They worked silently for a few minutes removing the books from their sacks, unwrapping the hay, sniffing the old bindings. Daeng was about to set off along a subtle chain of questions to discover the reason for the unpleasantness in her friend’s marriage. But Dtui saved her the trouble.
“Phosy has another woman,” she said, not looking up from the books.
Daeng coughed her surprise.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. She expected Dtui to put up a fight but the nurse merely pursed her lips and her eyes swelled with tears. “Dtui?” Daeng slid across the wooden floorboards to sit beside her friend. Malee stirred and twisted before settling down. “Dtui?”
“I’m sorry.” Dtui smiled. “I promised I wouldn’t cry when this happened.”
“What? What’s happened?”
“Like I said. I’m in the wife bank. Safe. He’s free to go off and make deposits in other accounts.”
“You didn’t just make that up on the spur of the moment.”
“My ma used to say it all the time.”
“That was your ma, and those were different times.”
“Men haven’t become different creatures.”
“That’s true, but I still don’t believe it.”
“It’s a fact.”
“You have proof?”
“I don’t need any, auntie. A wife knows. I see all the signs. It was my own fault. He didn’t tell me … hasn’t ever told me he loves me. In fact, dumb old me, he’d come right out with it, hadn’t he? Said he didn’t love me but he’d do the right thing. Said he liked me. Liked me and respected me. And what does desperate, fat Dtui do?”
“I don’t—”
“She says, ‘Oh, OK. Like is good. I’ll take that. I have all the love we’ll ever need. Maybe, with a little patience, your like will grow a few more leaves over the years, a blossom or two. That’s plenty. Once Malee came along I thought she’d bind us together but she didn’t. Even the like’s started to wilt.”
“Dtui, you can’t—”
“First he became this supervigilant father: ‘Don’t talk to her like that. Don’t give her too much of this.’ Then he started with the one-word answers to long questions, the grunts, the late nights, the working weekends.”
“I …”
“The ‘I’m really tired, I can’t.’”
“Perfume? Lipstick stains?”
“Who can afford perfume and lipstick in this day and age? And you don’t need forensic evidence, Madame Daeng. You know when your man’s drifting away.”
Later that night, once Siri had slammed the door of Civilai’s cream Citroën, reminded him to turn on the headlights, and sent him floating off home, he showered, cleaned his teeth, and joined Daeng in their room. She was sitting on the foot of the bed brushing her hair without a recognizable aim or outcome.
“How did it go?” he asked.
Daeng was silent. “The talk?” he reminded her.
She turned her head toward him and stared into his river frog green eyes.
“He’s having an affair, Siri.”
Siri laughed.
“He is not,” he said.
“Either that or he’s having a mental breakdown, because only a man out of his mind would exhibit all the signs of having an affair if he wasn’t actually having one.”
“Daeng, you were supposed to put her mind at ease. Not join her.”
“I’m not sure anymore.”
“Why not? You know Phosy. He’s married to Dtui and to his job. How on earth is he going to find any extramarital time between those two?”
“You have to ask him, Siri.”
“Ask him if he’s fooling around?”
“Ask him straight out. You’d recognize if he was lying.”
“It’s ridiculous.”
“Please.”
He sighed. “All right.”
She sniffed at the fine hair on his cheek.
“Thank you,” she said. “It’s the penalty you pay for having a perfect partner who causes you no strife. You have to do all your suffering through other people’s relationships.”
“I suppose.”
“Any gossip from increasingly cantankerous Civilai?”
“Ah, right.”
“What is it?”
“I might be popping over to Cambodia for a day or two.”
Bulgarian 101
The shackles have chafed my skin. I am certain an infection is bubbling beneath the metal ankle bracelet. One problem with being a doctor is that you’re instinctively obliged to analyze the roots of every ailment. You can’t merely sit back and enjoy the misery, ignorant of what’s happening to you. Not surprisingly, understanding my medical condition has never made me feel any better.
