Colin Cotterill - Curse of the Pogo Stick

“In schools two weeks’ walk from a village, in classrooms where few people speak a familiar language.”

“Of course not every child is able to attend. We have to select the brighter children.”

“Like Hitler.”

Judge Haeng’s acne flared like neon from the frustration of teaching new tricks to an old dog. Siri was calmly peeling a mandarin. A silver pheasant flapped in front of the slow-moving vehicle. The driver and Siri smiled at the omen. Haeng didn’t notice.

“We need to educate them, Siri. Do you know?”

“Know what, Judge?”

“Know what their religion is?”

“Judaism?”

“Shamanism, Siri. They believe in spirits. They have witch doctors dealing with medical matters.”

There came a distant rumble as if the earth had a stomach complaint. The dry lotus garland that hung from the rearview mirror began to swing wildly. Haeng seemed oblivious to it.

“They hold sйances and exorcisms-”

“Judge Haeng?”

“-and devil worship. What kind of children…?”

The world seemed to fall on them at that moment. The entire cliff came crashing down in front of the Land Rover. Rocks and earth smashed the windscreen and dented the hood. Siri turned his head in time to see the jeep far back on the road disappear as another wall of rocks and uprooted trees landed between them. He believed it was only a matter of time before a boulder-a big lump of rock with his name engraved on one side-came crashing onto the roof, leaving him and his boss a dimension short, flat and lifeless as roti. He even looked up defiantly at the car’s overhead light. But the end didn’t come. Only a peculiar silence he felt obliged to break.

“Well,” he said, “that’s livened up an otherwise dull day.”

He promised himself he’d never shout at a Party conference again. He wondered how much more hopeless the situation could become, but he didn’t have long to wait for an answer. The first bullet hit a tire and their vehicle sank toward the northeast. The bodyguard began to fumble at his holster. The second bullet grazed the roof.

“Oh, my God,” Haeng screamed. “It’s an ambush.”

Siri finished peeling his orange and handed a slice to the panicking judge. He knew from experience that all the squealing in the world wouldn’t help them now.

Bullets whistled in their direction from the steep grassy incline above them. The driver ducked into the space beneath his steering wheel and hugged the foot pedals. The bodyguard finally had his shaking pistol in his hand. His first shot narrowly missed Haeng and smashed the rear window.

Haeng screamed, “We’re surrounded.” He fell across the guard and grabbed for the far door handle. “Siri, for heaven’s sake. Do something.”

Siri ate the orange slice and wondered. In the brief few seconds since the ambush had begun, he’d already come to a conclusion. If the attackers really wanted them dead, the passengers would have been knocking on the gates of Nirvana after the first volley. Over twenty shots had been fired and only the first had made contact. If this wasn’t an attack by some blind bandit gang, the ambushers had a plan for them.

“I suggest you relax,” Siri shouted above the gunfire.

“Idiot!” shouted Haeng. It was his last word. He was able to wrestle open the door and, in throwing himself out, he managed to drag the bodyguard with him. Both men tumbled onto the dust and scrambled on all fours into the vegetation below. Within a second they were out of sight. Siri felt a sharp prick at the back of his neck. He turned to see a figure, the head wrapped in a sarong with just a narrow slit for the eyes. They were beautiful eyes. The assailant held up a thin stiletto as if to show Siri what had done the damage. Before he passed out, Siri offered the young lady the remnants of his orange.

“Look! You can’t just play policeman,” Phosy told the three amateur sleuths sitting around the table at the back of Madame Daeng’s shop. Moths and flying beetles strove to avoid collisions as they circled the hanging lightbulb above their heads. “Let the professionals handle this, won’t you?”

A burst of laughter would have been less bruising to his professional pride than the ironic raised eyebrows and pursed lips that met his comment.

“What?” he asked. “We have good people.”

“And you are one of them,” Civilai assured him. “But until your return this afternoon, it appears that the charge sheet had sat in an in tray on somebody’s desk.”

“We’re understaffed.”

“And will continue to be,” Civilai added. “And meanwhile, your pregnant wife is in extreme danger.”

Dtui remained diplomatically silent. Phosy looked around at the unlikely detectives. He’d tried and failed to deter them from irresponsible acts in the past and he had to admit, as a team, they were far more effective than the converted foot soldiers he was training at police headquarters.

“Well, I suppose attack is the best form of defense,” he conceded. The group cheered. Dtui gave his cheek a friendly sniff and refilled the glasses.

“Good,” Madame Daeng said. “So, let’s get down to it. Comrade Civilai, what other insights did your contacts come up with?”

“The military believe the hand grenade in the stomach of the corpse was one commonly used by the Royal Thai Army. As most of the aggression against us is launched from that side of the border, I suppose that’s only to be expected. As we only identified the Lizard from the photograph this afternoon we haven’t had time to contact the department at the Security Division responsible for her case file.”

“I can do that,” Phosy told them.

“And we’re certain this is the Lizard in the photograph?” Daeng asked.

“Well, she does look like most other skinny old ladies,” Phosy said. “But I’d go along with Mr. Geung on this one. Siri and I are the only two who met her in person so she is aware we can identify her. The only thing in our favor is she doesn’t know we’ve connected her to the bombing attempt. That gives us the edge.”

“I showed the photo around at the hospital today,” Dtui told them. “None of the other patients in the picture could recall seeing her before or after that afternoon. They say she wheeled herself there and joined them at about twelve. She acted senile. Didn’t get into a conversation with anyone.”

Phosy took a swig of the Thai rum generously donated by Civilai for the occasion. “All right then,” the policeman said. “So we know she was there at lunchtime. We also know the autopsy was delayed till five. So do we assume she was sitting there all afternoon in her wheelchair? Wouldn’t some of the hospital staff have approached her to find out if she was all right?”

“Good point,” Dtui said. “I’ll ask around tomorrow. I imagine she would have been safe there until they called the other patients back into the ward. After that she would have been a bit conspicuous.”

She looked at her new husband. She was very fond of him when he was in his managerial mode. She could almost see the dials clicking over in his brain. She brushed her hand against his arm and he pulled away self-consciously.

“I’ll see whether Security can give me extra copies of the wanted poster,” he said. “It wouldn’t hurt to have them placed around the hospital. It might jog someone’s memory. We can write something like ‘If you see this woman-”‘

“Shoot her!” Dtui cut in.

“I was thinking more of ‘Please report her to hospital officials’ or something, just in case she tries again. It might help if we knew where she got the dead body from. We can’t do anything about that until somebody reports him missing.”

“And the problem with that,” Civilai said, “is that nobody trusts the police enough to report a missing relative.”