Tanner On Ice

Chapter 16

“You are truly determined to leave Burma.”

“Vanya, I would do anything to get out!”

“It will be dangerous.”

“I do not care.”

“And there will be hardships. It will not be an easy journey, or a comfortable one.”

“It does not matter.”

“And we will have to travel light.”

“That is the best way, Evan.”

“Very light,” I said. “You will have to leave everything behind.”

“So? You know my family history. Every generation has left everything behind and fled one country to start anew in another.”

And every generation, I thought, has managed to choose the wrong side.

“Besides,” she said, “look around you, Evan. What is there that I would regret losing? I have nothing. You think it will sadden me to leave these four walls? Or these ragged clothes? Or anything else in my possession?”

“We’ll really be traveling light,” I said. “You’ll have to leave more than that.”

“But I have nothing else! Evan, tell me what else I have to leave. I will be delighted to leave it, but there is nothing else that I own.”

I looked at that beautiful face, that rich and exotic blend of East and West. Kipling was proven wrong; East was East and West was West, but the twain met spectacularly in those high cheekbones, that arch of brow, those almond-shaped eyes, that luxurious curtain of straight blond hair.

“This,” I said, reaching to touch her hair. “I’m afraid it has to go.”

“You think,” she said, wielding the scissors savagely, “that because I am a woman I am overly concerned with my appearance.” Snip! Snip! “But I do not care about superficial things.” Snip! Snip! “Hair is just hair. You cut it off and it grows back.” Snip! Snip! Snip! “It is true I like my hair” – Snip! – “and perhaps I take some pride in it” – Snip! Snip! – “but it is a small sacrifice if it will get me out of this godforsaken country” – Snip! – “and give me a chance at a new life!” Snip!

“That’s great,” I said.

“Yes.”

“Because I was a little worried. I know hair’s a big deal for women.”

“And not for men?”

“Not in the same way. We worry about losing it, but we don’t care what it looks like. We don’t even mind cutting it all off so long as we know it’ll grow back.”

“And you will not mind shaving off all of yours now?”

“No, of course not.”

“Then neither will I.” Snip! “There, Evan. I think that is as much as I can get off with the scissors.” She ran her hand through the mound of hair on the floor in front of her. “Well? You are the one who will have to look at me. How does it look?”

All she needed was a safety pin through her cheek and she could pass for a punk rock star. “It looks unfinished,” I said, “and it’ll be better when I’ve shaved it all off. But it’s not so bad.” I nodded at the mirror. “Have a look for yourself.”

“Why not? It is just hair. It is not important, it will surely grow back.” Then she fell silent as she looked in the mirror.

Then she burst into tears.

Her hair was fine and soft, and offered little resistance to the razor. When I’d finished, she looked again into the mirror, and for a long moment she was silent.

Then she said, “Do I look like a man? I don’t think so, Evan. I don’t look like a woman, but neither do I look like a man. I look like some sexless creature from another planet.”

“It just takes getting used to,” I said. I picked up the scissors, then turned to her. “I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe this is a bad idea. Suppose I just turn myself in. What can they do to me?”

“Evan-”

“I mean, they’re not going to hang me. So they’ll slap me around a little and kick me out of the country. Hell, I’ve been thrown out of better places than this.”

“Evan, please-”

“So maybe that’s what I’ll do,” I said. “How about you? You’ll be all right, won’t you?” I held up a hand. “Hey, I’m just kidding. Honest.”

“I know you are kidding,” she said. “That is why the scissors are still in your hand. Otherwise they would be in your heart.”

“Uh,” I said.

“My ears are large,” she said. “I never realized this before. I have large ears.”

“Your ears are beautiful.”

“They were better when one did not see so much of them. Suddenly I have ears like a bat. And look at the shape of my head.”

“What’s wrong with the shape of your head?”

“I don’t know. I was never so aware of it before, the shape of my head. Now I am suddenly aware of nothing else.” She patted at her skull, framing and reframing it with her hands. “It is small,” she said. “I have a small head. With big ears.”

“It just looks that way because you’re used to it with hair.”

“Of course I am. Evan, we should have made love before I did this. When I was still beautiful.”

“You’re beautiful now.”

“You don’t have to say that. I will get over this, Evan. I am in shock, that is all, but I am adjusting to it. This is just part of the process of adjustment.”

