The Second Biggest Nothing

by Colin Cotterill

  “I don’t know,” said Siri. “There was something uneasy about her.”

  He was sitting in front of Phosy’s desk at police headquarters telling them about his brief encounter with Cindy the night before.

  “And perhaps she had something to be uneasy about,” said Sihot who was leaning against the wall behind his boss.

  “Why’s that?” Siri asked.

  “I was talking to the Swedes last night,” he said. “One of them said he saw your friend Cindy talking to Jim the photographer the night before he died.”

  “That would have been after Dtui and I talked to them,” said Phosy.

  “You think Cindy was the mysterious contact?” Siri asked.

  “They’re sure to have spare keys for Silver City at the embassy,” said Phosy.

  “You’d think we’d have been smart enough to change the locks,” said Sihot.

  “There were no keys on the bodies,” said Phosy. “So, whoever tampered with the car had to be there to wave them off and lock up.”

  “The embassy has its own guests turning up for the parade today,” said Sihot. “They were given leis at the airport when they arrived. They have a supply.”

  “So, she gets there early,” said Phosy, “fills the tank, punches the holes in the floor, puts up the flowers and leaves the doors open until the Australians get there. They’re already on cloud eleven from whatever they’d been ingesting the night before, so they’re not completely tuned in. She joins them in a few sips of beer and off they go.”

  “It’s not impossible,” said Siri. “And Jim, wanting to document everything, insists on taking her photo. So, somehow, in the confusion of the departure, she makes sure the camera doesn’t travel with them.”

  “I don’t know,” said Phosy. “I don’t think a photojournalist would be separated from his camera that easily.”

  “The Swede said everyone was aware of Jim’s allergies,” said Sihot. “He’s been using an inhaler for years. He bought a fresh one the day he arrived in Vientiane. Always liked to have a spare in case of emergency.”

  “So, where were the inhalers?” Siri asked.

  “They didn’t see any at the pond,” said Sihot, “but they were looking under the water. Inhalers would have floated. I sent someone to talk to the fisherman, see if he caught anything plastic.”

  “Did you find out why the Swede was asking about Siri?” Phosy asked.

  “Something about writing an article for a French magazine,” said Sihot. “The life of an Ancienne graduate fighting against the French. We have no way of checking whether that was true or not.”

  “Oh, so close to stardom,” said Siri.

  “Look,” said Phosy. “I’ll be leaving all this with you two. I have to attend this damned stupid parade at That Luang and listen to a National Day speech moderately altered from every other National Day speech I’ve ever sat through. At least I can take some files and sign stuff. Siri, how are the arrangements for the funeral going?”

  “The Party’s having its state funeral on Friday,” said Siri. “It’s symbolic so they don’t need a body. Or, at least they won’t be getting one. They’re not having Civilai lying in state, although he’d really get a kick out of it. Not that it would matter if he were there. The average villager couldn’t identify a politburo member even if he had his name tattooed across his forehead. I doubt there’ll be a cheer squad or women throwing themselves in front of the hearse. The actual funeral will be this evening.”

  “I’ll be sending my people to both,” said Phosy. “I want photographs of the mourners and the gawkers. There’s a good chance our killer will attend one or both of them. If he . . . or she, has put as much effort into all this as it seems, he or she will be there to admire his or her work. Siri, I don’t want you or Daeng anywhere near the parade today.”

  “Oh, what a disappointment,” said Siri. “Daeng will be devastated.”

  Despite the threat to his life, Siri rode his bicycle back to the restaurant with Ugly trotting alongside, without giving a thought to snipers or tossed grenades.

  “You do know you started this whole mess?” Siri shouted. “What are you doing allowing a complete stranger to tie notes to your tail?”

  Ugly’s ears and tail drooped and he assumed a repentant expression all the way home. They arrived in time to find Daeng at a table with two Europeans. One was Dani, the owner of the Nam Poo bar. The other looked a lifetime older than Siri. The doctor pictured the old fellow lashed to the mast of a sailing ship for his entire life braving the storms and the baking sun.

