by Gill Lewis
“I’d recognize his car anywhere,” said Rami. “It’s the only one of that type in the city. A German import.”
“Difficult to get spares,” said Mr. Sone. “Especially the way he drives it.”
“So?” said Kham’s mother.
“So . . . if it breaks down . . . ,” said Mr. Sone.
Kham’s mother tutted. “No, not that. Why did General Chan make his visit?”
She looked at me, but I guessed she knew the answer already.
“He wanted bear bile,” I said.
Mrs. Sone wiped her hands in her apron. “Then it is true what they are saying at the hospital,” she said. “She is back in Laos.”
“Who?” said Kham.
“General Chan’s daughter,” said Mrs. Sone. “His only child. He gives her everything. Treats her like a son.”
Rami leaned across and nudged me. “She doesn’t look like a boy. She is the most beautiful girl in all Laos. Maybe in the world. She’s been the festival beauty queen twice already.” He leaned back and smiled. “She’s intelligent, too, getting her degree in engineering in Russia.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Sone, “I hear she is very sick. She had treatment there, but it wasn’t working. General Chan wants to use traditional Chinese medicine instead.” She looked at me. “He wants bear bile.”
“Well, I hope it makes her better soon,” I said.
I meant it too. I hoped Biter’s bile made General Chan’s daughter well again. I wondered just how much she would need. I hoped she’d get better, not for General Chan’s sake but for Biter’s and mine. What if it didn’t work? I’d seen the Doctor take out his anger on the bears.
There was no knowing what he could do.
It took me another two months after the incident with Kham and the ultrasound to dare to ask the Doctor for time off. I’d bought threads and rolls of cloth for Ma with the money I earned from Mr. Sone, and I had saved some money too. I wanted to go back home to see Ma.
I watched the Doctor through the window of his office. He’d been in a better mood lately. He was running a good trade. When people heard that General Chan’s daughter was getting better, they wanted bile from the Doctor’s bear farm too. People came for treatments for stomach upsets, sores, chills, and bruises. They came for almost anything. For some it was a tonic, a good-luck drink to be washed down with rice whiskey at weddings.
The bear farm became a tourist attraction. The Doctor built new toilets and turned the small office into a shop. He filled in holes and cracks in the concrete floors and repainted the rusting bars of the cages. Tourists arrived in minibuses with cameras to have their photo taken with the bears. The Doctor would let them feed the bears fruit on the ends of sticks. He loved to taunt Biter to lash out and show his strength. Biter impressed people. His bile was the priciest of all, and the Doctor would label some bottles with Biter’s name, though I suspected they didn’t all contain his bile.
People liked to take photos of Sôok-dìi, too. In those two months he’d grown from a wriggling cub, with a fat belly and stubby legs, to a leaner bear cub, a miniature version of the bear he would become. I couldn’t keep him in my room anymore. He’d tried to chew the bed and mattress and tear up the bolts of cloth for Ma. I hated leaving him in the cage in the bear barn. He’d moan and try to reach me through the bars, or sit with his back turned, sulking and sucking his paws.
I let him out in the barn when I was cleaning and feeding the other bears. He liked to follow me around and put his paws on the cages and sniff at the other bears, although I noticed he never went near Biter. I managed to train him too, with sugared nuts I bought at the market. I could make him sit and lie down and stay. I could make him reach up high, standing on his hind legs. I could make him snarl and bare his teeth and pat the air in front of him. All this, just for sugared nuts.
I was relieved to be able to feed him the same food as the other bears. The milk was becoming too expensive. I kept one bottle of milk for nighttime though. Then he’d curl against me and try to crawl up into my lap, even though he was nearly as heavy as me. He’d drink his milk, making his cublike humming noise. His coat was glossy and shiny. It was soft, especially over the top of his head and around his ears. When he stood on his hind legs, he came up to my chest. He was strong, too, much stronger than he looked. When the tourists came, he clamored for attention, for fruit and nuts. He let people put their hands through the bars to stroke and scratch him and feed him fruits from their hands.
“You see,” said the Doctor to a group of tourists, “this small cub was orphaned and brought to me. See how strong and healthy he is. See how I have saved him.”
