Love Songs from a Shallow Grave

3

Not for any religious conviction, Sunday was a day of rest in Vientiane. It had certainly been the Sabbath when the French oppressors ruled the roost and it was a habit that carried forward even after the churches were closed and the preachers sent on their way. Although they would never admit it, there was a number of reasons for communist Vientiane to stick with old colonial trends. In fact, historically, had it not been for the French, there would have been no Vientiane in 1978.

In the sixteenth century the Lao king had moved the capital from Luang Prabang in the north to a run-down, almost indefensible ancient kingdom on the bank of the Mekhong. With all the advisors at his right hand, one might surely have mentioned the fact that on the far bank of that same river — a stretch of water sometimes so low and slow you can wade across it — lived the Thais: the mortal enemy of the Lao. To nobody's surprise, Vientiane was sacked on a number of occasions and finally left in ruins. Only its old stupas and one temple remained standing but even these had been tunnelled into and looted by scavenging Chinese bandits. And there the old city rotted, strangled by the encroaching jungle, ignored, until deep into the nineteenth century.

Enter the French. Following a treaty with the Siamese, the east bank of the Mekhong was ceded to the invaders from Europe. Vientiane was dug from the forest, replanned and rebuilt in French colonial style. Temples grew around the crippled stupas and That Luang, the soul of the Lao nation, was recreated from French missionary etchings of centuries past. The buildings were a confused mismatch of Asian frugality and modest European splendour. It was a typical South-east Asian city as conceived on a budget on a drawing board in Paris. Just as in Saigon and Phnom Penh, the colonists had always known what the locals wanted better than the natives knew themselves. And the children grew up believing that this was their style, their architecture, and they were annoyed that the hokey temples didn't make any attempt to fit it. But there it was, voila, la nouvelle Vientiane, renamed to accommodate the French inability to pronounce the original name: Viang Chan.

And now, that same Vientiane which had once been consumed by jungle was being washed away by unseasonal and unceasing rains. Like ice-cubes in a sink, the buildings seemed to be melting away, first their mustard colours, then their shapes. The streets of brown mud melded into the shop fronts and invaded front yards. The heavy hibiscus bushes sagged and spread and blended together like slowly collapsing jellies. And, in their still-religious hearts, the Vientonians, who had prayed for rain for most of the previous year, were beginning to pray for it to stop.

Sunday was the day that Daeng shut her noodle shop and she and Siri would spend all their time together. Since the early rains had begun to thunder down on the city, just negotiating the motorcycle around town had become an adventure. There were potholes so deep it was believed they tunnelled all the way through to Melbourne, Australia. There were stretches of mud so slick it was like riding on hair oil, spots where you couldn't tell the road from the river. It made the city they lived in a wonderfully unpredictable place. On this particular Sunday their plan had been to have no plan. They might just slither around town or chance the northern road to Thangon and enjoy a fish lunch by the ferry crossing. Or they might hit a submerged rock and spend the day in a motorcycle repair shop. It didn't matter either way as long as they were together.

But Inspector Phosy had other plans for them. They were eating their pre-Sunday adventure breakfast behind the loosely pulled together shutters when they heard a thump against the metal.

"We're closed," Daeng called.

"Siri, it's me," came Phosy's voice.

The doctor thought he heard the splash of disappointment dropping into his belly. "We're shut anyway," he said. Then, under his breath he whispered to Daeng, "A million kip says it's gripe."

"Don't," Daeng said. "He's just a concerned father."

"He's a…Ah! Phosy. Come in. Had breakfast yet?"

Daeng was already dishing out an extra bowl. Phosy had squeezed in between the shutters but paused there and gazed back towards the river bank.

"Did you know Crazy Rajid is camped opposite your shop?" he asked.

"Yes," Siri nodded. "He's been there on and off for a month."

"We're assuming he's watching out for Siri," Daeng added. "Of course, it's hard to tell for certain." She put the bowl of rice porridge on the table and poured a glass of fresh orange juice from the jug. "We're guessing he thinks he owes us a debt of gratitude."

"For saving his life? Well, he should," Phosy said coldly. "I can't think of anyone else who'd go to so much trouble to help a fool."

