Colin Cotterill - Thirty-Three Teeth

“Manoluk, we should talk about this again, but right now I have something urgent that needs taking care of. I’m going to have to run.”

He returned the textbook, gave Dtui’s mother her juice, and headed for the door.

“Thanks for coming in. Tell Dtui not to worry about me.”

“I will.”

He felt overwhelmed. As he shut the clunky door that didn’t fit its frame, tears came to his eyes. They were tears for Dtui and her dreams, and for her mother and her lifetime investment in her daughter. And they were tears of helplessness. Where on earth could he look next?

That’s when he remembered something Civilai had said.

Despite constant prodding and poking from the Party, Civilai had still managed to avoid installing a telephone in his house.

“If they want me that urgently, let them get out of bed and come and get me,” he said.

Siri and the bike trailing his pulled up in front of the wooden bungalow in the sprawling compound that had once housed the American community. If it weren’t for the vegetation, you’d swear you were in a suburb in South Dakota. The lprp had been only too delighted to take over this little piece of Americana and thumb their noses at the cia who were now confined to a couple of rooms at the embassy.

Six Clicks, as the Americans christened their home away from home, was six kilometers from town. It had a pool and a gymnasium and restaurants and was surrounded by a large wall that could make the expats forget they were in a nasty Southeast Asian country far from home.

As always, one of the armed guards from the main gate had accompanied Siri, just in case he had an urge to detour and assassinate the prime minister. He’d been here hundreds of times, and they still didn’t trust him. Siri beeped his horn.

Civilai appeared at the window and gestured for his friend to come in. His sweet wife appeared beside him and waved. Siri waved back but made no effort to get down from his bike. He pointed to his watch. Civilai had no choice but to come out to the street.

“We’re both over the hoof-and-mouth disease. You could come in, you know.”

“Sorry. I can’t stop. In fact, if you had a phone, I would have preferred to do this without the Six K’s.”

“Good, that. Coming from a man who only learned how to use a telephone last year. What’s so urgent?”

Siri looked at the guard and raised his eyebrows at Civilai, who dismissed the man. “It’s all right. He’s safe. You can go.”

The guard roared away, and Civilai came over to sit on his white front fence.

“You said at lunch you had a call from Dtui this morning.”

“And I thought you never listen to me.”

“It’s important, brother. She’s been missing all day.”

“Shit.”

“What was the call about?”

“Like I said, it was quite peculiar. She wanted to know whether there were any underground caverns or caves around the city.”

“You’re joking. How did she …? What did you tell her?”

“Well, do you recall the pl had its headquarters not far from the Black Stupa? It was just down from the U.S. compound. We used it as a base here till we took over.”

“Yeah.”

“We were always expecting to get attacked or kicked out. So we took a leaf out of the Viet Cong’s survival manual. We gave ourselves a number of escape options.”

“Tunnels?”

“That’s it. There’s quite a network down there.”

“Damn.”

“What is it?”

“Do any of those tunnels go in the direction of the river?”

“Of course. The water was the best way to get away at night. One of them actually passes directly under the French embassy.”

“How do you get access?”

“What are you hatching?”

“Just tell me.”

“Behind the main building, there’s an area covered with large paving stones. One of those stones has a small hole in one corner. You need a hook or some kind of jemmy. It lifts up.”

“Did you tell Dtui that?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Listen. Go find someone with a phone.”

“What is it?”

“I think Dtui found those tunnels and something happened to her down there. The best we can hope for is that she got herself lost. But I’m afraid she might have found our weretiger.”

“Our weret …?”

“Tell Phosy to get some men there, armed, as soon as he can. If he’s not around, call in the bloody army. I don’t care what it takes.”

He kicked the starter of his old bike.

“Where are you going?”

“Where do you think?”

“Siri, you do realize if she is down there with some animal or lunatic, she could already be …”

“I know. I’m putting my money on Dtui.”

He left eight inches of rubber on the road.

The creature that Seua had become sat on the riverbank watching the moon rise. He scratched at the blood-caked fur that covered him in patches and dipped his face into the muddy water to quench his thirst.

It would soon be over for another month. The nurse would be the last. With the moon at its zenith, he would make his fourth sacrifice on the steps of the Black Stupa. He would dedicate it to Nyut Vaj. It couldn’t be long, with all this love he showed, all this dedication, before his God would accept him into the eternal Kingdom. Then he would be at peace and cease to walk the earth in animal form.

He looked up again. It was time. Bent almost double, he prowled to the spot where the roots of the sadness tree tangled down the bank. He parted the thick reeds and crawled deep between the roots and into the earth.

Siri was in such a state when he arrived at the old pl headquarters compound that he almost drove into a pole out front. He skidded to avoid it and only righted himself at the last second. He killed the engine and ran to the gate. It was chained shut, and even with all the extra adrenaline pumping through his veins, too high to climb over.

He reached inside and felt around the chain for a padlock. There was none. The chain had been draped around the bars and tied like a rope. He wrestled it loose, opened the gate wide enough to get inside, and barged through. His heart was already beating fast when he started to run down the side of the main building and around to the back.

There he found himself on a grid of large rectangular concrete slabs. The moon was high and bright, and it didn’t take him long to find the secret entrance to the tunnel. He didn’t even need to use a tool to raise it; someone had been there before him and left the slab lying beside a gaping hole in the ground.

He hurried to it and looked down into a pit. A ladder of steep wooden steps led down into inky blackness. He had no hesitation: He lowered himself into the hole and, with his feet, felt his way down the rungs. The thought of sinking down into the earth reminded him of his being dragged below the stupa by the Phibob and without thinking, he stopped, undid the top buttons of his shirt, and re-hung the white talisman so that it was on the outside.

When the top of his snowy head was at the level of the ground, he reached into his shoulder bag for the flashlight. It was always there, so he hadn’t bothered to check before he left home. He never took it out, except on days when he got his teeth counted. His heart dropped. He’d forgotten to return the damned thing. It was missing.

It was a terrible moment. He was about to go down into the earth to find Dtui. He instinctively knew that every second could be vital, but he had no light. What help would he be if that thing were down there? At least the beam of a flashlight might have made it wary of him. How could he help if he couldn’t see? Suddenly a difficult project had entered the realm of the impossible. But there was no time and no choice.