Bangkok Haunts

hotels, we’ll go straight into sex: no need for her to dress up. There’s a bounce in her step: anticipation of making a little on the side in what will probably be a pleasurable encounter that may lead to something more enduring: maybe I’ll even make her my
mia noi,
or minor wife; give her a salary and a room to live in. Also, since I seem to have decided to betray my wife after all, I must have found her irresistible: pride and dominance in her quick smile at me when she arrives.
    “Did you know we were raided last night, just after you left?”
    I shake my head. “Really? Did they find anything?”
    “No drugs, but they took away the computer with the member list. The boss has been on the phone all day talking to members who are scared the press will get hold of the list. Someone called Colonel Vikorn is taking money. Fuck cops.”
    “Right,” I say, giving up on the idea of coming clean. “Well, it’s not your problem.”
    She smiles. “Not right now anyway.” She waits expectantly. When I do not begin bargaining regarding the price of her services, she examines my face more closely. Maybe I’m one of those confused men who got into a marriage he’s not enjoying but is not sure if a mistress is really what he wants? I have not prepared properly for this interview, and I’m conscious of exceeding my authority. I feel more like a bandit than a cop when I take out my wallet and start to lay out some thousand-baht notes on the coffee table. There’s a flash of anger at my indiscretion which diminishes as I continue putting the money on the table. She has counted ten thousand baht and now checks my eyes. No one except a
farang
would offer that kind of money for a midday romp:
Okay, I’m special, but I’m not that special.
I roll the money up into a tight ball.
    “Let’s say I’m an investigator,” I say. “I work with banks.”
    Her shift into the new reality is pretty well immediate. “You’re trying to protect the members? That’s why you were there last night and didn’t want to do it? The bankers are paying you?”
    “No. Someone else is paying me.”
    I make a face that she construes as affirmation of her suspicion. Her features have hardened, and there is a new clarity in her gaze. “I’ll want more than that.”
    “I’ll double it.”
    “More.”
    “No.”
    “Then I’m not talking.”
    I puff out my cheeks. Twenty thousand baht would probably be what she averages per month. Most girls would grab it—unless they were frightened.
    “Look,” I say, “how do I know you have the information I’m looking for?”
    “I can guess. If you’re not working for the bankers, then you’re into some kind of blackmail scam. I don’t want to get involved, but I need the money. I’ll talk for fifty thousand.”
    There’s finality in the tone. “Okay. I’ll have to go to an ATM.”
    “We’ll go together, then we’ll go to a short-time hotel. That way everyone who sees us will think you’re hiring my body.” She pauses to look around the café. Three middle-aged white men are sitting with girls they probably picked up in this area the night before. The others are mostly
farang
men and a few
farang
women taking a break from the third world and reading newspapers and magazines over a caffè latte or machiatto. We go to the nearest ATM, where a couple of young
farang
men with eyebrow hatpins watch with amusement while I take out a wad of notes with my whore standing beside me.
    She knows the Nana hotels better than I do because she worked some bars here before she went upmarket to the Parthenon. We take a cab to a drive-in, where there are curtains to draw around your car if you brought one, and a hastily constructed set of rooms that give directly onto the underground car park. I pay a guard three hundred baht. Once in the room he asks if I want to watch porn on the DVD player while I’m humping, but I tell him no. Meanwhile Nok has started to feel horny. She sits on the double bed with a teasing smile and looks up at us in the ceiling mirror. I smile and shake my head. She holds out her hand. I give her ten thousand baht and promise to hand over the balance if she has useful information.
    There is a gynecological chair in one corner. In use, it must offer access to the captive vagina from virtually every point of the compass. Nok jerks her chin at it with a complex smirk:
Look what we could be up to if you didn’t insist on asking stupid questions; maybe we could