by Morris West
‘Forgive me. I must have sounded very impertinent, but I’ve worked a long time in this town. Strange things can happen.’
‘I know.’ Kenji Tanaka was as bland as honey, ‘I, too, have long connections here. I am glad you called. I did not have time to thank you this afternoon. You were in a difficult situation.’
‘Not too difficult. Wylie gave me the information because he expected me to pass it on and because he couldn’t prescribe protection for a non-national. Unless I gave it to both of you, I could have been rated by one or the other as a tale-bearer. Please give Miko my good wishes. Tell her I wish her a safe journey and a peaceful homecoming.’
‘She’s at the hairdresser’s now. I know she will want to call you before she leaves in the morning.’
‘And you, Kenji? How long will you stay in Bangkok?’
‘Until our situation with Leibig and with the Soviets is resolved.’ He gave a small, humourless laugh. ‘I am not yet ready to bid farewell to Gilbert Langton. Have a pleasant dinner.’
One way and another, it had been a very busy day. I decided I had earned a drink before I showered and dressed for dinner. I poured myself a stiff bourbon and picked up the South-East Asian edition of the Wall Street Journal. Our story had made two columns on page one, which was a compliment to Alex Boyko and his team. His text had been printed verbatim, but it ended with an editorial comment: ‘This news should lay to rest certain rumours which have been circulating in Asian financial circles, that the Tanaka Group has been in bad odour with the keiretsu and has been forced to seek maverick money to bolster its more risky enterprises.’
The italic type seemed to leap from the page. No one, least of all Domenico Cubeddu of the Palermitan Banking Corporation, could miss the import of the words. The shit had already hit the fan. Miko was still in the fall-out zone. Kenji Tanaka himself was working very close to the wind.
At eight o’clock, showered, shaved and dressed in tropical cottons, I was waiting on the landing stage for Boris and Tanya. Boris embraced me in a bear-hug. Tanya kissed me with agreeable intensity. The boatman handed us into the narrow craft and we roared across the river, narrowly missing a rice barge and a sand scow and a floating restaurant. Conversation was impossible until we were decanted on the wharf at the other side and walked the two hundred paces to Siri’s house on the klong. Tanya was goggle-eyed at the exotic interior; the rich teak, the antique tapestries in gold and silver thread, the cool stone of the Khmer figures. Boris stared at his hostess open-mouthed, like a frog-prince waiting to be made human with a kiss. It pleased me that I was the one to be kissed and ordered to make the cocktails. The children were not in evidence. This was a business occasion, they were absent about their own concerns. Finally, Boris found voice.
‘Siri, I am your slave. You are the most beautiful woman in the world!’
‘He was my slave when we were in bed at five-thirty. ‘Tanya was ready for a pitched battle.
‘He will be again at twelve-thirty,’ Siri told her cheerfully. ‘As Gil will tell you, I never even kiss on the first date. The last Russian I kissed was Yuri Yevtushenko, and only because he was a fine poet, slightly drunk, in a fit of deep melancholy. You remember, Gil! He stood where Tanya is standing now and recited ten stanzas of “Babi Yar”. What an actor!’
God bless the woman! She had Boris tamed and Tanya adoring her before we had finished the first martini. She told them the tale of Madame Loi, daughter of a Chinese warlord in the highlands, mistress of a prince, lover of an American diplomat, who had invested her savings in a house on the river and three godowns which she leased to the river traders and a small restaurant where she cooked and served the best Chinese/Thai food in Bangkok. It was a very private place. Big deals were done there. Marriages were arranged there. Certain noble love affairs had been consummated there. Once, according to ugly rumour, murder had been done in the river room. The truth, as Siri explained it in her calm fashion, was that the assassin and his victim had dined there; but the killing had been done twenty miles away in a banana plantation.
We strolled there in pairs, Boris and Siri in the lead, Tanya clinging to my arm and firing questions at me in Armenian. Where did you meet her? Have you ever been lovers? How can you work so closely together and still be just friends? How old is she? Where did she get all that beautiful education? Fortunately I did not have to answer too many of the queries because Tanya ran them together in a kind of breathless monologue, all the time keeping a wary eye on Boris, who was playing the courtier as if he had just stepped out of the pages of War and Peace.