  “This is Dani’s Uncle Joe,” said Daeng. “He’s visiting Dani and his family.”

  Siri shook the old man’s hand. He had one hell of a grip. The experience was like putting your hand on a railway track and having a train run over it.

  “Dani says he never forgets anything,” Daeng added.

  Joe sipped his coffee.

  “Tell him,” said Joe in gutter French. “Tell him I was there in Paris in ’32 when the president got shot.”

  They’d obviously discussed Siri’s request already.

  “Tell him yourself,” said Dani. “He speaks better French than any of us.”

  “What?”

  “You tell him,” said Dani.

  “He’s a Chinaman,” said Joe.

  “Try him,” said Dani.

  “You speak some?” shouted Joe.

  “Only what I picked up from the whores on the old rue Bouterie,” said Siri.

  He’d never actually been to the old rue Bouterie and had never learned anything of value from a whore, but his comment had its desired effect. Joe looked at the doctor and laughed so hard he couldn’t keep the coffee in his cup.

  “Good luck to you,” said Joe.

  “I was in Paris in ’32,” said Siri.

  “So Dani here tells me,” said Joe. “You anywhere near the shooting?”

  “I witnessed it,” said Siri.

  “You don’t say,” said Joe. “You don’t say. Fancy that.”

  Daeng refilled his cup.

  “They told me the Russian they arrested for the killing was just a patsy,” said Siri.

  “A madman,” said Joe. “A drunken fool so high he had no idea why he was pumping bullets into the guy. It was all set up by the family. Doumer had two of the boys killed over there in Annam.”

  “Do you know why?” Daeng asked.

  “All drugs,” said Joe. “Those were nutty days. Drugs bring out the worst in people. The third brother, Marcel, he was sworn to avenge the death of his kin. He was there at the . . . I don’t remember the name of the hotel.”

  “Rothschild,” said Siri.

  “That’s it. That’s it. He was there,” said Joe pointing at Siri. “Marcel was there to make sure the Russian wasn’t so out of it he’d miss the president and shoot himself. It all went great but Marcel got himself arrested somehow. I don’t know how that could of happened.”

  “What became of him?” Siri asked.

  “Not a lot, as far as I can remember. He was in jail for a week or so then the gendarmerie gave him some money for the inconvenience and sent him home.”

  “What?” asked Siri.

  “As far as I remember,” said Joe.

  “Why?”

  “Now, that’s another story,” said Joe. “He didn’t shoot no one, did he? And there was a little matter of repercussions.”

  “About what?”

  “Doumer had been the state representative for Corsica before stepping on a few heads and hitting the big time. There’s those that say it was drug money that got him up there. They say he’d feathered his nest over there in Annam and brought the trade home with him. If Marcel had been formally arrested and charged, there would of been a lot of evidence leaked to the newspapers to that effect. The government was struggling to keep e
veryone happy during the Depression. They didn’t want the presidency besmirched. And they had their assassin. They didn’t need Marcel, did they?”

  When the guests had left, Siri and Daeng went outside to sit on the two barbershop chairs that had arrived on the current one day and snagged in the weeds. Once they’d dried out they were surprisingly comfortable. Ugly lay between them.

  “So, you didn’t actually ruin Marcel’s life,” said Daeng. “A week in jail is hardly purgatory.”

  “I doubt he even remembered me when they let him out,” said Siri.

  They drank in the river air and considered Joe’s story.

  “It looks like we’re just about to learn whether our crazed killer is behind door number two,” said Siri.

  Daeng looked up to see a short plump man riding a bicycle. In white chinos and a pink brushed-silk shirt, he was dressed more for cocktails than exercise. On the otherwise empty road he stood out like an Easter egg on wheels. Monsieur Seksan was French with Lao parents. But France wasn’t ready for an ambassador to Laos of Lao ancestry. The compromise was that he could look after the embassy after diplomatic relations had broken down as a sort of high-level janitor. He showed his resentment of this slight by drinking all the wine in the cellar and damaging things.

