The Second Biggest Nothing

by Colin Cotterill

  The evening turned to night and the guests decided it was time to go to eat. Three restaurants had been set aside for the visitors and they opted for the nearest. Despite a lingering paranoia honed over five years of not knowing whom to trust, Dtui liked the foreigners for their openness. Her favorites were Marvin, the gangly Australian, and Jim, the dirty-mouthed but funny Englishman who had given up his British passport and was currently based in Sydney. She and Phosy knew that the pair were already stoned when they’d first arrived. Perhaps they’d been expecting the worst and put up that marijuana force field to withstand another night of sober cultural pleasantries. Neither of them seemed the worse for wear from their smoking. They held their own in the noisy discussions. Marvin had signed on as a journalist for the Sydney Morning Herald but he was, in fact, a Lao scholar: an expert in Southeast Asian history and culture. He had come, as he said, “To see what a mess they’d made of his beloved Laos.”

  Jim had made a name for himself as a photographer at the height of the aggression in Vietnam. He still carried an interior tiara of shrapnel as a memento. The editor at the Times in England had passed on the Lao invitation to him in anticipation that he might get a picture or two that belied the Soviet claims of peaceful community development under its leadership. He’d suggested Jim write a vignette of socialist Laos with himself as a central character: Sunday Times magazine fodder.

  Jim and Marvin went back a way. They’d shared a house in Vientiane in the sixties. They’d seen the country at its most corrupt and now they were seeing it at its most repressed. Both men were confident that it wouldn’t be long before the repression subsided and the corruption made a triumphant comeback. Dtui had immediately recalled Civilai’s description of the Customs department at Tar Deua.

  “So, my boy, you’re a plumber?” said Jim with his arm around Phosy’s shoulder as they walked into the street.

  It wasn’t an outright lie. Phosy was very handy with a wrench and undertook most of the repairs at the police dormitory bathroom. He’d decided nothing would be gained by announcing who he was to the group. But he was with a canny crew of journalistic vagabonds. Jim sniggered.

  “Something funny?” Phosy asked.

  “Nothing at all,” said Jim.

  Phosy knew his cover was blown.

  “What gave me away?” he asked.

  “Oh, I don’t know. Perhaps the manager calling you chief inspector?”

  “I didn’t think anyone heard.”

  “We’re daft. Not deaf.”

  Phosy raised his voice for the crowd on the grassy pavement.

  “Then I want you all to know I’m only here to chaperone my wife, for obvious reasons. I’m not spying. I’m off duty.”

  “Relax, Constable,” said Marvin. “We’ve been riding around on bicycles all day. Nobody followed us. No guard post stopped us. I got the feeling nobody was interested in us at all.”

  “I imagine that’s what the Soviets want us to write,” said Bjorn, the oldest and most opinionated of the Swedes. “How free this place is. No shadowy characters taking notes. No hidden cameras. No bugs in the rooms.”

  “I got bugs,” said Jim. “Big bastards in the bathroom.”

  “All we get is a jolly drunk policeman and his pretty wife,” Bjorn continued. “How can we not write lovingly about this lie?”

  “Here he goes again,” said Marvin.

  “Somebody has to,” said Bjorn. “Because this isn’t real, is it? The chief of police gives us free drinks. It must be such a liberal place. But it isn’t. It’s Vietnamese-style repression where you’re paper-worked to death. And you Lao have your own style of zero truth. They don’t say we can’t interview inmates in the reeducation camps, but it will be too difficult to get a flight north at this time of year. We’re welcome to speak with the minister who publically criticized the cooperatives, but he’s out of town right now. Everything’s possible, but nothing’s doable. You’re all cool about your history as colonized monkeys, but I don’t see any French or American newspaper people invited here. You were kind enough to let the Americans keep their consulate open after you took over, but they’re down to a diplomatic staff of six, and they aren’t allowed to do anything. You nullify your critics with your smiles and your fake indolence.”