Rajid was certainly crazy — mad as a lark — but he was no fool. He had migrated to the region from India with his father, mother and three siblings: The ship they travelled in went down in a heavy sea and only Rajid and his father, Bhiku, had been spared. The disaster had turned the young man's mind and he never again spoke to his father. The old man, who worked as an underpaid cook at the Happy Dine Indian restaurant, was still of the opinion that his son had been struck mute. But Siri and Phosy had heard Rajid speak, and the young man wrote weird but wonderful prose in Hindi. No, there was a good deal going on in the Indian mind, not a fool at all. But, seeing Rajid camped out in the pouring rain beneath a beach umbrella night after night, a person would have to believe there were power lines down somewhere between his brain and his common sense.

Phosy paused and watched the Indian playing with a toad. To the policeman's mind, the two creatures were equally mindless. He shook his head and came to sit at the table. Once there, he said nothing and tucked into the meal as if he had a reservation. Daeng smiled at Siri.

"What brings you out on a drizzly Sunday morning, Inspector?" she asked.

"Bad news," Phosy said. "As if we haven't had enough. We've found another one."

"Another what?" Siri asked.

"Another dead girl."

"Lord help us," said Daeng.

"Fully clothed, this time," Phosy said between spoonfuls. "Wearing a tracksuit. We found her in a school classroom. But it was a sword. Just the same as the girl yesterday. Through the heart."

"When did you — " Siri began.

"Two hours ago. The head teacher at Sisangvone primary school went in early to prepare for the Sunday Junior Youth Movement meeting and he found her in the room skewered to the blackboard."

"Through the heart?" Siri considered the scene. "So she was standing? Held up by the sword?"

Phosy nodded.

"That must have taken a lot of strength," Daeng thought aloud.

"Is she still there?" Siri asked.

"No," said Phosy. "We took her over to the morgue. We got Director Suk out of bed and had him open up for us. Sorry. I know this is your family day…"

"I can't understand what's happening to this country," Daeng sighed. She had already abandoned her breakfast, along with her hope for mankind. "It's not even May and we've had seven murders in the country already this year. And all women. It's almost as if Laos is doing its utmost to keep up with North America. Vientiane is turning into New York City."

"Madame Daeng," Phosy said. "Seven murders in New York would be one slack afternoon. We have a long way to go before things get that bad."

"I'm sorry, Inspector," she said. "But seven murders is seven murders too many as far as I'm concerned. We've had our wars. We've killed our brothers because this or that politician or general told us to. But it's over. Can't we enjoy our peace yet? Can't we stop all this insanity?"

"I agree," Phosy said, rising from his seat and wiping his mouth with a tissue. "And there's no time like the present." He drained his glass of juice and nodded. "Thank you for breakfast. Doctor?"

Siri hurried upstairs to change and followed Phosy to the morgue on his Triumph. As Phosy's Intelligence Section had used up its petrol allowance for the month, Phosy was on the department's lilac Vespa. For once, Siri thought it wise not to make fun of the policeman about his effeminate mount. This was a different Phosy from the man he'd befriended two years earlier, from the cheerful policeman who'd married Siri's assistant, nurse Dtui. Something had happened. A peculiar intensity had landed on Phosy like an enormous blot and suffocated his sense of humour. Siri wondered whether it was the job, whether it had started to infect him. Confronting the face of evil in so many dark corners had to have an effect; dealing daily with the depraved. For a man who'd grown up believing that the Lao were inherently good and kind, it must come as a shock to learn that his fellow man and woman were just as capable of committing atrocities as the foreign devils.

When Siri arrived at the morgue, Mr Geung, Phosy's Sergeant Sihot, and nurse Dtui were there in the office waiting for him. Phosy followed the doctor inside and was obviously surprised to see his wife there.

"Where's the baby?" he asked Dtui accusingly.

Dtui smiled. It was a smile which usually made people feel at ease but it apparently had little effect on Phosy.

"She's at the Sunday creche," Dtui said.

Siri noticed Phosy jerk his head towards the door as if he wanted to talk to his wife out of earshot of the others. Everyone noticed the gesture, including Dtui who chose to ignore it. Phosy, obviously frustrated, was forced to resort to a strained laugh and a warning couched as a joke.

