Bangkok Haunts

noticed how close she came to getting you snuffed by Khun Tanakan? You told yourself that she left you no choice, but perhaps you did not realize that she intended for you to get into a losing battle with your rival,
intended
for you to see your survival as dependent upon her demise.” His frown has deepened.
“She planned it from the start.”
Now his eyes have opened wide. “It wasn’t an idea that came to her toward the end of your affair—it was the reason she chose you in the first place. She read you. She knew you were the one to provoke and tease and torture. She put you in an impossible position of adversary to one of the most powerful men in Thailand—and you fell for it. Within a month she had put your life, your identity, and your career in peril. She knew you would agree to her idea in the end, as an elegant way of getting rid of her.” He is staring wildly. “How old are you? Let me tell you. You are forty-six years old.
Exactly the same age as her father when she had him killed.
”
    I stand up with a little hop. “It doesn’t much matter whether I take you in or not. I guess you would prefer not. That’s okay.” I take a piece of paper out of my back pocket, unfold it, hold it above him, and let it gently fall onto his head. It is a printout of an e-mail showing an enraged elephant with sociopathic tendencies. “That’s how she had her dad bumped off, Mr. Smith. She took the photos herself.” I reach down to touch the lacquered elephant-hair bracelet on his left wrist and wink.
    At the door I cannot resist turning back for a moment. He is prone, still, and apparently quite bewildered. “Sweet dreams,” I say as I leave, gratified by his gasp.

33
    I have no idea how or why Baker might have been involved. The only reason I think he must be directly implicated is because the monk has fingered him with an elephant-hair bracelet and because Smith the consigliere has visited him at least twice. Mentally we’re back to
Star Wars,
with me flying blind on instructions from some disembodied intelligence. I have not heard from Damrong’s brother for three days. I’m trying to brainstorm with Lek in the back of the cab as to how and why a small-time player like Baker might have wound up as a shareholder in a world-class snuff movie, and I don’t notice the new boys on the block until we’re out of the cab at Baker’s apartment.
    One locks eyes with me for a moment; I experience the kind of devastating insight into the void that makes you wish people with those kinds of problems would wear sunglasses. None of his features move, and he doesn’t bother to shift his gaze. He is in a guard’s uniform, with nightstick and cuffs hanging from his belt. I say something quickly in Thai, to establish that he does not understand. Lek is from Surin province and speaks a dialect of Khmer. I tell him to ask the new guard where the old guards went. The psychopath replies with surprising eagerness, apparently pleased to be speaking his native tongue.
    “He says a new security company has been appointed.”
    “How many of them are there?”
    “About ten.”
    As he speaks, I see some of the others. Not all are in uniform, but I’m prepared to bet they all speak Khmer.
    “Tell him I’ve come to see Khun Baker, the English teacher.”
    I watch carefully but see no reaction to the name. He knows which is Baker’s floor, though, and nods us into the lift, where I have to revise my approach to Baker. By the time we’re out of the lift, another thought occurs to me, accompanied by a sharp intake of breath. I tell Lek to go to Smith’s law offices and check on the guards there. He is to call me back on my cell phone. Lek takes the lift back down to the ground floor while I knock on Baker’s door.
    The trouble with inspirational detection: it can make you appear scatty. As Baker opens the door, I forget all about my planned assault on his psyche because a truly extraordinary possibility has occurred to me. I fish out my cell to call Lek again. “When you’ve checked up on Smith’s security guards, go to Tanakan’s bank. See if there’s anything unusual in the security there today.” I have spoken in rapid Thai, so I do not know if Baker has understood or not.
    Oddly enough, the moment of random-access intuition has freed up my brain, and now I think I know exactly why Baker was involved in the flick. I’m not angry with him, though—on the contrary, I believe the whole of my approach is tinged