{"product_id":"slash-and-burn-isbn-9781616951788","title":"Slash and Burn","description":"\u003cb\u003eThe eighth Dr. Siri Paiboun mystery\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDr. Siri never really wanted to be Laos’s national coroner. And now that he is in his mid-70s, he longs to spend some time with his wife before the untimely death that is sure to befall him, according to the local transvestite fortune-teller. But retirement will have to wait (again) until he has completed one last job for the Lao government: supervising an excavation for the remains of a US fighter pilot who went down in the remote northern Lao jungle ten years earlier. And the stakes are high. The presence of American soldiers in Laos is controversial, and the search party includes high-level politicians and scientists. So when a member of the party is found dead, Dr. Siri suspects it may not have been an accident. Can Dr. Siri get to the bottom of the MIA pilot’s mysterious story before the body count rises and the fortune-teller’s prediction comes true?\u003cb\u003e\u003cu\u003ePraise for\u003ci\u003e Slash and Burn\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Dr. Siri Paiboun will be a gladdening complement to many mystery-reader’s table. If you are unfamiliar with Paiboun works, it is time to crawl out of whatever cave you have been living in.\" \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e—The Christian Science Monitor\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Any crime fan who hasn’t discovered the Dr. Siri books should start  here and then work back. This is the eighth and best, and it’s been far  too long since book seven.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Globe and Mail\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Outstanding . . . deftly inserts humor into what could easily have been an unrelentingly grim plot line.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e, Starred Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“The most entertaining case for Siri (\u003ci\u003eLove Songs from a Shallow Grave\u003c\/i\u003e, 2010, etc.) in years.” \u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003e—\u003ci\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Cotterill brings together all the elements that have made the stories so popular: a good mystery, plenty of humor, and a touch of the supernatural. A must for series fans.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eBooklist\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cu\u003ePraise for the Dr. Siri series\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Unpredictable . . . Tragically funny and magically sublime.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eEntertainment Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A wonderfully fresh and exotic mystery. If Cotterill had done nothing more than treat us to Siri's views on the dramatic, even comic crises that mark periods of government upheaval, his debut mystery would still be fascinating. But the multiple cases spread out on Siri's examining table are not cozy entertainments but substantial crimes that take us into the thick of political intrigue.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—Marilyn Stasio, \u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"You get a real feeling for what Laos was like in the '70s. The humor is wonderful, too.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eNew York Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"The sights, smells and colors of Laos practically jump off the pages of this inspired, often wryly witty first novel.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eDenver Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A fresh and innovative detective who goes straight to the heart and soul, without any sappty sentiment. THe author gives us exotic locations; a world that few us know well; crisp, intelligent, and often-witty writing; and most of all a hero unlike any other.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003ePhiladelphia Inquirer\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A crack storyteller and an impressive guide to a little-known culture.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eWashington Post Book World\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“This is the seventh and most sardonic of Mr. Cotterill’s Dr. Siri series, and it is not easy to cope with the combination of misery and merry melancholy that he employs. His writing, as always, is skillful and smooth and his plot is artfully strung together. The book fascinates as it chills.