The Kiss of the Dragon

by Lilburne, Guy

  “Will they be able to make a proper job of all this?”

  “Yes, can do. No problem.”

  Ling also told him that a lot of the stuff that they had bought had already been delivered while they were still shopping. They pushed the trolleys out to the pickup truck and the stuff they bought filled the back of it. During the last few hours Danny had spent a fortune by Thai standards, but in English money he had spent only £2,500. He would usually spend that much on a holiday. He was delighted that he was able to bring so much joy and happiness and excitement to this lovely family. Danny went to a cash dispenser to get the cash for the workers and they went back to the house.

  When they arrived there were at least 20 people already scrambling and working on the house. It was still only midday. They reminded Danny of ants swarming over an ants’ nest. They seemed to be working hard and fast and things were being carried in and out of the house. Everyone seemed to be working on their own, yet still part of the bigger picture, but it was not obvious who, if anyone, was in charge. Although, once they arrived, it seemed that Ling was the boss.

  Danny was amazed. The upstairs floor boards had already been ripped up and some had been used to make ladders which people were using to climb up to stain and varnish the wood around the house. Others were painting, a lot were hammering and banging things, some were digging something at the back of the house and some were mixing concrete. There were posts and piles of wooden boards, panels of chip board, the new toilet and shower, a sink, some kitchen units and packs of green floor tiles.

  Danny did not try to get involved. It seemed busy and chaotic to him, but somehow it was organized chaos and, amazingly, the house was being transformed before his very eyes. The people worked until late into the evening before everyone sat around and had a drink of beer or whisky, ate some food prepared by Mama and were paid 100 Baht each by Danny. It seemed to him that they had worked very hard for many hours for very little. But all day long they had been laughing and joking as they worked and Danny could not help but be impressed by the level of skills that each one of them had shown in their work. The next day they came back at 7:00am and again worked all day. As darkness fell, the job was finished. Also, during the day, the beds, furniture and TV were delivered.

  The house was well and truly transformed. The back bedroom downstairs, where Mama and the girls had slept, was now a kitchen with a bathroom to one side. This had a proper shower unit and western style toilet that flushed. The floors were tiled and the kitchen was fitted with units. There were new stairs and a new floor upstairs. The chipboard had reinforced the walls and they had also made dividing walls to create three bedrooms. The whole house had been painted, stained and varnished and looked like a new house. It had been an amazing two days for everyone involved and it seemed that the whole village was sharing all the happiness.

  Chapter 19: Isaan life

  Danny was feeling well and truly part of Ling’s family. He thought that Ling was the most amazing person he had ever met. She was breathtakingly beautiful, but it was her natural charm, her strong personality, her sense of fun that had stolen Danny’s heart. He had fallen in love with her family too and they loved him. If any of them had ever been as happy as they were now, then they could not remember it. After the previous two days spent renovating Mama’s house, now it was time to relax. They were happy to walk around the farm land showing it to Danny. Ling pointed out the piece of land on her Mama’s farm where she wanted to build their own house. It seemed to Danny that she was making long term plans for the two of them. He could not have been more delighted and thrilled at the idea of spending the rest of his life here in Isaan with Ling and her family.

  Back at Mama’s house they had a barbeque and some of the neighbours, drawn by the smell of food, came to join them. There was lots of chatter and laughter. Danny joined in, even though he did not know what was being said or what he was laughing at, but there was a general feeling of wellbeing.

  “Are you happy, Darling?” asked Ling, tenderly squeezing his hand.

  “Yes. More than I ever thought that I could be. There is some magic here. Are you happy, Ling?”

  “Yes, I very happy.”

  “Do you want me to stay here Ling?”

  “Yes for sure. You want to stay?”

  “We will have to build that house straight away then.”

  “Yes darling.” Ling’s smile was beaming.

  “With proper toilets and air conditioning” he continued.

  “Yes darling. What you want, I want same.”

