Bangkok Haunts

deal. We’re very impressed with your product. Ain’t that right, Tommy?”
    “Oh, wildly, massively impressed. World class.”
    “Now, you’ve seen the contract, Mr. Jitpleecheep. What do you think of it?”
    “My Colonel and I have not yet had time to go through it,” I reply.
    “Your Colonel? This is the Emperor Vikorn, right? Too bad he couldn’t make it to the videocon. Listen, I might talk ocker ozzie, but I’m Asian to the bones, mate, Chinaman to me marrow, me, I speak fluent fucking Putonghua. I know why this Vikorn character didn’t want to come. I’ve checked him out—he’s a smart cookie, no way is he gonna expose himself. So he sends you, and anything you negotiate he can repudiate if he wants to. No, please, no need to deny—I’m talking with respect and admiration, as an Asian. I like it. So look, Asian to Asian, and not meaning any disrespect to Tommy there, who worked his balls off drafting it, but fuck the contract, right? You send us the product of the same quality as your trailer, and we wire the dough to whatever offshore bank you name. If we default, you stop supplying the product; if you default, you don’t get paid. If there’s a prob with any of the product, we’ll give you a chance to fix it, but if you miss a deadline, you’re penalized. How much a day, Tommy?”
    “Ten thousand U.S.,” Smith replies.
    “Right. That okay with you? Course it is. Your Colonel has no intention of ever paying a penalty to anyone, and there’s no way I can go after him in Thailand ’cos he’ll just have me bumped off if I try to enforce, right? So it’s as well to know what our leverage really is here.” Hitching the shorts: “I represent a large consortium of interested parties worldwide, not only hotel chains but other outlets in every civilized nation on the planet, especially media. So if you do default, you may as well start looking for another business to be in. Clear? Good. Now Tommy, you had a problem with one of the member corporations?”
    “A certain oil company that is closely connected to—?”
    “Oh yeah, the kid in the White House. Just to fill you in, Mr. Jitpleecheep, the oil companies are interested in your product as a way of keeping the men entertained during the long boring days and nights on the rigs. They’ve all had enough of the usual cock-and-pussy show, so they might be ready for your wacky stuff. But there is a whiff of S&M that’s got a few knickers in a twist. That right?”
    “That too, but according to some secret protocol, and considering the senior members of government who are associated with this oil company, they have reservations about showing actual penetration.”
    A groan from the little Chinaman. “Fuckin’ wimps. See, Mr. Jitpleecheep, this is what we have to contend with. The rules change from corporation to corporation, government to government, and from one fuckin’ month to another. There’s no industry standard, as I pointed out in a meeting of the top producers of this type of product in Manila couple months ago. I said, ‘This is crazy, mates. We’re going to be as big as oil in ten years, and there’s no bloody industry standard for anything. You can see the girl’s pubic hair but not her nipples, or depending on the time of day, you can see her nipples but not her pubic hair. You can see the couple rolling and humping, but you can’t see the actual pumpin’ dick, or you
can
see the pumpin’ dick but the tart keeps her bra on’—well, fuck it. Have someone tell the kid I might just start thinking about ordering a global return to reality-based journalism. That’ll put the wind up the fucker.”
    “I’ll make it happen, Mr. Yip,” Smith says.
    “On yer. Anyway, time’s up, thanks for the trailer, Mr. Jitpleecheep. Tommy, you and I need a private word about the other thing.”
    “Certainly, Mr. Yip. If you don’t mind, I’ll just show Detective Jitpleecheep out.”
    The Chinaman stares blankly out of the screen as Smith shows me to the door. In the corridor Smith turns to me. “Isn’t that a great guy? You ever meet a genius of that caliber before?” He is good at reading faces and sees it as part of his job to accommodate me. He raises his shoulders, points his palms at the ceiling. “What can you do? The pathologically greedy have inherited the earth.”
     
    Once on the street I fish out my cell phone and the card the
mamasan
gave me at the Parthenon Club last night. She agrees to meet me at Starbucks