The Amok Runners

by Colin Cotterill

  ‘Sissy?’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Remember we used to sit on the deck at Khin’s place and talk about how cool everything was. How people over in farangland would envy our peaceful lifestyle? How Nirvana had to be something like that deck on the side of Doi Suthep?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  When did we decide that wasn’t good enough for us?’

  Chapter 23

  “Named must your fear be before banish it you can.”

  Star Wars; The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

  We’d driven back to the house in silence. Sissy’s hands had begun to shake on the wheel even before we reached the happy Chinese Buddha at the entrance to the temple. I’d taken over the driving. My hands were steadier but my stomach was knotted like a string of old Christmas lights. We both had plenty to consider.

  Back at the house, Arny had gone to bed to rest his back. Bunny was in Bangkok for the night doing more blue-screen work. We joined Kuro on the balcony. He was trying to introduce us to Johnny Walker Blue. It was no more blue than Black was black or Red was red but it was exactly what we needed that night. The bank opposite seemed to present more of a threat than usual. The insects’ dirge was more foreboding – a million noisy witnesses to our discomfort.

  We’d settled down somewhat and the shakes had stopped by the time we heard the rotors of the helicopter that touched down on the cleared lot opposite the house. Once or twice a week, OB had taken to hitching a ride back to Chiang Mai with Dan Jensen. He liked to check the rushes in the studio of Living Films out on the Super Highway. He could have stayed at the Dhara Dhevi and come back with Jensen in the morning but he admitted there was only so much of the self-opined, whimpering little runt he could take. And OB had begun to treasure the nights on the balcony at the accountant’s house. He liked being around people he didn’t have to pretend with.

  He stopped briefly at his room to get into shorts and a Biere Lao T-shirt and hurried out to the porch. I could imagine the words ‘thank God’ tattooed across his forehead. He stood at the rail and took in a lungful of nature. We gave him his minute’s silence - the new ritual. When he was pure again, he turned to his housemates and smiled.

  ‘Hi, OB,’ we said.

  ‘Gentlemen. Lady,’ he smiled. ‘What’s our sin of choice for the evening?’

  A glass was already waiting for him beside his recliner. He sat and sipped. He generally seemed to accept anything we put in front of him. Any sedative or stimulant would do him fine. If we passed around a penguin we were certain he’d chew on it quite contentedly. Once he was home he deferred all decision making to anybody else.

  ‘Ah, Kuro,’ he said. ‘I see we’re taking advantage of the absence of our starlet to do some serious man drinking. Do we tell dirty jokes and look at porn movies later, too?’

  ‘Up to you,’ Kuro said.

  ‘You got any?’ Sissy asked.

  OB laughed too hysterically, too manically like a psychiatric patient letting go a trauma.

  ‘What’s happened?’ I asked.

  ‘We lost a can,’ he said.

  ‘Tuna?’

  ‘Film. Today’s shoots.’

  ‘Everything?’ Kuro asked.

  ‘About two hours on the main camera.’ He took a healthy slug of the light brown Blue and smiled. It was a particularly Thai smile.

  ‘How? You’ve got security people,’ I said.

  ‘A whole team of ‘em, yeah.’

  ‘So, how …?’

  ‘Somewhere between the helicopter landing spot and the studio. I don’t know. John Quirk was with the cans the whole time. He gets a bit anal about not letting them out of his sight.’

  ‘He had hold of them inside the helicopter, too?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, he wouldn’t have been clutching them to his chest the whole way, but, yeah. I guess. Why?’

  ‘It’s a police helicopter, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, it is. Do you know something, Jimm?’

  During our drive back to the house, we’d decided it was time to share our fears with as many people as possible. There was nothing heroic in dying with a secret. We dragged Arny out of his early bed and huddled together on the balcony, the drinks forgotten. Sissy acted as narrator: the attempts on our lives, the connection with director Boon, and finally the mystery of the non-Shan-speaking Shan. And he was careful to keep pulling on the thread that ran through it all – the Fang police.

