Love Songs From a Shallow Grave

by Colin Cotterill

  He often talked to himself when he was overwhelmed with fear. He saw it as a more dignified reaction than wetting himself. And invariably it helped. With his legs back under control he walked one more short block, looking over his shoulder the whole way. He was at the intersection of a wide street. It was one he knew well. One he recalled often when searching for happy thoughts. This was Boulevard Norodom, named after the fickle regent, the mood-swing prince who rented out his soul to any passing devil. Siri was no fan of royalty but if only half the stories he’d heard today were true, he wouldn’t be at all surprised to find Sihanouk’s head on a pole on his own street. He couldn’t imagine Brother Number One chumming up with the little regent.

  He stepped onto the deserted tree-lined boulevard. This was where he and his wife had walked hand in hand back in the forties. It was one of his golden scenes. Those moments had become fewer and farther between as Boua had become fanatically entwined in the struggle for independence. He needed to hold on to that Phnom Penh for as long as he could. But there were no smiling faces now. No lovers on benches. No impossible beds of tulips and roses. This was a morning-after Boulevard Norodom. Most of the imported trees had withered through lack of care. There was litter everywhere and evidence of vandalism. One street lamp was bent like a boomerang. Across the street stood half the national bank. A large dented strong room, open and empty, peeked from between destroyed brickwork.

  Siri began to walk along the median strip in the direction of Phnom Temple. He passed a porcelain toilet and, sixty feet farther on, waded through slippery puddles of French piastres. To his left the central market, the old Chinese quarter, was a graveyard of wrecked umbrellas and shredded awnings. It gave off none of the market scents, no rotten vegetables, no stale cereals, no putrid meat. This was a market lifeless for three years. It was about now that Siri began to hum. There was certainly nothing to hum about. The last dregs of joy at being alive in this world had been drained out of him in the cellar of the Lao embassy. But it was the type of annoying ditty you might pick up from the radio or Thai TV commercials. He couldn’t shake it off.

  He still had that “last man after the atomic bomb” feeling as he walked past the impressive École Miche, where he and Boua had attended night classes beneath ceiling fans vast as helicopter blades. He reached the European quarter. He had no idea how long he’d been walking but recently he’d been stepping to the tune in his head. He tried to find words for it but nothing came. It was lulling him into a bloated sense of security and self-confidence. Making him think that it was perfectly all right to be walking the streets of a hostile city all alone. He reached Le Cercle Sportif. To his right the Phnom Temple stood defiant at the top of its lion-guarded steps. Across the square was the national library. He knew he was only a block away from his hotel. All being well he could stroll past the guards and nobody would say anything.

  Such was his aim. He had survived. He headed off across the untended grass and could see the roof of House Number Two in the distance. But when he reached the lawn of the national library he stopped cold. His sadness for a beautiful defiled city turned to a bitter acid in his gut. Strewn across the grass were the soggy remains of thousands of books. Tens of thousands. Some old tomes had been set alight and had melded together. Illustrated pages flapped in the breeze. Precious and priceless volumes providing mulch for the next generation of plants. He crouched and paid reverence to the victims of ignorance and wondered whether anyone else in this city had been able to mourn the death of culture. It was then that he believed it all. If Big Brother could destroy literature and history, he could destroy lives.

  He walked back through the overgrown grass of the lawn and raked his fingers through his hair. He had to get out of this place, this country. He was in the dead center of a dead city. He had to convince somebody of what was happening here, but he had no proof. One more block and … The song was playing loudly in his brain now, confusing his thoughts. And finally the lyrics came to him. Not to his mind exactly, but to his ears. He could hear the male tenor voice as clearly as from a radiogram. It was even more hauntingly beautiful than he remembered it from his dreams. It came to him not from the giant speakers in front of the Ministry of Information or from the prayer room of the empty temple, but from the ground beneath his feet.