  He kicked down the bicycle stand and hurried toward the couple.

  “I thought you were anti-exercise,” said Daeng.

  But the man sidestepped her question, barged into Siri, threw his arms around him and wept on his shoulder.

  “I just heard,” he said through his sniffling. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. So, so sorry.”

  He then repeated it all in French. It took them a while to calm him down. They sat him on one of the barbershop chairs and Daeng patted his hand.

  “Give him the talk, Siri,” she said.

  “All right,” said Siri. “Here we go. Siri and Daeng and Civilai were elderly people who had lived for many years in an area rife with weapon fire, tropical diseases and falling coconuts. There were any number of ways our three heroes could have been snuffed out. They may have leaned a little too heavily on alcohol from time to time to get through it all, but get through it they did. And by some miracle they stayed alive until ripe old ages. They knew the grim reaper of infinite patience was sitting on a stool at the end of the tunnel ready to claim their penitence. And so the first pin fell. It was unfortunate that Civilai left them. They’d miss him. Given the amount of booze he’d thrown down his throat over the years, they could hardly have been surprised. It would have been a bigger surprise if none of them died. No, Monsieur Seksan, a lifetime is more than enough.”

  And, with that, Siri pushed the Frenchman away from his damp shoulder and asked him what he was doing there. After a few seconds of self-gathering, Seksan took a deep breath and said, “Yes, let’s all be brave about this.”

  Siri smiled at Daeng.

  “Let’s,” said Siri.

  “I found the records you requested,” said Seksan. “Before our little diplomatic standoff, Paris sent the no-longer secret files referring to the last few days of our occupation of Indochina. The staff here locked the files in the strong room and didn’t even get a chance to open the dispatch folders before they left. I took a look. Page after page of bureaucratic dross. But, as I’m blessed with having no distractions, I was able to dig down to the incident you mentioned.”

  “You found it?” said Siri. “Excellent. Did you see mention of Civilai and myself?”

  The name Civilai sparked another emotional response from the ambassador janitor. It took a while for the dry sobs to clear.

  “No,” he said at last. “But they did mention the incident. They wrote that French agents had uncovered a plot to steal valuable artifacts from the national museum in Saigon.”

  “Bastards!” said Siri.

  “That army officers were involved and that they were court-marshalled and executed by firing squad whilst still on Vietnamese soil,” Seksan continued.

  “And the museum curator?” Siri asked.

  “He was to return to France for a civilian trial. He was escorted by a French agent. On the ship home, according to the report, he pushed the agent to whom he was handcuffed overboard. The agent was a large man who couldn’t swim and the bodies were never found.”

  “And then there was one,” said Siri.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The Lightning Bug Angel

  They’d chosen Hay Sok temple for a number of reasons. It was small and intimate and it had a history. Siri’s first Vientiane house, before it was blown to bits by a mortar, had overlooked the temple grounds. He and Civilai had often sat at the kitchen window there and drank too much and finished one another’s sentences. One night, Civilai had alerted Siri to a surprisingly large swarm of lightning bugs gathered around the main stupa.

  “They’re trying to tell us something,” Civilai had said. “I feel this is a crucial moment in our lives.”

  Siri had been head down at the time, engaged in conflict with a wine bottle. He was holding it between his knees and gouging at the foil top with a corkscrew. He completely missed the significance of Civilai’s sighting.

  “I must be losing my touch,” he said.

  “It’s incredibly beautiful,” said Civilai.

  “There was a time I could just rip these things off with two fingers.”

  “No, I see it,” said Civilai. “I see the shape clearly now. It’s an angel.”

  “I’m bleeding here.”

  “She’s beckoning to me.”

  “They must be using some new alloy.”

  “I’m coming, my darling.”

  “I need a hacksaw.”

