by Yigal Zur
Somnuk looked disappointed. The police in Thailand have a propensity to close cases quickly, too quickly. It might work with local goons, but foreigners are a headache. So they prefer to lock them up first and investigate later. It’s more than likely that by the time the legal process kicks in, they’ll confess, or maybe cut their wrists with a rusty razor blade or shoot up with a used needle and get AIDS. If that happens, they’ll go quickly for lack of treatment and a compromised immune system. There’s also the possibility that the unfamiliar surroundings and uncertainty about their future will send them around the bend, so when their consular agent finally shows up there won’t be anything left of them worth bothering with.
“So what your connection with him?” Major Somnuk asked me, gesturing with his radio toward Waxman’s body. It was the first question he didn’t bark at me. Not that I imagined his Buddhist compassion was starting to show. I knew I shouldn’t count on the likelihood of his having spent three months in a monastery as a child, a common practice in his country, where he might have soaked up a measure of humanity. But since my gut was still hurting, I decided to be more accommodating.
There was no doubt in my mind that he was annoyed at being called away from dinner at his favorite club, where scantily dressed girls had been serving him bowls of savory meat. He was probably getting a foot massage while he ate.
“I was trying to help a kid out. Yesterday a cab driver gave me his passport and told me where to find him,” I said, reaching for the back pocket of my jeans. I stopped short when I saw the sharp look in Somnuk’s eyes. His hand moved toward the gun holstered on his waist. I wasn’t in America, but cops in Thailand don’t like their suspects to make sudden movements either.
“I’m unarmed,” I said. “I’m going to take the passport out of my pocket very slowly.” I reached behind me, moving as slow as I could, but my brain was running a sprint. I knew luck had to be on my side. I needed the best karma in the world for the passport I pulled out to be Micha’s and not Sigal’s. They weren’t any different to the touch, so there was nothing I could do to further my cause except maintain the most composed façade I could manage. I turned the expression off in my eyes, shut down my emotions, eased out one of the passports, and handed it to him.
Major Somnuk’s lieutenant took it from me and examined the photo, comparing it with the face of Micha Waxman on the bed. Apparently, there was still enough similarity between them to satisfy him. I took a deep breath. “I went looking for him, to give him back his passport, but he was too strung out. He didn’t care. He didn’t even want it.”
“That best story you can give me?” Somnuk asked.
I didn’t answer.
“You fuck him before you stick knife in his back?” His tone made it seem like a normal question, the kind he asked as a matter of routine. Maybe it was. Or maybe it was his own private fantasy. Or not a fantasy at all. I remembered Tom and his preference for ladyboys. He once told me that after the operation, what used to be their penis becomes part of a vagina that’s so sensitive their orgasms drive them wild.
“Do I look like a murderer?” I asked.
“Anyone can be murderer,” he answered. “In Bangkok people change. Everything very cheap, whores, drugs, so people look for blood.”
I didn’t know if he was referring to locals or foreigners, or whether they were all the same to him. But I did know what he meant. Bangkok represents unlimited freedom. Anything’s possible. The kingdom tolerates all forms of deviants. You can do whatever you want, just as long as you don’t insult the king or the Buddhist establishment. But Major Somnuk didn’t like foreigners. And I knew he wasn’t going to make my life easy.
“What hotel you at?” he asked.
“The Fontaine.”
My answer drew a laugh from Somnuk and his lieutenant. “You like be close to action. Don’t want waste time,” he said, adding with a threat in his voice, “You stay where we can find you.”
After seeing the body of Micha Waxman, the only thing in my mind on the way back to the hotel was a long shower. What had happened in the twenty minutes after I left him? The place where the body was found indicated he was expecting a long night of lovemaking, but with whom? Someone he knew? A regular? Someone who had tempted him with a wink and a whisper to go upstairs and then left him to die an agonizing death? There wasn’t the slightest doubt in my mind that his death had something to do with Sigal. I remembered the last thing he said to me: If the people who love her can’t save her, how could I? What did he mean? He was obviously afraid of Alex Weiss, and I still had to find out why, but at the end he was talking about someone else. Someone who loved Sigal but couldn’t save her. Who? For a while I’d sensed a shadow operating in the background, but now its presence was becoming more real.
