Colin Cotterill - Thirty-Three Teeth

“Which one?”

It was the same rude spirit speaking through the whittler.

“What?”

“Well, you said there can only be one politico-spiritual influence, one doctrine. But you mentioned two: Marx and Lenin. That’s confusing for the brainless peasants. Which one do they choose, arsehole?”

“Guards. Take this man-”

“It’s not me!” the man protested.

“-and his malevolent spirit outside.”

Two men in uniform escorted the embarrassed shaman out of the room. He walked calmly, but his resident troublemaker protested and blasphemed all the way to the door and beyond it.

“Pagan commie leeches. King killers. Organ suckers!”

When he was gone, Houey took a deep breath and continued.

“I’m delighted to announce that on this historic day, marked by the long-overdue erasure of the vestiges of the illegal royal bourgeoisie, the so-called royal spirits are also to be disbanded.”

There was a shocked buzz of comments around the room. Some laughed.

“Quiet! I’ve called you here today because you are going to summon the spirits and give them an ultimatum.” The murmur became a sea of bold comments and jokes. The audience laughed at each one-liner, and order was lost. The men on the stage reached for their whistles, but a much calmer sound quieted the rabble. Siri’s partner had begun to speak. His voice somehow threw a blanket of respectful silence over the others.

“If you please, Comrade Houey. It isn’t that easy.”

Houey looked for the source of the comment and saw the white-haired man and Siri for the first time. He became very angry.

“Is that you speaking, or are you a damned ventriloquist’s dummy as well?”

The man rose silently and far more elegantly than he had sat down. It was as if he were rising to full height in an elevator.

“No, sir. It is I. I am Tik Kwunsawan. I was the official court spiritual counselor to the late king. Forgive me for speaking out of line, but requesting the spirits to attend isn’t like calling pupils into a classroom. The conditions-”

“Well, Comrade Tik Kwunsawan, this is no request. If the spirits wish to be a part of the new democratic republican network, they have to toe the line. This is a State directive.”

“The State may as well order a rainbow, Comrade.”

“Sit yourself back down, old man. You don’t have any exclusive rights on the spirit world. Look.”

He held up the stapled booklet that was in front of him on the table.

“This is the official manual, issued by the Department of Culture in Vientiane, for the summoning of spirits.”

No joke could have drawn a bigger laugh than that. Not even Tik, rejoining Siri on the floor, could hold back his laughter. Siri recalled his visit to the Ministry the day after the suicide. He imagined the officials in one of those bare offices poring over the texts to remove all the religious and royal references from the ceremony. He was surprised there was enough left to make a manual. But it was significant that they hadn’t seen fit to ban the practice altogether. Too many of the country’s remaining three million people had come through life on the wings of the spirits to banish them completely.

The whistlers brought the crowd back to order, but before Houey could continue, the glue-haired woman asked: “If you can do it all with that little book, why do you need us at all?”

“Right,” echoed the audience.

Houey shook his head and smiled. “This is the very essence of socialism, my sister. We work together as a team. You help me and I help you. Despite our differences, despite our deep resentments and doubts, cooperation turns us into one single body. We are all here ultimately for one purpose.”

“And what is today’s purpose, Young Brother?” Tik asked in his quiet voice that still carried to the rafters of the building. Houey nodded to a sheet of paper in his colleague’s hand.

“We shall be giving the spirits this ultimatum.” Tik held back his smile. “They will have three choices. Three choices are very fair, I believe, considering the State has no legal obligation to them. The first-”

“Wait,” Tik said. “If these are conditions for the spirits, they should be here to listen, don’t you think?”

Siri looked around. It was obvious that the shamans were confused. How could they bring the spirits to a place like this? Houey consulted with his table mates. “That won’t be necessary.”

“How else can we be sure to get the message to all of them?” Tik asked.

“We were thinking you could sort of pass it on to them once we’d left, or when you got home.” Houey seemed to be getting paler.

“Goodness me, no. Much easier if they hear it straight from the horse’s mouth. Let’s bring them here.”

“That really isn’t-”

“Brother and sister shamans,” Tik said in a louder voice, slowly rising to his full height, “let us invite the spirits to attend their final meeting.’’

“I don’t th-”

But Tik had already begun a peculiar dance. He chanted in a tongue that neither Siri nor the others present had ever heard. If anything, it bore a close resemblance to a North American Indian rain dance.

Tik moved slowly toward the throng, raising his hands to call down the spirits and stamping his feet in time with his chant. At first the shamans looked on as if senility had taken him. But then one Hmong little lady zero stood and followed him, copying his rhythm and his gestures. She chanted counterpoint to his bass.

The men on the stage looked sideways at one another, not knowing how to react or what to say. This wasn’t what they had planned. One by one, the shamans stood and joined the line. One child dragged her hooded father by the hand. A toothless gash appeared on one ancient woman’s face, and she leaped to her feet, twirling and yelling like a young girl.

Siri had never attended a mass seance before and he was unsure of the protocol. But there was one point of which he had no doubt: there wasn’t a hope in heaven or hell that this fiasco would bring any spirits into the Luang Prabang Town Hall. He laughed to himself, got to his feet, and joined the conga.

The rhythm was strong now, and all the guests were riding the giant eel around the room. Those with instruments played them. Those without screamed and whooped and looked upward to the invisible heavenly ropes, down which the imaginary ghosts would descend. Without warning, Tik stopped and turned his head so suddenly toward the top table that the four men held on to their heartbeats. The room shushed.

“They’re coming,” Tik said in a whisper. He looked up, reached his hands to the ceiling and seemed to swell up. “Welcome.” All the others followed suit. Some twitched, as if the fit of the arriving spirits didn’t match their bodies. Some gulped them in like air. Some took handfuls of them and forced them into their ears.

And, like a sudden audience of zombies, Tik and the shamans turned toward the stage as slowly as melting ice, as silent as the graves from which the spirits had supposedly come. With eyes large and unblinking, they stared at Houey with their teeth bared.

The cadres on the stage were apparently in some kind of trance too. They looked down on the sea of drooling, staring people possessed by god knew how many angry spirits. It was a situation the manifesto hadn’t prepared them for. The crotch of the Security Officer’s trousers was already a noticeably darker green than the rest of his uniform. Siri could just see the parchment-white face of Comrade Houey. He had to give the governor credit: he didn’t run. In fact, although his voice trembled, he attempted to continue his speech.

“Comrade spirits. It … it has been vested in me, as a … a representative of-” He’d forgotten to breathe and the words stopped. He smuggled in one or two deep breaths to calm himself. “As a representative of the lprp, to make the following announcement.”