  There was a chilly Vientiane silence in the air for a second until Dtui laughed.

  “Well I think I know who’s going to mysteriously disappear overnight,” she said.

  A few more seconds for the chill to melt and the group fell into a swirl of laughter.

  “At last, you’ve met your match, you grumpy old bastard,” said Jim to the drunken Swede.

  They applauded the nurse, blew her kisses and congratulated Phosy for marrying her. In five minutes most of them were on their way to dinner and Phosy and Dtui were left with Marvin and Jim in front of the dark hotel façade.

  “Nice to see you’ve all got it worked out,” said Phosy.

  “Ah, don’t listen to that flaky old hack,” said Jim. “Nobody takes any notice of him. He’s been in the region so long he can’t see anything beyond his own bias.”

  “So, you don’t agree with him?” Dtui asked.

  “Some of it,” said Marvin. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. We’re very fond of this place. We aren’t going to belittle you in the press. But really, Dtui, what’s this junket all about? The government’s got nothing to show us apart from the fact you’re still here, still surviving in spite of all those years of war and strife. You’re a lesson to the world in tolerance, but I’m not buying the ‘land of the free’ angle.”

  “You do know I’m not a plumber,” said Phosy.

  “No, you’re a public servant,” said Jim. “And all the scary policies and cloak-and-dagger shit is put together at the Kremlins and the Stasi headquarters of the world, and I’d bet you’re no more aware of the dark side of your country than the average farmer. No offence.”

  Phosy resented hearing it from a foreigner but he couldn’t refute it. There were more secret police being trained by the Vietnamese in Laos than there were regular police officers. Even as chief of police, he wasn’t granted access to the study venue or its graduates. Half of his investigations of missing persons were stymied with an official “Confidential. Do not proceed.”

  But he was proud of his country for what it had achieved, and he wasn’t about to agree with a foreigner on its shortcomings. They walked the journalists as far as their Vespa and Dtui took the key.

  “So, what do you two do when you’re riding around on your bicycles?” Phosy asked.

  “Observe,” said Marvin. “Talk to the ladies in the market. Meet the unexpected character acquaintance from days gone by.”

  Phosy noticed a brief look from Jim that silenced his friend.

  “What type of acquaintance?” asked Dtui.

  “Probably one of the old girls from the White Rose,” said Jim. “That’s where he learned all about balloons and darts, if you know what I mean.”

  “Not to mention how to smoke ten cigarettes at a time,” said Marvin. “And I consider this to be the perfect moment to change the subject. You two wouldn’t happen to know of a doctor here in Vientiane called Siri, by any chance?”

  “He’s our—” said Dtui.

  “It’s a common enough name,” said Phosy. “Why are you interested?”

  “Just one of the Swedes was looking for him, is all,” said Marvin.

  “Do you know why?”

  “No idea.”

  “I’ll keep my eyes open for him,” said Phosy.

  They parted company with handshakes and the confession that the journalists probably wouldn’t be catching the following day’s 7 a.m. bus to visit the model collective. Dtui drove slowly back along the river road toward the dorm. They passed the Russian Club where the Soviet journalists failed in their attempts at Cossack dancing. They passed Daeng
’s noodle shop with Ugly on duty outside. They passed the grey padlocked shop fronts and the peeling white colonial buildings. They passed Crazy Rajhid being invisible in front of the Lan Xang Hotel, and they stopped for a while to admire the stars reflected in the water.

  “Do they really know more about us than we know about ourselves?” Dtui asked.

  “Dtui, when the only information you have about a place comes from the mouths of people who fled that place, you aren’t going to hear many positive comments. You’ll only get bitterness and anger and misinformation. That’s why they were all invited here. To remind them we aren’t evil. That we have the same dreams as them.”

  “What was all that about the darts and the balloons?” Dtui asked.

  He looked at her with his eyebrows raised. “Yeah, I didn’t get that either,” he said.