Hotel rooms are supposed to be locked, but the door to mine was ajar. Inside it looked very different from the way I’d left it, and certainly very different from the way it should have looked after maid service had been there. The few clothes I’d brought with me were lying in a pile on the rug. My suitcase was upside down, open like an oyster after the meat has been extracted. The lining had been slashed. But luggage can’t complain. A tie was hanging from the floor lamp as if someone was mocking my taste. That always irritates me—disguised mockery that doesn’t give you a chance to respond.
What were they looking for? The passports? I only had one left, Sigal’s, and that was in my pocket. Major Somnuk had taken Micha’s. But it didn’t seem likely that’s what they were after. So what was it? And who was it? Cops sent by Somnuk, or Weiss’s guys? Not that I saw a big difference between them at this point.
I had the unpleasant feeling that instead of being on Sigal’s trail, I was being led by the nose down some other path and I had no idea where it was taking me. Things couldn’t go on like this much longer. Something had to happen. One way or another.
I went out to the hallway. Two men stepped out of a room. Obviously, Israelis.
“Did you see anyone go into my room?” I asked.
“Why? Did someone break in?” the older one asked.
“Bastards,” the younger one said. “Come on, we’ll buy you a drink. Forget about it. This is Bangkok. They have no respect for anyone here, and there’s no one to talk to either. What can you do about it? Go to the cops?”
I thanked them for the invitation and said I’d take a rain check. Then I went downstairs. The young man behind the reception desk was dripping with smiles until I told him what had happened. He dialed a number, presumably maid service, and I watched as his expression turned to dismay. Then he apologized that anything like that could have happened at their hotel and promised that someone would tidy the room immediately. Meanwhile, he offered me coffee on the house.
I thanked him and declined the offer.
“Do you want me to call the police?” he asked.
I’d had enough cops for one day. I told him not to bother, although I knew that the moment I turned my back he’d make the call. It was his duty to report it. And it was safe to assume that anyone working hotel reception was a police informant.
I went back to my room thinking it was time to get things straight in my head. Surprisingly, the bottle of Jameson had been left untouched. I unscrewed the cap and took a long drink. There were three things I was certain of. Each of them bugged me and all three together really pissed me off. I took another swig. Someone had been playing me from the second I set foot in Bangkok. Another swig. Micha Waxman had been murdered. The next time I pulled on the bottle, I could see the bottom, and that really made me mad. I was convinced there was a connection between Micha’s murder, Sigal, and Weiss. The only thing left to find out was who was pulling the strings. But the bottle was empty.
I couldn’t stay there anymore. I left the clothes where they were, taking only my toothbrush and razor. There aren’t many things, or even people, I’m attached to, but those two items have accompanied me down many long roads.
CHAPTER TWELVE
KHAO SAN ROAD, in the Banglamphu district, has earned itself a reputation worldwide. It’s not particularly long, but it’s wider than most streets in Bangkok. At night, the street-long bazaar, where stall-holders hawk clothes, flip-flops, silver jewelry, used books, and other items popular with backpackers, becomes of secondary interest. The crowds stream in and the road fills with young Western males with voracious eyes, Western girls who sat for hours in the sun getting their hair braided and now want to feel alive, exhausted waitresses who have already been dragging their feet for hours but have to keep at it if they don’t want to be fired by the Chinese café owner, girls in neon colors handing out flyers for night clubs and calling out the prices of the drinks—“Singha beer just 100 bahts, Heineken beer sem sem,” the familiar phrase for “fixed price” aimed at drawing in the young Western falangs. Everyone knows they’re loaded despite their scruffy appearance.