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eWashington Times\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"This wonderful series has consistently managed to convey the beauty and sadness of this damaged country through the wisdom and humor of its protagonist.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Boston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I love this elegantly written series, set in Laos with clever, septuagenarian coroner Dr. Siri. This one, the seventh, is the best, but all of them are terrific . . . A delightful mix of history and politics, and an excellent mystery.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Globe and Mail\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“It’s a rare treat to say that a book placed so far into a series is the best one. Authors more often than not run out of steam by the seventh book. Not Colin Cotterill.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Oregonian\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Colorful.\"\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e—\u003ci\u003eThe Seattle Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/i\u003eColin Cotterill is the author of ten other books in the Dr. Siri Paiboun series, including \u003ci\u003eThe Coroner’s Lunch\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThirty-Three Teeth\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eDisco for the Departed\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eSix and a Half Deadly Sins\u003c\/i\u003e. His fiction has won a Dilys Award and a CWA Dagger in the Library. He lives in Chumphon, Thailand, with his wife and five deranged dogs.\u003ci\u003eAugust 1968—The Prologue\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eYou know? Being shut up in a cage with a live bear was a piece\u003cbr\u003eof cake compared to being drunk and high in charge of half-amillion\u003cbr\u003edollars’ worth of flying metal. The full moon beckoned,\u003cbr\u003ehanging there like an ivory wok in a vast steel-gray sky. It spread\u003cbr\u003ethe landscape with an eerie monochrome like daytime to a dog.\u003cbr\u003eMedium-gray jungle against dark-gray mountains. Patches of charcoal\u003cbr\u003eand slivers of silver off the rivers. Boyd could make out every\u003cbr\u003eleaf, every rock, as clear as creation day. He was a god. Oh, yeah.\u003cbr\u003eA deity on a mission. The almighty protagonist in the movies they\u003cbr\u003emade before they could afford colour: starring Boyd Bowry in his\u003cbr\u003enever-ending quest for . . . cheese.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Cheese, little buddy,” he’d told Marcos. “I’ll bring you back\u003cbr\u003ea hunk of moon cheese. They let you scoop it right out. You want\u003cbr\u003efries or something with it?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Man, you shouldn’t leave me here with that,” was all Marcos\u003cbr\u003ecould come back with. Boyd remembered being at the door of\u003cbr\u003ethe cage then. He’d stopped, looked back at the bear: drunk,\u003cbr\u003esnoring, farting, head in her feed trough.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“She’ll be cool, man. Fix her a cup of coffee in the morning.\u003cbr\u003eTell her it was great. Leave your phone number.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMarcos had done one of those non-military salutes. That’s why\u003cbr\u003ethat finger’s so long, you know? Gets all the exercise. That was . . .\u003cbr\u003ewhat? An hour ago? Half an hour? Time lost all its credibility at\u003cbr\u003eten thousand feet with no colour in the world. Someone oughta\u003cbr\u003ewrite a PhD about that. The relationship between . . . between hue\u003cbr\u003eand chronology. The colour of minutes. He’d heard Marcos yelling\u003cbr\u003esome Filipino double Dutch at him as he walked away. The little\u003cbr\u003eguy was mad. Smiled a lot, but. . . .\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eNo, wait. Marcos? That’s not right. Marcos is the goddamned\u003cbr\u003epresident. The guy’s about to be eaten by a bear. The least I can\u003cbr\u003edo is remember his name. I’ve known him for. . . .\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOK, don’t be distracted now.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFocus.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eCheese.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIgnition and all that instrumental hoo-ha had been instinctive\u003cbr\u003eand that was just as well ’cause he couldn’t recall doing any of it.