Say Uncle

by Benjamin Laskin

Thong Dee had really big ears. What surprised me the most about them, however, was how smooth and cool to the touch the leathery skin behind them was, especially compared to the course, bristly hide I sat on.

  But it was Thong Dee’s bugle that really dazzled me. God had created a masterpiece of ingenuity when He came up with the elephant trunk, I thought. It was loaded with extras. Thong Dee’s proboscis was nose, arm, hand, and fingers. It was powerful and flexible. What other animal appendage could boast such an array of uses? I was mesmerized by the way it swung to and fro, sniffing and snatching at the foliage along the path. The trunk seemed to have a mind of its own. I watched in awe as it wrapped itself around a young tree—no mere sapling—and yanked it out of the earth, roots and all, without so much as a grunt. Thong Dee stuck the tree into his maw and lumbered on, chewing on the tree as I might a matchstick. Only this stick was as thick as my leg. Seconds later I heard a resounding—crack!—and saw half the tree drop to the ground.

  As I hoped, the novelty of our trek had a distinct calming effect on Doreen. The remote terrain we plodded over seemed to instill in her a comforting distance from civilization and the dangers it carried. But I think what really eased her mind was Sook, her trusty pachyderm. Tamed though it was, there was no ignoring its wildness, and to be so close to such an exotic beast was a source of constant fascination for city dwellers like us. All wild animals, especially mammals, I thought, even domesticated ones like cats and dogs, horses and goats, can have a trance-like effect on people. They transport us to ancestral places in our minds and have a way of slowing time and easing burdens.

  Something else about our elephants added to our sense of safety and well-being, or mine anyway. Perched high atop my four-legged leather-armored tank, I felt like a real badass. When I wasn’t impersonating Tarzan, I imagined myself as Hannibal crossing the Pyrenees. I could almost hear the great general saying, “Wait till those Roman sons-of-bitches get a load of us!”

  Our elephants weren’t fast, but they were sure-footed and tireless. We lumbered up and down steep, verdant hills and forded swift running streams, none of which caused Thong Dee the least inconvenience. At one water crossing, TD, as I fondly called him, stopped in the middle of the stream for a drink, and as if reading my mind, finished by hosing down my sister. I don’t know when I had ever laughed so hard in my life.

  When we arrived at a small Thai village, we dismounted and Pu told us that we would continue the rest of the way on foot. I patted TD and said a heartfelt goodbye. He slimed me with the end of his trunk.

  A local villager by the name of Vat joined the three of us as our porter. Vat, a square-jawed, broad-shouldered man of about thirty-five, wore a camouflage green T-shirt, a cap that said NIKE, and rubber flip-flops. He hoisted a bulky bamboo basket filled with our provisions onto his back, and we headed out. He proved to be as sure-footed and indefatigable as our elephants were, even in flip-flops.

  Pu told us that we would spend the night at a waterfall. We arrived at dusk and Pu began immediately to prepare dinner. Vat tossed Doreen and I each a warm beer and went to help Pu. Doreen and I dug out our flashlights from our packs and went exploring.

  The waterfall was not high, but it was broad. Behind the cascading sheet we found a cave going back about twenty-five feet. The cave was barren of interest; it had no sleeping beasts, treasure chests, or skeletons. For me, however, all caves were pretty dang cool, especially one hidden behind a gliding curtain of water. We found a couple of large rocks near the back away from the deafening noise, sat down, cracked, clanked, and drank our beers.

  “Neat, huh?” I said.

  “Yeah.”

  We toyed with the beams of our flashlights, breathed deeply the moist, earthy air and sipped our beer.

  “Are you still mad?” I asked.

  “I wasn’t mad, Guy. I was upset and scared.”

  “Okay, upset and scared then?”

  “I’m still scared.”

  “Did they hurt you? Did they…touch you?”

  “No, thank God.”

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “There’s nothing much to tell. I spent the whole time on a ratty mattress in a hot windowless room.”

  “How many were there?”