"You do know our daughter's only three months old?" he mumbled to the woven plastic rug.

"And what better time to start socialising?" Dtui said.

It was clear that if they'd been alone, a serious domestic dispute would have exploded at this point. Siri, it was, who snipped the red wire.

"We have a body in the cutting room," he said. "It's Sunday and everyone's irritable, especially me. The sooner we get this over with, the sooner we can return to our loved ones."

It almost worked. Everyone snapped into action apart from Mr Geung who stood rocking in the corner by his desk. This was peculiar given that he usually led the charge into the examination room.

"Mr Geung?" said Siri.

"I…"

"Yes?"

"I…I don't have."

"Have what, Geung?"

"A…a loved one."

There was no sadness in his words. It was merely a statement like not having a bicycle or change for five hundred kip. He lived in a dormitory with three other male hospital employees and hadn't seen his distant family for a year. Siri could have ignored the comment and joked about it, but, were this a movie, it was the point when the audience would have broken into a spontaneous 'ahhh' and some old lady in the front row would cry loudly into her handkerchief. Although Siri was certain he felt much worse than Geung about this state of affairs, or lack of, he walked across the room and put his arm around his friend's shoulder.

"Little brother," he said. "There are forty nurses working at this hospital and I know for certain every one of them is in love with you."

"It's d…different love," Geung said immediately, as if he'd put many hours of thought into the mechanics of love.

"It's better love," Siri stepped in. "It's permanent. It has nothing to do with changing moods and passion." As soon as the words left his mouth, Siri realised that passion was a concept that would take more years of understanding than the doctor had left on the earth. "It's better."

"It-it-it's better," Geung repeated. But like a philosophical parrot he added a line of his own. "Better than a real g…girlfriend."

"Much better," said Siri with little conviction. He walked them both into the next room but his mind lagged a few steps behind. Once again, increasingly happy to unload the weight of the world onto his own shoulders, Sri decided to see what he could do about finding Mr Geung a girlfriend…whether he wanted one or not. It couldn't be that difficult, he decided. As simple as pulling together the banks of the Mekhong to reunite the Lao and the North-eastern Thais.

Once again the autopsy was straightforward. Siri estimated the time of death to have been around nine a.m. the previous evening. The young woman was probably in her mid thirties, very attractive, in good physical shape but soft, not the same taut muscles of the previous victim. She had been killed by one single thrust of an epee that passed directly through the centre of her heart. As with the other girl, there were three lines etched onto the inside of her left thigh. This time the signature was more clearly a Z. The killer would have had to pull down the nylon tracksuit bottom to make his mark. He'd taken his time on this one and, as there was very little bleeding, it had obviously been cut there after the girl's death. Sergeant Sihot assured him the victim had been properly attired when she was discovered. The mark brought to Siri's mind the brand of Zorro, the masked swordsman, a part played so convincingly by Douglas Fairbanks.

Siri dusted the epee for prints but it yielded none. He had Geung put it on the shelf beside the first weapon and the body joined its predecessor in the morgue freezer The bamboo tray Siri had built himself had been replaced by a Chinese stainless steel retractable shelf unit that could, at a pinch, accommodate three bodies in the single cooler.

Siri, Dtui, Civilai (who had been alerted to the new murder by Daeng when he stopped by the shop), and the two policemen sat in the morgue office drinking lethal Mahosot hospital coffee and eating Civilai's homemade brownies. The chocolate chips tasted a little like shotgun pellets but hospital coffee had a reputation for dissolving anything.

"So far," Sergeant Sihot began, "we haven't been able to identify this second victim. We're working on it. Nobody's reported a missing person as far as we know. But we have amassed a good deal of information about victim number one."

He flipped open his notepad and all the pages fluttered onto the floor. The others helped him retrieve them but it took him a few minutes to put them in order.

"Sorry. Thank you," he said at last. "Have to get that fixed. All right. Victim number one is…was Hatavan Rattanasamay. Known by the nickname of Dew. She's twenty-nine years of age…I mean, she was."

"Sihot, will you forget tenses and just give us the facts?" Phosy snapped.