I was halfway down the street when I heard the rumbling sound of motorcycles behind me. I turned and watched as they came closer. Three motorcycles racing through the crowds, wildly spurting ahead and braking suddenly, sending the pedestrians running for safety.
Why did I have the feeling they were coming for me? New 125cc Hondas, the most popular model in Bangkok. Hundreds of motorbike taxis just like them waited on every corner. The three drivers were clad in black leather jackets, the dark visors of their helmets hiding their faces. But I didn’t have to see them to identify them. I knew exactly who they were: the boxers from the alley. Apparently, they weren’t just random street thugs who’d been given a thousand bahts to harass me. Whoever was after me was raising the ante. They had come to do more than simply deliver a message.
I’m not wet behind the ears. Haven’t been for years. I’ve got a very firm stance and enough weight to land a serious punch. I made my body as loose as possible, assuming they were aiming to get within kicking distance of me. Unless, of course, they were planning to stab me. It’s no problem for an experienced motorcyclist to let go of the handlebars long enough to knife someone without even slowing down. The way they were riding, they looked very experienced, as if they’d grown up on two wheels. They sped up. The first two passed me, grazing me on purpose. The third stopped beside me, his tires squealing. He raised the visor with a gloved hand, revealing a broad face and slightly slanted eyes. There was nothing special about the punk aside from a large dark mole beside his nose. “Go home, falang,” he said. “Next time you’re dead.” Then he leaned on the gas and took off.
“The people here are crazy,” said a passing American guy with long hair and two young ladies on his arms, one American and one local. I nodded and kept walking.
Up ahead of me was a familiar figure, a woman I hadn’t seen in a long time: Mama Dom. Her fat idiot son was with her. How long had it been since I saw her last? Three, four years? Maybe more. I’d been robbed like a country bumpkin. Pretty girl, motel. The next day, Mama Dom showed up with my wallet. Nothing had been taken. She pulled a thousand-baht note from it and said in broken English, “It for my expenses. We not want trouble with foreign police.” Then she disappeared.
I wondered what she was doing here now. It was no accident. Mama Dom is a crime boss, although you couldn’t tell by looking at her. To the uninitiated she looks like a homeless woman as she drags her feet from one stall to the next collecting her weekly protection money. Half the stalls on Khao San belong to her. She’s into everything illegal: betting; cock fights in back alleys; drugs, particularly ya ba, the tablets that fuck with the heads of half of Bangkok’s slum population; prescription drugs; fake passports—you name it. I’ve seen her in action: a frowsy old lady who can turn into a venom-spitting cobra. If she was here, something must be going on.
It was.
She turned and started walking toward me. I pretended not to recognize her, but Mama Dom never forgets. Not anything. She hoards it all: information, memories, rags. Her restless little pig eyes caught me. She stopped, smiled to reveal teeth that were reddish black from all the betel quid she chewed, and gestured for me to follow her.
Nothing happens in Bangkok’s main streets except for traffic jams and car accidents. Anything of any consequence takes place in the side streets, the sois, to which the Thais have brought their village life. There, young men on motorcycles and high on speed still show respect to their elders. There, young girls from the Isan district in the northeast, who were sold into prostitution for a sack of rice, still bring gifts to the Buddha in the neighborhood temple. There, order reigns, and a person is esteemed according to their station. Mama Dom occupies a very high station.
She was waiting for me. She took out a bag with Coke, ice, and a straw and gave it to her son to suck on to silence the grunts he uttered constantly as she towed him along behind her wherever she went. He sat down on the sidewalk on a small piece of cardboard she laid out for him. A woman in a straw hat behind the steaming pots in a nearby stall brought out a yellow plastic chair for her to sit on.
Mama Dom’s English was minimal, like that of your average street whore, consisting mainly of a lot of fucky-fucky and boom-boom. But this time she made herself surprisingly clear. “You give me five hundred green, I tell you where falang lady.”
“What lady?” I asked.
Giving me no more than a brief glance, Mama Dom got up. She smacked the plastic bag out of her son’s hand and walked away, dragging him wailing behind her.
