by R. P. Harris
Nak removed the scowl from his face. “Good day to you, grandfather,” he smiled. “You didn’t happen to see a little girl with an elephant go by here recently, did you?”
“Maybe I did, and maybe I didn’t,” said the old fossil. “What’s it worth to you?”
“Worth to me?” Nak asked.
“Maybe you’d like to buy a charm, to change your luck.”
“I’m not a superstitious man,” Nak assured the old creature and laughed.
“Of course not. We live in the modern world. An amulet, perhaps, to ward off evil spirits?”
Nang reached under his shirt, clutched the medallion dangling from his neck, and whispered an incantation.
“What about your friend there?” The ancient nodded at Nang. “Would he like some … protection?”
Nang gulped.
Ignoring the questions, Nak pulled a twenty-baht note out of his pocket and waved it in the air.
“What will this buy me?” he asked.
“All that you desire,” the old man cackled. He snatched the note out of Nak’s hand, and pointed a bony finger across the street. “They went thataway.”
Nak darted into the road, waving back the cars and cursing their horns, while Nang scurried after. When they reached the embankment on the other side, Nak scanned the shoreline from the bend in the river above to the bridge below.
“I don’t see them anywhere,” Nak frowned.
Nang saw something bobbing up and down in the middle of the river like a capsized boat. There seemed to be someone clinging to the keel. He looked back over his shoulder. The old man had folded up his table and was gone.
“What’s that there?” Nak pointed to the middle of the river.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Crossing the River
A wave washed over Tua and she lifted her head, gasped for breath, and opened her eyes. A swift current was plunging them downstream. Whirlpools swirled around them in fits. And they were only halfway across the river. She pinched her legs together and locked her arms tighter around Pohn-Pohn.
When they reached the deepest part of the river, Pohn-Pohn rolled over with the current, and they slowly sank below the surface.
First Tua’s legs, and then her arms were torn free. She kicked and paddled through the dark, muddy water; popped to the surface and gulped a mouthful of air; but was quickly sent spinning under the waves again. Just when she thought her lungs would burst, something grasped her ankle and pulled. She lurched through the water, leaving a trail of bubbles behind her. Tua closed her eyes—and was suddenly bathed in sunlight.
She could breathe! She was floating in air—she was flying! Then she dropped like a coconut and plopped onto Pohn-Pohn’s back. Locking her legs around Pohn-Pohn’s neck, Tua grabbed both of the elephant’s ears. Pohn-Pohn curled her trunk back over her head and hosed Tua down.
“Cheeky chang,” she sputtered. Then she looked back over her shoulder. With the better part of the crossing behind them, the river wasn’t as scary as before—not if Pohn-Pohn was swimming with her.
Tua climbed to her feet and, standing on Pohn-Pohn’s head, scanned the shoreline in search of a place to land.
“There.” She pointed to an empty beach, dove into the river, and swam the rest of the way on her own.
The beach was not as empty as Tua originally thought. A committee of ducks had come down to the shore to meet them. They were lined up in a row and clapping their beaks in protest.
“Kho thot kha,” Tua bowed, begging their pardon. She started to offer an explanation when Pohn-Pohn emerged from the river behind her. The elephant walked through the middle of the ducks to a shallow puddle up the beach, knelt down, tipped over on her side, and began rolling in the dirt and mud. She scooped up a dripping glob in her trunk and tossed it on her shoulder.
This was more than the ducks could endure. They lifted into the air in a single body and soared out over the river like an arrow.
When Tua turned back around, she saw two men with a fishing net coming over the embankment. She waved to them, but they didn’t respond. They weren’t looking at her. They were looking at Pohn-Pohn.
She was thinking that she might owe them an apology as well, when they broke into a run. Before Tua lowered her arm, the men were on the beach and flinging their net over Pohn-Pohn.
“Look out for the trunk, Krit,” cried the bald fisherman. “Get the net over its head.”
“I’m trying, Prasong,” the scrawny fisherman replied. “It’s as strong as an elephant, you know.”