"Yes, Inspector. Born in Bokeo. Married with two children. Her husband Chanti was…I mean, is chief engineer with Electricite du Lao. Dew returned from the Soviet Union in January this year. She'd just completed a four-year course in internal security in Moscow. Before she left she'd been a lieutenant in the People's Revolutionary Army. When she got back she'd done so well they promoted her to the rank of major and assigned her to the Prime Minister's security detail."

"Any connections with fencing?" Civilai asked.

"We're waiting for the military to release her records," Phosy answered. "We do know that she took a number of physical fitness and self-defence courses. We just aren't sure which ones she enrolled in."

"How did you get the personal information if the army hasn't released her file?" Siri asked.

"From the husband," Sihot told him.

"Any emotions?" Dtui asked. "Was he distraught? Bawling his eyes out?"

Sihot thought back to his interview.

"No," he said. "He seemed quite calm. Cheerful even."

"His wife's just been killed and he was cheerful?" Dtui asked.

"The man just discovered his wife was with a strange man, naked in a…a steam room at two in the morning," Phosy cut in. "I can see a case for saving face during an interview, can't you?" Siri noticed a glare shared between the couple.

"Any views on who the lover might have been?" Civilai asked.

"I have to say the Vietnamese security people aren't the most forthcoming group," Sihot confessed. "In fact, they wouldn't speak to me. I got the odd brief grunt from the Lao security chief, Phoumi, but he wasn't very helpful. I got a feeling they're all holding something back. I did have more luck with the Lao counterparts on the bodyguard team. The Vietnamese didn't give them much of a direct role, it seems. There was a comment that our people are treated more like civilian security guards than trained soldiers. And language was a problem, too. Dew had Russian, as did a few of the Vietnamese, so she acted as a translator from time to time. Mostly the 'Tell them to do this or that' kind of thing."

"How many women are there on the Lao team?" Dtui asked.

"Two others beside Dew. One on the Vietnamese detail."

"Any inappropriate advances from the men?" Siri asked.

"Not from the enlisted men," Sihot recalled. "I got the feeling they felt intimidated by Dew. Plus she was married."

"Not the enlisted men?" Siri pushed. "But something from the officers? Major Dung?"

During their brief encounter the previous day, Siri had gleaned the impression the Vietnamese was something of a playboy. He had that cinema idol sleaze to him. He was used to getting his way with women.

"He did try it on with one of the Lao girls," Sihot said. "She wasn't interested. Or so she told me."

"And they didn't share a common language," Civilai reminded them. "He wouldn't have been able to pile on the charm. But with Dew he could communicate directly."

"Do we know anything about Dew's marriage?" Dtui asked. "Was it a happy one?"

Again Phosy jumped in. "She'd left him with two kids for four years. A man might take objection to being treated like a babysitter while his wife went off to play in Europe. What do you — "

He was interrupted by a loud crunch. Sergeant Sihot had bitten into a chocolate chip and a corner of one tooth had snapped off. The policeman retrieved it from the debris and held it up proudly. His smile revealed that this wasn't the first time his teeth hadn't been up to a challenge.

"No worries," he said. "Happens all the time. Teeth like chalk, my wife says."

"Sue the bastard, Sihot," Siri laughed. "Comrade Civilai shouldn't be allowed in a kitchen. His wife would be only too glad to get her oven back, isn't that right, old brother?"

Civilai blushed slightly but ignored the question and continued to gather the threads of the investigation.

"As I see it," he said, "we already have two suspects. Not bad after only one cup of coffee and one injury. We have the playboy Vietnamese major who sweeps Dew off her feet and causes her to risk her career for an hour or two of lust. And we have the husband, torn with jealousy, who watches his wife sneak off for her tryst and then, when she's alone, steals in to kill her."

"I don't think we should narrow the field so soon," Dtui decided. "A smart young woman has lots of opportunities for an affair in this day and age."

Only Siri caught Phosy's expression at that moment but it was one of unmistakable fury.

"You're right," Civilai decided. "I think we need to focus on the fencing connection. This is Laos. We are a small country at the edge of the world. Your average Lao wouldn't know an epee from an eggplant. I say we find anyone with a fencing background and we'll have our murderer. He can't be that hard to find."

"I wouldn't rule out foreigners either," said Siri. "I noticed one or two fair heads strolling around K6 yesterday. We should find out which European advisors have permission to be out there."

