Black Buddha

by Richard Waters

  I nodded.

  ‘Take a slug of this, it’ll kill the pain a little. Take two tablets as well. I’ll fix you an icepack in a minute… you ok to talk or do you want to rest a bit?’

  His journo juices were flying too quickly about his body and he couldn’t keep still. I thought about it a beat then took the drink, swallowing it back in one, the liquor gloriously burning my throat. ‘Don’t give me another drop,’ I said, ‘I’m an alcoholic.’

  ‘You should have said,’

  I laughed and it didn’t sound like me, a nervous bray. ‘If today is my last before I meet my maker, I’d like to have one indiscretion before I go.’

  Moore sat down and lit his own cigarette, crossing his wiry arms and legs like a poet, then flicking dried paint off his fingers, ‘And what makes you think today is your last?’

  ‘I’m being hunted,’ I said quietly.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘There’s something on the mountain that’s precious to someone... I don’t know what.’

  ‘How did you get here?’

  ‘I was buried in the ground. I escaped and jumped into the river and it brought me here,’

  Moore’s eyes burned with interest, he had a nervous twitch on his left cheek that was working overtime. ‘There goes one of your nine lives. How long ago did this happen?’

  ‘Last night. They murdered my friend too… in Bangkok… ripped him open.’

  ‘The Khao San murder?’ he asked, his stare flicking to the mountain in one of his paintings. He looked confused, as if perhaps I’d thrown a spanner into his theories. He tilted his bird’s head at me. ‘So why in your opinion, are they after you?’

  I barely had the strength to deflect him, ‘I need to find out why they killed my friend it, that’s all I care about.’ I tried to focus on him but his thin frame started contorting and flapping as I imagined him morphing into a heron and taking flight. Then I blacked out.

  - 30 -

  I smelt fried food and heard the shrill of a child’s voice coming up through the floorboards. At the same time I felt intense pain in my ankle and bruising around me ribs. I looked around; I was in a bed under a mosquito net, dust mites swirling in a shaft of light from the window, some sweat pants and a clean white t-shirt neatly folded on a chair. I couldn’t see my own clothes so I put them on. Outside I heard the buzz of insects and drone of a gong calling worshippers to prayer, the western chatter of tourists. As I limped downstairs, a little girl with button-brown eyes and a confusion of black hair took my hand and led me to a table set with fresh baguettes and paté.

  ‘Dad says you have to eat something… he’s cooking something proper in the kitchen. Mum’s at work,’ she whispered mischievously, ‘I stay with her in the evenings when they fight and Daddy drinks.’

  ‘How are you feeling?’ called Nathan Moore from the other room. The paintings weren’t dancing anymore; everything seemed still and peaceful in the mellow orange light. It was gone seven pm.

  I was almost speechless with gratitude. ‘I feel a lot better. Thanks for giving me somewhere to rest.’ I called, ‘I appreciate it.’

  ‘We’re shut today,’ said the little girl, ‘Dad said he didn’t want anyone coming into the gallery and disturbing you so I was on guard, my name’s Chloe. Did you dream a lot… you were shouting in your sleep?’

  I ruffled her hair and tried to smile, ‘I get funny dreams.’

  Nathan brought in two dishes of steaming foie noodles and a bowl of cereal for Chloe. ‘Here, you’ll need it to get your strength up. Chloe would you let Daddy and Alain have a little chat?’

  She rumpled her face and went upstairs to eat her cereal. I’d finished my dish before he was halfway through his. ‘Looks like you needed that! You’re Alain Deschamps?’

  ‘Yes.’ I said warily,

  He grinned back at me. ‘Well there’s a bit of syncronicity, I knew I’d seen you before… read your book about a month ago. In fact I’ve got it upstairs. I checked the photo on the dust-jacket while you were asleep. Very impressive piece of writing.’

  ‘That’s not what the critics said.’

  He raised an eyebrow, ‘We all have our critics.’