“I understand.”

“Anyway,” she said, “we will travel light, yes? No mirrors.”

I took her place in front of the mirror, looking at my own close-cropped skull. If a barber had done this to me, I thought, I’d kill him. It would be better once I shaved it, I told myself. And then I remembered that I’d told Katya the same thing.

“No mirrors,” I said. “Count on it.”

With our hair scissored off we’d looked like victims, and a tad demented in the bargain. With our heads shaved, we just looked weird.

In our new robes, we looked like monks.

Or did we? It was hard to tell, even as it was hard to wrap oneself properly in the dark red cloth. It was probably the first thing you learned at monk school, how to wrap the set of three cloths so that they covered everything they were supposed to cover and wouldn’t fall open at an inopportune moment. They all seemed to know how to do it, even the small boys, but there had to be a trick to it, because we didn’t seem to have gotten the hang of it.

“Don’t wrap the outer robe too tight across your chest,” I advised Katya. “It makes you look, uh-”

“Like a woman,” she said, and adjusted the drape of the robe. “All my life,” she said, “I felt that my breasts were too small, and now I find out they are too large. Should I bind them, Evan?”

“It’s too late now,” I said. “They’re already grown.”

“To flatten them,” she said.

“Oh, I was thinking of Chinese women, you know, binding their feet.”

“I don’t think they do that anymore, Evan.”

“No, of course not. But should you try to flatten them? I don’t know. Let me see.”

She opened the robe.

“I just meant let me look at you in profile, Katya. I didn’t mean let me look at your breasts.”

“I’m sorry. I thought you wanted to see them.”

“Well, I suppose I did,” I said. “But that’s not what I meant. My God.”

“What is the matter?”

“You’re beautiful,” I said.

“Even with my head shaved?”

“Even if you wore a Richard Nixon Halloween mask,” I said. “Your breasts are-”

“Too small.”

“No.”

“Too large.”

“No,” I said. “Just right.” I took a deep breath. “You’d better close the robe. Now let’s see how it looks.”

“And how does it look, Evan?”

“It looks fine to me,” I said. “But to tell you the truth, I liked it better open.”

I looked hopelessly white.

Part of that, I knew, was attitudinal, and would change of its own accord. An actor’s face changes slightly when he gets into character, and the same thing happens when a traveler in another country speaks and thinks in another language. Speak French, or even speak English with a strong French accent, and one begins to shrug in a characteristic French fashion, and in a short time one’s features take on a Gallic cast.

But that wouldn’t help me from a distance, and my freshly shaven head would be a positive beacon of whiteness. I said as much to Katya and she produced an answer, working on my head with cosmetics. Her supply was limited, as was my patience for this sort of thing, but I have to say it made a difference. I still looked white enough to join a neo-Nazi group – and God knows I had the right hairdo for it – but at least I didn’t gleam.

“Besides,” she said, “there are white monks.”

“Sure,” I said. “Franciscans, Carthusians, Dominicans, Benedictines-”

“White Buddhist monks.”

“In Burma?”

“In Burma,” she said. “I have seen them. They come here to study Theravada Buddhism. That is the same branch as in Sri Lanka.”

“And in Thailand,” I said. “And Laos and Cambodia.”

“They come to live in one of the meditation centers. I have seen them on the street in the morning, Evan, dressed in robes like ours and carrying their begging bowls.”

“Maybe they’re just hippies,” I said, “looking for a free meal.”

“They are monks.”

“I’m sure you’re right,” I said. “It’s just that I haven’t seen any.”

“Well, there are so many monks.”

“No kidding.”

“Every Buddhist is expected to pass some time as a monk. For a week or two as a young boy-”

“Shit,” I said, remembering the kid with the bird.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Never mind.”

“The boys serve for a week or two,” she said. “They are novices. There is a word for it.”

“Samanera,” I said.

“You know all this?”

“Ku Min gave me a crash course,” I said, “along with the robes and begging bowls. He’s a Buddhist, and he was a samanera and also a pyongyi. That’s when you’re a grown man and you spend three months at a monastery as a fully ordained monk. Not everybody stays the whole three months, some figure three days is enough, but Ku Min went the distance. He thought of spending the rest of his life there.”