\u003cbr\u003eHe’d cranked her up, left the ground, and here he was heading\u003cbr\u003eoff to the heavenly moon deli service. A Sikorsky was a hell of a\u003cbr\u003elot safer than a Chevy in so many respects. Never drove a Sikorsky\u003cbr\u003einto a fire hydrant, for one. And if you did, the cops would never\u003cbr\u003ecatch up with you, for two. And, what else? A Chevy never surfed\u003cbr\u003emoon rays like a Sikorsky H34.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOh, no.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOh, yeah.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWhat a trip. What a goddamned trip. Just hanging in the gray,\u003cbr\u003elooking at the moon. It was cosmic. What happened to nights like\u003cbr\u003ethis? What happened to love and harmony, man? No peace and\u003cbr\u003equiet for those monkeys down there in the trees. For those big\u003cbr\u003elizards on the rocks. “Sorry guys.” At least he didn’t have to listen\u003cbr\u003eto his own engine growl. He had his headphones connected direct\u003cbr\u003eto the cassette player. The Who: Brits, but complex, man. Percussion\u003cbr\u003elike the punch of anti-aircraft flak.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd even though the music went straight into his brain and deadended\u003cbr\u003ethere, he got it into his head that the words were being\u003cbr\u003ebroadcast all over Nam to the east and Thailand in the west and\u003cbr\u003esome karmic interpretation service was sending the message to\u003cbr\u003efarmers in their bamboo beds. He shouted over the music, “You\u003cbr\u003ewere deceived, brothers, but you can see what we’ve done, right?\u003cbr\u003eYou’ve got the magic eyes? You know we’ll get ours in some other\u003cbr\u003elife. You’ve got that damned right. What do we know?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd that was when it happened; the actual date and time when\u003cbr\u003ethe sky fell on Chicken Little. There was a thump first, then an\u003cbr\u003eodd lack of vibration. One second the scenery was holding him\u003cbr\u003eup, the next a trapdoor opened in the universe and he fell through\u003cbr\u003eit. Gravity. What a concept! The fuel light was flashing like\u003cbr\u003eChristmas. There were “procedures.” He could probably send out\u003cbr\u003ea mayday. That was on the list. But who in their right mind would\u003cbr\u003ebe up at 2:00 A.M. waiting for some dopehead on a magical mystery\u003cbr\u003etour to call in? And timing, man. He was in fourteen thousand\u003cbr\u003epounds of metal heading down to earth with twenty canisters of\u003cbr\u003evolatile substance on board. Some rescue that would be. He disengaged\u003cbr\u003ethe rotors, waited for stability, unclamped his belt and rose\u003cbr\u003efrom his seat. He smiled at the briefcase sitting in the copilot’s\u003cbr\u003eseat but he didn’t have time to take it with him. He had barely\u003cbr\u003ethirty seconds of the rest of his life to look forward to. To sort\u003cbr\u003eit all out.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Use your time wisely, man.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWho should he think of? Who to pledge his love to? Who to\u003cbr\u003ehate? No, that last one was easy. That son-of-a-bitch was one day\u003cbr\u003eaway from getting his. And now, look at this. Goddamn it. A oneway\u003cbr\u003eexpress ticket to some big old Boyd barbecue. All in the timing.\u003cbr\u003eHe worked his way down the crawl space to the cabin and staggered\u003cbr\u003earound in there. He’d seen men die in all kinds of ways. He\u003cbr\u003eknew what St. Peter’s first question would be.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“How did you go down, son? Were you calm about it? We don’t\u003cbr\u003ewant no screaming girl scouts up here, boy.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSo Boyd opted for cool. When you’re cool, death doesn’t seem\u003cbr\u003ethat final.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThere was a village and all were asleep save two. They saw the\u003cbr\u003echopper come down, not like a rock, not plumb straight, more\u003cbr\u003ethe way a slab of slate might slice through water. They both saw\u003cbr\u003ethe wheel hit the tree tops then a spark and the big bird exploded—\u003cbr\u003espewed out a whole galaxy. One of the insomniacs smiled and\u003cbr\u003eclapped his hands but he could never tell anyone what he’d seen.\u003cbr\u003eThe other was so shocked she fell out of a tree, hit her head on\u003cbr\u003ethe way down and knocked herself blind. But the last image that\u003cbr\u003eprojected itself in her mind was as certain as the earth. She’d seen\u003cbr\u003eit. A dragon had collided with the moon. It had burst into a\u003cbr\u003emillion shards and the pieces cascaded across the jungle and there\u003cbr\u003ewould never be lightness again at night.