Griswold attesting that I represented her in a search for her

missing brother-in-law.

“I don’t know where Mr. Gary go,” Kawee told us in a

breathy voice, his eyes fixed not on Timmy and me but on the

exit. We had found him placing offerings at Griswold’s shrine.

74 Richard Stevenson

He had left one marigold garland, a lotus bud, and an open can

of Pepsi with a straw sticking out of it.

I said, “Mr. Gary may be in trouble — we know that — but

we are not the trouble. We need to let him know that we can

help him with his trouble. You can help him by helping us do

that. Don’t you want to help Mr. Gary? Isn’t he your friend?”

“Yes, he my friend.”

“How do you talk to him? By telephone?”

“No, no telephone. He tell me no telephone.”

“When did he tell you this? Have you seen him?”

“He just phone me. On my mobile. But he doesn’t have

phone. He call from Internet shop.”

“In Bangkok?”

“I don’t know.”

“When was the last time?”

“Before two days.”

I asked Kawee if Mr. Gary was his boyfriend.

“No, no boyfriend. Friend friend. Mr. Gary help me so

much. He is kind man.”

“Where did you meet Mr. Gary?”

“At Paradisio. That gay sauna for meet people for sex. Most

farang just want to fuck Thai boy. But Mr. Gary, he love the

Buddha. He is kind. I help him, and he help me. I take care of

flowers and I make offerings until he come back.”

“When will he come back? Did he say?”

“No. Maybe long time. He send me money for offerings —

and for me. He help me very much.”

“But he does come here sometimes, late at night. Do you know why?”

“No. Mr. Gary no say.”

I asked Kawee how money from Mr. Gary was sent to him.

In an envelope via motorbike messenger, he said. Once a week,

to the room he shared with three others in Sukhumvit. Then the

THE 38 MILLION DOLLAR SMILE 75

messenger picked up Griswold’s mail, which Kawee had

collected from his friend’s mailbox. Here was a direct link to

Griswold that looked as if it would be not too difficult to

follow.

I said, “Did Mr. Gary tell you why he is not living here at

home?”

“No. He not tell me. Maybe Mango know.”

At last. “Who is Mango?”

“He was Mr. Gary’s boyfriend. But he hiding, I think.”

“They are no longer boyfriends?”

“They fight.”

“Fight?”

“Big argue. Mango angry Mr. Gary.”

“Mango made Mr. Gary angry? What did he do?”

“No, Mango angry. He say Mr. Gary bring bad luck. Mango

make merit, he say, but Mr. Gary bad luck. Bad men try hurt

Mango. He must hide.”

“In Bangkok?”

“I think so. I saw him many time.”

“Where did you see him?”

“Paradisio.”

“How can he hide in a public place?”

“No, Paradisio safe for him. The bad men he hiding, they no

go there. They not gay, he don’t think.”

“When did you last see Mango at Paradisio?”

“Last Sunday. He like go Sunday. Me also. Sunday busy.”

“Today is Sunday. Will you be going today?”

“I think so.”

“Would you mind if Timmy and I tagged along?”

“Tagalog?”

76 Richard Stevenson

“Came with you. Maybe Mango will be there and you can

point him out to us.”

Kawee thought about this. “Are you gay?”

“Yes, we are. Timothy and I are partners.”

He smiled for the first time. “Which one top?”

Timmy said, “Oh, really.”

“It depends on the phases of the moon,” I said.

“Ahh.”

We made a plan to meet at the entrance to Paradisio at two.

“Maybe you meet Mango,” Kawee said. “Anyway, you have

too much fun!”

Timmy said, “Too much fun is just barely enough for us,”

and Kawee looked over at him and smiled coyly.

§ § § § §

“The motorbike guy is a bad actor,” Pugh said. “I don’t

mean a bad actor like Jean-Claude Van Damme is a bad actor,

or Adam Sandler. I mean he’s a mean and dangerous man with

a criminal history that you want to be very, very careful of.”

We were back at the hotel and about to head out for lunch

when Pugh phoned me.

“Rufus, you’re obviously well connected with the police you

think so poorly of.”

“The police are still the police. But this man’s name I

obtained from a friend at AIS, the mobile phone service. A

police official, did, however, run the name for me. The

information is reliable too. This helpful acquaintance is a

captain to whom I send a case of Johnny Walker once a month

on his birthday.”

“He sounds old.”

“And wise. And often informative. As today. I won’t recite

the motorbike man’s full Thai name. You’ll never remember it.

He goes by the nickname Yai. That means large. Perhaps his

name should be Yai Leou, big and bad.”

THE 38 MILLION DOLLAR SMILE 77

“I’m making a linguistic note.”

“Yai served two years on an assault charge. He ran his

motorbike over an Austrian man who chastised Yai for driving

on the sidewalk. Yai turned the bike around and drove into the

man, knocking him to the ground. Then he turned around and

drove over the man a second time, causing serious injuries. It

was lucky for Yai that the victim was a tourist. If he had done

the same thing to a Thai of any consequence, he might have

been facing considerable hard time.”

“And what are Yai’s current pastimes?”

“This is unclear. Some of his associates are people with

likely narcotics connections and others have probably been

involved with the trafficking of human beings — sex slaves for

our pious Muslim brothers in Riyadh and certain C of E

chappies in Belgravia. Yai, my sources believe, is at this time

freelancing. So we must learn more about Yai, but we must take

great care in doing so.”

“I’ll leave that up to you.”

“Yes, for now.”

Rufus had made a number of calls to gay bar owners and the

bars’ habitués to get a bead on Mango. I told him we might not

need any of that, for I had found and spoken with Kawee, who

not only knew who Mango was but where he sometimes could

be found.

“Ah, Paradisio. One of the few revered institutions of

Bangkok I have not had the privilege of setting foot in.”

“They would let you in even if you’re not gay. I’ll bet you

could fake it.”

He laughed. “Could, and after a beer or two, have done.

Was Kawee otherwise helpful in our search for Mr. Gary?”

I told Pugh what little I had learned from Kawee. I said that

since Griswold phoned Kawee from time to time, I had urged

him to tell Griswold that friendly people were looking for him

and wanted to help him out of whatever trouble he was in. I

dictated Kawee’s multi-syllabic full name, which the young

katoey had somewhat reluctantly provided me, so that Pugh

78 Richard Stevenson

could check Kawee’s mobile phone records and try to ascertain

which Internet café Griswold had been phoning from. This

could help locate him in a particular Bangkok neighborhood, if

he was in the city.

Pugh said he would do this, and he asked me to alert him if I

was able to track down Mango. “I’m thinking,” Pugh said, “that

we should stake out Paradisio and, if Mango appears, tail him. I have staff who can do this, and quite expertly.”

I said that sounded good. “If I meet Mango, I’ll follow him

outside when he leaves and pass him off to your team. But how

will your guys recognize me?”

“I have already seen to that.”

“You photographed me? I missed that, Rufus.”

“No, your photo appeared in the Albany Times Union on July twelfth, two years ago. This was after you got into what the