“But instead he became a money changer.”

“And threw himself out of the temple,” I said. “But he’s still a good Buddhist. I think it bothered him a little, the idea that I’d be pretending to be a monk. Sacrilege and all that. But he gave me a quick course in the religion so that I’d know what kind of behavior will be expected of me.”

“You’d better tell me, too.”

“Monks have to live by ten precepts,” I remembered. “There are the five rules that all Buddhists are expected to follow – no killing, no stealing, no unchastity, no lying, and no intoxicating substances.”

“The last three, Vanya, may be a problem.”

“I’ve broken two of them already today,” I said, “and I stole some guy’s shoes. I’m chaste, though, and I haven’t killed anybody lately. Anyway, those are the standard ones. There are five more for monks.”

“What else can’t we do?”

“No eating after noon,” I said. “No listening to music or dancing.”

“What if there is music playing? How do you keep from hearing it?”

“I guess you just think of something else. Just so you don’t break into a fast fox trot.” I scratched my head. “There’s three more. No wearing jewelry or perfume. No sleeping on high beds. And no accepting money for personal use.”

“We cannot eat after noon?”

“Not when people are watching.”

“And I cannot wear my ring, but I already thought of that. A ruby ring would look out of place on the hand of a monk.”

“Oh, I don’t know. The color’s a good match for the robe.”

“No high beds. To remain humble, I suppose. The difficult one will be not to eat after noon.”

“All it means,” I said, “is we have to avoid being seen eating after noon. Look, the monks probably rise and shine around two in the morning and go to sleep by sunset, so abstaining from meals after noon probably isn’t that much of a stretch for them. We’ll manage to stow some food and eat it when nobody’s looking. Remember, most of the time we’ll be walking along the road, with nobody anywhere near us. We can eat all we want then. Hell, we can even talk.”

“Can’t we talk the rest of the time?”

“I don’t think it would be a good idea. We’d call attention to ourselves by speaking in Russian or English. And your voice is a little higher than the average monk’s.”

“Of course. If they hear me-”

“The jig is up,” I said, “and I don’t know what they’d do if they found out a woman was pretending to be a monk, but I think it might involve a violation of the First Precept.”

“The one against unchastity?”

“Uh-uh,” I said. “The one against killing.”

We each had a cloth shoulder bag. They were both the same, and both matched our robes. Each contained a black lacquer begging bowl, a cup, and a razor. (I thought the razors would be of the old-fashioned cut-throat variety, but Ku Min had furnished a couple of disposable Gillettes. That was going to make shaving easier, but it substantially reduced the razor’s potential value as a defensive weapon. “Watch it, you son of a bitch, or I’ll slice you open with my plastic safety razor.” No, I don’t think so.)

We each had a small strainer of woven bamboo, for removing insects from our drinking water. That didn’t bear thinking about. A pair of wandering monks wouldn’t be buying bottled water, not that we’d be likely to find it on sale in the little village markets along the way. That meant we’d be drinking tap water or well water or ditch water, whatever the locals drank, without having built up the immunity that the locals had.

That being the case, I figured it would be a good sign to find insects swimming around in our drinking water – it meant the stuff would support life. And the insects, if we chewed them up and swallowed them, might be all the protein we got that day. Of course it would mean violating the precept against killing – and, depending on the time of day, the one against eating after twelve noon.

The few kyat we had left went in my bag, since I’d be more able to speak up safely if we needed to buy something. The three ivory carvings, wrapped up again in their bubble wrap and oilskin, went in Katya’s shoulder bag. I didn’t know how or to whom we could peddle them, but their value was high in proportion to their weight.

Besides, I wasn’t going to leave them behind. A man had died giving them to me (although he probably hadn’t planned on giving them to me any more than he’d planned on dying). I figured I ought to hang on to them. And, as Katya pointed out, Good Luck and Good Health and Long Life were much to be desired, and by no means to be taken for granted in the adventure we had in store for ourselves.

Katya’s eyes widened when I put the brick of heroin in my bag. Was it not dangerous to be carrying it? And would it not add unnecessary weight? And, at the risk of being picky, was it not somehow a violation of one of the precepts? Surely it was an intoxicating substance, was it not?

