Bangkok 8 Part 12

"D'you know who Sylvester Warren is?" A shake of the head while he's stripping the rest of the bone with his teeth. "A billionaire jeweler and art dealer, knows presidents. He comes here once a month."

Elijah's face is blank. He shakes his head again before starting in on the nachos. With his mouth full: "We got a lot of billionaires who have to leave America to get their kicks. It ain't like it used to be. We got media, mind police, electronic surveillance. White boy like that who knows presidents can't afford even to look at his secretary the wrong way. They ain't as broad-minded as us n.i.g.g.e.rs. They really f.u.c.ked themselves all up. No wonder he comes here every month, this Warren. Did he know Billy?"

"They exchanged e-mails."

"Think he was the one had him killed?"

I shrug. "No one can think of a motive."

Elijah pauses with a forkful of potato salad. "Me either. Let's face it, Billy tried all his life to be as big as his body, but at the end of the day he was a little guy. A sergeant in the Marines who liked to hire cheap p.u.s.s.y out of Third World go-go bars. He wasn't important enough for a rich white boy to kill."

"Tell me this. Was your brother more than averagely scared of snakes?"

"More than average? I dunno. I guess every n.i.g.g.e.r in Harlem's scared of snakes. The African jungle is quite a few generations back. Sure, he was scared of snakes, same as me. I used to tease him that if he went ahead and joined the army he would be sent to the jungles of Southeast Asia where boa constrictors roamed on the loose. Freaked him out but it seems like I was right."

"Do you intend to avenge your brother's death, Mr. Bradley?"

My question, perfectly reasonable to me, has astonished him. He puts down his fork and pushes his seat back a foot to stare at me. "You mean like a vendetta?" He scratches his head by way of answer. "Only time I had anyone rubbed out was because they double-crossed me. In the business, when that happens you don't have any choice, but to tell you the truth I been regretting it ever since. I'm not a man of violence. Most of the time, being this big, I don't need to be."

"You didn't love him?"

"I don't know. He was my brother but we weren't close. I came over to sort out his estate. I get the feeling we're dealing with a cultural difference, here, Detective. Only Sicilians do that vendetta stuff in the U.S. We blacks prefer to rely on the rule of law. What you you gonna do when you find who did it?" gonna do when you find who did it?"

"Kill them," I say with a smile.

It is 4:32 a.m. by the time I reach my hovel. As usual, I had forgotten to take my mobile with me. It bleeps while I'm falling asleep and the screen tells me there's a message. I fumble with the controls until the message appears: River City, 2nd level, Warren Fine Art and Jewelry. Opens 10 a.m. See you there. K.J. P.S. Dress up.

Between the two incompatible worlds of waking and sleeping my mind reverts to the d.i.l.d.o garden at the Hilton. Meditation is just a way of preferring reality to fantasy, as our abbot used to say. He would not have been put out by that small forest of c.o.c.ks, though he might have had a problem with the Hilton. Like many of our country abbots, he retained much of the shamanism of pagan times and liked to predict the future. Once he foretold the winning numbers in the national lottery, just for fun, but hid the paper on which he made the prediction until after the deadline for purchasing tickets, so as not to corrupt his monks. There will be a ma.s.sive s.h.i.+ft of power from West to East in the middle of the twenty-first century, caused not by war or economics but by a subtle alteration in consciousness. The new age of biotechnology will require a highly developed intuition which operates outside of logic, and anyway the internal destruction of Western society will have reached such a pa.s.s that most of your resources will be concentrated on managing loonies. There will be TV news pictures of people fleeing from supermarkets and pressing their hands to their heads, unable to take the ba.n.a.lity anymore. The peoples of Southeast Asia, who have never been poisoned by logical thought, will find themselves in the driver's seat. It will be like old times, if your time line stretches back a few thousand years.