  ‘Hell!’ said OB. He topped up his glass and drank half.

  Kuro smiled in a way that some clever westerners describe as ‘inscrutable’ but which is actually just the Japanese way of saying, ‘Shit!’

  ‘Okay,’ OB sat nodding through his thoughts. ‘Then let’s suppose all these unfortunate accidents we’re having on and around the set aren’t accidents at all.’

  I sat up and counted them off on my fingers. ‘Two bush fires in two days. Two rocket-proof cameras breaking down at the same time. Extras retreating despite very clear instructions they should be attacking. A lost can of film. I don’t know. That doesn’t take much supposing in my book.’

  ‘All right then,’ OB nodded. ‘So what do they hope to gain? They were delighted to have us here. The police major and the governor gave a dinner in our honour. They told us how hard they’d fought to have this movie shot in their district. It meant extra income for Fang retailers and hoteliers. Why would they want to sabotage the whole thing?’

  We sat quietly pondering that very point.

  ‘I get a feeling we’ve got all the parts but we aren’t putting them together right,’ I said.

  ‘I agree,’ said Sissy. ‘And I’ve got a hunch if we can find out what the story is with those extras we’ll be half way to seeing the picture. OB, what do you know about their work permits and visas?’

  ‘I can check.’

  I nodded. ‘I doubt we’ll come up with anything there. But it’ll help to know just what documents these guys need to work here. Are they all legal? That kind of thing. I just have this feeling there’s something bigger. We really should talk to the extras without their minder breathing down our necks.’

  Kuro ran his hand through his long black hair, frowned like Toshiro Mifune, and sucked in a tight hiss like the door closing on an airport shuttle bus. I could imagine a million teenage boys in Japan standing in front of a mirror and practicing that self-same gesture.

  ‘The probrem is,’ he said. ‘we don’t know what ranguage they speak.’

  ‘What we could do is record them while they’re together and have someone analyze it,’ OB suggested.

  I looked at Sissy. A different idea had occurred to us simultaneously.

  ‘Better than that,’ I said. ‘We bring in someone who can go straight into the interview.’

  Chapter 24

  “Alone, bad. Friend, good.”

  Bride of Frankenstein(1935)

  Khin was at the west wall of Wieng Kum Kam pacing. She wore an enormous straw hat and when she stood still to record her measurements she looked like a well-used beach umbrella. Her footprints criss-crossed the entire area. The residents whose houses backed on to the site had been watching her through their kitchen windows, wondering when she’d faint from the heat. But they didn’t know Khin.

  ‘Anyone mentioned you look like a sun flower in that hat?’ I said.

  Khin turned to the voice and saw me leaning on a sacred boundary marker as if it were a pile of bricks.

  ‘Jimm,’ said Khin enthusiastically. ‘Delighted to see you.’ She came over and shook my hand. ‘And your film?’

  ‘I took the day off.’

  Khin’s countenance became overcast with the threat of rain.

  ‘Oh dear. I promised to telephone you to inform you of my progress, didn’t I? I have been a recalcitrant member of the amok runners. I have been plunged into a frenzied period of confounding activity, you see? Forgive me.’

  ‘You’re forgiven. All I know is you’re a pain in the ass to find.’

  ‘Yes. Then, h
ow did you succeed?’

  ‘Last thing we knew you were at the museum in Lamphun.’

  ‘You went there?’

  ‘Yeah. And the watchman said you’d left there happy as a finch and not told a soul where you were off to. So, I figured, if you were in that good a mood you probably weren’t on your way back to Burma. You must have found something to support this month’s Mangrai theory. And that’s what brought me here. I asked a few people if they’d seen a skinny Burmese prodding and probing around the sites and step by step they pointed me in this direction.’

  ‘Brilliant,’ she said. ‘You should have been a detective rather than a hack.’

  ‘I’m a reporter, Khin.’

  ‘Same difference. But why have you been so diligent in your search for me, Jimm?’

  ‘We need you.’

  ‘I am touched. What for?’