  This was the spot. This was, in some inscrutable way, the answer. He dropped to his knees, put his hands together to show respect, and, without once considering the ramifications, began to dig into the rain-softened earth.

  Can We Have Sex Tonight?

  Phosy and Dtui had run out of tears. They were as dry and exhausted as old batteries. Phosy had squeezed his wife’s hand bloodless. They sat on the flat roof of the police dormitory on two director’s chairs their neighbor had once requisitioned for evidence and forgotten to give back. There was still rain in the air but it was an almost imperceptible mist. The low clouds denied them a view of the universe, and the night all around them was so black they might have been in the belly of a giant river dragon. But still they thanked the stars they couldn’t see that only Siri and Daeng had been witness to their foolishness.

  Phosy had been astounded at Siri’s accusations at first. Why in blazes would he have an affair? Who’d want him? Where would he ever find the time? How would he muster the enthusiasm? And what would the point have been? He already had a wife and he was doing a poor job of keeping her happy. At first he’d wondered whether Siri had been encroaching on the subject because the old fellow himself was on the hunt, or already had his snout in the chicken coop. But then, no. Who in their right mind would cheat on Madame Daeng, a woman very handy with a cutthroat razor? And then the note. Siri’s hurried note before he left. Tying up loose ends. Expressing doubts, and then the postscript. The last thought of Chairman Siri. “If you’re having an affair, stop it.”

  He’d told Dtui about the note. He hadn’t been able to show it to her because he’d destroyed the postscript. But he laughed it off as one of Siri’s overprotective moments. A ridiculous thing.

  “Are you telling me you aren’t having an affair?” Dtui had asked.

  “Why on earth would I want to?” he’d replied.

  “That wasn’t the question.”

  “No, Dtui. Of course I’m not having an affair. Don’t be ridiculous.”

  And that introduction had led into a long, painful confessional of the doubts of the pair of them. They’d asked policewoman Wan to look after Malee and they’d fled to the roof where nobody could hear. And all the anxiety, the frustration, and stupidity were released into the night like steam from an old rice cooker. Phosy, for the first time since they’d been together, perhaps for the first time ever, had shared his feelings. It was a significant step for a man who kept everything bottled up inside. He told her about his family and his first wife and his fears that one day he’d come home to find their room empty. When the words were all out they both sighed. Phosy noticed that he was holding Dtui’s hand in his and it felt squashed and numb, but she hadn’t attempted to wrestle it free. The fine rain had mixed with their tears and left them fresh faced. Everything would be all right. Malee wouldn’t be growing up in a single-parent household.

  “All you need is love,” said Dtui in English.

  “What?” said Phosy, who didn’t speak the language.

  “Beatles.”

  He had no idea what she was talking about.

  “As a medical person, I’m predicting we’ll catch pneumonia if we sit up here in the rain for much longer,” Dtui told him.

  “That’s all right. We can share a bed in an emergency. Joint drips.”

  “That’s so sweet. I think I’m going to like this new romantic Phosy.”

  “Don’t get your hopes up. If this conversation gets out to anyone else, you and the orphan are on the street. Get it?”

  Dtui put her arm around his neck.

  “I think we owe Siri and Daeng a meal, don’t you?”

  “We would have sorted this out eventually.”
>
  “Probably. In two or three years?”

  “You’re right. When the good doctor gets back from his trip we’ll take them somewhere nice. I’ll start saving.”

  “Good. Phosy?”

  “What?”

  “Can we have sex tonight?”

  “Dtui!” The policeman blushed the color of a rat-excrement chili.

  “What? We’re married, you know.”

  “A lady doesn’t …”

  “Sorry.”

  They looked out into the vast darkness all around them.

  “Phosy?”

  “What?”

  “Can we?”

  “Absolutely.”