I stood back and watched. I didn’t like the Doctor or the tourists feeding him. I didn’t like them looking at him, prodding him and poking him or the way they cooed and clucked at him as if he were a small child. They just saw a bear cub. They didn’t see the sores on his elbows and back legs from lying on the bars. They didn’t see the swollen abdomen of Mama Bear’s son, and the way he groaned and grunted with each breath, or the bleeding gums of the bears’ mouths where their teeth had been cut short and filed. They saw what they wanted to see, and then they walked away, and they forgot.
I followed the Doctor and the group of tourists to the office, where the Doctor sold the bile in bottles, flakes, and powders. It was a big group. Twelve Japanese tourists. Their minibus had pictures of Laos painted along the side, of mountains and golden temples and statues of Buddha. I watched the tourists climb back into their minibus and leave with their bile, a tonic for the way home.
The clouds were low and heavy, with more rain yet to come. Cars had their headlights on, and the streetlights were lit up, even though it was not yet nightfall. I leaned against the door. The Doctor was smiling, counting the money, letting the bills flip over in his hand. I knocked on the door and he looked up at me.
“The tourists liked the bears today,” he said. “Here, you have done well.” He pushed a US dollar into the top pocket of my shirt. “Have this. See how generous I am.”
“Thank you,” I said. I stood, facing him. It was now or never. He was in the best mood I’d seen him in for a long time.
“I was thinking of my family,” I said.
The Doctor looked up.
“Maybe I could have some time off to visit them,” I said. I started gabbling. “Just to see Ma and my sisters. It wouldn’t be for long.”
The Doctor’s face clouded over. He turned away. “We are very busy here, Mountain Boy.”
“It would be two days at most. Maybe Asang could feed the bears when I am gone.”
The Doctor tapped his fingers on the table. His face creased into a frown. “Do you have money?”
My hands felt clammy and cold despite the heat. I didn’t want him to know I earned some money from Kham’s father. “Maybe I could use a little of the money you send to my mother to pay for my trip home.”
The Doctor took a deep breath in and let it out slowly. “Do you know how much it is to travel home?”
I shook my head.
“Do you know how much a bag of rice costs?”
“No,” I said. “But . . .”
The Doctor looked up sharply. “Then I suggest that you stay and work so your family can eat.” He stood up, all the smiles gone from him. “Besides,” he said, snatching up the keys to his motorbike, “I am going to buy more bears. There will be more work to do here soon.”
I watched the Doctor rev out of the compound, his wheels spraying grit into the air. I stormed into the bear barn and pulled the sliding doors across, slamming them shut behind me. I flung Sôok-dìi’s cage open, and he threw his big paws on my shoulders. I shoved him off and walked away. He followed me and tried to snuffle in my pocket for honeyed nuts. I pushed him off again, and he loped off to explore beneath the cages of the other bears for food dropped by the tourists. The others were quiet, sedated by the drugs and the pressing heat of the day. Above me, raindrops started to patter on the iron roof. The sound seemed to still the
bears. Biter raised his head and looked upward, licking his lips at the sound of water. I slid down against Sôok-dìi’s cage and closed my eyes. I thought of the rain in the mountains, thundering on our roofs, turning the smallest streams into mighty rapids. I thought about Ma. Had she managed to plant the rice, or vegetables? Was she even in the same house? It had been so long since I’d seen her.
I thought of Sôok-dìi, too. I’d made a promise to him that I would get him back to his home. I couldn’t even get back to my own family. How did I think I could get Sôok-dìi back into the forest too? The rain rose from a patter to a steady drumming. Water crept underneath the sliding doors, bringing in bright blood-red mud. The rain hammered against the roof, faster and faster. I couldn’t think. I covered my ears and pressed my head into my knees. There was no way out of here. I was as caged as Sôok-dìi and the bears.
The rain stopped as suddenly as it had begun.
It was only then that I heard the scream, high-pitched and terrified.
“Tam!”
Again the scream.
I looked around. By the sliding doors I saw Kham splayed on the floor. Sôok-dìi was standing over him, paws pinning his shoulders down, jaws wide open and stretched across Kham’s face.