Pohn-Pohn rocked back and forth and tried to lift her head and trunk—tried to get her legs under her body—but the net held her down in the mud. Then both men fell on top of her, and she screamed for help.
Tua set off like a rocket and, pouncing on the bald fisherman, grabbed both his ears.
“Ai-yee!” he cried, throwing his hands over his head. He scratched at Tua’s arms and rolled off Pohn-Pohn’s back.
Tua dropped to the ground, ran to the river, dove in, and swam away from the shore.
“Help, Prasong, quick!” called Krit. “I can’t hold it by myself.”
As Prasong turned to assist his friend, Tua caught the current and was swept away downstream.
Tua stayed in the current until she rounded a bend. Then she swam to shore, crept back along the embankment, and crouched down in the tall grass above Pohn-Pohn.
“What do we do now?” asked the scrawny fisherman.
“We’ll sell it, of course,” said Prasong. “Pound for pound, an elephant is worth more than a fish.”
“But who do we sell it to?”
“To me,” came an answer from atop the embankment.
Recognizing the voice, Tua flattened herself in the tall grass and caught her breath.
“Congratulations, gentlemen,” said Nak. “Well done, well done. Your talents are entirely wasted on the river. You could be big game hunters.”
Nak and Nang followed a narrow path down to the beach. Nang carried a heavy chain over his shoulder and an ankus in his hand. The sight of the ankus, with its pointed spike and pointed hook, made Tua shudder.
“If you just hold the beast steady while my partner attaches the chain to its foot,” said Nak, “we’ll gladly take it off your hands.”
“Who are you?” Prasong squinted at the strangers.
“I am the owner of that elephant you’re sitting on.”
“What elephant? I don’t see any elephant. We’re fishermen. This is a fish. If you want to buy a fish, it’s twenty baht a pound. I reckon this fish weighs, oh … some four hundred pounds … times twenty … that would come to … eight thousand baht,” he grinned.
Krit covered his mouth with his hand and snickered.
“Come now, gentlemen,” said Nak, “be reasonable. You’re not exactly in the best bargaining position, are you? How did you plan on getting up? Do you have something to secure it with? Can one of you hold down an enraged ‘fish’ while the other goes off to fetch a chain or a rope? How long were you planning on sitting here … under the sun … with nothing to eat or drink?” He reached for a water bottle from a cloth bag slung over his shoulder, took a long pull from it, gargled, rinsed his teeth, and spat the water in the sand between his feet. “Eh?” he smiled.
The two fishermen looked at one another and shrugged.
“What about a reward, then?” Prasong wiped his bald head.
“That’s more like it,” said Nak. “I’m sure we can come to some arrangement.”
Leaping to her feet, Tua shouted: “Nine thousand baht.”
Pohn-Pohn cried out at the sound of Tua’s voice.
The four men swung their heads to the embankment and squinted into the sun.
The elder fisherman turned to Nak and said, “That’s ten thousand to you, I think.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Nak snorted. “Where would a ragamuffin like that get nine thousand baht?”
“My auntie will give it to me,” Tua said, not knowing where these ideas wer
e coming from. “She’s Lady Orchid, the actress.”
“I think I’ve heard of her,” said Krit.
“Have you got the money on you?” Prasong nodded at Nak.
“It’s as close as the nearest cash machine,” Nak assured him.
“The first one back with the money gets the elephant,” he declared.
Tua hopped over the embankment and down the other side. She had bought herself some time. But where was she going to get nine thousand baht?
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Paying the Ransom
At the rubbish dump, Tua found everything she needed: two plastic bags—a red one and a white one—and a stack of newspapers bound with plastic twine. She sat down on a biscuit tin and began tearing off strips of newspaper, stacking them in two piles.
“What are you doing that for?” asked a voice.
Tua looked up at a sooty-faced girl who was peering at her through a gap in a chest of drawers where a drawer used to be.
“I’m making a ransom,” she said.
