“Want a cigar?”

“You know I don’t smoke tobacco.”

“How about some ganja? One of the boys busted a dealer with export-quality stuff. Here.” He reaches into his top drawer and tosses a Ziploc bag of dense green vegetation onto his desk. I wasn’t about to accept, but the deep shade of the grass, together with the superabundance of buds, weakens my resolve. As I reach for it, however, he clamps it to his desk with a heavy gnarled old hand.

“Where’s the video?”

“At a secret location.”

“Does it really show them fessing up to everything? Conspiring to make a snuff movie, taking shareholder positions, all that?”

“Yes. Naked, bent over trestles in a compromising position. It’s very elegantly done. Yammy’s come a long way.”

“Yammy? You used Yammy?”

“Is there anyone better?”

“Okay, how much do you want?”

“I want thirty percent for charity, plus twenty-five million dollars in seed money for Yammy’s feature film. It sounds like a lot, but you’re going to grab half of Tanakan’s fortune, so why should you care?”

“Show me the video first.”

“Do I look that stupid?”

“Okay, okay, if it’s as good as you say, I’ll agree.”

“Write that down. I want you on your honor.”

He frowns, then takes out his pen, writes, and hands me the contract. I fish a disk out of my pocket, walk over to his DVD player, and switch it on.

It was kind of cozy watching Yammy’s private masterpiece, which had the Colonel chortling and congratulating me. With the FBI standing next to him wearing her new gun, Yammy used two cameras to somehow make magic of a sorry tale. He made Smith and Tanakan confess slowly, deliberately, as if reciting poetry on a stark stage in front of the hut the elephants had shattered. They speak in solemn, well-modulated voices, as they recount every detail of their contract with Damrong and the morbid passion that led to it. Yammy and I used her extensive notes as a kind of film script.

Sometimes I think things are almost normal again, but of course they are not, because they never were. The illusion of continuity is busted, my concentration shot. Yesterday, hardly aware of what I was doing, I bought a bronze statue of the elephant god Ganesh to use as a paperweight on my desk. Not a minute passes without thoughts of Gamon. I frequently find an excuse to go to the wat to meditate. Even then I see him everywhere. Something he said almost inadvertently one day repeats itself over and over in my mind: When you tear away the last veil, you know with certainty that love is the foundation of human consciousness, that there really is nothing else. It’s our constant betrayal of it that makes us crazy. Hard to live by, but I guess you have to try.

There’s one other little thing I ought to mention. Damrong came to me a few nights ago, and I found no strength to resist her; but in the dream (it is comforting to call it that) a figure in saffron robes, with a machine gun slung over his shoulder, held up a Buddha hand of peace, and she disappeared. When I awoke with a jolt, Chanya was sleeping peacefully beside me.

It’s Vikorn, of all people, who keeps reminding me that I have a loving pregnant wife waiting for me at home. Who would have guessed that he was capable of worrying about my mental health?

But what of the FBI, whose sudden passion was quite eclipsed by events? Seduced, in my turn, by the sickly temptation of do-goodery, I took her last night to Don Juan’s, because I knew Lek was rehearsing there for a katoey cabaret they were planning. I sneaked her in surreptitiously and had her sit with me at the back of the bar while Lek and his chums laughed, screamed, ad-libbed, and made wicked jokes about how Pi-Lek would soon go under the knife. I took Kimberley’s hand by way of comforting her, but she removed hers very quickly. I thought she was angry because I was showing her just how perfectly Lek fitted into his katoey world, and how impenetrable that world was even for me, let alone a female farang. Wrong.

Afterward, sipping drinks at a bar in Pat Pong, she said, “That was sweet of you, in a way, Sonchai, but you’re behind the curve. A week has passed, and I’ve grown up. I know that different cultures produce very different human beings. Americans find that hard because the empire that dare not speak its name doesn’t like us to know there are alternative cultures on earth-but I’m not stupid. I know he can’t love me. Hell, maybe he is a spirit in human form. I also know that if I deny love one more time, I’ll turn into just another drone with no life outside of work. That’s a trap in the States, especially for a single woman over thirty-five. Bizarre it may be, incompatible we may be, but I have to see this through. We’ve done a deal. There’s no way he’ll be able to remain a cop after his operation, and I can’t stand the thought of him selling his body in a bar on Soi Four. I’m going to be like one of those lovelorn white men -I’m going to send money every month from the States to keep him off the Game, and he’s going to come visit me from time to time, except he’ll be a she then, of course. It finally dawned on me that money is something I have that he needs. And guess what, I made him laugh the other day-so some communication is possible between alien species, right? I think we’re going to be good friends. Don’t underestimate the glamour of my country-he can’t wait to see Hollywood and the Grand Canyon. If you want to be useful, keep an eye on him and send me reports.” She smiled.

Well, that’s it, farang, save for one loose end: I never did find out who sent me the Damrong DVD.

I am yours in Dharma, Sonchai Jitpleecheep.

Appendix

Erotica Inc. -A Special Report: Technology Sent Wall Street into Market for Pornography

By Timothy Egan (The New York Times), 4297 words

Published: October 23, 2000

Correction Appended

The video-store chain that Larry W. Peterman owned in this valley of wide streets and ubiquitous churches carried the kind of rentals found anywhere in the country -from Disney classics to films about the sexual adventures of nurses. Mr. Peterman built a thriving business until he was charged last year with selling obscene material and faced the prospect of bankruptcy and jail.

Just before the trial, Mr. Peterman’s lawyer, Randy Spencer, came up with an idea while looking out the window of the courtroom at the Provo Marriott. He sent an investigator to the hotel to record all the sex films that a guest could obtain through the hotel’s pay-per-view channels. He then obtained records on how much erotic fare people here were buying from their cable and satellite television providers.

As it turned out, people in Utah County, a place that often boasts of being the most conservative area in the nation, were disproportionately large consumers of the very videos that prosecutors had labeled obscene and illegal. And far more Utah County residents were getting their adult movies from the sky or cable than they were from the stores owned by Larry Peterman.

Why file criminal charges against a lone video retailer, Mr. Spencer argued, when some of the biggest corporations in America, including a hotel chain whose board of directors includes W. Mitt Romney, president of the Salt Lake City Olympics organizing committee, and a satellite broadcaster heavily backed by Rupert Murdoch, chairman of the News Corporation, were selling the same product?

“I despise this stuff-some of it is really raunchy,” said Mr. Spencer, a public defender who described himself as a devout Mormon. “But the fact is that an awful lot of people here in Utah County are paying to look at porn. What that says to me is that we’re normal.”