Colin Cotterill - The Merry Misogynist

She asked to speak to the driver who worked the Vang Vieng to Ban Xon route. They were in luck. He was still at the yard and scheduled to leave with an empty truck after breakfast. Dtui reminded him about his behaviour at the morgue the previous day. Sober, he was a humble and sensible man who was happy to accept this opportunity to put back the pieces of his 'broken' face in the eyes of Dr Siri and his nurse. He agreed to take Mr Boonhee and the body of the invisible woman home.

Boonhee thanked everyone at the morgue for their help. While they wrapped and loaded the body, Siri sat with him in the office.

"How is Mongaew taking it?" he asked.

"Don't think she'll ever get over it," the farmer said. "This was all her doing. She thinks that because of her, Ngam never had a normal life. And just when it finally starts to go right…"

"I know." Siri was tempted to say she shouldn't blame herself, but deep down he knew she should. What she had put her daughter through was inexcusable. So, instead, he nodded.

"Comrade Boonhee, we, I mean the police, have been in touch with the Highways Department. They do have a Phan or two but not one who was away in your district on the dates you gave me. In fact, they don't have any projects in progress or planned for Ban Xon."

"Well, that don't make sense." Boonhee was still trying to work it all out. "Phan stayed at the headman's place. He had a letter and everything."

"Comrade Boonhee, I took a detour via Vang Vieng on my way back yesterday and I talked to a police sergeant who's investigating this case. He'll be travelling up to talk to your headman very soon. If there was a letter of introduction there should be a name and position on it. That might help us locate him."

"You think he done it, don't you?"

"It's too early to say, Comrade. But as far as we know he was the last person to see your daughter alive. When I left your farm I stopped by the regional registry office. There was no record of a marriage on March the seventh."

"No, he…Phan said it was better to register here in Vientiane. He brought all the papers signed and stamped when he turned up for the ceremony. He said Ngam would have more rights here, easier to get a passport, he said. But the ceremony was all proper, brother. We had the local official tie the wrists, and they made their vows. We even had a monk there. In the eyes of heaven it was decent."

Phosy arrived back from Luang Nam Tha just as the rice truck was pulling out of the hospital grounds. He went straight to the morgue and directly into Siri's office. He was obviously worked up about something.

"Siri, I did it. I met the — "

"Good health, Inspector Phosy."

"What? Yeah, anyway, I — "

"I'd imagine, as you've been away for a few days, you'd probably want to go directly into the cutting room and say hello to your very pregnant wife."

Phosy smiled and put his pack on the chair.

"Exactly what I was planning to do," he said.

It was a brief reunion because three minutes later he was back.

"Now," said Siri.

"Did I just see a body in the truck going out?"

"You did."

"Was it…?"

"It was."

Siri spent the next fifteen minutes going over the details of his trip north. Phosy was scribbling as fast as he could in his already full notepad, stopping Siri now and then to clarify and expand.

"I need to get back to headquarters as soon as I can to find out what's happening," Phosy decided. "You know? Most of this country's in an information black hole. People up in Luang Nam Tha get more news from Beijing than they do from Vientiane. Only the military seem to have any operable communication equipment and that's for authorized personnel only. When I was military intelligence I outranked all those stuffed shirts up there. But out of uniform they treated me like I was a pig farmer. I have a good mind — what are you laughing at?"

Siri swung back onto his favourite two legs of the chair and put his hands behind his head.

"Phosy, I never begrudge a man a good grumble, but I was rather hoping to hear what transpired in the deep north."

"You're right." Phosy flipped back through his notes but started to speak without referring to them. "I didn't have any trouble finding the lycee student's sister. But I did have a problem getting her to speak. She denied she'd ever heard the story. It wasn't till I told her I'd travelled half the country just to talk to her and I'd arrest her little sister for lying that her memory started to come back. It turns out she'd picked up the story from her boyfriend. He'd heard it from a fellow who used to be in the army. He was the horse's mouth."

"He'd seen it for himself?"

"And tried to forget. It was early in '69. Chaos everywhere. Most of the fighting was concentrated around Huaphan and the east. But it spilled over into the northernmost provinces from time to time. The Royalists were recruiting younger and younger conscripts to defend key installations. Nobody up there really wanted to fight against their own people, but the RLA was one of the few employers that offered a living wage. The young fellow who told the story was called Sida. He'd only been stationed in Luang Nam Tha town for two months. The local police had already fled the scene for fear they'd be shot in their beds by PL sympathizers. The regional army commander had to do something to convince the locals somebody was keeping the peace. He didn't want all-out anarchy. So, as a token gesture, he sent half a dozen of his young boys to man the police box in town. They weren't qualified to do anything but walk around the streets and look official. Heaven forbid they'd have a crime to investigate.

"Sida's on duty one afternoon when a hunter comes down from the hills and reports he's seen a body. The boy's very first case, not even a drunk and disorderly or littering offence before that. So Sida and his pal follow the hunter up the hill road. They don't expect much of a shock. There's a civil war on. People are getting killed all the time. All they have to do is identify which uniform the victim is wearing and file a report. But twenty metres off the main road they see her."

"Tied to a tree."

"Exactly like our girl in Vang Vieng. But this one had been there a little longer. There was significant animal damage so you can imagine the scene. Two young conscripts without any battleground experience…"

"I'd guess not even war could have prepared them for a sight like that."

"After they throw up their lunch, they decide they should tell someone. Our boy Sida stays with the body while his pal runs off to find the army commander. And our boy gets bold. He unties the ribbons that bind her hands, and she falls backwards, and that's when he sees the pestle. If he'd had any more lunch…"

"Did anyone report it?"

"It all seemed to vanish. The commander told them he'd handle it and that they shouldn't mention a word of it to anyone. I imagine he didn't want a panic on his hands. While Sida was still on duty in the town, not one person came forward to report a missing girl. Case closed."

"Did you get this directly from Sida?"

"No. For obvious reasons, he didn't stick around once the PL took over. It appears he was pretty close to the nurse's boyfriend, though. But you're right, it's all hearsay. Nothing we could use in court. There were one or two little details that make it obvious this was the same perpetrator."

"Like the ribbon?"

"And candles…little temple candles. And the pestle was black stone."

"That's him all right. Did Sida remember any physical signs? Did he notice whether the girl had been strangled?"

Phosy went through his notes. "No. I get the impression she was pretty far gone as animal feed by the time they found her. I was surprised what a detailed description Sida was able to give his friend. I'd be surprised if he doesn't still have nightmares about it. He talked about her face being gone and one of her fingers hanging off. There was gore every — "