  ‘It’s a long story. Is there somewhere we can sit and talk out of the sun?’

  ‘Certainly. There is my house.’

  ‘Your …? You have a house?’

  ‘I used the American aid money to rent a domicile.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Right here in Wieng Kum Kam. At the heart of my place of employment you might say.’

  Khin walked me through the narrow streets of little houses, all of which seemed to resent the presence of the ancient ruins in their community. Nobody wanted a heap of rubble as a next door neighbour, not even the poorest householder. We passed a toy town-sized shop whose old lady proprietor seemed to have been scaled down to fit her establishment.

  ‘Hello, teacher,’ she said in English.

  ‘Hello, Mrs. Lah,’ said Khin.

  ‘Looks like you rule the hood already, Khin,’ I said.

  ‘That was my local Seven-Eleven,’ she blushed. ‘And this …’ She held out her hand like a game-show hostess pointing to the night’s star prize, ‘this is my abode.’

  It was the sorriest looking hovel I’d seen in a while – low and bare, like a concrete gun placement on some windswept coast. It was scarcely broad enough for a woman of Khin’s height to lay lengthwise without banging her head against the wall. It was sky blue and apparently suffering from earthquake damage. We entered but neither of us bothered to take off our shoes. There was no optical illusion. It didn’t magically defy dimensions and turn into a vast chamber inside. The ceiling was low enough to touch and it was basically one room – the living, sleeping, dining area and a kitchen alcove. The bathroom, toilet, spa, Jacuzzi was in a packing case-sized construction in the back yard.

  ‘So,’ I asked, already sensing the worst, ‘how much are you paying for this?’

  ‘Yes. It was a steal, Jimm. Only eight thousand baht a month – and a mere two months down payment.’

  ‘That really is a steal, Khin,’ I said.

  ‘And they didn’t even ask to see my particulars.’

  ‘You surprise me. And they’ll be shipping in the furniture when?’

  ‘The mattress is more than adequate. Although I confess a refrigerator might not come amiss.’

  She seemed so happy I didn’t have the heart to shoot her down. A change of subject was in order. There were no chairs upon which to sit nor table upon which to lean, so we sat cross-legged on the mattress. I began to itch as soon as I lowered myself onto it.

  ‘Khin, my sister.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘We have a mission.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘I need you to come back to Fang with me.’

  The pallor of disappointment passed across Khin’s face quickly like the shadow of a 747. I knew the poor woman was being wrenched from the love of her life but the Burmese sense of honour amongst friends outweighed her frustration. I was also aware that Khin’s love affair would never be requited and a few days off might actually do her good.

  ‘Your wish is my command,’ said Khin.

  ‘It shouldn’t take long.’

  ‘Tell me of your problem.’

  As I told the tale and described what role we hoped Khin might play, I noticed a non-dripping tear form in the corner of my friend’s eye. Khin inflated with pride right there in front of me. I believed if the Burmese had been in possession of cutlery she might have gone so far as to make an incision in our two palms and swear a blood allegiance right there on the living room floor.

  ‘I don’t know how to repay you for this opportunity,’ Khin said, leaving me stuck for a response. It was clear that Khin saw this as a way, in small part, of repaying the mountain of kindnesses she’d received since we adopted her.

  ‘No, in fact I do,’ she decided. ‘When everything is resolved in Fang, Sissy and Arny and yourself will come here as my guests …’

  ‘Khin, that really isn’t necess …’

  ‘… and together we shall …’

  ‘Khin.’

  ‘Together we shall recover the great treasure of King Mangrai. It is the least I can do. I insist.’

  I puffed out my cheeks and turned to look into the delighted, childlike face of Khin of Burma.

  ‘Thanks, Khin.’

  Chapter 25

  “Nobody takes a picture of something they want to forget.”