I was flattered that the abbot chose me rather than Pichai with whom to share this side of his enlightenment, though the finer points which enable one to predict a lottery he kept to himself (on the other hand he initiated Pichai into the deepest mysteries that exist concerning the relations.h.i.+p between the so-called living and the so-called dead).

There won't be another world war, but by the middle of this century every country except Iceland and New Zealand is involved in a more or less violent dispute with neighbors over water rights. Papua New Guinea beats Argentina 31 in the 2056 World Cup final. How to Deal with Crazies Without Turning into One How to Deal with Crazies Without Turning into One tops the best-seller lists throughout 2038. Marijuana (universally legalized) overtakes alcohol as the recreational drug of choice in Europe, even in France where legislators rush to bring it under the tops the best-seller lists throughout 2038. Marijuana (universally legalized) overtakes alcohol as the recreational drug of choice in Europe, even in France where legislators rush to bring it under the appellation controlee appellation controlee laws ( laws (Champagne Jaune, Bordeaux Blond, Noir de Bourgogne, etc.). etc.).

34.

This morning I woke early and spent an hour in the Emporium building on Sukhumvit, before the shops opened. I see that the explosion of color which was really started by Yves Saint Laurent has migrated to Italy, mostly to Versace and Armani, while Saint Laurent himself has returned to blacks and browns. Ermenegildo Zegna on the other hand has never abandoned the glazed beiges which work so well on his superfine wools. I spare a moment to drool over his camel double-breasted blazer with mock tortoisesh.e.l.l b.u.t.tons (about U.S.$1,500), but today it is the atelier of Armani which has my attention with its new collection of silk-satin woven ties, cashmere one-b.u.t.ton sports jackets and plaid four-b.u.t.ton double-breasted suits. It is a subtler, suaver art than the late Versace's, but who could deny the elan, the very Italian playfulness (so close to Thai), in those houndstooth check s.h.i.+rts, wrinkle-cotton striped dress s.h.i.+rts and wool crepe skirts in the Armani window? My real vice, though, is shoes, and I spend most of the time ogling the Bally collection (dull-glow mahogany slip-ons, some very daring perforated brogues with echoes of Gatsby-I saw the film-and some utterly fantastic women's stuff with heels and points no one else would get away with), not that I neglect Fila, Ferragamo, Gucci or the very exotic Baker-Benjes, which has only recently appeared in our kingdom. I would like to claim it is my farang farang contamination in the blood which is responsible for this defilement and debilitating disease, but the truth is I caught it from Truffaut and Fritz, both consummate narcissists in different ways and hypersharp dressers, who intervened in my development at a crucial juncture. The FBI's instruction to "dress up" has thrown me into a crisis of inferiority which will take some meditating to deal with. I'm fed up with being poor, at least the non-Buddhist side of me is, and feeling pretty d.a.m.n low when I take the motorcycle taxi to the Hilton to meet Kimberley, who has hired her usual car to take us to River City. contamination in the blood which is responsible for this defilement and debilitating disease, but the truth is I caught it from Truffaut and Fritz, both consummate narcissists in different ways and hypersharp dressers, who intervened in my development at a crucial juncture. The FBI's instruction to "dress up" has thrown me into a crisis of inferiority which will take some meditating to deal with. I'm fed up with being poor, at least the non-Buddhist side of me is, and feeling pretty d.a.m.n low when I take the motorcycle taxi to the Hilton to meet Kimberley, who has hired her usual car to take us to River City.

In the back of the car I explain: "River City is where the rich and dumb go to buy Oriental art. You pay a hundred percent markup for the sensitive placing of the piece, the backlighting, the mincing salesperson. It's a shopping mall for art tasters and looks exactly like the one near you." The tension in my voice is a direct product of my pressed khaki s.h.i.+rt, white pants, polished black lace-up shoes (all items generic and the shoes particularly ugly). The FBI has relegated me to the position of Indian guide by the time we reach the car park.