"Chief Phoumi has made interviewing at K6 very difficult," Inspector Phosy conceded. "They don't want us out there."

"Hmm." Civilai scratched his chin stubble. "Now that I think I might be able to help with. I'm having dinner with the president this evening, just the two of us. And I'll be taking a couple of bottles of very good wine from my secret cache. I wouldn't be at all surprised if we could wrangle the security chief's full cooperation."

Siri frowned. "Brother, I've known the president for thirty years. He's never once invited me for dinner. What's your secret?"

"I'm an agreeable person, Siri," Civilai boasted. "And I know when to keep my mouth shut."?

I emerge from a shallow sleep surrounded by the same type of inky darkness in which Daeng and I had awoken a few weeks earlier. A few weeks that have stretched into an infinite number of years. That night still full of hope and love. That night long before I arrived in hell. But, unlike that night with my wife's hand in mine, this dark surrounding me holds no promise. It's murky and hangs in the air with menace, like a vampire's cape. I've endured the endless hours of brightly burning strip lights and not known whether it was day or night. I've begun to babble to myself. To count seconds and minutes. To recite The Prisoner of Zenda aloud in French, hoping it will all stave off the inevitable disorientation. It worked briefly. But now they're screwing with my confused mind by introducing a never-ending night. Cunning bastards. Or could it be a power failure? Have the captors' evil plans been thwarted by an unpaid electricity bill?

"Keep it to yourself, Siri."

They've already punished me for my flippancy. 'The Three Little Pigs' seems to have pushed them to their limits. They haven't beaten me or cut me with their thin bamboo canes. I have already endured those horrors alongside my unseen neighbours. It's as if I can feel as well as hear their punishment. But my minders are depriving me even of the sensation of pain. Instead they've removed gruel from the menu. And, as gruel was the only thing on that menu, I am now surviving on an occasional cup of water. And my sense of smell tells me what they've done to that water. But, didn't fakirs in India drink their own…?

"Sustain, Siri. Take whatever they give you for sustenance."

When the lights were still burning I was able to add the modest nutrition of cockroaches to my cocktail. Steve McQueen taught me that trick. Papillon.

"Your time will come soon enough, Siri," Steve tells me. "Your opportunity to die heroically. Take down six of the blackguards with you as you fight for your life."

Perforated postage stamps with my face peering out. Primary school textbooks telling of the day Siri took down twelve, no, fifteen armed guards as he fought for his freedom. Siri the hero. A band around his head. "Fifteen in one blow." The year 2010. "Yes, my grandfather knew Dr Siri Paiboun. He massacred entire armies with his bare hands. They finally finished him with a poisoned epee through the heart. It was the only way you could bring down a Siri."

I have been catching myself more frequently engaged in such prattle, but I can only blame that Siri fellow. No self-control. Showing weakness. I'm open to attack. My protection against the phibob is gone but they haven't yet come. They haven't begun to torment me into harming myself, or stopped my heart from beating as they do to the day labourers in their sleep. Busy, no doubt, troubling the souls of all those who are dying in this school building. This rotten school building.

"A school? Surely a school is a place for growing…for acquiring. Surely a school should be a step forward, not a step back. A place for giving life a kick-start, a push, a roll. Surely a school shouldn't be the last place you see in your life?"

"I was a teacher," the smiley man said in his neat but unexpressive French.

Surely not here. Surely not in this 'end of everything' high school.

"I learned more as a teacher than I ever did as a pupil," he said. "I learned that students need guidance and sometimes that guidance has to be cruel in order for it to be effective."

"I'm not your student," I told him. "I'm your superior."

Yes, I'm the grand emperor of knowing when to keep my independent mouth shut.

"If that's true," said the man. "Why are you in chains while I am free to walk out?"

"Because you're a despot," I told him, "and despots act out of panic. History shows us that a tyrant's reign is short because it's conducted in an atmosphere of fear. You'll always be looking over your shoulder. You'll always make mistakes. Despots invariably end up with a burning poker up their rear ends."

The smile on the face of the smiling man sagged momentarily. Then, from the cloth bag over his shoulder he produced another sheet of paper and another pencil. He held them out to me.

