Colin Cotterill - Love Songs from a Shallow Grave

The fish and vegetables they served were fresh and, they had to admit, delicious. But the lunch table conversation was torturous. Every topic was a slow drip of water onto the forehead. Whenever light and jovial threatened, the Khmer would step in to redirect the mood in the direction of sombre and dull. There were no servants. The Lao diplomatic staff delivered the meals and collected the dishes without speaking.

It was during the distribution of the pumpkin custard slices that one young diplomat dropped a spoon on Siri's lap. It was a minor inconvenience as there had been nothing on the spoon at the time. Siri reminded him that, as far as he knew, they didn't teach the dishing up of pudding at the foreign diplomats' school, but the young man made a terrible fuss. He bowed and threw his hands together in apology and berated himself. And, as he leaned over to right whatever wrong he thought he'd done, he dropped a folded napkin into the doctor's lap and engaged his eyes briefly.

Siri finished his dessert, asked where the bathroom was, and excused himself. There was no lock on the bathroom door so Siri leaned against it and unfolded the white cloth serviette. In laundry pen were written the words:

Siri. Find an excuse not to go on the a.m. trip. Stay here. Urgent. Kavinh.

Siri pulled the chain, climbed onto the porcelain toilet and dropped the napkin into the overhead cistern. He waited a few minutes before returning to the table. His rendition of a man suffering from diarrhoea and stomach cramps was spectacular. He'd obviously seen his fair share of victims. The noises he somehow produced from his bowel region were frightening enough to make everyone in the room fear they might forfeit their own lunches. Siri was led to a camp bed in a back room, covered in a blanket, and left to groan. Knowing his friend's solid constitution, only Civilai saw anything suspicious about the attack and he kept his doubts to himself.

"I'm not really feeling too well myself," Civilai announced. "I'm wondering whether something in the lunch was off."

"I assure you — " the short-haired minder began.

"But, at least one of us should make the effort," Civilai decided. "I'll carry our flag to your collective, comrades. Let's hope my colleague is well enough to attend the reception this evening. I'd hate for this to turn into a diplomatic matter."

He told them he wouldn't push the issue with the Chinese as long as the doctor was given care and rest for the afternoon. The guide seemed almost relieved to leave Siri there. And so it was that Civilai and Comrade Chenda boarded the bus to District Seventeen and Siri did not.

Phnom Penh, under whatever tyrant or warlord, had always observed the colonial French custom of sleeping after a good meal. Those two hours during the hottest part of the day belied the claim that Kampuchea did not know worklessness. Comrade Ta Khev, the sun-blistered cadre attached to the Lao embassy, was no exception. As soon as the man began his customary afternoon nap, and the bestial sounds of his snoring could be heard behind the door of his room, the embassy came alive. One diplomat was posted in front of the cadre's room. Ambassador Kavinh was kneeling on the floor at Siri's cot, hugging him like a newly deceased relative. It was a desperate and unexpected gesture.

"Siri, Siri, my old friend," he whispered.

"Kavinh? I thought you'd forgotten me."

"My past is the only thing I can think fondly of," he replied. It was a curious comment but Siri instinctively understood it.

"Come, we don't have much time," Kavinh said, climbing slowly to his feet. "And there's a lot to do."

Siri was led through the house to the larder. In the corner stood a stack of wooden crates. Those on the top contained cans of meat and fish. The lower boxes were apparently empty. Two of the junior diplomats quickly slid the stack to one side and revealed a large metal ring on a hinge embedded in the wooden floorboards. They prised the ring upwards and pulled. A heavy trapdoor lifted slowly and without sound and Siri found himself staring down into a black pit. The embassy staff looked at him and gestured that he should go down. Siri, it had to be said, had a problem with black pits. Some of his worst living nightmares had taken place in such places. He baulked.

"Really, Siri," said Kavinh. "We don't have much time before the bastard wakes up."

"Oh well."

A metal ladder led down into the darkness. Siri took a deep breath and began to descend. The ambassador followed close behind. Siri arrived at a concrete floor He stood aside and Kavinh stepped down. The trapdoor closed and Siri could hear the rearrangement of the crates overhead. The darkness was total and overwhelming.

"Bien," said the ambassador.

There came a tinkle of glass, the strike of a match, and Siri saw a disembodied hand suspended in mid-air. It carried the flame to a wick and a dirty yellow light from an oil lamp bathed the cellar. Twenty eyes looked out of the ochre shadow.

"Good afternoon," said Siri.

There was a long moment of hesitation before four men and six women stepped up to him, smiling, taking his hand, squeezing his fingers. None of them spoke.

"This is the real briefing," Kavinh whispered. "It will have to be quick. But this is the information you need to take back to Vientiane when you leave."

"Who are these people?" Siri asked.

"They're Khmer. All of them. Some we found. Others found us. This room is ventilated and sound doesn't carry. But we have to be careful. If they're found we'll all be killed."

"But, why are they here?"

"Siri, you're going to learn a lot today that will stretch your belief. Things so horrific you won't sleep well for a year. We haven't had direct contact with Vientiane for eight months. We have no phone here. We can't travel without our minders. Every document passes through censors at the foreign ministry. So I haven't been able to alert our government as to what's happening. When I learned there would be a May Day reception and that a Lao delegation was invited, I knew it would be our best chance. Perhaps our last. I was so happy when I saw your name on the list, Siri. You're exactly the type of man I need to fight for us, for the Khmer."

The situation seemed somewhat ridiculous to Siri, far too melodramatic. A lot of film extras overacting. Anne Frank-like whispers in the attic. So the Khmer Rouge were paranoid. Weren't their own Pathet Lao? Didn't they also over-regulate Laos into a societal straitjacket? But, 'we'll all be killed'? Come on. Siri was tempted to smile and would have done so but for the serious expressions all around him. A girl, probably no older than twenty, brought over two stools. She gave one to Siri and sat on the other. Ambassador Kavinh and all the pale dwellers of the cellar sat on the ground with their legs crossed and their backs straight.

The girl was paler than the others. Siri wondered how long she'd been here in this sunless place. She was pretty but her young face was drawn now and her eye sockets were hollow and grey. She began to speak in French.

"My name is Bopha," she said. "My father was the curator of the Khmer national museum." Her voice was like thin ice disturbed by the rippling of a pond. Her grammar was perfect. Her accent suggested she'd lived in France for some time. She spoke carefully, searching for exactly the right words.

"I was his assistant," she continued. "I studied museum sciences at the Sorbonne. On April the seventeenth, 1975, my father and I were given an hour's notice to pack our belongings and join the exodus from Phnom Penh along with two and a half million other people. The Khmer Rouge told us we were all to go to the countryside to work. My father had been entrusted with the safety of our heritage, our national identity, our treasures. He refused to leave and asked to speak to a commanding officer. A young soldier spat at my father and cut off his head with a machete. I was standing beside him."