Colin Cotterill - Thirty-Three Teeth

But the Party saw these gatherings as potential boiling pots of political unrest. They were afraid of young people, with the same fire that had once burned in their own breasts, raging through the village festivals and leading to a popular uprising. After eighteen months in power, paranoia had become a national symptom.

The first test would come in May. The popular rocket festival had been banned completely. “Too many people; too much gunpowder,” they’d said at the meeting. Civilai argued until he was no longer red in the face that you couldn’t just erase a festival that had been part of the culture for hundreds of years. The rocket festival was a fertility rite. It appeased the gods of the harvest and begged them to bring the rainy season. What would happen if the festival were banned and the rains didn’t start on time? What would the people think of their new regime then?

They scolded Civilai for his superstitious ways and voted him down-again.

“They’ll be sorry,” Civilai mumbled as the prime minister took his seat. “Look at those old fogies.”

“They’re all younger than you,” Siri reminded him.

“Only in years, Siri. In mentality they’ve all got one foot in the grave.”

“T … too … too bad Dtui can’t be here t … to … to see this,” Mr. Geung said, appropriately changing the subject. He sucked happily on his corn ice pole, a rare treat in those hard times. Civilai agreed.

“She’ll be up and about in a week or so. She should be here, considering that all her medical bills are going to be covered by this little performance.”

“And … and all the o … o … other nurses that get sick,” Geung reminded him.

“It’s a service the government should be offering, not you, Siri. We should-”

“Come on, Older Brother. Let’s enjoy this, can we?” Siri urged. “Take off your grumpy hat and relax.”

“Ha, grumpy hat.” Geung found that a hilarious concept and laughed contagiously. Civilai and Siri and a dozen people around them caught it.

“All right,” Civilai conceded. “I’ll enjoy myself.”

“Good.”

“On the condition that you tell me how you swung this little con.”

“Swung? Con? Civilai, this is a joint Ministry of Sport and Culture-Russian Embassy event. No swinging was involved. What do you mean?”

“Getting them both to agree to support your Nurses’ Fund, for one thing. That had to involve some very sharp political maneuvering, Dr. Siri.”

“Not really.”

A Ukrainian man with a guitar climbed up on the stage, sat on a rickety stool, and proceeded to warm up the audience with American folk songs translated into Russian.

“Come on.” Civilai leaned across Geung and spoke in a low voice. “How did you do it?”

Siri leaned over as well, but Geung found it all too funny, so he and Siri changed seats.

“You have to promise not to tell anyone.”

“Who’d listen to me?”

“Okay. I blackmailed them.”

“Who?”

“All of them. The ministry people, the Russians.”

“Oh, come on.”

“Really. The head of the archive department at dsic was moonlighting at Tong Kankum market, selling fish during office hours. That, you have to agree, is against regulations. So he thought it would be a very socially aware thing to offer the proceeds of a concert to the sick nurses.” “In exchange for …”

“My silence.”

“Okay. That I can believe. But the Russians? What have you got that they want?”

“Well, it was Dtui, actually, who sparked my interest. When she went to see Ivanic, she said she saw this nocturnal panda they’d just smuggled in through customs. I’d never heard of an animal changing its sleep habits to suit the weather, so it got me suspicious. I checked with my spy at Wattay. There hadn’t been any flights, direct or indirect, from China during the period they claimed the panda had arrived.

“So I tried a little bluff. You remember the bear at the Lan Xang that started all this fuss?”

“Yes.”

“Everyone had believed it was too infirm to have made it out of the hotel compound without help. So I wondered what type of person might love animals enough, and have the resources, to rescue the poor old girl. The name of Ivanic popped up in my suspicious mind. What if he and his secret police friends did a raid to spring the bear and take her to the circus compound?”

“He didn’t?”

“He would have needed a good cover story to explain the sudden appearance of a bear, especially as most of the armed forces were out hunting for it. That’s when he came up with the Chinese panda alibi.”

“How do you turn a Malay black into a panda?”

“Bleach, and enough shadows to make sure nobody gets too close. Once I’d come up with that little theory, it seemed more and more plausible. So I approached the Russian with it.”

“Well done.”

“Being a good Soviet Communist, he came straight to the point and asked me what I’d want to keep my mouth shut. So, here we are: circus day.”

“Siri, apart from myself, you have to be the most devious old bastard I know.”

He threw back his head and laughed, put his arm around his friend’s neck and kissed him on the cheek.

“Get off.”

“That’s wonderful, really. It makes up for everything else. It honestly does. God, I love you.”

He kissed him again.

Civilai giggled through the entire show. The big Lao girls in their underwear tumbled bravely and climbed into swaying towers of bodies. Three jugglers kept a lovely bunch of coconuts in the air for the longest time. A clown in ever-falling trousers brought excited howls and hoots from the huge crowd.

At halftime, a Lao orchestra came on the stage, and in front of them a smartly attired Mr. Inthanet and some Fine Arts students presented a play with the Royal Puppets. It was a magical moment, and when it was over the crowd truly believed they’d been honored to see it. The puppets got the loudest cheer of the night. They would return to their teak chest pumped with pride from a magnificent performance that would be talked about forever.

For the final act, a wagon covered in a black cloth was wheeled in front of the VIPs. Ivanic, in his leather thigh-high boots and a frilled pink shirt open to the navel, pranced down from the apron of the stage like the ham showman he was. He shouted some indecipherable words to the audience and grandly pulled back the cloth.

The glistening black puma, elegant and frightening under the glare of the spotlights, prowled back and forth in the small cage, growling at the huge audience. They first gasped at the sight of the magnificent creature, then applauded. With his arm twirling through the air and his deep incomprehensible voice enthralling the onlookers, Ivanic walked to one side of the cage. The puma charged at him. He charged back and the two stood eyeballing one another through the bars. Ivanic reached up and pulled a large metal pin from the side of the cage and the entire front flap dropped to the ground.

The sudden intake of breath almost sucked the performers into the audience. The creature looked to one side and tensed with excited apprehension. There was nothing now between it and the front row of the VIP seats but warm air and a sudden charge of anxiety. The old men tensed. Some stood and prepared to run. The bodyguards on either side reached for their pistols and took a step forward.

The puma froze. The audience froze.

“Eat ‘em,” shouted Civilai.

But before any eating could take place, Ivanic stepped bravely forward into the void ‘twixt the drooling animal and the perspiring VIPs. With his back to the puma, he raised his right hand. There came a growl from behind him and the animal seemed to half squat, ready to spring. Some women screamed, but they were the ones too far to see the calm on Ivanic’s face.