  Surrounded by his paintings and little girl wombling around I felt a little more settled, but I knew it couldn’t last; a false calm before the storm. ‘I don’t know how I can repay you.’

  He swatted away the comment. ‘It’s not every day I have real talent under my roof. And as for repaying me, you already have… people thought I was losing the plot, and you may be evidence I’m not. I do a little stringing for The Times in London. Anything happens in Laos - not that it does - I cover it for them. Brings in a little money now and then. I also worked for the Vientiane Times and a couple of others like the Bangkok Post. After my ‘disappearance’ article came out the work started drying up… almost overnight in fact. I’ve been painting to make ends meet.’

  ‘Why?’ I asked.

  ‘Painting?’

  ‘No, why did the work dry up… because of just one article?’

  He looked out of the window and smiled grimly. ‘A journalist’s career is a house of cards. In one fell swoop you can fuck up years of contacts. Never thought it would happen to me, at least not for trying to tell the truth.’

  Something about him, an earnest quality, made me think of war correspondents and their passionate obsession with story and fact. I never had it myself. ‘So who put the black mark on you that it would reach all the way back to London?’

  He grimaced. ‘I don’t know who fucked things in London; an anonymous email to The Times saying my claims were unsubstantiated. As to here, let’s just say certain people didn’t have time for my interpretations of the truth.’

  ‘The evidence in the morgue, I heard about it.’

  He smiled grimly, his eyes flinting. ‘Sometimes the dead walk… Money talks here, it’s the new religion. The Lao government’s so poor they won’t even send their Police to the mountain for fear of upsetting the people who own it.’

  ‘I heard it’s a Nationally Protected Area?’

  ‘… More like a dead zone. First, there was an ecologist murdered there a couple of years back, then the kids started disappearing. I didn’t want to say so at the time, it was more than my job was worth, but I know they didn’t just get lost in the NPA. They were taken.’

  ‘Why?’ I asked.

  ‘To instill fear in the local poachers I guess, that and food for the reptiles.’

  He still hadn’t told me what he thought was going on up there. ‘I couldn’t figure out what they were,’ I said, ‘but one nearly got through the cage they put me in. It was enormous.’

  He lit a roll-up he’d been fiddling with, a thin smile on his face. ‘This is going to sound outlandish but I’m a hundred percent they’re Komodo Dragons. Weird thing is, there are only two islands in the world you can find them and they’re off the coast of Indonesia. So what the hell are they doing in the jungles of Laos?’

  ‘Maybe someone brought them here.’

  He scratched at his chin. ‘I don’t doubt it, but who?’ He leaned in and whispered, ‘Not a lot of people know this but there are secret army roads no-one is allowed on.’

  ‘And you think this was how they brought them here?’

  ‘I do. They run the length of the country and are used by the government to transport things of a sensitive nature.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Underage whores - or girls from tribes who get turned into whores; rosewood and mahogany trees which are smuggled into China and Vietnam-’

  ‘So whoever smuggled the reptiles had to have permission from the powers that be, or some crooked minister in the government? But Komodos?’ I said shaking my head, ‘Seems so improbable.’

  ‘Not really, it’s no different tha
n having an open zoo, but in this case they’re a deterrent to keep people out of there.’ Nathan looked around to make sure Chloe wasn’t eavesdropping. ‘The tissue samples of the dead kids were full of acid. And your sighting just confirmed my suspicions. I’ve got to get in there.’

  My ankle was pounding, I felt spent again and my skin was crawling with heroin funk. ‘Only if you have a deathwish.’ I said.

  ‘So, do you want to tell me why your friend was killed?’

  ‘To isolate me.’

  He lit another cigarette and passed it to me, ‘And why do they want you so badly?’

  ‘With respect, I’d like to hear your theories before I tell you mine.’

  Moore looked at me squarely. ‘Okay, I’ll level with you. There’s something up there that someone wants to keep people away from - that we both know. The ecologist endangered that when he lobbied to open the forests to trekkers and wildlife buffs, so they slotted him. I’m also thinking you know something you shouldn’t and they were going to do the same to you.’

