-o-
About two minutes later, three smiling judges come back to their perch. But interesting enough, Jaroon didn't come back out. Neither did the lawyers. Jesus knows what they did with 'em. But the middle judge cleared his throat and announced in language that weren't exactly legal jargon; "He's got a little dick with two moles on it."
There was a cheer you could of heard in Indiana.
-o-
That was the turning point of the trial, sure enough. The newspapers started to call it the 'moley dick' evidence and it stuck. It set a precedent that found a meaningful place in Thai legal history. Thammasat University wrote a unit around it for their law degree called the 'moley dick riposte' and I heard they're still teaching it today.
But more important, once Jaroon and his lawyers knew they was screwed, they started to implicate every man and his dog that had anything to do with the racket. And as it was too big and loud to just vanish at the wave of a magic billfold, all the Thais that was involved ended up rotting in jail. Even the goddamned rich ones. That was probably the last time justice was seen to be done in Thailand.
66
On their last day at Mrs. Porn's, before they was due to fly back to the States, Saifon and Waldo was making the most of their last evening. Waldo and Soup was having a last series of pool. Waldo spent an hour teaching him how to screw (that's a pool term) and he was getting pretty good at it.
Saifon and Porn was out in the gazebo thing getting pickled on real French wine. Mrs. Porn put on her glasses and read the label of the bottle they was presently guzzling from.
"You know, dear, exactly what it is we're consuming here?"
"Wine?"
"Well done. But it isn't just wine. It's very old wine."
"Don't worry. It still tastes OK."
Porn laughed
"It doesn't go off, Saifon. It gets better the older it is."
"Yeah? Sounds like Waldo."
"I think it's time to wean you off beer and onto the finer things in life. This particular wine, for example is from Bordeaux and if you were to buy it in New York, it would cost you approximately $2,000."
Saifon choked on it.
"Shit."
"We'll also need to work on your vocabulary when describing fine wine."
"$2,000 for grape juice? You gotta be kidding me. How did you get hold of it?"
"We stole it from the French. We've got a cellar full of the stuff."
"Good for you. Here's to stealing from the French. Cheers."
"Salut." They chinked glasses and chugged. "I feel we've had quite a lot." She refilled four glasses but there was only two there. "Oops."
They was lying back in them wooden recliner chairs looking up at where the moon would of been if this wasn't Bangkok. Porn thought about Saifon leaving the next morning and come over all emotional.
"Saifon."
"Yeah?"
"I'm sorry."
"What have you done?"
"No. I'm sorry about what happened to you when you were little. When that beast …"
"Ahh. It weren't so bad."
"Wasn't so bad? But he …"
"No he didn't."
"What?"
"He just fiddled around a bit. I screamed and kicked so much he give up."
"But he was naked. You saw his …His …"
"No."
"No what?"
"No he wasn't, and no I didn't."
"But you said …"She shook her head and gulped at her wine.
"Yeah. I know. But that greasy, strawberry-nosed lawyer was wiping the floor with me."
"You lied?"
"There weren't no bible or nothing."
"But how did you know?"
"About his …?
"Yes."
"I asked around. I found out where he liked to go drinking. When I was there having a few beers who should I meet but the young gal that collected the glasses. And you'll never guess what he got her to do on more than one occasion. She was thirteen. I give her a few dollars for her trouble and she give me some details."
"You little minx."
"Do you hate me?"
"Saifon. I couldn't love you any more if you were my own despicable daughter. You are really something special." She leaned over and give her one of them French kisses. Not the … well, you know what I mean.
"What's a minx, then?"
From inside the house they heard Soup cheering and screaming. He'd beaten Waldo again. Probably won another dollar. It was odd how bad Waldo had got at the game since he found out Soup was a prince.
67
So, even though Saifon and Waldo was heroes in Thailand, there probably weren't a soul knew nothing about it stateside. They was in the departure lounge at Don Muang International airport. The news on the TV showed American and South Vietnamese troops invading Cambodia. The botched invasion of Laos hadn't taught 'em much. They was screwing this one up too. Most folks stateside wouldn't be hearing about that neither.
There was body bags lying all around and choppers ferrying wounded. (On the TV. Not at the airport.) Waldo must of been moved by all them bagged dead guys cause he decided that was the time to tell Saifon something he hadn't never told no one else in his life. Not even Aretha. The place was crowded and noisy and sticky but sometimes the moment chooses itself. You got no say in it.
"I took a life once, Saifon."
"Yeah. Right." She didn't believe him but he looked so repentant she couldn't really ignore what he'd said. "Who was it?" He let his eyes swerve off across the terminal.
"Ralph."
"I don't believe you. When?"
"June 3rd. 1955. It was a month after Reet Passed away. You know. I took her death real bad. But Ralph, he couldn't live without her. He didn't eat, couldn't sleep, just let himself fret on after her."
Saifon couldn't understand how she could of known Waldo all this time without this Ralph character coming up in conversation. Something just didn't hang right.
"You never told me about Ralph."
"I never told no one. Shooting Ralph ain't something I'm proud of."
"You shot him?"
"In the head."
"Jees, Waldo. How old was he?"