  “We should invite them to Daeng’s shop,” said Dtui. “I’d love to see them lock horns with Siri and Civilai. They’d really have something to write about then.”

  “We’ll see,” said Phosy.

  She kick-started the Vespa. The engine spoke up like the only voice in the whole of Laos. She wondered whether any of the English speakers would make it up in time for the early bus. She knew she wouldn’t be meeting Jim and Marvin there. What she didn’t know was that she’d never see them again.

  Chapter Six

  Civilai’s Own Brigitte Bardot

  Siri’s second threat arrived in the pouch of a postal worker early the next morning. The envelope was foolishly small like one of those wedding invitations impoverished couples sent out to save money. There were two stamps, both Lao: one with a picture of Lenin and one with the words Royaume du Laos with Royaume struck through. The old postman didn’t leave. He was dressed in civilian clothes, with an armband and a battered hat as his only uniform.

  “What are you waiting for?” Siri asked, “A tip?”

  The old man’s eyes and nostrils were already feasting on Daeng’s breakfast noodles. Like the teachers, he hadn’t been paid for several months. The modest Soviet funding hadn’t stretched to the end of the year. Moscow and Hanoi were talking about reactivating some of the old opium plantations in order to cover government salaries in Laos. Siri stuffed the envelope into his shirt pocket and showed the postman to an empty stool. One more en-suite bathroom for Siri’s charity penthouse apartment in heaven.

  It wasn’t till after eight, the office workers sated and at their desks, that Siri and Daeng could finally take a break.

  “Tell me again,” said Siri.

  “They’ll be back in seven days,” said Daeng.

  “What could they possibly do for two weeks on a honeymoon?”

  “Well, during the day, they’re learning vegetable cultivation,” said Daeng. “The rest you’ll have to use your imagination.”

  “Can’t we . . . you know . . . hire someone till they come back?”

  “Why, Siri? Don’t you enjoy watching me work?”

  “I do my share. And you know I love watching you work. You are the prima ballerina of noodles. But I would love it even more if I could sit at a back table with a strong coffee and a good book. I’m retired.”

  “You’re sounding more like a Mandarin than a forty-something-year paid-up member of the Communist Party. Lording over the staff indeed. Shame on you. It’s good for you to labor from time to time. Learn new skills.”

  “What’s wrong, Daeng? Did my table-wiping ability not please you today?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re being grumpy.”

  “I’m not being grumpy. I am being both angry and anxious.”

  “Why?” he asked.

  “You know why. I saw the postman, I saw the look on your face and I saw you stuff a letter into your pocket.”

  “Oh.”

  “Let’s see it.”

  “It’s probably just an ad for colostomy bags. They have a mailing list for everyone over—”

  “Siri! I have a noodle strainer in my hand. In the underground, they taught us thirty ways to disfigure a man using a noodle strainer, so don’t push me.”

  Siri fished out the crumpled envelope and tore it open. They sat at the nearest table while Siri scoured the letter. He looked up.

  “Well?” she said.

  “Colostomy bags,” he said.

  Daeng reached across and thrust the strainer, missing his already-disfigured ear by a fraction.

  “I can’t read it,” he said.

  “English?”

  “Same handwriting.”

  She took the letter from him, nodded, and slid it into her apron pocket.

  Dtui was off at some cooperative with her group, so they had to wait until ten to get a translation. Bruce had an appointment to get a Lao driving license at nine. That involved taking his Australian license to the motor registry department, translating it for the clerk, and waiting an hour while she typed up a new one and attached a photograph to it. They insisted on taking the photograph themselves so Bruce arrived at the noodle shop with a license that looked like it belonged to a Solomon Islander.

  “Makes your teeth look nice and white though,” said Daeng.

  “In fact they’re all you can see,” said Bruce. “They’ll have to turn the lights out to ID me.”

  He was carrying a heavy cloth bag and a clip file. He put the file on the table in front of Siri and Daeng. They looked at it.

  “Go ahead, open it,” said Bruce with that big Solomon Islands smile.