  Ling turned to the others and announced it, to a chorus of screeches and screams and everyone was hugging each other. Danny looked on happily. Then, it all suddenly went quiet and Ling turned to face Danny again.

  “When we get married, Darling?”

  Danny thought for a moment.

  “As soon as we can I guess. Do we need a license or something?”

  “Yes, you get from British Embassy in Bangkok. No problem. You detective.”

  Ling spoke to the others and they screeched and screamed again.

  “Come on, Darling. Today we have a lot to do now.” Ling stood up and put her hand out to pull Danny to his feet.

  “Where are we going?”

  “We go to city. Buy ring, buy food, buy beer. Make good party.”

  Danny, Ling, Mama and Am and Om got into the pickup truck. The neighbours who had gathered to share the BBQ clapped them and waved them off. They drove into Udon Thani to buy a ring and the stuff for a party. Ling spent a lot of time on her mobile phone, telling friends and relative about her good news. They went to one of the Chinese jewellers in the city. After 20 minutes, and trying on a lot of gold rings, Ling had found the one she wanted. It was a beautiful ring.

  They then shopped for food and drink and loaded the pickup. Everyone was happy and there was a real cause for celebration. Ling kept holding her hand up to admire her new ring, and then, inspired, she would lean across and kiss Danny.

  “Thank you, Darling, I very happy. I love you real.”

  When they got back to Mama’s house there were already people there. A big awning on a steel frame had been erected at the front of the house. Huge speakers had been piled up each side of it and music was blasting out at ear splitting volume. A man was singing something hopelessly out of tune in Thai on a karaoke machine. There seemed to be an army of old ladies waiting, just to help cook all the food they had bought. The pickup was unloaded with many helping hands. Everyone was smiling and laughing. There was a lot of waiing and even handshakes and back patting. Bottles of beer and rice whisky were opened. The party had already begun and a constant stream of people came to join in. Danny gave himself a moment to think about all this. Is this what he really wanted? Is this how he wanted to live his life? In this community? Only a few days ago he hated the place, now he loved it. But did he really want to stay?….Holy Jesus Mother of God! Yes, forever.

  The party went on until after midnight and then everyone just seemed to leave as quickly as they had arrived. Left-over food was packed and taken with them, as were the remaining bottles of beer. The speakers and the awning were quickly and efficiently dismantled. In the morning there was no sign that such a grand party had taken place at all. The only things that remained were the memories and the hang over that pounded inside Danny’s head.

  Danny was quite content to stay lying in bed wrapped around Ling. But once Ling was awake she would get restless. She tried to start some conversation. This was only met by grunts and groans from Danny, still struggling to clear his head.

  “OK, Darling. I go make coffee.” She kissed him and went downstairs.

  Danny followed her down a few minutes later and was met with the usual smiles and wais from Mama and the girls. Danny sat outside and smoked a cigarette with his coffee and just took in the views across the fields. Alrea
dy the day was hot. When Ling came and sat with him Danny told her he wanted to open up a joint bank account, and he wanted her to start building their new house on Mama’s land, because tomorrow he was going back to Phuket to find Jack Morgan.

  “Darling, I go with you.”

  Danny hesitated a moment, almost lost in the beauty of her eyes.

  “No, yer grand. I’ll not be long and I’ll come back to you. I want you to look after Mama and the girls and build our house. I can’t drag you around with me and, anyway, the sooner I find Jack Morgan, the sooner I can come back.”

  “You come back sure?”

  “Jesus! I’ve never been so sure.”

  “Why you sure, Darling?”

  “There is a lot I have to tell you, but not now. I’ll tell you when I get back.”

  “Say little bit now.”

  Her pleading made Danny smile.

  “It’s too long a story to tell you now, Ling.”

  “Say little bit please. I want to know why you sure you come back.”

  “OK, OK. Do you believe in spirits?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Well, I think a spirit called Ying brought me back to Thailand. Brought me to you, to make me happy……to make you happy too.”