"Dunno. Must of been about twenty I guess."
"Jees."
"He'd been with us most of his life."
"Living with you and Reet?"
"Yeah. He was unbreakable, you know? He fell out of windows, got run over by cars. He even had his foot sliced off by a goods train."
"I see. Now, Waldo, this ain't a person we're talking about here is it?"
"Of course not. Hell. What do you think I am? Ralph was Reet's cat."
"You shot a frigging cat?" She laughed.
"He weren't just a cat, Saifon. Aretha used to say he was an angel been sent down from heaven to watch over us. And I reckon that was true, cause when Reet took off, Ralph's soul left on the same flight. There was just his body left on the sofa.
"I watched it get skinnier and skinnier and it just killed me. I took my old revolver out the closet. I carried what was left of Ralph up to the quarry and I blew his little brains out."
"Then I don't see a problem. You were being kind, that's all."
Waldo had come over pale. He was drained as a goat in a meat shop.
"No. There's a problem. Oh boy there is. I ain't never been able to tell Aretha what I did to her cat."
"Waldo. She'd understand."
"I don't think so. You see? It's worse than just the …the killing."
"What can be worse than killing it?"
Waldo looked around at all the folks desperate to get out of Bangkok. He lowered his voice.
"Saifon. I hated that goddamned cat. I hated it from the first day she bought the scrawny runt home and started feeding it up."
"Why didn't you tell her?"
"I couldn't. She loved the son of a bitch. I knew it was like a child to her. I tried to like it. Really I did. But it knew I didn't like it. It knew, and it didn't like me bac
k. When Reet was around it'd be all sweet and loving and stuff. Then, soon as she went out, the little vermin would hiss and spit at me and pee all over the place. Every time it left I wished a pack of rabid dogs would get it.
"So, you see? I wished it dead for most of it s life. Then as soon as Reet wasn't around no more, I made it dead."
"Waldo. You killed it cause it was fretting."
"On the outside, yeah. That's what I thought I was doing. I thought I was putting him out of his misery. But deep down, I was putting him out of my misery. I read all about it. It's called 'psychological'. That means your body does something your head tells you to, and you ain't got no say in it. Now, how in tarnation can I tell Reet that?"
"You old assassin, you."
"It ain't a joke, girl. I was so filled with remorse and prodded by the firey finger of the Lord, I didn't know what to do. His lifeless body looked like one of them fur collars. I took the bus up to Lake Michigan late at night and threw the goddamned gun in the lake.
It was after that I went in search of the Lord to beg for redemption."
"Over a frigging cat?"
"I told you, Saifon. In Reet's eyes it was like our fluffy, four-legged baby.It was like I'd blown our baby's brains out. Aretha was already suffering from being dead. I didn't want to make it worse for her."
"Being?"
"Dead AND mourning."
"So you been doing the mourning for her. All this churchgoing and talking to the Lord."
"I guess."
"You gotta tell Aretha."
"No. I can't."
"You told me didn't you?"
"That's different. You're my girl."
"That's just it. How long I been your girl and how long's Aretha been your wife? You owe her."
"You reckon?"
"Damned right I do."
"Jee."
Waldo sat and considered it for a long while. Saifon didn't want to interrupt his considering so they just sat quiet till the woman announced their flight was ready to board. Everyone stood up and got in a long queue 'cept for Saifon and Waldo. Even when the queue was down to a little waggly tail they was still stayed sitting. Waldo looked at the people with one eye and the TV screen with the other eye. At last he asked,
"Saifon."
"Yeah, I know." She reached for her bag.
"Why we going back?"
"What?"
"Why we going back to the States?"
"Why?"
"Yeah. What do we have to go back there for?" She thought some.
"I don't know."
"Me neither."
"You wanna go back to Laos?"
"Do you?"
"I guess I could."
"Me too."
68
And that was how them two ended up staying. Just like that. And I mean staying. Neither of 'em went back to the States. Not for thirty odd years. Not till till two months ago.
Saifon and Waldo had made a lot of friends of one type or another up on the Lao border. With the war still going on, visas and working permits wasn't easy to get a hold of so they figured it'd be better if Waldo didn't spend all his time on the Lao side. Wilbur fixed him up with a job on base at the US commissary in Udon Thani. He was working in the store there for a while, selling stuff to spies and pilots. He was great with figures. At weekends and on his days off, he took the bus over to Mukdahan and visited with Saifon and the skinny mafia guys and the commy students.
Things was going real good till Wilbur turned up in Udon. Waldo had missed him, but he didn't want to see him like he was by then.
-o-
Wilbur'd hardly knew a day's sickness in his life. Health was something he never thought about. He didn't take no precautions against tropical diseases, not cause he was ornery, but because guys that don't never get sick, don't know what it feels like.
It started with a kind of lethargy. He didn't feel like leaping out of bed. He walked when he would normally of jogged to the chopper. He felt it most in sport. He normally got through three sets of tennis without breathing heavy. But these days he was tuckered out after just the two. Then he could barely get through one.