“We’re not going to ingest it,” I said. “As a matter of fact we’re not even going to take it with us. At daybreak Ku Min’s coming to take us to the boat.”

“That is very nice of him.”

“Well, he’s a nice fellow, and the two of us really hit it off.”

“And he bought these sets of robes, and the begging bowls, and the shoulder bags.”

“And the Gillette razors, too,” I said. “And in return we’re going to give him a kilo of heroin.”

“It is for him?”

“Why not? Have you got any use for it? Because I don’t.”

“No, but-”

“I told him I wasn’t even certain what it was. I said it’s probably heroin, but it might be milk sugar and quinine, for all I knew. He seemed to think it was worth the gamble.”

“Evan, if it is heroin, how much is it worth?”

“You got me,” I said. “If the DEA seized it in a drug raid in Miami, the newspapers would tell you it had a street value of a quarter of a million dollars. But that would be what it would wind up retailing for after it had been stepped on three or four times and parceled out into twenty-dollar bags and sold to desperate junkies. That’s a lot different from what it’s worth to a wholesale buyer in the States, let alone to someone in Rangoon.”

“Even so-”

“Even so,” I said, “it’s worth a lot more than a couple of red schmattes and a pair of black bowls. Is that what you were going to say?”

“I guess so. What is a schmatte?”

“A rag,” I said. “Or in the present instance a robe. If Ku Min finds a buyer for the stuff, I guess he’ll make out handsomely. But he’s making more of an investment than the robes and the rest of our gear. He got us the sandals, don’t forget.”

She picked up one and studied its bottom. “It doesn’t say Ferragamo,” she said. “In fact it was cut from an automobile tire.”

“That means it’ll probably outlast anything Ferragamo makes. He also set things up with the guys on the boat, and he’ll let people in Shan country know that we’re coming. Katya, I was planning on leaving the heroin behind and trying to think of a way to get rid of it that wouldn’t get it traced back to us. If you think I made a mistake-”

“I did not say that, Evan.”

“I’m not sure any of this is a good idea,” I said. “All we can do is roll the dice and take our best shot.”

“It would be safer for you to travel alone.”

“I’m not even sure of that. Maybe a monk knocking around on his own is cause for suspicion. Maybe they’re like nuns, always traveling in pairs.”

“But they do not travel with women, Evan.”

“Well, no,” I said. “They don’t.”

“I think I will go to sleep now,” she said after a moment. “We have only a few hours before daybreak. Will you come to sleep, Evan? It may be your last chance to sleep in a high bed.”

“I think I’ll sit up for a while,” I said.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m too tense to sleep.”

“There must be a way to get rid of tension.”

“I don’t think that would be a great idea, Katya.”

“I do not blame you,” she said. “Who could make love to someone who looks like this?”

“That’s not it.”

“It is,” she said, “but it is all right. I am too tired, and you’re right, it is not such a good idea. Good night, Evan.”

“Good night, Katya.”

She was silent for a while. Then she said, “Vanya, could you just lie with me and hold me for a little while? I will be strong once our journey begins, but right now I am frightened.”

I got in bed with her. She had shucked her outer robe and one of the others, leaving only the third, a sort of glorified loin cloth. She came into my arms and burrowed close, and her fear was a palpable thing. I could feel her trembling, and I held her gently but firmly in my arms until the trembling ceased.

She murmured something. I could tell it was in Russian, but it was too soft for me to make it out. I went on holding her and breathed in her scent, and even as her own breathing deepened with the onset of sleep, I felt myself stirring in response.

Easy enough to open my own robes, easy too to take the last bit of cloth from around her loins. Easy to part her thighs, easy to ease between them…

I don’t know what stopped me. Not fear of disapproval, God knows. If anything, she’d welcome it. But it just didn’t seem appropriate, not hours before our entry into monastic life. And it struck me as strategically unwise. The role we would be playing was a sexless one, and how sexless an energy would we project if we had just squeezed in a quickie?

My mind knew this, even if my body had a will of its own. I clenched my teeth and breathed deeply, and my resolve stiffened. It wasn’t the only thing that did, but it proved the stronger, and after a few minutes I got out of bed without disturbing Katya and sat cross-legged in a corner of the room, waiting for the dawn.

I felt, by turns, virtuous and stupid. And after a while I realized it was possible to feel both those things at once.