  Daeng flipped open the cover and there at the top was their title page held down with silver clips. They’d given their film the working title Death to the Oppressors. Both the Ministry of Culture and the Lao Women’s Union had expressed their concerns, but Siri had assured them it was just a temporary filler until they had feedback from their marketing department. But it was Death to the Oppressors that stared back at them from the front page of the script. It was the most professional looking thing they’d ever seen: no typing errors, no cross throughs, no smudged or fading ink, no wine stains.

  Daeng continued to thumb through the pile: the list of characters, the timeline. By the time the first page of the screenplay showed itself, Siri had already decided to adopt Bruce as his only son and leave him the Triumph in his will.

  “How did you achieve all this?” Siri asked.

  Bruce, as pleased as a papaya slice, unzipped the cloth bag and produced a clunky mechanical gadget that opened up to look like some science-fiction typewriter. It had a screen like a small television and a keyboard and other knobs and levers that gave the impression it could take off and fly.

  “It’s called a word processor,” said Bruce. “Wordstar—just came out a couple of years ago, but it was already hot in the stores as I was leaving Sydney. The tech boys at UTS put together a Lao script version. You make all your mistakes in the screen here, correct them and print it out at the back. I took the liberty of retyping your script using a screenplay format. I can change it as we go along.”

  “Siri, you’re dribbling,” said Daeng.

  “It’s marvelous,” said Siri. “Right, Daeng?”

  Daeng wasn’t nearly as excited. She was too focused on the letter in her apron pocket. Her instincts were tingling. Her tail was twitching. The two notes might have been the work of a crank—some dark practical joker—but she hadn’t stayed alive this long by being complacent. If someone had gone to the trouble of contacting and threatening them, he was a troubled soul and anything was possible. Leaving Siri to drool over his new toy, she took Bruce to a table near the road and made him a coffee.

  “Bruce,” she said, “I was hoping you might take a look at something for me.”

  She handed him the letter and leaned back on her chair. He read it, looked up, then read it again.

  “What is this, Auntie?” he said.

  “One of the j
ournalists was asking if he could help with the script. This is a sort of screen test. We want to know if we can use his idea in our film. Of course, we’d have to translate it, but . . . just see what you think.”

  The boy read through it again silently to be met by a smile from Daeng.

  “I don’t believe you,” he said.

  “Which part?” she asked.

  “Any of it. This looks like the real thing to me. Am I wrong?”

  “Perhaps you can translate it for me?” she asked.

  He huffed and nodded his head.

  “Hello, Dr. Siri,” he read. “Let’s face it; you wouldn’t be afraid of me if I didn’t give you a demonstration of my power. Threats without bodies to back them up are meaningless. Don’t forget the theme of this maniacal obsession is ‘loved ones’ although there may be one or two collateral victims who fall outside those parameters. Since I arrived, I’ve been watching you. Clearly, the love of your life is Daeng. Then there’s Civilai. We all know how close you are to him. So I’ve decided the order of departure of those remaining will be your best friend first and then your wife. I doubt you’ll consider life to have any meaning once you’ve lost those two, but don’t worry. Your own death will be so slow you’ll have plenty of time to contemplate your loneliness.

  “The cogs in the clock have started to turn and they are unstoppable. I look forward to watching your futile attempts to undo that which cannot be undone.”

  Bruce stared at her but her expression gave nothing away.

  “Thank you,” she said. “I think that was quite convincing, don’t you?”

  “Madam Daeng, we have to talk ab—” said Bruce.

  “Oh look, Comrade Civilai,” she said.

  Civilai’s lemon Citroën pulled up half on, half off the pavement in front of the restaurant. Siri broke away from his word processor trance and came to the doorway to see what was happening. He stood beside Bruce and Daeng. Civilai fought his way out of the driver’s door and walked slowly around to the passenger side, using the car to prop him up. He opened the door and out stepped a classical blonde beauty in a sensible blouse and an ankle-length skirt.