He decided he needed a tonic. The guy they all lovingly called the witchdoctor at the RLA clinic give him some stuff that looked like shampoo and tasted like vomit. He asked Wilbur if he'd happened to see a captain they'd been missing for a couple of months. Wilbur didn't know nothing about it.
In Savannakhet after a series of defeats, Wilbur didn't get a lot of sympathy from the Lao army for the way he was feeling. There was troops dropping like flies from dysentery and malaria. He understood only too well how they felt about his being poorly. In fact, for a long time he kept it to himself. But now it was gone too far.
"Man, you look like hell, Will."
The helicopter pilot was an old crop duster from Kansas. Him and Wilbur'd been close for years. Wilbur saw his own reflection in the guy's shades. If there was worse than hell, he looked it.
"Where you going, Hank?"
"Udon. Wanna come? I think you should."
"Yeah. I guess I'd better."
Hank dropped him on the lawn out front of the clinic at the RTAF compound. He only had to walk twenty yards to the door but he barely made that. He should of been there two weeks earlier to give himself a real chance. The hepatitis already had a hold, and he weren't going no place but in the ground.
Oh, he fought. Man, he fought it. He hung on there for a month when most other guys would of pulled the pin. A lot of friends that knew him and respected him come to visit between missions. But there was one guy camped out in his room for the whole time.
"Sir, you understand it's contagious?"
"I know it."
"Wouldn't you like another room?"
"No ma'am. Thank you."
Waldo weren't going no place. They had a lot of meaningful talks in the time he was there. There was three that Waldo remembers real well. The first one went something like this: "I been talking to her, Waldo."
"Who's that, Wilbur?" He'd said, 'who’s that, Wilbur?' but he knew already. They was up on the roof of the clinic and there was more stars up there than you could count in a lifetime.
"To Mary."
"I'm glad."
"It really helped. It made me feel …calmer. You always right, man?"
"No. I made a mistake once. It was 1937."
"Really? I would like to have been there for that."
"It won't happen again. What you telling her?"
"Mary? I tell her I love her. Tell her I've never loved anyone else. Tell her all the stupid things I've done. Tell her I was too bloody-minded to take all the inoculations they recommended."
"Do you tell her how many people come by and visit? How many people love you?"
"You think they do?"
"I know they do. And Mary oughta hear it too."
The second big talk come about a week before the end. Wilbur was looking kinda orange by then. They'd been joshing about it. Waldo complained Wilbur was sliding through the Dulux paint chart so quick he didn't have time to get down to the store and see what color he was.
When he'd stopped laughing about it, Wilbur remembered something.
"You recall what you gave me when we first met, Waldo?"
"Don't reckon I do."
"You gave me two packs of Darkie toothpaste." Waldo giggled.
"That's right, I did."
"And you were so pleased they were making toothpaste just for us dark folk. You didn't see nothing wrong with it, at all."
"There's something wrong?"
"Right. You know, Waldo. I'd always gotten mad when I saw that Darkie toothpaste. I always took it personal. I guess I'd gotten so paranoid about being the only black, sorry, the only mocha cream guy around, that I was waiting for insults. I was expecting people to be looking down at me like they did at home.
That toothpaste was an attack on my blackness. So I thought. Then you come along and you think it's the greatest joke on the planet. And I go
on home and I think about it. The people that made the toothpaste didn't have a thing against me any more than the Pillsbury Dough people had against big round white folks. Whatever bad feeling I got from it came from me, not it.
And after that I looked at the way things were around me here. People didn't judge me for what colour I was. They judged me for what I did with 'em, and for 'em. Most of 'em hadn't ever seen a person of colour before so it occurred to me I was a clean slate."
"Maybe a blackboard."
"Yeah. Maybe a blackboard. But you did that, Waldo. You wiped my blackboard clean. I don't know how you do what you do, but you sure do it."
Waldo had that combination feeling of embarrassment and ignorance he was getting a lot lately. A lot of folks was seeing stuff in him that weren't really there, and he didn't know how to go about putting 'em right.
The last big talk was the night he went. Waldo knew his buddy was going. If the truth was to be told, by that stage they was both looking forward to it. If it had to happen, Wilbur wanted to still have the strength to think right to the end.
They was lying side by side on the single cot. The Wilbur of a year before wouldn't of fit on there by himself.
"You promised, Waldo."
"What's that, man?"
"To tell me what you do."
"Oh, Wilbur."
"Come on, bro. I'm outa here. I ain't gonna tell nobody in this life. There ain't a secret so deep you can't tell a dying man."
Waldo didn't know what to say. He was hurting for a sign from The Lord; some way he could make Wilbur believe. He didn't want his friend to go to his grave thinking he'd lied.
And suddenly it come. It come plain as the nose on his face, and through it. It come floating up from the bed pan beneath the bed. At the same time as the stink come to his nostrils, the name of B.O. Bulokavic come into his mind.
With tears of laughter streaming down his cheeks, Wilbur listened to the story of B.O. and how he married the girl without no nose, and the poem he read at the wedding. Then there was the night at the Inn Diana and the boys that found true romance with the Hollywood showgirls. And he heard how Saifon disguised herself as a Japanese and bought Mattfield from old Roundly's daughter.
Pool and its Role in Asian Communism Page 20