Why do I have the feeling she planned this moment while she was sitting in her office in Quantico and fantasizing about the glory she would bask in when she bagged Sylvester Warren? Her hair is blond again this morning, she is wearing wraparound Gucci sungla.s.ses, a black YSL business suit with trousers, white s.h.i.+rt open to a string of pearls. Tiny pearls.

"I'm here on a buying trip from New York," she explains. "You're my man Friday."

We ride the escalator to the second level and there is Warren Fine Art in triple A position, in your face as you step off. Jones was wrong about the opening time. It's the kind of shop that doesn't open until eleven, when an overdressed beautiful person will unlock it with a yawn. Smart buyers do not browse, they make an appointment. For the right smart buyer the beautiful person would open the store at midnight. We pause at the window long enough for Jones to show off her expertise.

"Some not bad stuff here. That Buddha head is definitely Khmer, someone ripped it off from Angkor Wat. If Warren didn't have connections he'd be in jail, the son of a b.i.t.c.h." We take the ten or so paces to the next window, which is the jewelry and jade section. It is not like any of the jewelry shops in Chinatown, or anywhere else in Krung Thep. The work is almost all jade, often mounted on gold. Gold and jade necklaces, gold and jade bracelets, earrings. Arising out of the sea of green are some of the more substantial pieces, which cleverly highlight the rest, giving the impression that the whole window was once guarded by imperial eunuchs in the Forbidden City. "Will you look at that condor plaque! See the bald head, the creases in the neck denoting the bird's spare skin in that area? Just look how accurately a Neolithic person, illiterate, probably with a vocabulary of a few hundred words, has observed a creature, stylized it and turned it into art without sacrificing accuracy. Most college graduates today couldn't do that. They wouldn't even understand what I'm talking about."

I spare her a quick glance. Here is yet another personality, and a surprising one. I have been puzzling and meditating on the karmic connection between Jones and Warren without being able to figure it out. It is certain, though, that Warren has influenced her from a distance. It could have been him talking. In her compartmentalized farang farang mind she cannot see the significance of this, she sincerely believes she has become an expert on Far Eastern art exclusively to nail Warren. She would see it as evidence of pathetic weakness on her part to acknowledge how Warren has broadened and deepened her mind, even before she ever met him. From afar he has changed her destiny forever. With whom in the Bureau could she share this new pa.s.sion for Oriental art? Even her family sooner or later will think her strange, and this strangeness will be her path. I dare not warn her that she is destined to return to my country again and again. I predict the allure will work through her p.u.s.s.y, at least at first. The path to the mind she cannot see the significance of this, she sincerely believes she has become an expert on Far Eastern art exclusively to nail Warren. She would see it as evidence of pathetic weakness on her part to acknowledge how Warren has broadened and deepened her mind, even before she ever met him. From afar he has changed her destiny forever. With whom in the Bureau could she share this new pa.s.sion for Oriental art? Even her family sooner or later will think her strange, and this strangeness will be her path. I dare not warn her that she is destined to return to my country again and again. I predict the allure will work through her p.u.s.s.y, at least at first. The path to the farang farang heart lies invariably through the genitalia. heart lies invariably through the genitalia.

"Wow! That tiger is priceless," Jones explains. "It's the big come-on, the piece which tells you this guy is the king of jade." Her voice has risen an octave when she says: "See how the sculptor has bunched the muscles, giving that impression of power, and look at the harmony. Limbs, haunches, back, shoulder, stomach-synchronized, masterful, harmonious."

"It's not green," I object.

"That's the point. After about a thousand years jade loses its color. That tiger goes back to the Early Western Zhou dynasty. He would never sell it, I bet. To anyone who knows anything, it's as intimidating as h.e.l.l." She shakes her head. "I'm surprised he's got the guts to show some of this stuff. Look at that crouching dragon in mutton-fat nephrite and those thrush-breast freckles-think of the genius it took to see that dragon in the crude stone. That chatelaine is impressive, too, and look at that openwork plaque with peonies. I don't know, this is more than just a collector, this is a curator of his own museum." She takes the two steps back to the center of the window. "That tiger, though, it's still the best piece on display. It's more than just a great piece, it's world cla.s.s, the stone equivalent of the Mona Lisa-if you like the Mona Lisa, which I don't, personally. Oh, look, he's acknowledging his Chinese connections. See that brilliant piece of calligraphy hanging on the wall consisting of a single pictograph? That's the Chinese character yu yu."