  “I only saw two, but I heard others now and then.”

  “Could you make out what they were saying?”

  “No.”

  “Did they interrogate you?”

  “The guy you beat up asked me a lot of questions, but I never knew what he was talking about, and he seemed to believe me after awhile. I got the impression that they’re not so much after the journals but the man who wrote them—” Doreen shined her light in my face. “What’s the matter?”

  “‘The guy you beat up,’” I repeated. “It didn’t occur to me until you said it, but I beat up a man. I caused him pain.”

  “You were protecting me, Guy.”

  “With my bare hands I shed his blood.”

  “But, Guy, he might have killed you.”

  “I left him lying there unconscious.”

  “Guy, there wasn’t any time. We had to get out of there.”

  “Doreen, do you realize—”

  “It’s okay. You didn’t mean to hurt him.”

  “The hell I didn’t! I kicked his fucking ass! Kicked it good. Beat the crap out of him!”

  “Oh, Guy…”

  “Felt damn good too. Lousy creep. I showed him. Who did he think he was that he could just—”

  “Okay, Guy…”

  “Nobody messes with one of my sisters and gets away with it!”

  “Thank you, Rambo. Enough, Rambo.”

  “Those bastards will think twice before they tangle with an Andrews again!”

  “Guy!”

  “Doreen, can’t you see I’m swaggering here? I’d appreciate it if you’d quit interrupting me. I knocked the snot out of a man twice my size. How often do you think that has happened in my life? It doesn’t. A rare moment of exultation is all I’m asking for. A little gloating. Some harmless braggadocio. Is it going to kill you? Sheesh.”

  “I’m sorry. Go on.”

  “Nah, I’m finished.”

  “I don’t think they are, though. Somebody wants Anonymous Man, and whoever he is he knows that the journals are the closest link to him. And as long as those cursed books keep popping up in your hands we’re in danger.”

  “But who wants him?”

  “Well, I don’t think it’s that man back at the station. He’s just doing the dirty work.”

  “What makes you think so?”

  “Well, there was one time when he was questioning me that he got a phone call, and although he didn’t say anything more than yes and no, he always addressed the caller as Sir. ‘Yes, Sir. No, Sir. Absolutely, Sir.’ Like that. He was obviously talking to a superior, and someone he was very intimidated by.”

  “Okay,” I said, “so whoever is looking for Mr. A wants to stay as anonymous as he is.”

  “So it seems.”

  “So how does that help us?” I posed.

  “It doesn’t.”

  “Maybe not,” I said, “but it does mean that whatever is going on is even deeper than we thought. We have to think beyond the obvious.”

  “Yeah…?”

  “Well, it’s like this cave.” I shined my light around and made some shadow puppets against the wall. “What’s in here?” I asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “And it’s dark,” I added.

  “So?”

  “Why?”

  “Because the fall acts like a curtain blocking out the light.”

  “Right!”

  Doreen scoffed. “Guy’s analogy of the cave. Plato wasn’t nearly as cryptic as you’re being.”

  “Jeez, Doreen, I’m just trying to look at this thing from a more imaginative angle, okay? …Man.”

  “Yeah, well, Plato had a point to make. What’s yours?”

  “The waterfall. It’s a curtain like you s
aid. And we watch it like Plato’s prisoners did the shadows on the wall. But it’s just a distraction.”

  “Guy,” Doreen growled.

  “Do I have to spell it out for you?”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “The journals, dummy. The journals are the curtain.”

  “So Mr. A is using the journals to distract us? What from?”

  “Not us. They are a smoke screen for whoever it is that is after him. In fact, I think the journals might be a lure.”

  “You’re making this up as you go, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah, but it makes a certain sense, don’t you think?”

  “Not much. Besides, if the journals are a lure, then that makes us the bait.”

  “Yes, it does.”

  “Why us?”

  “I don’t know,” I said.

  “And why lure whoever it is in the first place?”