  One Hour Photo (2002)

  Despite all he’d learned about the Fang police, OB had a movie to make. He’d urged us to abandon our mission and return to Chiang Mai, but it didn’t surprise him when we refused. There was something of the mild-mannered super hero in him too. He wanted to avenge those who had suffered and climb tall buildings in the pursuit of justice. That undying belief that we were more righteous than our foe reminded OB of his fiery youth – of the boy who’d made documentaries that told the truth. In those days the truth had been a dangerous weapon. He’d taken on the corporations and the establishment and he’d made dents. You could never completely crush the bastards but there had been battles won and faces broken. The pledge of allegiance we’d made on the Saturday evening had been particularly Fantastic Four-like.

  Over the years, OB had gazed down upon a sea of flesh from his scaffold. Like most directors he had stopped seeing the bit players as people. They were scenery with legs. But today there was a new dimension to the game. He visualized, not only the effect the movement of the extras would produce on screen, but also the drama that might be playing on their lives. What intrigue was afoot? For the first time in many decades the fact had become more important to him than the fantasy. It occurred to him that distracting people from reality wasn’t nearly as satisfying as changing the reality itself.

  They were reshooting the lost can. The extras in Thai garb charged and charged again, all give or take those who retreated. In post-production the army would become two-hundred thousand. Twenty-first century audiences hummed at two-thousand. In the Rings series, Jackson had conjured militias of a million. In Troy a fleet of a hundred thousand ships was already a thing of no great wonder. Hollywood had become a slave to excess.

  There was an observer zone at the shoot sight. It kept all the visitors in one spot so there would be less likelihood of some actor’s mother strolling across a battle scene with a video camera. Local dignitaries and the press were fenced off in this compound and shepherded by an official with a walky-talky. They were situated on the top of a hill and had refreshments and clean Porta-johns to keep everything civilized. From this vantage point one could see the corner of the city walls and the palace in the distance. There was a good view of the camera placements and the largely unemployed extras and elephants. And high on his metal throne sat the great director passing on judgments electronically.

  Major Ketthai and Sergeant Manuth stood in the observer zone with police-issue binoculars. The major was giving orientation to his new sergeant following the sad and sudden death of his predecessor. They were not watching the coordination of the men down in the valley but instead trained their glasses on the back of their new target.

  ‘That one,’ said Ketthai. ‘Do you see him?’

  ‘The old one? Yes major. I see hi
m.’

  ‘They call him OB. The actors have bodyguards but this one thinks he’s special. I don’t want any mistakes, understand?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  Manuth still had the hop, skip and salivary glands of a puppy dog. He was eager to please the major. But Ketthai despaired at the lower ranks – so enthusiastic to work their way into the upper circle where the serious money was to be made, but so incompetent. And now the academy was talking about honour and honesty there seemed little hope of finding young police officers with the right attitude any more. But, he had to give this one his due. He’d handled the dispatch of Sergeant Chat most competently. Chat had taken to drinking and talking too much about the wrong things. He was careless. He’d bungled the shooting and setting up the dead body. He’d been due an accident and his replacement arranged it well. Perhaps there was hope.

  Chapter 26

  “If there's anything in the world I hate, it's leeches - oh, the filthy little devils!”

  The African Queen (1951)

  Sissy walked along the air-conditioned hallway and admired the artfully framed portrait photographs of Thai celebrities he couldn’t name. He was a television amputee. He knew nothing about Thai pop culture and had no ambition to learn. Life was too short and fame too fleeting to invest time on its study. He’d given Thai cinema its chance and there were flowers blooming here and there but mostly it was a desert of schlocky horror and whacky slapstick. Directors gave the audiences what they were used to and didn’t feel obliged to wean them off the sugary diet they’d been on for generations.

  Ask Sissy about Thai literature and art and he’d hold his own in sophisticated company but the average eight-year-old could out-pop him hands down. The faces that watched his progress through the studio corridors were air-brushed strangers; too young to be talented, too pretty to be permanent. He used to be one of those pretties so he knew. This day he was more elegant than glamorous in a beige skirt suit and high heels. He’d applied his makeup in the airplane so it wasn’t perfect but it would do. He turned a corner as the receptionist had instructed and came face to limited-feature-face with Gus.