"My student," he said, "you would be surprised how few people in here get a second chance. But I believe that even the most naive student wouldn't fail to learn from a mistake. And so I am giving you a second chance. If you get it right this time it will make your passage to freedom very simple. I can even give you the answers to your examination questions and you can walk from the room with a degree and honours."

I had to laugh at that. I said, "Great master, tell me the answers. Show me the light."

The last of the unconvincing compassion drained from the man's eyes.

"You are a foreigner," he said. "And we don't want to involve you in our struggle. All you need to do is write what my superiors want to read and you are free to return to your country."

I took the pencil and paper and sat poised to write.

"I'm ready, oh masterful one," I said.

"All I expect is that you tell us your real name and describe in detail when the Vietnamese first recruited you as a spy. Tell us the name of your coordinator in Hanoi and what information he told you to gather. As simple as that. You write it. We file it. You go home."

I did my best to match the man's smile tooth for tooth. And, yes, I did, I considered writing his confession. I wondered what the odds were of being released if I made up a story and names and places. But, deep in my soul, I knew there was no point. They could either execute me as a confessed spy or just shoot me or torture me to death as the fancy took them. I've heard and seen too much of what they're doing here. I will never see the outside of this school.

"Any chance of a bit of lunch before I start?" I asked. "Writing fiction can really take it out of a person."

The man sighed and carried his heavy smile to the door. He stood there and watched me tear off strips of paper and put them into my mouth.

"It has no nutritional value, of course," I told him between mouthfuls. "And all that glue and chemicals won't do me a lot of good. But it should quiet the grumbling in my gut for an hour or two. If I close my eyes it's just like eating noodles."

The smiling man slammed the door behind him.

It's dark now and I feel an ache in my stomach. I wonder whether it's dark because I ate my homework and I'm being punished, or because the world has come to an end and there's nobody to turn on the power. And as I lie back contemplating being the last person on earth, starving to death in a classroom, something moves in the darkness and takes hold of my hand.?

"…and he was dead."

"He was dead?"

"Completely."

"He was dead?"

"Is your needle stuck?"

"What happened to the Hollywood ending?"

Siri and Daeng lay on their mattress. It was one a.m. Whatever bribes needed to be paid to whomever on the Thai side of the river had been paid and the street lamps burned yellow there. The glow shimmied across the Mekhong and crawled up the Lao bank. Despite the drizzly clouds that masked the starry sky, there were no longer any completely black nights. Even by the dim light that filtered through the rose-patterned cotton curtains Siri could see his wife clearly and she could see him. There would be no mistaken identity on that bed.

"It wasn't a Hollywood film, dear husband," she reminded him. "It was pure Chinese propaganda and Wei Loo was dead as a beefsteak by the end of it."

"But Ming Zi had spent two hours looking for him."

"Tough! It epitomised the futility of false hope."

Siri sat up on his elbows and was starting to wish he hadn't chosen this time to have Daeng tell him the story of the movie he'd missed, The Train from the Xiang Wu Irrigation Plant. He couldn't hide his devastation.

"But what's the message?" he asked. "Struggle, struggle, struggle and you'll end up with a dead boyfriend?"

"All right. I'm not quite at the end of the film yet. Wei Loo had died constructing a dam. We get this in flashback through sepia lenses. There'd been a freak flash flood and he'd rushed to the site, rescued all his colleagues, and sacrificed his own life to prevent the dam being washed away. Once she'd recovered from the shock, Ming Zi understood there was more to life than personal relationships. She realised that love for a mega-project and the development of the country was more satisfying than mere love for another human being."

"Rot."

"She found solace. As, coincidentally, she was also a qualified hydroelectric engineer, she applied for the position of project coordinator on her fiance's dam. Of course she didn't play the sympathy card. She didn't tell anyone who she was. She was appointed purely on her qualifications and experience. She was a conscientious worker, very popular with the men and women under her. But on the eve of the grand opening of the new dam…"

"Oh, don't tell me."

"…there's another storm and another unprecedented flash flood."

"Which had been precedented."

"Exactly."

"And Ming Zi saves the planet."

"Just the dam and twenty comrades."

"Of course she dies?"

"Penultimate scene."

"Holding a red flag?"

"She was underwater but she held on to it."