"So what?"

"Yu is Mandarin for jade. Since the Chinese were the first to discover it, you could say it's the original name. Those three lines mean 'virtue, beauty and rarity,' in other words the three qualities of jade according to Confucius." is Mandarin for jade. Since the Chinese were the first to discover it, you could say it's the original name. Those three lines mean 'virtue, beauty and rarity,' in other words the three qualities of jade according to Confucius."

"See the piece on the shelf," I say, pointing behind the window display, into the interior of the shop.

"Well, I'll be . . ."

"It might not be the same one."

"Oh, it's the same one."

Horse and rider.

In a small cafe in the main complex, downstairs, while we're waiting for the shop to open, Jones says: "I did try love once. I really did. It still gets so much hype, you feel you've got to give it a chance, right? I think in the States we're way past that stage, though. It's like, in the first phase of industrialization there's still marriage as in an undeveloped agricultural economy, meaning it lasts for life. The next phase, people get married knowing they'll get divorced. One phase further on, and you find people marrying in order to in order to get divorced. By the time you reach twenty-first century America, love is a blip on the career path, something that was capable of making you late for work for a week, before you got over it. The sad truth is it's incompatible with freedom, money and equality. Who the h.e.l.l really wants to be stuck with their equal for life? Human beings are predators, we like to hunt and eat the weak so we can feel strong for a moment. How about you?" get divorced. By the time you reach twenty-first century America, love is a blip on the career path, something that was capable of making you late for work for a week, before you got over it. The sad truth is it's incompatible with freedom, money and equality. Who the h.e.l.l really wants to be stuck with their equal for life? Human beings are predators, we like to hunt and eat the weak so we can feel strong for a moment. How about you?"

The question has taken me by surprise, not least because Jones has her hand on my thigh again. This time there can be no doubt as to her meaning and I think the talk about predation must be a kind of foreplay. My inferiority in my badly tailored khaki s.h.i.+rt, awful pants and truly hideous black anvil-shaped shoes is evident. I should take her hand off my thigh to make it clear I don't want to be eaten, but instead cast around in my mind for an answer to her question. I think of Kat as I say: "Some people give their hearts only once. When love fails, they take up some occupation which reflects their bitterness."

Jones raises her eyebrows. "Is that what I did? Became a man-hunter because my true love betrayed me?" I expect some cynical coda. Instead she mutters, "d.a.m.ned right," and takes her hand away. Jones is not a Buddhist, therefore I do not explain the endless cycle of life after life, each one a reaction against some imbalance from the one before, that reaction setting up yet another imbalance and so on and on and on . . . We are the pinb.a.l.l.s of eternity.

At 11:20 a.m. we ride up the escalator again and I am surprised at the preindustrial feeling of antic.i.p.ation in my stomach, a delicious foreboding of dangerous karma to come.

She is slightly inside the fine-art side of the shop, dusting a full-length standing Buddha from Ayutthaya with a feather duster. A gong sounds as we cross the threshold and she turns toward us, a polite smile on her face. She is wearing a simple white linen blouse from Versace with open neck projecting a delicious vulnerability, black skirt probably also by Versace to below her knees. Her string of pearls is much larger than the FBI's, but what causes my most intense suffering is her fragrance, the name of which escapes me but not the brand: it is indisputably from Van Cleef & Arpels, no doubt flown in from their store on the Place Vendome, the very shop where Truffaut seduced my mother's nose even if the rest of her body remained beyond his failing powers. I pretend to sneeze slightly to have an excuse to inhale deeply. (Smell is the most animal of the senses, (Smell is the most animal of the senses, Truffaut advised, Truffaut advised, and like an animal a person will fall prey to a delicious intensity when he or she truly enters the universe of fragrance.) and like an animal a person will fall prey to a delicious intensity when he or she truly enters the universe of fragrance.) The first words I ever hear her utter are Good morning, Good morning, and I note with mounting joy how her voice-womanly, soft with Negroid timbre-so exactly matches and expresses her physical beauty. and I note with mounting joy how her voice-womanly, soft with Negroid timbre-so exactly matches and expresses her physical beauty.