At Madame Loi’s the miracle of food was performed, followed by another which never failed to amaze me: Siri effacing herself into almost total anonymity while the currents of business talk swirled around her. Yet her placid presence muted the harshness of the problems exposed in our talk. I set down the options as they had been discussed with Tanaka, Leibig and Laszlo; I asked Vannikov to give me his own version of the possibilities. His answer was simple.
‘There is nothing in your documents which, in normal circumstances, we would refuse to accept. The principles are sound. The ways and means could be argued, plus or minus, in committee. However, our circumstances are not normal. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is fragmenting itself. The president has been vested with dictatorial powers to stop the fragmentation. There is grave doubt that he can succeed. Therefore, much as I regret to say so, our discussions here in Bangkok have become marginal, untimely and unreal.’
‘Wrong words, Boris!’ Tanya was a dominating presence in the quiet room. There are eight billion dollars of hard currency investment available. They are not at the exclusive disposition of the presidential council. They are a benefit to be shared with all the republics. That’s real. And God knows, it couldn’t be more timely. We have to make that clear at home.’
For a long moment, Vannikov sat silent, staring down at his plate. When he looked up, his face was sombre and there was in his eyes a tenderness I had never seen before. He addressed himself to Tanya.
‘I wasn’t going to tell you this until the morning. But, to the Devil with it! Before we came out tonight, I received a message from the Embassy. It was an instruction from the presidential council. Their own difficulties make it impossible to commit to the terms of this commercial enterprise at this moment. They now take the view that further debates and discussions in Bangkok will serve only to highlight the increasing problems in the homeland. Therefore we are recalled!’
‘No!’ It was a cry of pure despair from Tanya. ‘They can’t do that!’ She fought back the tears of anger and frustration.
Vannikov’s answer was curt and final. “They’ve done it. We wear it.’
‘Not without a fight.’ Tanya refused to be silenced or mollified. ‘You’ve got to hold them off a few days longer. We can’t retreat from Bangkok like a defeated army. I refuse to be shamed by those bastards in Moscow.’
“They’ll shame you more if they refuse to pay your hotel bill and your airfare.’ Vannikov still managed to extract a drop of black humour from the situation. ‘Unless, of course, you want to defect and take a job with Gil here.’
‘Will you have me, Gil?’
‘Any time, my love.’
‘Good!’ Vannikov was in control again. ‘Now, let’s be practical. If Moscow will consent to a tactical withdrawal instead of a full retreat, how far will your people co-operate, Gil?’
‘Frankly, I don’t know. It’s your people who are pulling the rug on the deal. If you can persuade them to modify their attitude – to postpone, prorogue, pending further consultations – then the picture changes somewhat. However, if you’re asking the investors to hold their money in place, you have to hold their rights and pre-emptions in place too. What we don’t want is a repetition of today’s situation, where the presidential council had agreed something and the army countermanded it. We need assurances that the position we have established will be maintained, at least for a reasonable time.’
&nb
sp; ‘Therefore we need time to frame the assurances.’ Tanya was pressing hard. ‘We also need time to explain our resolves to the press. We dare not break off abruptly. I think we have to sit out the whole session here. At least we have to leave a working committee for the full time. Don’t you agree, Gil?’
‘Tanya, my love, it doesn’t matter whether I agree or not. I’m the mediator, not a voter. Let me show you what you’re up against. Item: a lot of money which can’t be kept idle. Item: Kenji Tanaka, a dying man eager to quit, his new and powerful associates sceptical of the venture anyway. Item: Carl Leibig, a solid man with steady nerves but dependent on his bankers; Pavel Laszlo, a brilliant entrepreneur but totally intolerant of bureaucrats and bunglers. Item: an underlying resentment that, having invited them to set up this consortium, you are not ready to meet your commitments. Add to that the prospect of war in the Gulf and the forgotten trade war which is going on between the United States and Europe and Japan – you’ve got a hell of a lot to contend with.’