  “This is where I shall be laid when it’s all over,” said Civilai, looking down at his young brother spouting blood.

  “What?” asked Siri.

  “My cremation. It will be here.”

  “Then this will be the death of both of us.”

  “Siri, what are you doing?”

  “I’m trying to get to the cork.”

  “There is no cork.”

  “Eh?”

  “It’s a screw cap, Siri. You’re hacking through metal.”

  “Sacrilege,” said Siri. “Since when did wine come in screw tops?”

  “A present from Australia. You don’t have to drink it if it offends you.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  Siri hadn’t seen the lightning bugs and he had to take Civilai’s word for the angel, but he referred to it often. So it was decided that Hay Sok temple was where they’d barbecue old Civilai. And they’d do it at night because fire in the daytime always seemed like a wasted opportunity to watch the spirit take off. There was only one monk minding the temple, and it wasn’t the same ghost monk Siri had once talked to. This was an ex-mathematics teacher whose wife had swum the Mekong to get away from him. He’d decided that becoming a monk in a city that had little respect for monks was preferable to giving chase. And it seemed fitting. They didn’t want some religious fanatic telling them how their sins could be forgiven. Siri and Daeng were fond of their sins and they wanted credit for them.

  It was just as well the math teacher didn’t have a lot to say because the guests wanted Civilai on the bonfire and on his way so they could get to the wake. Despite the overwhelming sense of irreverence, there was a healthy crowd there to pay respect. In Bruce’s bag of magic tricks there was a Super 8 home movie camera. He was entrusted with the task of filming everyone in attendance. If Phosy was correct, the killer was somewhere in the crowd. Siri didn’t know everyone there but there were a number of old friends. He was hoping to see Dr. Porn and have her explain the tablets beside Civilai’s bed, but there was no sign of her. Sitting around on the grass with lit candles dancing in the breeze were Madam Nong and Daeng; Crazy Rajhid in a white nightshirt; Phosy and Dtui with Malee o
n her lap; Mr. Geung and his bride, Tukta; non-Ambassador Seksan; the Swedes (although nobody remembered inviting them; Cindy and two others from the US embassy; the entire household of Siri’s government residence still given over to the homeless; and an assorted collection of people who had felt Civilai’s warmth and kindness over the years. There was nobody from the politburo.

  To the math teacher’s dismay, Civilai had written very simple instructions for his trip to the pyre: tell a couple of jokes, pour some accelerant on the body so it doesn’t take all night to burn, and go get drunk.

  “How can you celebrate his death with alcohol when it was alcohol that took him from us?” asked the annoying latest girlfriend of Mr. Inthanet, the puppet master.

  “If he was run over by a bus, would you force the guests to find their own way to the temple on foot?” asked Daeng.

  “If he drowned in the river would you tell everyone they couldn’t bathe for a week?” asked Siri.

  The bemused girlfriend scurried back into the crowd and Siri and Daeng performed their own version of a high five. Of course, Civilai would haunt them all for eternity if there was no booze at the wake.

  Across town the fireworks had begun, marking the last leg of the journalist’s visit and the end of the second biggest nothing. After an arduous ceremony at the stadium, seemingly endless speeches and an embarrassing display of military might, the guests would have been enjoying the last of the freebees. Those that could be bothered would have read the Xerox of Civilai’s posthumous speech Siri had delivered to their hotels that afternoon. At least there would be one small belt of honesty for them to consider on their journeys home.

  The firework show was limp compared to what they had seen at the Olympics, but the timing was perfect. Civilai’s journey to Nirvana or heaven, whichever he best qualified for, was accompanied by whooshes and bangs and one or two “ooh” moments. As predicted, the whole thing was over in thirty minutes. Siri had brought a pack of sparklers and they caught the last flames of the pyre and waved them as Siri and Daeng sang Civilai’s bawdy Lao version of “La Marseillaise.” Siri had marshmallows and wooden skewers in his shoulder bag but decided at the last minute that only he and Civilai would see the funny side of that.