Bangkok Haunts

He maintains radio silence for about ten minutes-at least, that’s what it feels like. Finally, forcing me to stare back into those bottomless pits of morosity: “You have to babysit me, don’t you? That’s your job. So, we’re going to get drunk.” He tosses back some sake and nods at me to do the same. I’m still nursing guilt and mourning Nok and ca

“But you have Jock?”

He grunts. “If not for him, I really would resign.”

That night Chanya surprises me. We are in bed together with my hand on the Lump, and I have just finished telling her how Nok died. I was expecting another fear reaction, followed by a demand that I listen to Vikorn and forget Nok. Chanya, though, is quiet for a long time. Finally she says, “Do what you have to do, Sonchai.”

“But what about you and the child?”

“We’ll have to take our chances. Too many people in Thailand are in denial. Keeping quiet in the Thai way doesn’t work anymore. Maybe one day a rich man will decide to rape and kill me, then pay off the police. Change has to start somewhere.”

“That’s not the way you talked last time Tanakan’s name came up.”

“I know. Now another woman is dead. Perhaps our Buddhism has made ordinary Thais too humble.”

“And the others too arrogant,” I mumble.

21

All serious crime starts with a plausible excuse: terrible childhood, fell down the stairs at a tender age, emerged from urban squalor, et cetera. The one I plan to commit needs nothing more than the murder of Nok, Pi-Oon, and Khun Kosana qua motivation; let’s not dwell on any residual outrage I may feel at the ma

I don’t have much of a plan as yet, which puts me in one hell of a mood. All I can think of is to grab the footman at the Parthenon on some pretext and do whatever is necessary to get him to talk, but if I do that, Tanakan will find out and snuff me. Anyway, that man does not fear death or jail; Tanakan holds his women, who are everything to him. He won’t talk unless he wants to. Sometimes I envy my Western counterparts the simplicity of their lives; presumably they have no care in the world beyond bringing perps to justice? A little schoolboyish, though, and lacking in moral challenge. I doubt you can burn much karma that way.

Still furious, I decide to take a walk around the block. I’m in no mood for social niceties when the Internet monk manages to get in my way as I’m crossing the road. I glare and pass on.

It is about eleven-thirty, the time when all good hawkers get cooking in readiness for the midday rush. They have set up their stalls opposite the police station especially for cops and staff, which earns them a special dispensation from arrest. You can tell what they are selling depending on the utensils: a simmering brass basin probably means a beef-based soup; a big enamel basin will have pigs’ legs simmering in it; a dark brown burnt-clay mortar with wooden pestle will produce wickedly hot somtan salad; a wok over charcoal means a fry-up, and so on.

I’ve cooled down a bit by the time I’m returning to the station, and I’m wondering if this might be the time to bring the monk in for questioning when he reappears out of the Internet cafe just as I am passing and bumps into me all over again. I turn on him with a sarcastic comment on my lips but freeze because he is standing with his hands in the air, palms facing me. The expression on his face is quizzical, almost amused. Mad monks are as common in Buddhism as in other monastic traditions. I think he must be really crazy, though, when he maneuvers to stay in front of me until I can find a way around him. I’m still thinking about him when I reach my desk and Lek joins me.

“D’you know what that Internet monk just did? He deliberately bumped into me and went like this.” I hold up both hands, palms toward Lek.

“He did the same thing to me yesterday.” I’ve noticed that Lek is less keen on the monk than he once was. “Maybe he is nuts. Did he show you his scar?”

“What scar?”

“I thought that was why he was holding his hands up. He has this scar on his wrist, like he once tried to commit suicide or something and maybe now he’s obsessing in some way.”

“But the bracelets?” I say.

“Maybe he’s giving bracelets to everyone he meets. Maybe there is no co

“He didn’t give me one.”

Actually, I did see the scar but paid it no attention. We both shrug. Nobody wants to be the one to get a monk put away in a mental asylum. It’s a shame, though, for one so young to be in such decline. I dismiss him from my thoughts as I refocus on how to pot Tanakan, whether Vikorn likes it or not. I don’t think about the monk at all for the rest of the morning, and it’s only when Lek and I are sitting at a cooked-food stall for kong kob kiao, something to chew, that I think of him again. I am holding half a dozen fish balls on a stick, which I put down on the table.

“The scar,” I’s‘ay.

“What scar?”

“On the monk’s wrist.”

“What about it?”

“I want you to check the Internet cafe to see if he’s still there. I’m going back to the station. If he’s in there, ask him if he wouldn’t mind coming up to see me at his convenience. Be polite.”

Lek shrugs. Maybe I’m the one who will soon end up in the nuthouse.

I watch from the window next to my desk while Lek emerges from the Internet cafe, pushing his hair back with both hands. He appears at my desk a few minutes later, alone.

“Well?”

“He said he would be delighted to come and see you here in about an hour. He is going to the wat to meditate for a short time.”

I feel a twinge of a

“Phra-I’m sorry, I do not know your Sangha name.”

His sangfroid is imperturbable, I have to give him that. “It doesn’t matter. From the look on your face, I suppose you believe I do not have a Sangha name. Is that not so?”

Irritated all over again, I ask, “How many precepts do you follow?”

“What a childish question, Detective. You know very well every monk must follow two hundred and twenty-seven precepts.”

“I’m sorry,” I say, “foolish of me.” I am taken aback at the educated quality of his Thai. I expected a lost, unlettered young man from the poor north.