"And the closing scene?"

"The grand opening of the Xiang Wu Irrigation Plant with the lovers' photographs displayed on easels on either side of the starter button."

"Reunited in death. Oh, I wish I'd seen it."

"Everyone was in tears."

"I bet."

"Even the Chinese ambassador and he'd seen it twice."

Siri sighed and rolled off the bed.

"If only life were a film," he said. "Birth, life, love, adventure and death in under two hours. Nothing superfluous. Succinct, simple dialogue. Nothing boring. No roles for characters outside the main plot."

The window was open and rain dribbled down from the top awning in strings of pearl droplets. Through them he could see Rajid sitting on a stool under the umbrella on the river bank.

"He still there?" Daeng asked.

"At least he's under the umbrella now."

"Did he eat his supper?"

"I can't see the plate. Do you think he ever sleeps?"

"What's he doing?"

"It's dark but if he's doing what I think he's doing, I don't think you'd want to know."

"Virile young man, isn't he?"

"Very."

He was about to make a comment like, "Perhaps we should find him a girlfriend," but it occurred to him he was slowly sliding into the role of auntie to the masses since he'd married Daeng. He wanted to help everyone; Mr Geung, Phosy and Dtui, the Hmong, the starving people in Bangladesh, whales, and now here he was fretting over a street Indian. How would he ever find a mate for a non-speaking, self-abusing flasher from Delhi? Not even beautiful Ming Zi with her perfect skin could find true love. Siri started to wonder whether he was the only lucky romantic on the planet. No, he couldn't find romance for Rajid but he could attempt to replace the blown fuse in the relationship with his father. A young man shouldn't go through life hating someone who loves him. Siri had attempted to talk to Rajid before but not with any great belief in his own ability. Now, after several evenings with Sartre he was beginning to believe anything was possible, or at least, that if he didn't solve problems himself, nobody else was going to solve them for him.

"Won't be a minute," he said, heading for the door.

"Take an umbrella."

Daeng was always one step ahead of her husband.

Siri joined Rajid under the beach umbrella. They were sharing a small rainless cylinder of space and the little man was unpredictable. Sometimes he'd sit with you. Others he'd run and hide like a street cat. This was a sitting night.

"OK, Rajid," said Siri, sinking down to squat on the back of his heels. "Let's assume you understand everything I'm saying because I think you do. I know you can write because your father translated your poems for me. And if you can write, you can think, ergo, you can understand."

Rajid's concentration was already flagging. He seemed to be looking around for some other place to be.

"And, let's assume," Siri continued, "that you're here watching over me because you're grateful that I saved your life. By the way, I'm glad I did save your life because I think it's a life worth saving. We'd all be sorry not to have you around. But you're right. You owe me. A life is a big debt to owe so I'm asking you to repay that debt. I want you to talk to — "

Rajid sprang from his seat as suddenly as a cricket, but Siri had been expecting it and his reflexes were still sharp. He caught hold of the Indian's wrist and held it tightly. Rajid squirmed and growled like a trapped animal but Siri wasn't about to let him go until he was finished with his speech. He anchored his free arm around the umbrella stem and focused on his breathing until the wild man calmed down. It took some while.

At last, Siri continued, "I want you to talk to your father. I know you can speak. I've heard you. Your father didn't kill your family, Rajid."

The man shook violently but couldn't break the doctor's grip.

"The ocean killed them," said Siri. "The unsafe, unregistered boat killed them. Fate killed them. Hate all of those if you like, but not your father. He suffered even more than you when it happened. But every day he sees you like this he has to relive your family tragedy. I know you see it too. I know you have that same nightmare. I know what you saw disconnected some mechanism in your head and I'd bet you're as confused as anyone can be. But your father loves you and you're breaking his heart by punish — "

Rajid wrenched his arm from Siri's grasp and twisted his lithe body. He crashed into the umbrella and sent it tumbling into the damp undergrowth. His body fell sprawling onto the mud but he recovered before the doctor could get his bearings and scurried down the river bank and vanished in the darkness. Siri sighed, righted the umbrella and collected the plate of half-eaten dinner. He trudged back towards the shop and looked up to see Daeng enjoying the show from the upstairs window.

"Nicely done," she called.