“Sôok-dìi,” I yelled. I ran at him, clapping my hands and flapping my arms in the air. “Sôok-dìi! Away! Away!”
Sôok-dìi lowered his head and backed off Kham.
“Hup! Hup!” I yelled, still flapping my arms.
Sôok-dìi reared up on his hind legs and took backward steps. I lowered my arms and he slumped onto his haunches. I patted the floor and he lay down, his head lowered and ears back. I rummaged in my pocket for his honeyed nuts, scattered them on the floor, and spun around to look at Kham.
Kham had crawled backward and had his back pressed against the sliding doors. A trickle of blood ran down his forehead, from a gash just above his eye. He just stared past me at Sôok-dìi, his mouth hanging open.
I crouched down beside him. “Kham!”
Still he stared.
“Kham! Can you hear me?” I shook him by the arm. “Are you okay?”
He turned to look at me. “Bear . . . ,” he said.
“I’m sorry, Kham. I didn’t hear you come in. . . .”
“Bear . . . ,” he said again.
“Your face . . . he’s drawn blood.”
Kham touched the cut on his head and looked at the fresh blood on his fingers. His eyebrows rose a little in mild surprise.
Sôok-dìi had moved a little closer. He snuffled in my pockets and then started sniffing Kham’s feet.
I raised my arms and yelled at him, “Sit up, Sôok-dìi. Sit. Up.’
Sôok-dìi sat back on his haunches and then slumped on the floor with a groan, as if I’d stopped his fun.
I turned to look at Kham again, but he was just staring between the bear and me, a look of utter disbelief on his face.
“It’s okay, Kham,” I said. “I won’t let him touch you.”
Kham grabbed my arm and pinned me next to him. “That bear . . . ,” he said.
“Let me put him away.” I said the words as slowly and calmly as I could. “And then I’ll take you home.”
Kham pulled me closer still and shook his head. “No! No! You don’t understand.” He turned to me. “That bear,” he said, a huge grin spreading across his face, “that bear is going to earn us a fortune.”
I pushed Kham away. “What?”
Kham scrambled to his feet and pointed at Sôok-dìi. “He does what you say!”
“So?”
“So,” said Kham, “so there hasn’t been a dancing bear in the city since the One-Eyed Bear Man’s bear ate a tin of rat poison and died.”
“Kham!” I said. It was my turn to pull him around to face me. “What are you talking about?”
Kham clapped his hands in front of my face and laughed. “Wake up, Tam! Listen! When I was little, there was a man who used to sit outside the temples and museums and make his bear dance for the tourists. They paid good money to have their photo taken with the bear.”
I frowned. “So you’re saying we should take Sôok-dìi into town and let people take photos with him.”
Kham slapped me on the back. “Exactly.”
I stretched my foot out and scratched Sôok-dìi behind the ear with my toe. Sôok-dìi rolled over and licked my toes. I thought of the tourists who visited the bile farm, and how they laughed and pointed at the bears. I didn’t want that for Sôok-dìi.
“I don’t know,” I said. “Besides . . . I don’t know what he’s like with strangers. He drew blood on you.”
Kham touched his head. “He didn’t bite me,” he said. “It’s where I hit the floor when he pushed me down.”
I stared at the bump swelling on his head. “Anyhow, how would we get him into the city center? We can’t just jump on a tuk-tuk with a bear.”
Kham stood up and paced around Sôok-dìi. “We wouldn’t need to. We’d take the three-wheeler and the cart I use to run errands at home. He’d fit in, just.”
I stared at him.
“And,” continued Kham, “we’d be equal partners. We’d split it right down the middle. Fifty-fifty. Half each. I’d get us into the city and collect the money, and you’d be in charge of the bear.”
“What if the Doctor finds out?” I said.
Kham rubbed his chin. “That’s the risk you’d have to take,” he said. “The Doctor is away on weekends, you say. We’d just go on weekends.”
“I’d lose my job,” I said.
“My father said you could work for him.”
I ran my hands through my hair.
Kham opened his hands out. “Think of the money, Tam! What would you do with the money?”