  “You know Ying before she spirit?”

  “Yes, she was a very good person. Good heart…..” Danny made an involuntary sigh and continued. “….We set up Bank account today and tomorrow I go and find

  Jack Morgan. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  Ling squeezed his hand.

  “OK, Darling. I can do everything and I wait for you. You know I love you real.”

  “Yes I know.”

  Chapter 20: Back to Phuket

  It was just over an hour’s flight to Bangkok, then a wait of nearly two hours for another one hour flight onto Phuket. Danny paid 600 baht at Phuket airport and was given a pink slip to give to the taxi driver who would now take him back to Patong. On the way the taxi stopped at a little glass fronted office in a small row of buildings. A pretty girl came running out and wai’d to Danny through the window before opening the door.

  “Hello. Welcome to Thailand. Please come in, we have water for you.”

  “I’m grand thanks. I’m just on my way to Patong. I don’t know why we stopped here.” Danny was about to ask the driver, but the driver got out of the car and lit up a cigarette and wandered over to a couple of men sitting outside the office next door.

  “Please come into the office for a few minutes. We have air conditioning and water and we sell trips and hotels, very good price.”

  “Oh! Right so. I got it now.”

  Danny didn’t have a hotel booked. The girl didn’t know it yet, but she was about to make some commission. Danny followed her inside but, when she kicked off her shoes outside the front door, he hesitated. She glanced down and saw he was wearing laced shoes.

  “No problem” she smiled. “Leave on.”

  Danny told her he did not want to book any tourist trips, boat trips or shows, but she insisted on giving him a pile of leaflets anyway. Her eyes lit up when she asked him where he was staying and he told her he was not booked into anywhere yet, and he did not know how long he would be staying.

  “I just want somewhere cheap and central” he said.

  After a typing frenzy on her computer and a few phone calls, she told Danny that he could stay at the Lamai Inn, on Rat U Thit Road. On a weekly deposit of 1000 baht, paid in advance, and settle the bill in full when he wanted to check out.

  “Very good hotel, and not charge extra for you to bring back lady.”

  “I won’t be bringing back any lady, but that will be grand. I’ll take that.”

  The taxi dropped Danny off outside the hotel. It had a small bar/restaurant and massage parlour, no swimming pool, but the room was big and clean and it was central. There was a Seven Eleven shop a few doors down. Danny had not really had a drink for a few days now. Well, not a lot of drink and not a drink just for the sake of drinking; not for the sake of just getting drunk, getting lost in the alcohol. He had a couple of Jack Daniels at the hotel bar, politely fended off the girls from the massage parlour, before going to the Seven Eleven, buying a bottle of Jack Daniels and going back to his room. He looked out over the main road. A tangle of black electrical cables ran between poles just a few feet from his window. One of the cables had exposed wires where it was wrapped around the pole, which sparked unnoticed by everyone except Danny. He drank the bottle, smoked his cigarettes and, at some stage, fell asleep on top of his bed. It was a peaceful sleep and he had a dream that was again about Ying, walking towards him holding out a baby. Again her face wasn’t quite clear enough to see properly, but he knew it was her. He had had this dream so many times in the last year.

  He awoke just after 8:00pm. The air conditioning was set so cold he woke up because of it and he was shivering. He showered and dressed in jeans and a tee shirt before he wandered downstairs and out onto Rat-u-Thit Road. He crossed the road and bought some barbequed chicken from one of the many food sellers that had now set up along the street. He wandered around and ended up sitting in Captain Morgan’s Bar. There were a few lone males in and enough bar girls so they could have one each, but it was not busy. Danny had a bottle of Chang beer and a brandy. He was going to pick his moment and start talking to one of the girls about the new lady owner ‘Fon’ and the previous English owner Jack Morgan. But the moment never came and, later on, Fon herself turned up at the bar. She was dropped off from the back of a motorbike. Danny couldn’t see the man’s face but he could see that he was Thai. Fon wai’d and smiled at Danny. Danny smiled and nodded. He needed to know what she knew, but he knew she wasn’t going to just tell him. He needed help. He had nobody in the Police to help him this time. He did not want to go back to Udon Thani and ask Ling to help. He did not want her anywhere near the bar scene. He thought about her ladyboy friend, Suzie, the dancer from Simons Cabaret Club. But this was not a bar for a ladyboy to work and, if she just turned up and started asking questions, she would be unlikely to get the information that Danny needed.