‘And you, my dear Gil,’ Siri spoke for the first time. ‘You have now said enough. In this place we are friends trying to help each other. Look out at the river. It is the lifeline of our delta people, but we have to adapt to it, live with its moods, rejoice in the food it nourishes, endure the parasites it inflicts upon us. You are all caught in the current of history whose headwaters rise in the dark mountains of the past. You cannot change it; you survive and help others to survive by adapting to it. Let us relax now. We are friends who trust each other. Madame Loi still has a few surprises for us.’
‘My biggest surprise, ‘said Tanya in her forthright fashion, ‘is that you and Gil work so closely together, you’re so obviously fond of each other, yet you’ve never thought of getting married.’
Siri smiled, that slow, subtle Buddha-smile, and answered for both of us. ‘Once, a long time ago, we thought about it and talked about it, but it didn’t make sense to change the course of our lives so radically. We have each been married before, and very happily. Each of us has grown children. Gil, like his father, is at heart a gypsy. I am a very settled person, with many relatives of my own and a whole web of family connections on my husband’s side. Those connections mean duties and pieties of one sort and another which, to a farang like Gil, would mean a total shift in the direction of his life. Neither of us demands that kind of sacrifice from the other. My children and I were brought up by Gil’s father, so there is already a family relationship between us…What more do we need?’
‘Gil needs a wife!’ Tanya was getting high on Madame Loi’s Chinese wine.
‘I know he does, my dear.’ Siri seemed to have a limitless fund of patience. ‘But I’m not the woman for that role.’
‘Would you consider a bid from me, madam?’ Boris was elated but still sober. ‘I’m not doing so well as a chief of delegation, but I do have other talents.’
‘I know you have, Boris, but I’m not sure that I’d wear very well in a Moscow winter, or you in a tropic monsoon.’
‘He’d probably end up covered with green mould. ‘That was Tanya’s last contribution before Madame Loi presented the masterpiece of the evening: deep-fried duckling in pandamus leaves with a sauté of tropic vegetables and fruits.
We sat for another hour over the meal. Our talk lapsed into fragmented exchanges of reminiscence, old tales retold, opinions half examined, trotted out once more for friendly inspection. It was just after eleven when Madame Loi bowed us off the premises. It was half past when we said goodbye to Siri at her front door and strolled arm in arm down to the landing stage to pick up a water taxi for the short river crossing.
From where we stood, the Oriental hotel was clearly visible, the last late diners on the terrace, the glow of the barbecue area, the landing stage where the big river boat was moored, fuelled and ready for the next day’s excursion to Ayutthaya, the upward thrust of the high block of balconied suites overlooking the terrace and the river reaches.
We were just settling ourselves into the narrow, rocking water taxi when we heard a hubbub of shouting and screaming. When we looked up, we saw the late, sparse crowd converging like a scurry of ants on the square of terrace just below the riverside suites. Then the scene was blotted out by a line of rice barges going down river. When we came finally to the landing stage the hubbub had died to a low, sinister murmur. The security guard who handed us ashore gave only a laconic answer to our questions: there had been an accident; we should not go along the terrace, but take the long way round, through the garden and past the swimming pool, thence into the foyer.
Once we were out of his sight, we slipped back on to the terrace and worked our way through the crowd of guests which was becoming denser every moment. As we moved, we gathered our information in snatches, but the final confirmation came from a young waiter whom I questioned in Thai. He pointed upwards along the lighted face of the residential block. A young woman had fallen or jumped from one of the topmost balconies. She died the moment she hit the ground, a terrible mess. The police were on their way. We could hear their sirens. We saw their first contingent thrusting through the crowd, forming a protective cordon around the victim, covered now with bloody tablecloths.
Suddenly I caught sight of Tanaka, flanked by two of his staff and led by the assistant manager, pushing his way through the crowd under the colonnade. I pointed them out to Vannikov and we, too, began to barge through the spectators towards the police cordon. Tanaka and his escorts got there before us. I saw them in hurried dialogue with the police. Tanaka stepped forward. One of the policemen lifted a corner of the tablecloths. Tanaka stared for a moment, nodded, then turned away and vomited on the pavement.