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003e1\u003cbr\u003eAnother Fine Mess\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDr. Siri and Madame Daeng sat on the edge of the smelly bed\u003cbr\u003eand looked at the body hanging from the door handle opposite.\u003cbr\u003eThey were a couple not renowned for silence but this one lent\u003cbr\u003eitself most splendidly to speechlessness. They took in the too-red\u003cbr\u003elipstick and the too-tight underwear. They breathed the whiskey\u003cbr\u003efumes and the scent of vomit diluted with disinfectant. They’d\u003cbr\u003eboth seen their share of death, perhaps more than a fair share.\u003cbr\u003eBut neither had experienced anything like this.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Well,” said Daeng at last, uncomfortable in the early morning\u003cbr\u003equiet. The foggy mist rolled in through the window and rasped\u003cbr\u003ethe inside of her throat.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Well, indeed,” agreed her husband.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“This is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into, Dr. Siri.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Me? I didn’t do it.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“No. Not it exactly. It you didn’t do, I grant you. But the consequences\u003cbr\u003ethat led to it. They’ve got your fingerprints all over them.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Madam, judging from the evidence in front of us, I’d say this\u003cbr\u003ewould have occurred whether we were here or not. And it didn’t\u003cbr\u003eeven have to have happened here. This was a tragedy begging to\u003cbr\u003ebe let out of the bag.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Again, you’re right. But if you hadn’t volunteered yourself,\u003cbr\u003evolunteered us all, we’d be at home now beside the Mekhong\u003cbr\u003eeating noodles in relative peace. We wouldn’t be in this room with\u003cbr\u003ethis particular body, about to be embroiled in an international\u003cbr\u003escandal. This would be someone else’s problem. Someone in good\u003cbr\u003ehealth capable of handling it. But oh no. One last adventure before\u003cbr\u003eI retire, you say. What can go wrong? you say. Everything’s perfectly\u003cbr\u003esafe, you say. And look at us now. Five weeks ago we were perfectly\u003cbr\u003econtent and now we’re up to our necks in dung.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Come on, Daeng. Be fair. What could I have done to avoid it?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“What could you have done?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Yes.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e‘Torn up the note.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eFive Weeks Earlier\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt was true, just five weeks before, things had been normal. Well,\u003cbr\u003enormal for Vientiane. But first there was the haunting, then the\u003cbr\u003enote, then the Americans. And somewhere between the three life\u003cbr\u003ehad become complicated again. That was Laos in the late seventies\u003cbr\u003ethough, wasn’t it? What can you say? The place had always\u003cbr\u003ebeen mysterious, always been a victim of its politics and its confused\u003cbr\u003ebeliefs and its weather. While the north ex perienced a premature\u003cbr\u003edry season, the southern provinces were being flooded by Typhoon\u003cbr\u003eJoe. Worst hit was Champasak, the show province where almost\u003cbr\u003ehalf the country’s farming cooperatives had been established. All\u003cbr\u003eof them had been rained into submission and, once again, the\u003cbr\u003elocals were convinced that Lady Kosob, the goddess of the rice\u003cbr\u003eharvests, was displeased with government policy. The collectives\u003cbr\u003eprogram was doomed. This came as a blow to the ministry of\u003cbr\u003eagriculture who’d nationalized all the old royalist estates in preparation\u003cbr\u003efor this great socialist plan.