Fatima's father was black American, mine was white American, there the difference ends. I know she is experiencing the moment in the same way while Jones, with great professionalism, conceals her surprise at seeing her in Warren's shop. I do not hear Jones' spiel about seeking out special pieces for her bijou gallery in Manhattan, and neither does the spectacular woman who was Bradley's lover. Jones' voice could be a mile away, all I hear is Fatima's polite reply: "Oh, how wonderful of you to think of us!"

I am pierced by her fragility, the sense of a recent loss of life-threatening proportions so similar to mine; pierced also by a perception which initially is mind-boggling, then blindingly obvious. Why did I not think of it before?

Clearly such mutual depth of emotion can only be the product of an intense relations.h.i.+p in a previous lifetime, and Jones' comment about people dying, then carrying on conversations after rebirth, echoes in my head. Jones stops in mid-sentence while I float effortlessly toward Fatima across the polished floor. I have the impression of waltzing between Buddhas while I jabber in Thai about Khmer art, of which I know nothing, and-it is obvious-neither does Fatima. She explains, with a laugh, that she does not actually work here, she is filling in for someone as a favor to the boss. Here should be my opening to insert the name of Sylvester Warren, instead I let it pa.s.s. I do not want to talk shop.

Jones tries to follow us around the salon and I am pleased to see she has no idea what is going on. We are continuing not one conversation, Fatima and I, but many, perhaps hundreds, from hundreds upon hundreds of lifetimes. She is my twin. The words we use have no correspondence to the present moment, they are merely vehicles of our excitement at meeting again at last. How long has it been? A hundred years? A thousand? Now Fatima is leading me into a remote corner, near a door. It is as if she wishes to tell me something. She has taken care to choose a moment when Jones has been left behind. I see him for a split second, a face at a doorway partially opened, before he withdraws and closes the door. It was one of the Khmer who befriended Elijah, the one with the knife. I make startled eyes at Fatima, but she shakes her head to rea.s.sure me. I nod as if I understand, even though I am now thoroughly confused.

After half an hour my poor nerves cannot take any more of this intensity and I am ready to leave the shop. Fatima's body wai wais to me at the threshold, my own body wai wais back. Thus do two dolls bow to each other while the puppet masters exchange knowing smiles from eternity. Jones follows me to the escalator. "What was that all about? You seemed to establish a rapport, anyway. Did you discover anything useful? What about Warren?"

"We didn't talk about Warren."

"Oh, but you got her number and address? Her ID? Her real name in Thai? You can get hold of her?"

"No."

"So how are you going to find her again if she doesn't really work there? Don't you want to interview her? Isn't she the last person to be seen with Bradley alive? Isn't she a suspect? Wasn't she the one in the car when you followed Bradley from the airport?" Exasperated. "Don't you want to know who did it?"

"I know who did it."

"Who?"

"Bradley did it. To himself. With help from Warren."

I am walking quickly toward Jones' hired car, in which the driver is waiting with the engine running for the air-conditioning. Jones is sweating in the heat with the effort to catch up. "Wait a minute, are you for real? Are you saying that Bradley committed suicide using-oh, I get it. We're back to the Buddha, right? It's a point about karma you're making here? You've just beamed yourself up to that point five miles above the earth where good Thai cops go when they die or get confused-or fall in love. Have you any idea how unsophisticated you looked just now? Like a teenage boy. I've never seen anything so unprofessional."