“Khun Mama Dom,” I called, adopting a more respectful approach.
She turned, looking at me as if to say, What? Now you’re trying to suck up to me? Get me the money. You know how the game is played in Bangkok. First the money. Then she stopped and said coldly, “Israel falang think Thai people see money only. Thai people think money to show they serious. Falang talk-talk about everything, also about money. In end they close hand like bunker. Who care what falang talk? Falang talk like duck ass in water. Only open and close. Talk not worth nothing and falang not learn nothing. So how falang want to find what falang look for?”
I kept silent. That’s one thing you learn in the East. You never know when you’ll get a sermon or a punch in the nose. And you never know who you will get it from. “Falang not understand karma,” Mama Dom went on. “Falang lady live or dead. It same.”
“Khun Mama Dom,” I said. “The falang lady has a mother, a father. Maybe she made a mistake. Mai pen rai—it doesn’t matter.”
“Falang talk like idiot. Boring. No mistake. Karma. Karma only law. Falang think he better. Falang talk justice, morals. Piss me off. When mosquito bite at night, it hard to sleep. When water buffalo fly look for place to put eggs, it sting. Hurt all day. When falang lady run, she pay. No talk about it.”
“Why did she run?” I asked.
The look in her eyes was contemptuous. Her son was still wailing. She said something to the woman in the stall, who was frying rice noodles and sprouts. The lady left her pan and got a bottle of Coke from the refrigerator. Mama Dom handed it to him.
“Falang like my son,” she said. “No think.”
Again, I kept silent.
Gazing at me, she said, “Falang no talk. That good.”
I remained silent. What could I say? I saw the sparkle in her eyes. She was enjoying every minute.
“Where falang go sleep?” she asked. “No can return to hotel.”
They know everything here, I thought to myself. If Mama Dom knew, everyone did. No one was talking, but someone was calling the shots. I was the only one still in the dark.
“Come,” she said. “Mama Dom find you place bon-bon. Major Somnuk not know. Mr. Weiss not know.”
She took the bottle from her son. Naturally, he started wailing, but he trailed after her. I followed. We made a rather strange procession, but no one ever looks at Mama Dom. Because she knows and never forgets. Not anything.
We walked in the direction of the Banglamphur temple. Behind the monks’ cabins was a small one-story building. Several doors faced the alley. Three giggling girls were rinsin
g vegetables with a hose and cleaning offal in blue plastic basins, making supper for the women in Mama Dom’s little whorehouse. She kept going. We came to a large warehouse where a few children were sitting on the floor sorting plastic parts from old radios and computers for recycling. In the back was a door.
Mama Dom opened it with a flourish. The room was simple, almost spartan. A bed with a thin flowery spread, a straw chair, a plywood closet, and a corner shower behind a curtain even more flowery than the bedspread.
“You pay two hundred bahts for night. It okay,” she said. “It not Fontaine Hotel but no one know you here.”
I said the only thing I could. Thank you.
She was already at the door when she turned and said, “You look for Israel falang. In Krung Thep long time.”
“Who are you talking about?” I asked.
“Angel for all Israel falang,” she said, and walked out.
I’d gotten something more than just a room. In fact, I’d gotten quite a lot, although I didn’t yet know how much. All I knew was that at some stage I’d have to pay. Mama Dom didn’t give anything away for free.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I WAS IN urgent need of a cold beer.
I settled myself on a stool at a bar opposite the entrance to the Apocalypse Club. If Micha and Sigal had been in any of the establishments around here, this would be the one. The street was crowded with pedestrians. I was drinking Singha straight from the bottle when I felt someone press up against me. The guy was slovenly and unkempt, his hair twisted into a mass of tangled dreadlocks tied back with a filthy rag. I could smell his hair from miles away. A rolled-up woolen blanket hung by a rope from his shoulder. “Hey, bro,” he said in Hebrew, “buy me a beer?”