A man, an American, speaks English into my ear. “May I speak with Detective Sonchai Jipeecheap please?”
It takes me a moment to realize he has attempted to pronounce my family name. “Speaking.”
My English is almost free from a Thai accent, although it contains shades of many others, from Florida to Paris, reflecting a childhood spent in the wake of my mother’s career. I am told that when stressed I speak English with Germanic precision and a Bavarian accent. I will tell you about Fritz soon enough.
“Detective, I’m very sorry to be calling you at home at this time. My name’s Nape, I’m the deputy FBI legal attaché at the American embassy in Wireless Road. We’ve just been contacted by a Colonel Vikorn who has informed us of the death of William Bradley, a Marine sergeant who was attached to the embassy here. We understand you are investigating?”
“That is correct.” Shock has distorted my perspective. I wonder if this conversation is taking place on some other planet, or in hell, or even in one of the heavens? I have no sense of gripping this unreality.
“I understand your partner and close friend Detective Pichai Apiradee also died, and I want to extend my sincerest condolences.”
“Yes.”
“You probably know that under a protocol we have with the government of Thailand we have the privilege of access to information you may come by in your investigation of the death of American service personnel in such circumstances, and by the same token we would be willing to share FBI forensic resources with you. When would be convenient for you to come to the embassy to discuss information-sharing-or would you prefer we come to you?”
I want to laugh cynically at the thought of entertaining the FBI in my tiny hovel without chairs.
“I’ll come, but you must give me a little time for the traffic.”
“I understand, Detective. I’d offer to send a car, but I’m afraid that wouldn’t solve the problem.”
“No. I’ll come. I’ll come soon.”
Without returning to my room I descend the concrete staircase to the ground floor. Outside, a makeshift shop leans against the wall of the building, with a long green awning which extends almost to the ground. Under the awning louts with many tattoos and almost as many earrings lounge on camp beds, smoking and drinking beer, their numbered jackets slung on the ground beside them. These are the licensed motorbike taxis, Krung Thep ’s most dangerous form of public transport, and its fastest.
“American embassy, Wireless Road,” I snap at one of the louts, and kick the side of his camp bed. “Now.”
The louts are local suppliers of yaa baa. They are intermittent users, too. From time to time I have toyed with the idea of busting them, but if I bust them someone else will take over the trade and perhaps expand it beyond the scope of these boys. Hit dirt with a stick and you will certainly spread it. Anyway, they buy a lot of their yaa baa from police confiscations, so there would be professional consequences for me. Colleagues would complain I’d taken the bread out of their children’s mouths.
The motorcyclist whose bed I kicked jumps to attention and then runs to his bike, a 200 cc Suzuki, which must have been very sexy when new, with sculpted lines which run from the teardrop fuel tank to the upturned twin exhausts. Krung Thep has a way of punishing elegance, though, and it looks shabby now, with quite a few dents, mud on the footrests, rusting exhausts, a torn seat. The driver offers me a helmet but I refuse. Helmets for passengers are one of our many unenforceable laws; most people prefer the risk of head injury to the sensation of having one’s brains boiled.
“You really in a hurry?” the kid asks.
I think about it. Not really, but anything to distract my mind, which is starting to implode. “Yes, it’s an emergency.” The kid’s eyes gleam as he presses the start button.
I enjoy the ride because I’m sure the kid is on some drug or other-if not yaa baa, then ganja-and on quite a few occasions I am certain I am about to die and join Pichai sooner than expected. It is with disappointment and some surprise that I see the white walls of the American embassy as we turn off Phloen Chit, and find myself still in the prison of the body.
I pay the boy, then make his eyes widen when I say: “Get me some yaa baa. Come to my room tonight.” Excited all over again, he makes wheel squeals as he rides away. Now I am face to face with a bronze eagle in a plaster medallion, a stainless steel turnstile and some heavily armed Thai cops lounging against the walls. I show my ID and tell them I have an interview with the FBI. This is relayed to the American behind the bulletproof glass at the turnstile, who takes my name and makes a call.
In meditation there is a point where the world literally collapses, providing a glimpse of the reality which lies behind. I am experiencing the collapse but not the salvation. The city falls and rebuilds itself over and over while I wait in the heat. I wonder if this is a message from Pichai? Meditation masters prepare us for the shock when we finally experience the fragility of the great out-there. It is supposed to be a very good sign, although for the untrained it presages certain madness.
Fritz was a bastard whom my mother and I both loved for a moment. The others were kinder but somehow we never managed to love them.
6
While I wait I remember the embassy was rebuilt in 1998, soon after the bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. The ambassador appeared on TV to explain, in not-bad Thai, that although America saw no threat from the Thai people, she feared those long porous borders with Cambodia and Myanmar where explosives and heavy armaments could be bought by just about anyone. Now the walls are massive reinforced concrete, capable of withstanding an assault by a ten-wheel truck, and if the truck did succeed in breaching the walls, there is a moat. In the twenty-first century the American ambassador works in a medieval castle. What is the karma of America?
Suddenly the American in the cabin, who might be a marine in plain clothes, decides to let me through the turnstile. One has to adjust to the jerkiness of farangs; this one has replaced his first jerk of suspicion with a jerk of hospitality. Through his microphone he says: “The Bureau is expecting you. D’you want to wait in here, in the air-conditioning?”
Something bleeps as I cross the threshold and I see a colorful image of myself and every metal object in my pockets displayed on a monitor on the desk. In the cabin I shiver at the blast of cold air. The young man at the desk, his hair so close-cropped he is almost bald, stares at the monitor for a moment, then asks me for my ID, the number of which he taps into his computer. I see my name appear on the screen. The marine grunts. “You’ve never been here before.” This is not a question, it is what the computer says. “Next time we won’t have to go through all this rigmarole.” As he speaks he nods in the direction of the main buildings as if it were the rigmarole who is now walking mannishly toward us, a gigantic ID tag swinging from between her small breasts. Even from this distance I see that the rigmarole’s name is Katherine White, deputy chief of security. About thirty, brunette, intense, athletic, frowning. I feel very Thai, despite my straw-colored hair and sharp nose.
“You have Detective, lemme see, Jiplecreap, for the FBI legal attaché?” Her voice is squeaky over the voice transmission system.
“Yep.”
“I wasn’t expecting him to be in there. Do I come in or do you bring him out? I forget which.”