Bangkok Haunts

“That’s my lesson.” Hurriedly he grabs a T-shirt from a drawer and pulls it on.
    I nod for him to open the door, and Lek and I both examine the new arrival: a slim Thai in his early twenties, respectfully dressed in white shirt, black pants, and polished black lace-up shoes, an innocence in his eyes that you rarely see in
farang
of that age. What unreal ambition has brought him here today, probably on his day off from some dreary office job? What stories has he believed about the global economy and language skills? When he sees me, he makes a respectful
wai
and says, in excruciatingly correct English, “Excuse me, am I interrupting a conference?”
    “We’re just going,” I say in Thai. In English to Baker: “Perhaps we might return at a more convenient moment?”
    Baker gives a helpless shrug to say,
A Thai cop can make me do whatever he likes.
    “Say seven P.M. ?”
    “Tomorrow evening would be better. I’ve got another private lesson at six, and then another at nine, plus I’m working at the school all day.”
    Lek and I stand up. “Tomorrow then.” I cough apologetically. “Mr. Baker, I’m afraid I must ask for your passport in the meantime. I will return it to you tomorrow.”
    The Thai student makes big eyes. He hadn’t realized I was a cop, and to see his respected
ajaan
hand over his passport suddenly changes the dynamics. He’s ready to flee from Baker, so I say to him in Thai, “Just an immigration matter,” and smile. He smiles back with relief. Downstairs I slip the guard another hundred baht on condition he keeps an eye out for Baker’s comings and goings.
    In the cab back to the station, I check Baker’s passport, then pass it to Lek. We exchange a shrug. Baker was out of the country at the time of Damrong’s killing. It would seem he flew to Siam Reap in Cambodia, the nearest airport to Angkor Wat, several days before the event and did not come back until after the approximate time of her death. Damrong owned an American and a Thai passport; both documents indicate that she had not left Thailand for more than a year before her death. Forget Baker.

7
    Without any leads other than Baker, I decide to spend quality time with the ladies in my life. I take my mother, Nong; Chanya; and the FBI for a buffet supper at the Grand Britannia on Sukhumvit, just near the Asok Skytrain station. A gay waiter charms Chanya with his concern for her condition and makes her laugh when he admits he envies her. The FBI also is solicitous and insists on fetching her whatever food she wants, while Nong casts a shrewd eye over the clientele.
    “See that whore from Nong Kai? Her name is Sonja—she works at Rawhide. I’ve been trying to persuade her to work for us, but she’s happy where she is. You know how they are.”
    “Friends are everything. If she has plenty at Rawhide, she’ll never come work for us. How can you blame her? They’re as lost as
farang
in Bangkok—even more so, since they don’t have any money.”
    “Well, she certainly seems to have her customer under control. She’s giving him the marry-me treatment. Look, she’s brought her family down from Isaan to meet him.”
    “Must be serious,” I agree.
    A big muscular Australian in walking shorts, long white socks, and sandals, in his fifties with a gigantic beer gut, is bringing his plate back to where the girl, her mother, and a few other relations, who are probably siblings or cousins, plus a boy about five years old, have occupied the table next to us.
    “That’s her son by a Thai lover,” Nong explains in a whisper.
    The Australian tries to make conversation with the family who are keen to adopt him, but his true love is enjoying speaking her native tongue, a dialect of Laotian, and cannot resist gossiping with her family. Every now and then she casts the Australian a warm, comforting smile, presses his thigh with one hand, and says a few words to him in English, then returns with renewed enthusiasm to the gossip. The Australian perhaps does not realize it, but his future in-laws are behaving exactly as if they were at home in their wood house on stilts and sitting barefoot on the floor nattering, probably with the TV on at full volume and a dozen kids beating one another up in the background. Nong understands Laotian better than I do and has started to grin. When the FBI comes back with a plate of oysters for Chanya, my mother enthusiastically explains in English for Kimberley’s benefit:
    “Her aunt just asked