  It was some two, perhaps three hours later that Phosy, wearing only a loincloth and a grin, brought his papers into the police common room. He tugged on the bobble chain that clicked on the lightbulb. He had a report to write about the three-épée case. The commissioner of police had been very pleased with the thoroughness of the investigation and was optimistic as to how the police would look in the eyes of the public once the trial was over. He had mentioned over tea that afternoon that, as far as he was concerned, the case was closed. All he needed was the final report. The trial, he conceded, was just a bit of trumpet blowing from Justice. Phosy didn’t have to be involved in all that. He didn’t even need to put in an appearance.

  Phosy had been confused. He’d asked how they could have a trial without the arresting officer present. How would they present the evidence he’d collected? The commissioner had smiled and leaned close to him, even though there were only the two of them in the office.

  “They’ll read out your report,” he said.

  So pressure was on to have the report finished to read in evidence the next day. He opened the case of the portable typewriter and clicked the bones of his fingers. He had to get his spelling right. He’d have Dtui read through it in the morning to be sure the grammar was … Or perhaps not. She’d ask questions and the report would never be delivered. She’d ask questions like “What kind of trial doesn’t allow the defendant’s representative to cross-examine the investigating officer?” She was like that. Logical. He looked at the folder with all his hours of interviews and communiqués from Europe. He stared at the pile like a writer with a block. Apart from Dr. Siri, everyone had decided Neung was guilty. It didn’t matter what the accused said or did during the trial. He was a dead man.

  Phosy put a sheet of paper between the rollers and held his fingers over the keys. They hovered there for a minute playing air keyboard, before he brought them down all at once. The keys wedged together and remained stuck, handprints in metal. What had Siri asked? “What does your instinct tell you?” And Phosy’s instinct told him a lot. Nothing about Neung suggested the man was a mass murderer. Everything about this case was weird. There were more questions unanswered than answered. Ignoring them didn’t make the inconsistencies go away. The trial would go on for a day or two. There was time for just a little more police work.

  Comrade Civilai sat on the end of the bed in House Number Two waiting for the guide to escort him to the ball. Anywhere else and he would have had two or three drinks beforehand to numb the forthcoming pain. He’d represented his country at numerous events such as this. Over the last five years he’d begun to wonder if it was the only thing he was good at, pretending to have a good time. The more objectionable he’d been in the cabinet meetings, the more overseas missions they sent him on. Anything to get him out of sight. There was nothing those politburo boys liked less than having someone disagree with them. Politics had changed him. He probably couldn’t tell a plow from a shear these days but he could name any cocktail from three hundred feet off.

  And then came retirement. It had been touch and go for a while whether they’d put him out to pasture or wrap a blindfold round his head and shoot bullets at him. Both had their good points. But thanks to Siri, his fall from grace had one or two padded cushions beneath it. And here he was a year later still upsetting everyone. Making a nuisance of himself. And still they had him handshaking, head nodding, gorge rising on the cocktail circuit. He hated it. But at least he had Siri with him. Nothing ever seemed so dark when friend Siri was around. He could have used the old boy’s sunshine to brighten up the dull afternoon at the state farm.

  “This is an orange,” the commentary had begun. “It achieves its bright orange glow from the combination of fish entrails mush and fertilizer blended from our own chicken manure. The orange, a tropical fruit, originated in … et cetera, et cetera.”

  They’d given everyone a slice of orange to suck on. In spite of all that shit blending and offal mushing, it had tasted like any common or garden bloody orange. And Civilai had looked along the rows at all the bananas and papayas and mangoes and lemons and pomegranates and jackfruit and star fruit and he knew what a lot he had to look forward to and how much more fun this fruit cocktail party would have been with his brother at his side. And wished that he were with him now. There was something sinister about this country. It wasn’t a comic parody of a socialist state, it was a deadly serious parody. It was as if they believed that this was how it was supposed to look. They’d read The Communist Manifesto and missed the point. Just as Christian and Muslim extremists found hatred and vengeance that didn’t exist in their respective manuals, these Red Khmer believed Marx and Lenin had called for the obliteration of personality and pleasure and free thought. Believed that blind allegiance was the only way to proliferate their doctrines. Civilai had never read it that way because that wasn’t how it had been written.

