“You were?” A deprecating laugh. “Don’t sweet-talk me, Detective. You were all laughing behind my back.”

“Why should we have done that?”

“The silicone, of course. Joey was always so busy making money, he never inquired about proper enhancements. Look.”

She pulls open the housecoat, and there they are. For the first time Lek shows an interest in the case. I feel it will be a load off her mind if I follow her directions and examine them, although I’ve already seen the point. The stiff silicone is all gone, replaced no doubt with saline bags or collagen, which, I can report, yield nicely to the touch, bounce and swing beautifully, and really are more or less indistinguishable from the real thing, although a purist might complain they belong on a woman ten years younger.

“Can I?” Lek asks. Mu smiles and nods. With great reverence he handles both breasts, as if examining art objects that he soon will own himself. “They’re amazing.”

“Yes,” I say, “excellent. You must be very proud.”

“Yes,” as she does up the coat with a quick glance at Joey. “Now, what d’you want to know? About once a year Vikorn sends someone to me, but I’m really very out of touch now.”

“In front of Joey?”

“Of course not. Let’s go upstairs-I like to look at the animals.”

The bedroom is so large, it is like the bedding department of a great store. Everything is high schlock. For a moment my tortured eye rests with optimism on a modest set of bookshelves. I’m impressed that the books are all Buddhist; my heart sinks, however, when I see they are all the same book.

We three sit demurely on a window seat, which I think must be her favorite in the house, and look out onto the courtyard, where a monkey is riding a Great Dane, just like a jockey, even using his long arm to urge him forward. All is going well-even the dog seems to be enjoying the privilege of transporting a higher species from place to place, when another monkey, a chimp I think, somewhat older and shrewder looking, wants to hitch a ride.

“That’s Vikorn,” Mu explains.

Vikorn’s first thought is to swing from the tail, which has the effect of halting the dog. Now he jumps on his back, joining his colleague, while other monkeys gather round. Mu pronounces their names softly from time to time. The whole of District 8 is here, it seems.

One by one Mu names the dogs. They are all well-known drug dealers. “That’s how I remember people. I think which of my dogs they most resemble. Unless they’re cops, then they have to be monkeys. The monkeys are smarter, but they’re not very happy. There’s always a problem with them, but the dogs are pretty content unless the monkeys start giving them a hard time.”

“Is there a dog named Denise?”

She flicks me a glance. “Denise?” Pointing to a female bulldog: “Yes, there she is. Is she the one you want to know about?”

“If you don’t mind.”

She hesitates. “Is this authorized? Vikorn is supposed to keep me alive.”

“We took precautions, came in a cab; I’m sure we were not followed.”

Agitated, she gets up to fetch a Chanel handbag and a large hand mirror in silver frame. Without a hint of self-consciousness she opens the bag, takes out a silver box that might have been designed for snuff, drizzles a line of the white contents onto the mirror, scrapes it all together with a razor blade, leans over, presses one nostril with her left index while sniffing through the right, switches nostrils, and rises again to replace handbag and mirror on a nearby table, all in a seamless movement. Catching Lek’s eye: “For my nerves.”

Flicking me another glance, she sighs. “There are more farang women in the business than there used to be. Denise has been around quite a while now. At first she was a minor player, quite scatty. The British intelligence people, MI6, were spying on her in Ko Samui and Phuket. She never carried herself but used men as mules-a variation on the usual method. The men were always clapped-out white men, mostly Brits and Australians with no brains, beach bums with habits to feed. More than half of them got caught, so her reputation suffered, and everyone who knew anything about the business was afraid to carry for her. Somehow she made contact with the army and reinvented herself. But she had to convince the mules that she was properly connected in Thailand. One of Zinna’s men introduced her to me.”

“You arrange her credibility sessions?”

A smile. “You could put it like that. She became very careful about the men she used. They were still stupid but much more experienced. They weren’t the usual bums, they were part of the industry in their own countries, usually they had done jail time, but at least they knew the ropes. The last one, Chaz Buckle, knew a lot about Thailand and how the system works. He knew that the best way to leave the country with a suitcase full of dope was to have one of the authorities on your side. Cops or army.”

“He was her lover?”

“Yes. They usually are. She uses sex like that-I think it’s the way she gets her kicks.”

“He has her name tattooed on his arm.”

She shrugs. “Tattoos-what do they mean? They’re like T-shirts. But maybe they had a real thing going. After all, she introduced him to Zinna himself.”

“Why would Zinna agree to that?”

Locking eyes with me. “Because he suddenly found himself with more than a hundred kilos of morphine that he needed to move in a hurry. I think you know where the M came from. It’s the same stuff Vikorn used to try to frame him in that court-martial. He wanted to get rid of it right away because he knew Vikorn would be on to him. He needed the carriers to take as much as twenty, thirty kilos at a time-you can’t do that with amateurs; you have to use people who know what they’re doing. And such people want security. In Thailand they want to know someone big is on their side to ensure a smooth passage out of the country. They tend to be wise to the scam that uses a small-time carrier as a sacrificial decoy while the big shipment goes undetected.”

“The meeting took place here?”

“Yes. I’m the neutral ground.”

“Zinna came with some of his men?”

“Of course. It was quite a show. The farang carrier Buckle was very impressed.” She glances out the window, then back to me.

“Thank you,” I say. “That’s what I needed to know.”

She smiles politely and gets up to lead us downstairs. Clearly this is as much risk as she can take. The interview is over. Outside, on the magnificent pillared porch, she rests her eyes on Lek. “Can you really take care of him? He’s too beautiful, too innocent.” Reaching out, she strokes his hair as if he were a dog. “Poor darling hasn’t been wounded yet. I do hope you survive.”

In the cab Lek controls himself for as long as he can, then blurts: “So when do I get to see Fatima?”

“I’ve got to prepare her. She may not want the responsibility. Give me a week or so.” Softening my words with a smile: “I’m quite busy, you know.”