I turned to Vannikov. I read in his eyes my own unspoken thought. I told him curtly: ‘Get Tanya out of here. Tanaka needs some help. I’ll call you later.’
He moved fast, dragging Tanya out of the crowd and heading away into the shadows of the garden. I pressed forward to make contact with the officer in charge of the police detachment. Before I opened my mouth, he waved me away. Then, when he heard me speaking Thai, he became courteous, but made me pay a price: my own identification of the victim. I managed to control my nausea and confirm that it was Miko and that she was personal assistant to Mr Kenji Tanaka, one of the principals at the current conference. Then I had to explain my own role. After that the officer was amenable to the suggestion that I take Mr Tanaka away from the scene and hold both him and myself available for questioning after the forensic formalities.
We made our way back to Tanaka’s suite in silence. Once there, he dismissed his two assistants and sat slumped in an armchair, staring into some private pit of despair. I made him a stiff drink. He gagged on the first sip and then downed half the glass at a gulp. Slowly the colour came back to his cheeks, but he found no words and his eyes were still focused on dark infinities. I had to begin the talk by telling him of the subtleties we might expect in a Thai interrogation. I warned him against any hint of brusqueness, impatience or irritation. I suggested that, unless the police officer spoke Japanese, which was unlikely, he permit me to act as interpreter from Thai to Japanese, from Japanese to Thai. I would undertake to read both the Thai and the Japanese transcripts. He should sign the Japanese version, while I certified the Thai version before he signed that too.
The exercise seemed to jolt him out of his torpor. He began to talk slowly and ruminatively as if he were totally detached from the events he described:
‘You spoke to Miko and me in the suite. You told us of your talk with Wylie.’
Wylie! I had forgotten him completely. I muttered an excuse to Tanaka, reached for the telephone and asked to be put through to the Noel Coward Suite. Wylie answered. He sounded drowsy and distinctly unwelcoming.
‘Who the hell is this?’
‘It’s Gil. What have you been doing for the last hour?’
‘Sleeping, for Christ’s sake! We were in bed by ten. What’s going on?’
I told him. He was instantly awake and wary as
a fox. I told him I had spent the evening on the other side of the river. He let out a long exhalation of relief.
‘Good. Three-monkey trick: no see, no hear, no say.’
‘That was my thought. The police will be here soon to question Tanaka. I’ll be interpreting.’
‘And you’ll keep me posted.’
‘You likewise, Max.’
‘Of course, but, as they say in the army, never volunteer anything, even the time of day. I’m going back to sleep.’
‘Apologies to Jeannine.’
‘She wears earplugs and eyeshades. She didn’t even stir. Good luck with the gendarmes.’
Kenji Tanaka was alert now, watching me with dark, mistrustful eyes.
‘What was all that about?’
‘A friendly exchange of news and views. Remember that Miko, Cubeddu and Hoshino are already in the police computers. Nothing that should concern you. Now, you were about to tell me what happened after I left you and Miko this evening. Imagine I am the policeman who will be here presently.’
‘Nothing happened. We talked.’
‘About what?’
‘About the conference, whether it should be continued or postponed. When I should return to Japan. Miko thought I should leave as soon as possible. I felt I should stay at least until the end of the week. I told her I did not want to linger in Tokyo, but go almost immediately to the country, to Nagano, because that is where I want to die. Miko thought it would be a good idea if she left early to prepare the place for my arrival. We agreed on that. She left to go to the hairdresser, saying she would have the concierge get her a seat on tomorrow morning’s flight. While she was at the hairdresser’s, I made all the other arrangements for her exit’
‘Why did you go to so much trouble?’
‘You know why, Gil!’
‘I am not Gil. I’m a police officer gathering information.’
‘Miko is an important person on my staff and in my personal life. I depend upon her. It is only commonsense that I take care of her.’