‘It’s history, Daeng. A personal historical document. I’m not about to make fun of your spelling and grammar.’
‘I don’t want you to. I want to … to know how it made you feel.’
‘As in …?’
‘As in … Damn it, Siri. I’ve confessed to … to using intimacy to extract information. I’ve slept with men I didn’t love. Men I hated.’
‘A lot of women sleep with men they hate. But they’re usually related.’
‘Siri!’
‘What?’
‘How can you be … be near somebody like me after you’ve read all that?’
‘You know? I’ve been thinking about it.’
‘And?’
‘Did you always hate it?’
‘What?’
‘Was it always really awful or did the thrill become a drug?’
Daeng lowered her face from the freckled night sky and stared at her husband.
‘Siri …’
‘You’re a passionate woman, Daeng. My goodness, do I know that. Once you realized you held that weapon, and that you could use it on any one of those faux empereurs and destroy them any time you liked, that’s an awful lot of power to hold in your gut. Oh, you must have been full of that power. Bursting. I wouldn’t be surprised if the adrenalin channelled itself right to your pleasure nodes.’
‘I didn’t …’
‘And, as a result of that, I wonder if in subsequent years you didn’t sit on your noodle stool after the lunchtime rush and start to feel guilty about it all. Not the lies. Not the subterfuge. Not even the killing. That was all unavoidable. But the fact that you enjoyed it. The fact that there were times you took pleasure from those men. That your work had given you an excuse to break out of your culture and be promiscuous. There was even something about the awful times that made you happy, because you could always see the final scene played out in front of you. You knew your victims would suffer one way or another. And, Daeng, I tell you, if the French army had been all female, I would have been at the front of the queue of volunteers.’
She laughed.
‘I doubt you would have been recruited,’ she smiled.
He leaned away from her.
‘Madam, are you casting aspersions as to my prowess on the mattress?’
‘Not at all. You’re a veritable gymnast. But women like to look up at their men. French military Amazons would tower over you, my husband. You’d need stilts just to dance with them.’
‘I’d win them over with my boyish charm. We’re all the same height lying down, you know. And, no matter how ugly they were, I would engage them boldly for the nation.’
‘Now you’re making fun of me.’
‘No I’m not. I’m just telling you I admire you for what you did. That, if roles had been reversed …’
‘It’s not the same.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you’re a man, and men are lauded in our society for the number of times their pestle hits the mortar. I’m a Lao woman. Do you honestly believe if that document were published, there wouldn’t be an outcry about my morality? That mothers wouldn’t tell their daughters, “If you continue with your loose ways you’ll end up a Madame Daeng”?’
They were silent for a long time. They both knew she was right. He took her hand and massaged her palm with his thumb.
‘So you wrote it for me,’ said Siri.
‘Of course.’
‘Thank you.’
‘You’re welcome. Siri?’
‘Yes?’
‘What was so funny about my spelling and grammar?’
It was the night of Auntie Bpoo’s Phasing Away party. Siri and Daeng had debated not going. It seemed … weird. Were it a wake, at least you’d know what to wear. Everybody had a white or black wardrobe for such occasions. But to arrive at a party knowing that the host-cum-hostess would be kicking the bucket sometime in the middle of it all, made you want to take your funeral clothing in a plastic bag and change when the time was ripe. But Siri was concerned that nobody would show up at all. That Auntie Bpoo would die alone and friendless — a lonely, wandering spirit for eternity. And so Siri and Daeng spruced themselves up and decided to make the best of it. And there was one more reason for attending. Inspector Phosy had been off in Vieng Xai since before their return and would have arrived back in Vientiane late that afternoon. They’d all bullied Nurse Dtui to drag him along. There were numerous questions about his investigation of Madame Peung that still had no answers.
Auntie Bpoo had told them to meet her at the Russian Club at six. The Russian Club was neither Russian, nor a club. It was one of the few surviving nightlife venues in Vientiane still standing on the bank of the Mekhong. It was a large wooden restaurant whose only walls surrounded the kitchen. The rest was open to the elements. It held on to its licence and its profits by catering to the large Eastern European expat community. It had an endless supply of beer and other more expensive tipples such as vodka, leading one to believe that the owner had friends in high places. The restaurant was always full and it often stayed open after curfew. Siri had bemoaned the choice of venue.
‘I doubt she’ll even be able to book a table,’ he’d told Daeng.
It was therefore not a total surprise when they arrived at the club fashionably late to be met by military guards in full uniform including holstered weapons. They were standing out front checking invitations. There were large placards in Russian and English apologizing to esteemed regular guests for the fact that the restaurant would be closed this evening as it had been booked for a private function.
‘See? What did I tell you?’ said Siri. ‘That really stuffs up Auntie Bpoo’s plans. I bet she didn’t know about this. You’d think a fortune-teller would have predicted it.’
‘Don’t you be so hasty,’ said Daeng. ‘Who’s that sitting over by the railing?’
Siri looked up to see a table of friends waving; Phosy, Dtui, Mr Geung and his fiancee Tukda, Civilai and his wife, Noy.
‘How the hell did they get in?’ Siri asked.
‘I’d say this is Auntie Bpoo’s party,’ said Daeng.
‘Don’t be … How could she?’
Siri walked up the steps where he found a large hand on his chest. He looked up into the face of a middle-aged man in uniform.
‘Invitation,’ said the soldier.
Daeng followed demurely behind her husband.
‘Take your hand off my chest, son,’ said Siri. ‘Do you honestly believe I’d be here without an invitation?’
‘No. But if I don’t see it, I don’t believe it,’ said the military bouncer.
‘You obviously don’t know who I am,’ said Siri.
‘You’re Dr Siri,’ said the soldier. ‘You took a chunk of shrapnel out of my knee once.’
‘Well then.’
‘No invitation, no entry. Sorry.’
‘If I ran past you, do you think you could catch me?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then the operation was a success.’
‘Yes.’
‘Then?’
Madame Daeng laughed and produced her invitation from her sequinned soiree bag. The soldier looked at it and nodded for her to pass.
‘Where’s mine?’ called Siri.
‘You threw it in the bin, remember?’ Daeng told him. ‘Said it was ridiculous to take an invitation to a funeral.’
She walked to the top of the steps, turned around to see the sad sight of her husband behind the barrier, then relented. She returned to the guard and produced a second invitation.
‘I rescued it,’ she laughed.
The place was crowded. The tables were full and others stood around. In 1978 Laos, it was rarely necessary to raise one’s voice. There were the late insect choruses and monsoons on tin roofs and thousand-amp speakers at large gatherings but being heard at social events had hardly been a problem before this. There was no music in the Russian Club that night but everyone was shouting. There was a selection of beverages on each table and an open bar for those who had nowhere to sit. There were spirits and, to Daeng’s delight, red or white wine. They had asked a passing waitress whether she might open a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon for them. She produced a beer bottle opener and left it on the table for them. Fortunately, Civilai remembered that his Swiss Army knife had a corkscrew attachment.