  “Okay, think about it,” I said. “If you knew an invisible man was after you but you didn’t know where he was or what he was up to, what would you look for?”

  “Footprints…shadows…evidence of where he’s been.”

  “Right. Now, the Invisible Man, he could be anywhere so you need to know his boundaries, set them yourself if you can, and find a way to keep tabs on him—”

  “The journals.”

  “Exactly. Invisible Man knows that Anonymous Man is connected to the journals and Anonymous Man, knowing that, has the means for monitoring his foe’s movements.”

  “I don’t know, Guy…”

  “Do you have a better idea?”

  “No. But what you’re saying is that both men are invisible to each other and are playing the same game, a game in which you and I are stuck in the middle.”

  “Yeah, but don’t you also get the feeling that each considers the other a very crafty and dangerous fellow, a worthy opponent?”

  “I hate them both,” Doreen said.

  We saw another torch beam slice through the darkness. Doreen and I turned our lights on the source and saw Pu’s smiling face.

  “We eat now, okay?” he said.

  “Great,” Doreen said. “I’m starved.”

  Pu waved his arm for us to come and slipped back around the fall’s edge. Doreen and I rose, tipped back the last of our beers and headed towards the corner of the cave.

  I halted halfway. “I’ll be right there.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothin’. Go ahead, I’ll be there in a minute.”

  Doreen shrugged, took a few steps, but then turned back around. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Yeah, fine.”

  “You’re acting kinda weird. You have me worried.”

  “Don’t be. We’ll get out of this. I’ll think of something, I promise.”

  “That’s what I mean,” she said, walking back over to me. “You think this is some sort of game. What you said about the two of them being worthy opponents and everything. I don’t like it. These people are dangerous. We’ve been really lucky until now, but if these men are as you say, we’re gonna get hurt…or worse.”

  “I know that, Doreen. But we haven’t any choice. We have to be smart. Smarter than they are.”

  “But we’re not, Guy. We’re nothing like these people. We’re a couple of college brats from Phoenix, Arizona, whose biggest concern until now was getting good grades.”

  “No, that was yours. Mine was getting laid.”

  “Oh, Guy. Don’t joke.”

  Who’s joking?

  “We are way over our heads,” she said.

  I pointed my torch under her chin and saw a tear race down the left side of her face. I put my arms around her and cradled her tightly.

  “Don’t cry, Doreen. You know it breaks me up to see you cry.”

  “I’m sorry,” she sniffled.

  “At least we’re together. You don’t know what hell I went through when we were apart. It’s not going to happen again. We’re safe for now. It’ll be a while before anyone picks up our trail. Pu said that where we’re going isn’t even on a map.”

  Doreen stepped back and wiped her tears away with the bottom of her T-shirt.

  “Come on,” I said, taking her hand. “Let’s eat.”

  “I thought you wanted to be alone.”

  “Screw it. I was just gonna stand here and stare into the waterfall and wax lugubrious. I’m not in the mood anymore.”

  Doreen grinned. “Sorry I ruined your fun.”

  Pros and Cons

  Pu was an excellent cook. I was expecting the bare minimum but he put together a feast of fried rice, sautéed veggies, soup, and some noodle dish. It was spicy and delicious. Doreen shoveled it in.

  “Didn’t those guys feed you?” I said.

  “For some reason,” she replied dryly, “I wasn’t very hungry.”

  Pu prided himself on his culinary skills and was pleased by our voracious appetites and the way we carried on about how delicious everything was. He artlessly boasted that it was the love he put into his cooking that distinguished his treks from that of the competition.

  Pu was the most easygoing person I had ever met. His amiableness seemed an open invitation for questions, and Doreen fired one after another at him in her desire to learn his life story. I thought his lighthearted personality all the more profound after listening to his remarkable saga.