For some never-to-be-explained reason, my mother angel has joined the audience. She must have smuggled herself in inside the luggage. She’s sitting cross-legged at the far left side of the classroom by the door, gnawing on her betel. I’d introduce her to you but you probably don’t speak Lao. She’s just one of your number, twenty or so spaced-out spirits watching the show. I try to imagine the scene from your point of view. Siri, naked, chafed, incontinent. Heavy monk, tears in his eyes. Could this be a climax at the end of a very dull play? An operatic final scene. If nothing comes of this, I warrant you’ll expect your money back. Am I right? But wait, the heavy monk begins to speak.
“What’s that you’re eating, brother?”
“Burnt wood,” I tell him. “It appears the kids set fire to the blackboard before they graduated. I took the liberty of breaking off the corner of the frame. I hope these fellows don’t withhold my security deposit. They look like a tough bunch.”
I can feel myself weakening. I can feel the energy and will being sapped from my old body. But it isn’t hunger that drives me to eat the blackboard. It is a hope that the charcoal at the core of the charred wood might act to remove the toxins from my body and stop these runs. It’s unlikely, but worth the try.
“I admire your spirit,” says the heavy monk. “I used to have a sense of humor. They took that from me as well.” He looks at me with dramatic sincerity. “Old doctor, I feel my days are numbered. Do you mind if I unburden myself before they take me?”
I decide to play along. “You mean like a confessional?”
“Is it exclusively for Catholics?”
“They do have a better accounting system. I wouldn’t know how many self-flagellations or push-ups to impose on you.”
“It doesn’t matter. The very act of talking to someone who doesn’t judge should be enough. I … I did all the things they’re accusing me of. I was a spy for the Vietnamese. I’ve been sending messages to—”
“Oh, do shut up,” I tell him.
“What?”
I’ve taken as much as I can. The thought of one more gruel donation has kept me silent, biting my tongue until now. But I’m damned if I’ll allow myself to be subjected to any more of this.
“Well,” I say, “I suppose I could listen to you as you list your sins and you tell me how good it feels to get it out of your system. And then you’ll say something like, ‘Is there anything you’d like to confess, brother?’ And I take this heaven-sent opportunity to spew forth the locations of all the top-secret Vietnamese missile silos and the names of all my spy-school teachers and their hat sizes. Spare me.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t you? That’s a shame.”
“What are you trying to say, old man?”
“That you’re a poor excuse for a human being. That’s what. You’re no more a monk than I’m a malt grinder. The old ‘Get into his heart and drain him of information’ routine. It’s been done to death. My word, if this is the best your founding fathers can come up with, I’d give your ugly regime six weeks before it vanishes up its own backside.”
“You can’t t—”
“Has this ruse ever worked? I don’t believe anyone conscious would fall for it. Go on, get out. Call your
cronies and tell them you’ve failed.”
The kind eyes of the heavy, and now defrocked, monk cloud over. The smile curls into a smirk. He glares at me. He glares needles into my eyes. Then he shouts for the guards and, as they unlock his chains, the man has the audacity to ask, “What was it that gave me away?”
I’m flabbergasted. Astounded. Does he really believe I’ll point out his errors so he’ll be able to get it right on the next poor soul? Instead, I give him a gesture I’ve seen work effectively in some Hollywood films. I’ve found very little opportunity to use it myself. It involves the unfurling of the digitus medius. The monk has obviously seen the same movies. He stretches, walks back to me, and slaps me with the back of his hand across the cheek. He turns and walks out of the room. I know that whatever cruelty awaits me beyond that door has just increased tenfold, but I don’t care.
And what is this, my hard-to-please poltergeists? You haven’t been lifted by this display? Inspired? You sit with no noticeable emotion on your faces. Ah, but there she smiles, my mother, a very broad smile that drools with bloody red betel. A mother’s pride for her clever son. So clever he’s doomed himself.