  Nok came into his mind like an inspiration. Nok was the bar girl he met on Bangla Road. She used to work in Moon’s Bar and she became Danny’s friend. He smiled as he thought about the things she had said to him. She was a nice girl. Danny gave her the money she needed so she could stop working in a bar and go back to her home farm in Surat Thani to open up a shop with her granddad. Maybe Nok could help him, she owed him a favour. Danny played with the idea in his head. He knew he still had the beer mat, with her contact details scribbled onto it, tucked in the back of his wallet. He had taken it out and looked at it often enough, as he sat on the banks of the Thames back in London getting drunk each day. It suddenly seemed like a good idea. Tomorrow he was going to find Nok. He could not remember her address, but he knew it was somewhere near Surat Thani, although he had no idea where Surat Thani was.

  Chapter 21: Surat Thani

  The train journey to Surat Thani was pleasant enough. The food was good and the scenery at times was breathtaking. The train rumbled into Surat Thani station and Danny got into the back of the first taxi waiting at the front of the station. He just knew that he was about to be outrageously overcharged, as he passed the driver Nok’s address written on the beer mat. The driver did not even seem to understand when Danny asked how much it would cost, but he soon got the idea when Danny said

  “200 baht?”

  The driver shook his head and held up five fingers of one hand

  “Jesus!” muttered Danny.

  “You want 500 baht, do yer?” he continued.

  The driver smiled and nodded so Danny nodded his agreement. It was so, so hot outside and the air conditioning in the car felt so cool. He really could not be bothered to find an alternative taxi ride
. The driver, seeing Danny sweating, offered him a box of tissues over his shoulder, as he steered off with the other hand. Danny pulled some out of the box and, with eye contact in the rear view mirror, they nodded to each other again. With the friendship now cemented, the driver chatted away in Thai, but Danny could not understand a word. Every now and again the driver paused and looked at Danny for a response, so Danny nodded and the driver carried on the conversation.

  The taxi ride came to an abrupt end some 30 minutes later. The driver had already stopped twice to ask directions from locals. Now he stopped just off the main road at the bottom of a lane that was little more than a dirt track. Danny could see some pickup trucks and motorbikes along the lane, but it was obvious that the taxi driver had no intention of risking the vehicle’s chassis by trying to drive over the dips and pot holes. He nodded several times to Danny and, smiling, waved for him to get out of the car and pointed along the lane. He kept nodding and smiling.

  “Jesus Christ Mother of God…..” Danny muttered.

  He could see a lot of buildings dotted along the lane, but he had no idea how far he would have to walk, or where exactly Nok’s farm shop was going to be. The buildings were mostly wooden construction and similar to the houses he had seen in northern Thailand around Udon Thani. He gave the driver a 500 baht note and the driver wai’d to him, holding the money between his hands.

  “Khob khun mak khrap.” (Thank you very much) He beamed.

  Danny got out of the taxi and the dry heat hit him as if it came from a fan assisted oven. He started sweating as soon as he started walking. He was aware, as soon as he started up the lane that everyone was looking at the farang (foreigner) as he walked along, visibly wilting in the sun. Soon, a few young children started following behind him; dancing, laughing and giggling, excited about the stranger visiting their village. The gang of dancing kids grew in number as he walked further along the lane. Danny did not really know what he was looking for. It dawned on him that he was looking for a big shop with a sign in front of it, possibly saying Nok’s, but there did not seem to be any shops along the lane at all.