  So far, he’d only seen what they wanted him to. Yet instinctively he knew that something unpleasant lurked below the surface. He felt it in his heart and he wanted to have Siri around to talk through his theories. He wanted to know what the little lunchtime drama had been about, whether Siri had learned anything more about this weird place. But most of all, he wanted to be sure his friend was safe. As far as Civilai was concerned, their departure the following day couldn’t come a moment too soon.

  He was startled by a knock.

  “Siri?”

  There was no answer. Civilai hurried to the door and threw it open. Comrade Chenda stood there, pale and flustered.

  “It is time to go down,” he said.

  “But what about Siri?

  “Comrade Siri might join us later.”

  “Where is he?”

  “He’s … It’s time to go.”

  * * *

  Phosy had spent the day interviewing, phoning, knocking on doors. He had all his notes spread around him on the floor and sat at their center like a frog on a white lily pad. He had become more confused as the day progressed. Malee lay on the bed gurgling and laughing at the stars-and-planets mobile circling above her head. Her parents noticed she was particularly fond of Pluto. Phosy crawled across to the bed and took hold of his daughter’s hand.

  “What would you do in my situation?” he asked.

  Dtui burst in through the door and threw her bag on the floor.

  “If I have to go to one more Nurses for a Better Future meeting I’ll scream,” she said. “I hope you two aren’t talking about me.”

  Phosy looked up at her with the hopeless expression of a pig on its way to the slaughter.

  “He didn’t do it,” he said.

  “Who didn’t do what?”

  “Neung. He wasn’t the one.”

  “Malee told you that?”

  She squeezed her husband’s shoulder as she walked to the kitchen corner of the room.

  “In a way, yes. Neung’s wife was away on the weekend of the murders. He was looking after their son. He’s six. Now whoever killed those three women had gone to a lot of trouble, put a lot of planning into it. But there he was babysitting all weekend.”

  “So?”

  “So why didn’t he get his mother-in-law or a neighbor to look after the boy? He could have pretended to be working over the weekend. Why risk your son waking up in the middle of the night and not finding h
is dad there? Crying the damned house down? And how would he do it? Put the boy to bed, run off to K6 in the early morning, have a romp in a sauna with his boss’s wife, stick a sword in her, drive home, and kiss his son good morning?”

  “He might have sent the boy off to a minder somewhere,” Dtui suggested, pouring hot water on her instant noodles.

  “That’s what I assumed at first. But the neighbors remember hearing the boy at various times over the weekend. Someone else recalls seeing them at the market on Saturday. His wife said he’d come by the school to pick up their son on Friday. That wouldn’t work out. To kill the first victim he would have had to be inside K6 at night. They wouldn’t have let him in if he’d turned up late. What kind of electrician works at midnight? He had to have been there inside the compound, hidden away somewhere after his regular day of work.”

  “The wife might have been lying.”

  “I thought wives didn’t lie.”

  “Good ones don’t.”

  “Well, his wife’s been camped outside the jail day and night since Neung was arrested. She refuses to leave. She knows he was having a relationship with one of the victims but she’s still there supporting him. I’d say that makes her a good wife, wouldn’t you?”

  “Dr. Siri’s got to you, hasn’t he?”

  “There are just too many ‘Why would he?’ questions. Why would he murder the women in places that could all be traced back to him? After all the planning, why would he not cover his tracks? And then there’s motive. What reason did he have to kill them? I didn’t find any conflict. He doesn’t strike me as the type of person who’d kill just for the thrill of it. And this murderer really has to be some kind of psychopath.”

  “Somebody must have had a motive,” Dtui said. She put a flat plate on top of her noodle bowl and let it sit until all the chemicals and flavoring and inedible carbohydrates decided to become food. She sat on the edge of the bed and stroked her daughter’s hair. “If Neung didn’t do it,” she said, “someone must really hate him.”