  From what he told us, there are about 600,000 Lahu in the world, most of who live in nearly inaccessible regions of southwestern Yunnan in China, and parts of northeastern Myanmar, or Burma as it used to be called. According to Pu, about 60,000 Lahu were scattered in the mountainous regions of northern Thailand. They were made up of five subgroups: Black Lahu, Red Lahu, White Lahu, Yellow Lahu, and Shehleh. Pu said he belonged to a Red Lahu tribe that was chased across the Burmese border into Thailand when he was three years old. He had little recollection of those early years but heard that they were particularly harsh. An epidemic of some kind broke out and decimated half his tribe, including Pu’s parents and two siblings, sparing Pu and one older sister. Shortly after, Christian missionaries arrived and the tribe converted to Christianity, though, he said, it was more in name than in practice.

  As was their nomadic way, their clan moved frequently from hilltop to hilltop as their slash and burn agricultural custom required; a practice frowned upon by the Thai government. At fourteen, he married “a beautiful girl with always sunny smile.” She was twelve and died two years later giving birth to their first child, who also died.

  A missionary who had taken a particular liking to Pu convinced him and the elders that Pu should go to the big city and receive special training that would confer honor and blessing upon him and his people. In Chaing Mai he had his first encounter with civilization. He had never seen a car, a bus, or even pavement before. He scalded his fingers touching a light bulb, washed his face in the first toilet he saw, and after seeing people drink Coca-Cola, assumed anything in a bottle was edible and swallowed a mouthful of shampoo. “It was a different world,” he said with characteristic understatement.

  Pu stayed with an elderly white couple, missionaries from America, and learned to speak, read, and write both Thai and English. He also learned all about Noah, King David, Jesus, heaven and hell.

  “I was very confused,” he said, “and asked many stupid questions. The old woman told me I’d understand everything if I opened my heart to Jesus and prayed to him for forgiveness. I did as she said but after a week of praying I was no smarter. The woman said I didn’t pray hard enough. She said I should pray like I was about to die. I tried again. The next day the old woman choked to death on a chicken bone. I felt very bad. I thought maybe I prayed wrong and it was my fault she choked on that bone. Her husband became depressed, packed his things and went back to America. He left me with a rich Thai family, a member of his church. I became their houseboy, but I stayed only a few months. They didn’t like me, maybe because I was Lahu and did strange things, so I ran away.”

  For
the next ten years he worked any job he could find for whatever they would pay him. He ticked off the number of different jobs he held on his fingers.

  “Why didn’t you go back to your own people?” Doreen asked.

  “I wanted to,” he said, “but I was ashamed.”

  “Why?”

  “The city way made me into bad Lahu, and I had nothing to give my people.”

  Then one day he saw a sign advertising treks for foreigners to the different hill tribe peoples. He had found his calling. First he got hired as a guide for one of the many new trekking companies that were popping up everywhere and learned the ropes. A year later he started his own business. His office was two plastic chairs and a poster on a street corner. He promised small groups, seeing no other trekkers along the way, elephant riding, bamboo rafting, and good food. He worked hard and his practical knowledge of English as well as a number of other tribal tongues and customs made him a competent guide.

  “I was happy,” he said, “because I could now do something for my people. My customers buy their crafts and I give them money to stay a night in their village.”

  Trekking was seasonal, and like any tourist-based industry dependent upon many factors outside the industry’s will. His earnings were puny by western standards, but he considered himself fortunate. He had a wife and two little girls and they had a roof over their heads and food to eat. He had the mountains he loved, friends, and the joy of meeting people from all over the world. “Money is good to have,” he told us, “but knowing what you love is better.”

  “Is a hundred dollars a person your usual fee for a trek?” Doreen asked.

  “Oh, no,” he said, embarrassed by the number. “That’s more than my usual charge for three-day trek. Miss Noriko insisted, though. She knew, maybe, that usually I take six or eight peoples. But for her I would do for free.”

  “Why’s that?” I asked.

  “She is good friend to me. She sended me many customers. And when trekking season is finished, she gives me construction work to do at the places she builds in north.”

  “What do you know about her?” I asked.

  “She is very smart and important person.”

  “You mean because she’s a famous model?”