Bangkok 8

“Let’s take a walk,” Vikorn says. “It’s such a nice day.”

Another of his lies. It is muggy, the sun is invisible behind the pollution, and the crowds droop as they make their way along the strip, dodging from one air-conditioned refuge to another. After a couple hundred yards we reach the Consulate of the Republic of Ukraine, which gives all three of us pause for thought. What middle-ranking functionary, violently liberated from the straitjacket of socialism and brow

In the lobby the eye is inevitably, if not subtly, drawn to a window about a hundred feet long behind which are arranged perhaps three hundred plastic seats. It is daytime so most of the seats are empty; there are no more than about thirty beautiful young women sitting in their finery, all carefully selected for their porcelain skin, perfect bosoms and beguiling smiles. Vikorn twists my head to make sure I’m looking at them. “Aren’t they fantastic? And you know what, because of the prices they charge and the tips they get, they want you as much as you want them. Which one will you have?”

I give him a wild look and shake my head. Suvit has increased his grip on my arm, while Vikorn loosens his and walks over to the reception area to say a few words to one of the men in di

Now Vikorn has returned and we are making for the lifts. At the fifth floor a sign warns that we are entering the VIP Club, which is reserved for members only. Three young women, who have benefited from the improved diet which was available to their generation and are about my height and sure contenders for Miss Thailand, are waiting in elaborate silk bathrobes. The fourth woman is about forty, shorter, well turned out in an evening gown.

“This is Nit-nit, Noi and Nat,” she explains with a deep wai to Vikorn and Suvit. The minders are guarding the lift.

“Where’s the room?” Vikorn asks. The mamasan gestures to a padded green leather door off the reception area. He turns to me. “Your choice. Do you want the girls to strip you or shall we do it for them?” Not bothering to wait for an answer, he says to the mamasan: “Lock the door on him. Don’t let him out until his time’s up. How much did I pay for downstairs?”

“Three hours,” she says with a curtsy and a wai.

The girls giggle behind me while I am taken and thrust into a gigantic bathroom, with Jacuzzi as central feature, a Sony flat plasma TV about a yard long and two feet tall, high up on a bracket, a double king-size bed with rubberized sheet, and a dazzling array of aromatic oils in bottles standing around the Jacuzzi. The door shuts, then opens again and Nit-nit, Noi and Nat stride in, gri

Nit-nit returns from the Jacuzzi, undresses completely and runs her finger gently along the ladder of my stitches, moaning sympathetically. It’s enough to make me burst into tears.

“D’you want the TV on or off?” Nat asks sweetly while she undresses.

“I don’t care. Whatever.”

“You don’t mind if we put the football on?”

“Is it Man U?”

“Playing Bayern Munich.” Breasts dangling, she reaches for the remote.

39

The Colonel, a cybervirgin if ever there was one (mouse? double click? keystroke?), has surprised and impressed my mother by purchasing for a hefty fee from a gangster in Atlanta a specialist e-mailing list (updated every thirty minutes) which is automatically transmitted to a gangster in Phnom Penh (try nailing anyone for anything in Phnom Penh) who, for really not much money at all, will zing advertisements for the Old Man’s Club at any surfer who has been so uncircumspect as to alight for a nanosecond on a web page bearing such keywords as Viagra; sex; Bangkok; go (go); porn; impotence; and prostate. There really ca

On my way to work on the back of the motorbike this morning, listening to Pisit’s phone-in: Thai Rath reports that car thieves have hit on a new wheeze: rent a car, drive it over the border to lawless Cambodia, sell it to a Khmer thug, report it missing to the Cambodian cops, let the hire companies claim the insurance. According to Thai Rath, the culprits are all Thai cops. There is the usual flood of callers complaining about police corruption before Pisit introduces his guest, an insurance expert.

Pisit, laughing: “You have to hand it to the cops, they do seem to have found a crime without a victim. I mean, who loses here?”

“Everyone, because of the rise in insurance premiums.”

“Does the average Thai driver pay insurance?”

Insurance expert, laughing: “No, if he gets into an accident he bribes a cop.”

Caller: “Does this mean that money which would otherwise go to insurance companies goes to the police?”

Pisit, laughing: “Looks that way, doesn’t it?”

Caller: “Is this right or wrong? I mean, if the cops didn’t get the money, their salaries would have to be increased, which would mean an increase in tax, wouldn’t it?”

Pisit, admiringly: “That’s a very Thai question.”

When I arrive at the police station Jones is already there, in our workroom. I decide to begin on a dynamic note which to my fancy has a measure of American aggression about it, which I think she’ll appreciate.

“Kimberley, there must be something else Warren did. Why are you holding out on me?”

I take my place beside her at a crude wooden table on trestles. We are carrying on from the day before yesterday and there’s a stack of cassettes in a wooden box between us. Jones figured we would not have the facilities to play the large-spool tapes they use at Quantico, so she had them copy Elijah’s telephone conversations onto the cassettes. She also figured, with equal clairvoyance, that we probably wouldn’t have the facilities to play the cassettes either, so she bought a couple of cheap Walkmans on her way here, and now she’s taking a break with the headphones hanging around her neck. There’s nothing on the bare boards of the tabletop apart from the Walkmans and our elbows. No pens, no paper, no computers, no files, but there is a stack of old file covers that someone has dumped in a corner of the room and one empty chair in another corner.