"If you didn't love crooks you would never have become a cop," I snap.

Her jaw hangs open. She is truly baffled and, for once, stumped for something to say.

We are in the back seat of the Mercedes after the FBI has slammed the door shut on her side. I am trying to find the key to our past lives, Fatima's and mine, the trigger, so to speak, that set us off on our centuries-old game of hide-and-seek.

"s.h.i.+t." Jones fixes her eyes at some point out of her side window while we wait in traffic. "If I'd known I'd have gotten her number myself. This is like being a cop in ancient Egypt."

Hiding a smirk: "You remember?"

She continues to grumble in my left ear while I try to disentangle great reams of karmic information that are flas.h.i.+ng through my head. I have never experienced this before, not with such intensity. "You have to have forgiveness," I mutter. "It's the only way back."

"d.a.m.n it, I'm going to get her number myself. If I had the right I'd bring her in for questioning. She's the link for Christ's sake. You must see that? The link between Bradley, Warren, the jade and the meth. Under the right pressure she could solve the case in five minutes and I could get the h.e.l.l out of this place. Maybe nail Warren at the same time."

She has the driver turn around. I wait in the car while she rushes up the escalator to Warren's shop, close my eyes and meditate. When she returns a few minutes later her clothes are soaked in sweat and a great fury is working her jaw muscles. "The b.i.t.c.h closed the shop and did a runner. We've lost her again."

"Really?"

She practices deep breathing for five minutes. In a controlled voice: "Don't you have anything new to report? What about your long talk with Elijah last night? Didn't anything useful come up?"

"Actually, yes, something crucial. William Bradley never mentioned Fatima to his brother. Elijah didn't know about her until he called William's mobile after the murder."

"That's crucial?" She rubs her jaw with that disbelieving look that Americans do so well when abroad. "Tell me where you want me to drop you off, because what I need right now is a big fix of cra.s.s Western culture. I'm gonna go back to the Hilton, order American food to be brought to my big, bland, air-conditioned room and watch CNN until I remember who I am. This is a magic-ravaged land, you know that? Coming here has made me appreciate whoever it was invented logic, because before logic I think the whole world was like this."

"That's true," I agree. "Magic is preindustrial."

I stand by the curbside and watch Jones' car drive off to join the jam on Rama IV. I feel a little sorry for the FBI and her belief that there is anything logical about human existence. I suppose it must be the delusion of the West, a cultural defilement caused by all those machines they keep inventing. It's like choosing the ringing tune on one's mobile: a logical labyrinth with no meaningful outcome. Logic as distraction. Frankly, I can't wait for that global power s.h.i.+ft the abbot talked about. My mind returns to Fatima. That Khmer, though, he is a puzzle.

The truth about human life is that for most of the time there is nothing to do and therefore the wise man-or woman-cultivates the art of doing nothing. I return to my hovel to meditate. I have to confess to a certain amount of self-love arising from having solved the case (at least in outline), which I need to eradicate in order to progress further on the Path. There are still many loose ends, after all. The snakes and Warren continue to be enveloped in mystery. Likewise it is not apparent to me how I will find the opportunity to kill Warren. And what am I supposed to do about Fatima? I feel very near to understanding the snakes when the telephone bleeps. I have to control my irritation when I observe from the screen that it is the FBI.

"Ah, look, I want to apologize. I was way out of line. I did exactly what they tell us you should never do. I lost it and got arrogant. Guilty. I guess culture shock is more powerful than anyone realizes. I really felt like I was drowning. I've never felt like that before, like being in a place with no references. Where what you thought were references are illusions. Am I making sense here?"

"I think you're making progress. That is a spiritual experience you are describing." I do not add: Welcome to the world Welcome to the world.

"You don't have to patronize me just because I patronized you. I thought we could have lunch, talk about the case."

I do not want to talk about the case. I feel a digression is called for. I say: "I have to go to Samutprakan crocodile farm tomorrow. If you like we can go in your car."