Word had come back from teacher Oum at the Lycée Vientiane that the tests on victims one and two had proven negative for sedatives. Siri was now more certain than ever that both women knew and trusted their killer. He hadn’t found it necessary to render them unconscious before impaling them with three feet of steel. But the contents of the vitamin bottle Siri had found at the auditorium had been more difficult to analyze. The results showed a strong possibility, although not conclusive, that it had contained morphine elixir. If it was indeed connected to the case, it added to the questions rather than answered them. What was it for? It had to be assumed that either the killer or the victim had consumed the elixir to deaden pain. As there was no evidence of previous injuries on Jim’s body, and no indication of illness or disease, the likelihood was that the killer had been suffering in some way. Perhaps from an injury sustained in one of his attacks. Teacher Oum had only just received the samples from the third victim and was in the process of testing them for morphine. There was a good deal to discuss.
Phosy’s Intelligence Section at Police HQ had, in its heyday, enjoyed a staff of five. Then some genius at the Ministry of Interior had decided Vientiane was under control and three of Phosy’s men had been dispatched to the provinces. Despite their own comparative inexperience, they had been sent to train ex—foot soldiers in the art of policing: a thankless and hopeless operation. So Phosy and Sihot were it as far as detecting was concerned. As they had three victims, and as Siri had done all he could in the morgue, Phosy recruited him unofficially to help out. He was given the task of looking into the life of Kiang, the second victim. For a closet detective like Siri, this was not unlike winning a Nobel Prize. He took Nurse Dtui with him as backup and left Geung to guard the morgue.
Apart from Ministry of Education copies of Kiang’s academic records obtained from Bulgaria, the only source of information they had for Kiang was her mother. So that’s where they began. The house was in That Luang district on a hill that was unlikely to experience the floods. Two ancient flamboyant trees stood guard outside the front fence, which itself had taken root and sprouted leaves. A straw and bamboo gazebo sagged in front of the house. It stood beside an enormous gray water jar that spilled over with runoff from the roof. Dtui and the doctor climbed down from the Triumph wearing their enormous blue plastic ponchos. They looked like giant morning glory blossoms. Siri was from the old “Wear little, get soaked, dry off” school of surviving the monsoons but Dtui had insisted he try one of the new Soviet ponchos. It kept off the rain sure enough, but in Laos, whose humidity reached eighty-two percent, it merely acted like a portable steam room and rendered them both soaked beneath the plastic.
“Who’s there?” came a woman’s voice from inside the house.
“Dr. Siri and Nurse Dtui from Mahosot Hospital,” Dtui called.
A woman appeared in the open doorway wiping her hands on a cloth. She was tall with greasy cheeks and hair pulled back in a bun so severe her ears were almost behind her.
“Mahosot?” she said, alarmed. “What’s happened now?”
“We’re from the morgue,” Siri told her. “We’re very sorry about your loss.”
“The … ? Oh, of course.” Her sadness overwhelmed the visitors.
“We’re helping the police put together a file on the victims,” Siri continued. “If it isn’t too painful, I was hoping we …”
The woman seemed to awaken with a start. “Oh, my. I’m sorry. Where are my manners? Come in, please.”
They drank hot tea and ate excellent homemade kanom kroc, sweet patties, at the kitchen table. The inside of the house spoke of more affluent times. Happier days. Now it seemed to be draped in the same shroud of grief as its owner. Kiang’s mother told them of her husband’s death from malaria in ’68. How he had been the dean of education in the liberated zone. How his eldest girl had trained with him and become a teacher, a brilliant, well-liked teacher. How she had been in love with a soldier who was killed in a battle in Xiang Khouang. How the mother’s second child had contracted dengue and been taken from them two years earlier. Now Kiang. How their youngest son, Mung, wanted to mourn for them but didn’t know how because the schools didn’t teach you how to pray anymore.
By the time the mother had finished the litany, Dtui and Siri would have gladly committed suicide right there at the kitchen table. But the woman hadn’t cried or used her voice to elicit sympathy. She’d smiled as she recalled her loved ones. She seemed to enjoy the reminiscences. Yet she wore her sadness like a bright blouse and it was impossible not to notice it.
“Did she tell you anything about her time in Bulgaria?” Dtui asked with a catch in her throat.