“What’s a ransom?” asked another voice. This one belonged to a small boy, also covered in soot, who was lying on a tattered mattress with his chin cupped in his hands.
“It’s money you pay to get something back that’s been taken away from you.”
“What’s it for?” asked a third voice.
Tua turned around to find another boy standing on a tire with his arms folded across his bare chest. He wore short, baggy trousers that were knotted around his waist with a tie. He was older than the other two children, and Tua hesitated before answering him.
“An elephant,” she said at last. “It’s a ransom for an elephant.” Realizing how ridiculous this must sound, she added: “Her name’s Pohn-Pohn.”
“Can we help?” asked the sooty-faced girl.
And just like that, the four of them were sitting in a circle tearing newspaper into strips the size of banknotes, while Tua told them her story.
“I’m back, Pohn-Pohn,” Tua called out from a distance down the beach. “And I’ve got the money.”
Panting, the fishermen lifted their drooping heads and shaded their eyes. Prasong had wrapped his T-shirt around his head, while Krit had coated his bare neck and shoulders with mud.
“Bring it here to me,” Prasong looked up and beckoned with a limp hand.
“You have to let Pohn-Pohn go first.”
Tua dropped the bags in the sand, a few yards apart from one another, and stepped away from them.
“The white bag has four thousand baht in it,” she said, “and the red bag has five. You can choose who gets the red bag.”
“I do,” Prasong said.
“No, me,” said Krit.
After trading glances, the fishermen were on their feet and tearing across the beach after the red bag. And while they were writhing in the sand, biting, punching, and scratching each other, Tua pulled the net off Pohn-Pohn and helped push her to her feet.
“Hurry, Pohn-Pohn! Follow me.”
They ran up the path, over the embankment, and down the other side. When they had reached the dry creek bed below the rubbish dump, they heard a whoop and a whistle from the top of the hill. Tua looked up and saw the three children who had helped her with the ransom waving from the roof of an abandoned car.
After waving and whooping back to them, she bowed a wai.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The Other Ransom
“What a despicable child,” growled Nak. He dropped a ten-baht coin into the cup of a limbless beggar with one hand and, just as swiftly, swiped up the cup with the other.
“She tasks me,” he continued, ignoring the beggar’s protests and stepping into a waiting tuk-tuk. Nang tumbled in after him. “To the train station. And don’t spare the pistons.”
After paying the driver, Nak gave Nang an extra-extra-large T-shirt to wear, carried him into the station on his back, and sat him on the floor with his arms and legs concealed under the garment. Then he stuck the cup between Nang’s teeth and crept off in search of unattended luggage to rifle and pockets to pick.
Nang was content to hum his gratitude for the few coins dropped in his cup. But when a tall farang donated fifty baht to his charity, he opened his mouth to speak:
“Khrap—”
As the cup dropped from his mouth, Nang snapped his teeth—then his arm shot out to catch it. When it hit the floor, scattering coins and bills in every direction, he sprang into the air after them like a toad. The farang gaped, then frowned at this scoundrel’s newly restored arms and legs.
While Nang gathered up his ill-gotten gains, all eyes—save for one pair—turned on him. Nak was lifting a wallet from the purse of a ginger-haired farang. He pulled out the bills and credit cards and tossed the rest in a trash can.
Two policemen appeared in the crowd as Nang beat a hasty retreat. They hadn’t gotten far in their pursuit when a voice cried out in English:
“I’ve been robbed! Pickpocket! Somebody stole my wallet!”
A tuk-tuk was awaiting Nang on the road outside the train station. Nak’s long arm reached out and dragged him into it.
“To the riverside,” Nak ordered the driver.
Back at the beach, Nak surveyed the empty scene, then bent down and picked up a strip of newspaper the size of a banknote. The beach was littered with them.
“She’s clever, I’ll give her that,” he hissed. “And all the worse for it. Cleverness in children is an abomination.”
“It’s only newspaper.” Nang held up a fistful of the fake notes.
“An abomination,” Nak repeated.
