand this place as well as you think.”
Maybe I don’t, at that.
No tanks in the streets, anyway. Assuming I get back alive, I get to tell Gus he was wrong.
* * *
The next morning, there’s a newspaper waiting on the table in my hotel room. Hok Lundy has died in a hel
icopter crash.
* * *
Afternoon: long and hot. Nothing changes. The Sangker still creeps by below, sticky as maple syrup. The midges and mosquitoes go on with their dance. I sip my Angkor.
Battambang.
Two weeks now I’ve been up here, like a fly in amber. The world has stopped.
I’m on beer number five when Theary struts in, swaying on heels like circus stilts. She stops next to my chair, and I run my fingers up under the fringe of her daisy dukes. Get a little hard as I imagine her pulling her blue tank top over her head, brown nipples popping free above gently heaving ribs. I follow that thought with another, chase them with the rest of my beer.
“You gonna sit down?”
She smiles and runs her nails down my leg, slowly tracing magic words in Khmer. They do spells like that.
I give her hand a squeeze. “Did you bring them?” She nods. “Did anyone ask about them?”
“No.”
Good. I still can’t say why I’ve kept the journals secret all this time—why I moved them from hiding place to hiding place, why I smuggled them out for Theary to keep safe. Maybe I want the answers all to myself.
As I feel Kara’s claws in me, maybe I just want something that’s mine.
Theary leans in and whispers in my ear. She wants to go to the hotel, she’s found a new position on the Internet and wants to try it out. She kisses me, breath sour under the sweetness of rum.
“Let’s go,” I say.
But as we walk away I glance back at the river, and for a second I think I see that shadow, waving silently to me out of the glare.
* * *
I wake up gasping.
Theary is still asleep. She grew up in a one-room house with four brothers and five sisters: nothing can wake her if she doesn’t want it to.
She lies curled up like a dead spider, brittle and brown. Beneath her left shoulder blade, a patch of dark, rough skin extends halfway down her back: a birthmark of some kind, like a place where wings started to grow and gave up.