“It was hard,” she replied. “I know it was hard but she never complained. She sent me a small share of her per diem every month just to help out, and a letter. She always tried to be cheerful but I know it was a difficult time for her. The language. Heavens above. How did she ever learn it?”
“Did she have any friends over there?” Siri asked. “Other Lao?”
“There were five girls, all selected by their district education offices. The Bulgarian Embassy offered a scholarship to teachers but insisted they study in different cities. So Kiang didn’t have anyone close she could share her feelings with.”
“Did she have a boyfriend back here she could write to?”
“No, Nurse. She’d been so in love with Soop, her soldier, that nobody else could match him. She had more offers of marriage than I can count, suitors coming by the house all the time, but she turned them down.”
“Do you know if she met anyone while she was away?”
“In Bulgaria?” She let out a little laugh. “I have to confess my girl was a bit afraid of Western men. No, that’s not true. I’d say it bordered on being petrified. She was scared to death of them.”
“Any reason why?” Siri asked.
“The smell, Doctor,” she said. “You know, that odor they have, as if they’re a different species? Really, most of them are animals. Oversexed, loud. I feared for her safety every day. She was a beautiful girl, Doctor.”
“You must have been relieved when she came back,” said Dtui.
“She was so happy. She wasn’t a racist but she was pleased to be back among her own kind. They put her to work straightaway out at the library at Dong Dok. She was supposed to be categorizing their books except they didn’t have anything to categorize. They’d thrown out all the American- and French-language materials and what little there was in Lao was mimeographed and poor quality. All the new books were Vietnamese, Russian, and Chinese and she couldn’t read any of them. You’d have thought they’d send her somewhere with a language that might be useful to learn, wouldn’t you?”
“How long had she been back?” Dtui asked.
“She came back in January.”
“And since then
no new friendships? No boyfriends?”
“Doctor, I know she was only thirty-two but I really think the idea of having a boyfriend didn’t appeal to her anymore. She loved being here at home. They didn’t pay very much at Dong Dok; sometimes they didn’t pay at all. But she got rice and tinned foods from the co-op and she was happy to know that she could provide for me and her brother, Mung.”
“It sounds like you two were close,” Dtui said.
“I know we were mother and daughter but in fact we were more like sisters. There were no secrets between us.”
The mother smiled that incongruous sweet and sour smile again that had the visitors reaching for the razor blades. She poured them all more tea. Siri didn’t want to worm his way into any more bitter apples but the question had to be asked.
“On the night she died,” he began, “she told you she was going to exercise?”
Kiang’s mother nodded and her eyes became moist opals of despair. “Yes, I have to say I was a little surprised. Shocked even. She’d found her old high-school tracksuit somewhere deep in the closet and she marched in and announced she was going to get fit. She’d never shown any interest in sports at school. In fact, I think the tracksuit was still in its original plastic. She had a nice figure. She didn’t eat sweet food. I don’t know what had entered her mind.”
“You don’t know who she went with?”
“I forgot to ask. I was so surprised. I laughed. I asked her what had brought on this sudden urge to get fit. She said something that sounded very Party to me. Oh! Sorry.”
“No offense taken,” Siri said.
“She said, ‘The body’s a machine and if you don’t oil a machine it dries up and shuts down and it’s no use to anyone.’ It didn’t sound like the kind of thing she’d make up herself. And that was the last …” The opals cracked and tears rolled and the woman’s greasy cheeks put up no resistance and sadness dripped into the teacup she held in her hand.
* * *
Siri and Dtui rode from the house on the hill with lumps in their throats. They weren’t really in a mood to socialize but before returning to the morgue, they made a brief detour to the Lao Patriotic Women’s Association. There they met up with their old friend Dr. Pornsawan. They were only in the office for half an hour but they made a deal that—if the spirits were feeling particularly benevolent—might change one or two lives for the better. Goodness knew, after the visit with Kiang’s mother, they needed to spread some cheer.
Love Songs From a Shallow Grave Page 12