  I had to give him something in exchange. ‘Wherever I’ve been they followed me - Hanoi, Bangkok, Vientiane… everywhere. They could have taken me out any time. I think they lead me here.’

  He rubbed his hands and shifted his weight, ‘”They”? Who is it you think you’ve seen?’

  Just then we heard a knock at the door.

  ‘Who is it?’ he called,

  ‘Chief of Police, Da Prom.’

  Already?

  Nathan motioned me upstairs with a finger to his mouth. I listened from the top of the stairs, weighing up if the Jai-Dam would strike in daylight - apart from the incident on the river in Vang Vieng, they’d always struck at night.

  ‘Mr Da Prom, how can I help you?’

  I felt a tug on my arm. ‘Why are you hiding? Can I play?’ whispered Chloe. I too held a finger to my mouth as the front door opened.

  ‘You are closed today?’ said the voice.

  ‘I’m a little tired, too much lao-lao last night,’ said Moore.

  ‘We looking for farang, maybe you seen him?’

  ‘I see many farangs, what does this one look like?’

  ‘Tall, broken nose, brown hair.’

  ‘There could be a few hundred of those in town. What’s he done?’

  ‘Oh nothing, I look for him for a friend of his, special friend. Important friend. He wants to find him.’

  ‘What’s his name, I’ll keep an eye out for him?’

  ‘Deschamps.’

  Silence for about ten seconds. What were they doing, miming? Then finally I heard him say, ‘Goodbye Chief.’

  Nathan locked the door and came upstairs. ‘Someone knows you’re here and that someone has the Police in his pocket. I think you should split, I know it’s easier said than done, but I can probably get someone to take you over the border to Vietnam.’

  I shook my head. ‘I can’t leave, not yet. Besides, they’d only catch me somewhere down the line.’

  Chloe tugged at his leg. ‘Daddy can we take Alain to the river to play?’

  ‘Not just yet sweetheart,’ he said kissing his daughter on the forehead, ‘go to your room and play with your crayons for a bit.’

  I looked about desperately. Maybe it was my pathetic appealing expression which changed his mind, for Moore, renegade that he’d clearly become, looked at me and grimaced. ‘I’m not about to cast you onto the street, but you’ve got to consider my position as a father - people get deported overnight here, that’s how it happens. If they know I’m abetting a perceived felon, the Police will stick me in jail or put us on a plane back to England. She’s my anchor - without Chloe I would have lost it a long time ago.’

  ‘I understand,’ I said quietly, ‘Maybe they don’t know I’m here yet.’

  ‘Look, either someone saw you arrive here or they figured I was an obvious place for your detective work.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘There aren’t too many farangs based here apart from restaurateurs and NGOs, and I’m the only one with the dragon theory.’

  ‘I don’t want to bring any danger to your house and your little girl,’ I said. ‘I couldn’t live with myself if anything else happened.’

  He shook his head. ‘You can stay with us a few days till your leg mends. But on two conditions: first, you never go outdoors – day or night - and second, if anyone comes here and finds you, your name is not Alain Deschamps, at least that’s what you tell them.’

  I could have hugged him, but instead I gripped his hand and shook it, then I looked around to check his daughter was out of earshot, ‘You still haven’t told me your theory about what’s going on up there.’

  ‘Heroin,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘The komodo killings are just a superstition smokescreen to keep local people away. Probably meth-amphetmaine too that’s involved; they bring it over from Burma and sell it to Thailand.’

  But it didn’t sit right… the frightened rhetoric of Gerald King and bloody remains of Lucan Maybury and Skip Martin, just for heroin? I searched his face for dishonesty, it looked as if it hadn’t slept a full eight hours in months, but he seemed pretty certain of his convictions.