CHAPTER TWENTY
The Wat
Tua and Pohn-Pohn followed a dirt path alongside vegetable gardens, orchards, and rice paddies. Some women planting shoots in knee-deep water rose up from their work to wave straw hats over their heads.
“They’re planting rice.” Tua waved back. “Rice paddies are not good places for elephants to take baths in,” she added, in case Pohn-Pohn might be tempted.
They met a family of water buffaloes on the path. Tua bowed to the barefoot boy following them, then asked if he knew the wat they were looking for.
“It’s over there, chang,” the boy said to Pohn-Pohn. He didn’t seem to notice Tua at all.
“Khawp khun kha,” Tua thanked the boy.
“Khawp khun khrap, chang,” the boy said to Pohn-Pohn again, bowed her a wai, and ran off to catch up with his buffaloes.
In the distance, a glittering building loomed up from behind a whitewashed wall. A golden bell-shaped tower gleamed in the sun beside the temple.
“That’s the chedi where the monks keep their sacred relics,” Tua explained to Pohn-Pohn. “When we get inside we’ll make three turns around it for luck. And to show our respect, of course,” she added.
As they drew near the wat they could hear bells, chants, and chimes. Then a procession of saffron-robed boys with shiny shaved heads marched out of the wat toward them. Some were carrying workbooks and pens as if they’d just been dismissed from school.
“Look, Pohn-Pohn,” Tua said. “Those boys are learning how to be good. All boys shave their heads and come to study at the temple—sometimes for three whole months! Girls don’t have to, so we must be good already.”
The monks poured around them like a stream, their heads shimmering in the sun, and guided them inside the walls in a protective embrace.
Tua made three turns around the chedi with Pohn-Pohn following behind her. After they’d finished this ritual, a tall, slim monk in his teens approached them from across the courtyard. He was wearing sunglasses and talking into a cell phone.
“Sawatdee khrap, Tua,” he said, bowing a wai. “I’m Chi Chi.”
Tua bowed back a greeting.
“Your auntie’s on the phone.”
“Kha,” Tua said, and put the phone to her ear.
“Hello?”
“Tua, darling, is that you? Are you all right? I’ve been so worried. Where have you been? What adventures
have you had? How’s my honey, Pohn? Is she behaving herself? Isn’t Chi Chi handsome? Tell me everything.”
With Pohn-Pohn beside her and lending a large ear, Tua recounted their adventures after leaving her auntie’s house.
“Are you hungry, Tua?” Chi Chi asked.
Tua knew that monks never eat after midday. And they never cook for themselves either. They go out early in the morning with their alms bowls and accept offerings from the people. Tua didn’t know what time it was, but she knew it was well past midday.
“I’m a little hungry.” She hunched her shoulders. It had been ages since she’d eaten. And poor Pohn-Pohn had only had a box of mangos for breakfast. “What about Pohn-Pohn?” she asked.
“We took our alms bowls to the farmers’ market for Pohn-Pohn,” Chi Chi said. “The people have been very generous. And we saved some of our midday meal for you. Come.”
As they crossed the courtyard a temple dog awoke from her nap in the sun, stood up, barked three times at Pohn-Pohn, and fell over as if in a faint. Three more temple dogs came out of the shade to investigate, saw Pohn-Pohn, and withdrew into their crannies and nooks. Then a black and brown rooster, with a red coxcomb and coppery tail, strutted across their path as if on a dare.
Tua sat down on a mat under a shelter and was brought three covered bowls by the monks: one with soup, one with curry, and one with rice. There were piles of mangos, pineapples, watermelons, and bunches of bananas as well. Tua bowed three times to thank the people for their offerings.
“Try the curry,” said a boy monk with ears like the handles on a trophy cup.
Tua filled her bowl with curry and rice, took a bite, and licked the spoon.
“Aroy mak mak,” Tua said. “I love it.”
“My mother brings it every morning to the corner where we go for our alms. It’s my favorite,” the boy monk said.
“She must love you very much,” Tua said.
The boy blushed with pride and wiggled his ears.