I walked away from him, scuffing the floor with my feet. Sôok-dìi scrambled up and loped along beside me, pushing his nose into my hands. His claws clicked on the concrete. I knelt down and buried my face in his fur. I didn’t like the thought of him being gawked at. But maybe Kham was right. If I earned enough, I could pay my way to visit home, buy more silks for Ma or food and clothes for Sulee and Mae. The Doctor would never have to know if we only went on the days he was away. Maybe there would even be a way to get Sôok-dìi back to the forest. I paced in circles around his empty cage.
Maybe.
Maybe.
Maybe.
I stared down the line of bears. Hua was sucking at the bars, licking one area over and over. Mama Bear’s cub swung side to side, banging his head against his cage. Sôok-dìi leaned against me. He was becoming a big bear. In another few months he might be too big to handle. There would soon come a time when the Doctor would milk him for bile. And I would lose him. Sôok-dìi would live like the other bears. Caged. Confined. He would never see the forest or feel the rain or the earth beneath his feet. He would become a bile bear, and it would be no life at all.
I closed my eyes and tried to push those thoughts away, but an image of him pressed against the bars burned deep in my mind.
Maybe there was no other way.
I walked back to Kham. He was standing with his arms crossed against his chest. “Well?” he said.
I ran my hands through the fur on Sôok-dìi’s head. “Okay, Kham,” I said. “When do we start?”
I clung onto Kham’s back as he pedaled in and out of the traffic. The early morning sun was bright in our eyes, glaring off car rooftops and windows. The trailer behind his three-wheeler was made from old wooden pallets set on a wheel axle. It was lucky that the road into town was flat, because Sôok-dìi was heavy, and he sometimes lurched in the trailer, making it tip. I could hear him scratch and scuffle at the lid, and I turned around to see the tip of his nose and paw push against the gaps between the slats. He must have eaten all the melon I’d put in there.
“We’ll try one of the small temples near the river first,” Kham yelled back at me. His feet pedaled fast as he pushed out into the center of traffic. I could see beads of sweat gather at the
nape of his neck and trickle down his shirt. “It’s near the coffee shops and bakeries. There’ll be loads of tourists there.”
“I hope it’s not far,” I yelled back. “I don’t think Sôok-dìi likes it in there much.”
“It’s another five blocks away, but it’ll be worth it.”
I held on tight, as cars and trucks and tuk-tuks whizzed past us. I didn’t like to even think what would happen if we were knocked over and Sôok-dìi escaped.
“There it is,” said Kham.
The temple’s sloping roofs were flame red against the deep blue sky. There were several groups of falang standing in the plaza in front.
Kham swung the three-wheeler into an alleyway behind the bakery. The smells of hot sweet bread and coffee rose out in a steam of condensation and mixed with the heady scent of sandalwood from the temple.
Kham leaned against the wall, catching his breath. “Ever had a chocolate croissant?”
I shook my head.
He smiled. “If we earn enough today, I’ll buy you one. You haven’t lived if you haven’t had one of Madame Philippe’s chocolate croissants.”
I looked beyond him to a group of three falang sitting at one of the tables beneath the shade of the café’s awning. There were two men in T-shirts and shorts. In their twenties, I guessed. Both had beards and shaggy, unkempt hair. There was a woman with them too, in a tank top and a short skirt. Three huge rucksacks lay at their feet. Ma would have been shocked to see one of the men’s feet propped up on the table. I could see the dirt on the soles of his feet.
“Backpackers,” said Kham. He wrinkled his nose. “Probably English, maybe German. They don’t wash so much.”
I watched the woman spread a thick spoonful of jam into her croissant.
Kham leaned into me. “They follow one another like goats. Party goats!” He laughed. “They say they have no money, but they spend a month’s salary in one evening on drinking. I don’t think we’ll get much from them.”
Sôok-dìi scratched again at the trailer. He was getting hot and restless inside. I had no idea what he would be like in the open. I’d made a head collar out of rope, like the ones I’d seen grandfather make for the buffaloes he’d borrowed from the neighboring villages in the mountains. Grandfather said if you controlled an animal’s head, you controlled the whole beast. Sôok-dìi was so strong now that I knew I’d have little control if he decided to run. I could just about hold him if he didn’t struggle. I fished some more honeyed nuts from my pocket and dropped them through the wooden slats.