  ‘Why draw attention to yourself in the middle of the jungle if you want to keep people away? Surely they could guard it with something less conspicuous than Komodos?’ I said,

  The twitch was working overtime on his left cheek. ‘Money and mystery, it’s a perfect combination; they scare the commoners by reviving an old legend, then they pay the Police to bury the case. It’s one of the most underfunded Police Forces in one of the poorest countries in the world. Trust me, after the trouble with the Taliban there’s a gap in the ‘H’ market bigger than the Khyber Pass. Afghanistan isn’t churning it out anymore and Colombia and the Golden Triangle can barely keep up with the new demand.’

  I thought back to the key, trying to return myself to the chaos theories of my tormentors. Their spectres were changing shape in the shadows of my subconscious, the supernatural sect merging into a bunch of financially motivated murderers. But why would anyone be so desperate to get hold of a key and a map if they were running a perfectly successful heroin subterranea? It didn’t hold together. Time to tell him my theory.

  - 31 -

  Jacques guided the boat past the Bhudda statues watching him in the dark from the mouth of the Pak Ou caves. Only a mile to go, then he’d reach the Palace. He eased the motor and let the swirling eddies of the Mekong carry him the last leg. Something moved in the darkness, a heavy scuffling coming from the opposite bank. The sound of clanking chains drew closer, then in the inky light Jacques could see an elephant shifting in its sleep by the river bank.

  The little boat moored up against the clay bank and Jacques crept towards the high wall lining the Palace grounds. Just as Yin, the regent’s gardener had instructed, he waited by the tallest palm tree beside a shrine. A candle was burning within it just as he’d said it would be. Inside the palace he could see a light on in one of the rooms and a soft glow coming from the adjacent temple, but there was no one to meet him. Jacques took out his lighter and flashed his hand across it three times. Almost immediately a rectangular silhouette emerged at the lighted window, the ponderous shape of the King.

  Across the manicured lawns darted a reedy figure. He cut through the lemon grove nearby and appeared beside Jacques with barely a rustle. ‘The King is ready for you now sir, I take you to the chess room.’ The royal gardener walked ahead, leading the way to a back entrance. Inside, the palace was dark, Jacques followed him through the servants’ quarters into the green velvet-walled corridors. At the end of one they could see a light. Yin knocked at the open door,

  ‘Show him in,’ said a voice.

  King Savang Vatthana was in his pyjamas and silk dressing gown sitting in a studded leather armchair, besi
de him a table topped in a chess set and a jug of water with a lemon swimming in it. He looked up and smiled at Jacques. ‘Thank you for coming, I’m sorry if the hour is disagreeable. I hope you understand, I didn’t want anyone to see you arrive. Can I get you a drink?’

  ‘Water is fine,’ Jacques said.

  On the walls were paintings of western landscapes draped in snow. Yin glided across to Jacques with a chair. Jacques motioned to the oils, ‘These are beautiful.’

  ‘Thank you. I love Europe, especially the vegetables, but I think we talked about that didn’t we?’

  The king rubbed his hands together and looked at the chess set. It was made of teak and rosewood, the knights and queens finely crafted warriors on the backs of miniature elephants. ‘Shall we play?’ asked the monarch.

  It was almost morning when they were done, Jacques managing only three wins to the five of the King. They played in rapt silence and when the first of the birds replaced the external song of the crickets and Jacques started yawning, Savang Vatthana shuffled lugubriously to a cabinet at the other side of the great room. From his satin dressing gown he produced a key and unlocked a hammered tin box. ‘The diamonds I left you with the other day were a test, as was the chess. I can tell a lot about a person by playing chess with him.’

  Jacques laughed into his palm, what a wily old cat he was, overfed but sharp as a knife.

  ‘If only I could sit down with Uncle Ho and play a game, I’m sure I would be able to persuade him to take away his Vietnamese troops from our country. They say he’s a very learned man.’

  ‘So it was a test, but for what?’

  The older man opened the box, withdrew an ornate brass key in the shape of a dragon’s head and said darkly, ‘I have a favour to ask.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Do you believe in destiny, Monsieur Deschamps?’ he said, passing him the key.

  ‘I’m not a very spiritual person.’