At Bang Kwan that afternoon they told me Fritz had been badly beaten the day before and was in the hospital. They refused to let me see him until I threatened them with a prosecution for obstructing justice. In a ward largely dedicated to the malnourished and terminally ill-AIDS is still a big killer here-he is propped up on a pillow with bandages around his head; his left leg and right arm are in splints. I think that this time he will not recover, that his body was too weak to take such punishment, but as I approach I'm surprised to see him smiling and apparently in good spirits.

"What happened?"

"My pardon came through."

"That's great but I meant about the beating."

"What do I care about that? Didn't you hear me? My pardon is through. The King's signed it already, it's only a matter of days now."

"I'm really pleased for you. What was it you wanted to see me about?"

He gestured as best he could to his leg and arm. "Can't tell you. Sorry."

"Don't worry, I understand."

He gestured to me to come closer. "Not because of the beating. The pardon. They said it could still be canceled. I hope you understand."

I nod vigorously. I wouldn't want to jeopardize his pardon, not for all the evidence in the world. I leave a pack of cannibalized Marlboro Reds on the table next to his bed.

35.

I am lying on my futon waiting for Jones to arrive and listening to the radio on my Walkman. Pisit reports that all the newspapers are reporting that the Supreme Patriarch has approved and blessed two thousand new surnames created by senior monks. The names will be offered under a surname reservation service. Pisit's guest is a spokesman for Buddhism who clearly expects joy and delight at the news. Pisit is in a skeptical mood and asks if it is appropriate to be living in a medieval theocracy in the twenty-first century when men dressed in robes from the third century B.C. B.C., who spend their time chanting in a language which has been dead for over two thousand years, are responsible for people's names? The spokesman, a monk himself, asks-aghast-how anyone could possibly want a surname that has not been blessed? Pisit quickly gets rid of him and replaces him with a sociologist who explains that we are a superst.i.tious people for whom anything as intimate as a name needs to possess magical powers. Pisit brightens and asks about Western names. "Usually they reflect the Western obsession with money, in that they are a statement about the work an ancestor did: Smith, Woodman, Baker, et cetera."

"So it's money with them, magic with us?"

Doubtfully: "You could say that, although it might be an oversimplification."

Pisit gets rid of him in favor of a psychiatrist who is happy to discuss Pisit's favorite topic. Why are Thai men risking their health and virility by having their p.e.n.i.ses enlarged with silicone and gel? The operation is extremely painful with side effects such as swelling and infection, and is illegal. The shrink explains that prior to the invasion of Western advertising it never occurred to Thai men to think much about size, quite rightly since the standard Thai male member is perfectly adapted to the standard Thai v.a.g.i.n.a, but with Western hard p.o.r.n and cigarette adverts, there has been a serious loss of self-confidence. Ironically, the effect of this a.s.sault from the West has been to cause impotence, either because of the disastrous operation or through chronic self-doubt.

Pisit, laughing: "So on top of everything else, they're castrating us?"

Laughing: "You could say that."

On a whim, Pisit calls the monk back to ask what he thinks of all this, and Western culture in general. After his drubbing just now he is in a Zen-ish sort of mood, not to say downright sarcastic: "Actually, the West is a Culture of Emergency: twisters in Texas, earthquakes in California, windchill in Chicago, drought, flood, famine, epidemics, drugs, wars on everything-watch out for that meteor and how much longer does the sun really have? Of course, if you didn't believe you could control everything, there wouldn't be an emergency, would there?"

There is a knock on my door. The FBI has arrived.

In the back of the car again I try to explain why meditation can help in the art of detection. I'm not sure if I believe what I'm saying or not, I just happen to be in the mood to say it. I may have fallen prey to the irresistible temptation to wind her up. "To understand why someone suffers a violent death, it can be helpful to investigate their past lives. These things do not happen by accident. There are no accidents, no coincidences."

"Uh-huh?"

"For example, in olden days in America, were there many brothels?"