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIf the weather wasn’t bad enough, the country’s close proximity\u003cbr\u003eto Kampuchea, once a cultural and commercial partnership,\u003cbr\u003ehad become a liability. Refugees fleeing the Khmer Rouge were\u003cbr\u003eflooding into Thailand and southern Laos. The Lao government\u003cbr\u003ehad issued twenty official statements denying KR claims that they\u003cbr\u003ewere allowing Vietnamese troops to cross Lao territory. They\u003cbr\u003eabsolutely weren’t amassing at the border in preparation for an\u003cbr\u003einvasion, which, of course, they were. But as there were still no\u003cbr\u003eactual laws, the Politburo could logically argue that they weren’t\u003cbr\u003ebreaking any. The forty-six-member Supreme Council had been\u003cbr\u003eworking on a national constitution for eight years and had barely\u003cbr\u003emade it beyond the design of the front cover. This general disorder,\u003cbr\u003eplus the fact that money was harder to come by than a cold beer,\u003cbr\u003eresulted in an estimated 150 citizens crossing the river to Thailand\u003cbr\u003eevery day—120 successfully. An editorial in Pasason Lao newssheet\u003cbr\u003einformed the 40 per cent of the country who could read\u003cbr\u003eand the 2 per cent of those who could be bothered, that the\u003cbr\u003ePeople’s Democratic Republic of Laos had never had it so good.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eDuring the month of July in 1978, people did the morgue at\u003cbr\u003eMahosot Hospital a great favor by not dying mysteriously. They\u003cbr\u003emerely passed away as people do and no questions were asked.\u003cbr\u003eNo motives sought. It was almost as if they sensed that Dr. Siri\u003cbr\u003ePaiboun, the country’s only coroner, was reaching the end of his\u003cbr\u003eunasked-for tenure and they didn’t care to trouble him. The good\u003cbr\u003edoctor had been putting in his notice every month since the Party\u003cbr\u003efirst manhandled him into the job three years earlier. His boss,\u003cbr\u003eJudge Haeng, little in so many ways, had ignored the requests. “A\u003cbr\u003egood communist,” the man had said, “does not let go of the plough\u003cbr\u003ehalfway across the paddy and leave the buffalo to find its own\u003cbr\u003edirection. He eats with her, tends to her injuries, and sleeps with\u003cbr\u003eher until the job is done.” Siri had resisted the temptation to\u003cbr\u003espread the word that the Party was advocating bestiality. He’d\u003cbr\u003eknown his time would come. But when it did, he’d been only a\u003cbr\u003eheartbeat away from occupying his own slab. He’d met the\u003cbr\u003edeparting spirits eyeball to eyeball, and they were waiting for him.\u003cbr\u003eAfter the horrific events of May that year, he was still deaf in one\u003cbr\u003eear and could barely feel his right hand. His few hours of sleep\u003cbr\u003ewere plagued with nightmares. Everyone agreed that after his runin\u003cbr\u003ewith the Khmer Rouge, Dr. Siri had earned his retirement.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIf he could stay out of trouble, Siri had under two months\u003cbr\u003eleft on the job. Then, the leisurely life he’d dreamed of through\u003cbr\u003edecade after decade in the jungles of Vietnam and northern\u003cbr\u003eLaos would be his; coffee mornings overlooking the Mekhong,\u003cbr\u003eleisurely noodle lunches at his wife Daeng’s shop, long evenings\u003cbr\u003eof talking rice whiskey nonsense with ex-Politburo man Civilai,\u003cbr\u003eand nights stretched out against a triangular pillow in his illicit\u003cbr\u003ebackroom library reading French literature and philosophy.\u003cbr\u003eDallying through to the early morning with comrades Sartre\u003cbr\u003eand Hugo and Voltaire. Really. All he had to do was stay out of\u003cbr\u003etrouble. For anyone else this might not have been much to ask.\u003cbr\u003eBut this was no simple man. This was Dr. Siri Paiboun: seventyfour\u003cbr\u003eyears of age, forty-eight years an unconvincing member\u003cbr\u003eof the Communist Party, host to a thousand-year-old Hmong\u003cbr\u003eshaman spirit, culturally tainted beyond redemption by ten years\u003cbr\u003ein Paris. Emotionally numbed to the horrors of injury and death\u003cbr\u003eby years of battlefront surgery, Dr. Siri felt he had earned himself\u003cbr\u003ethe right to be an ornery old geezer. And, no. Staying out of\u003cbr\u003etrouble for two months was no easy task for such a complicated\u003cbr\u003eman.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHe’d had just the one case since his retirement notice was\u003cbr\u003eaccepted. Compared to some of his adventures, it was barely worth\u003cbr\u003ementioning as a case at all. The children at Thong Pong middle\u003cbr\u003eschool had become unhinged. A number of them had started to\u003cbr\u003evibrate uncontrollably and speak in languages none of them knew.\u003cbr\u003eThe local medical intern had seen nothing like it and requested\u003cbr\u003eassistance from the Ministry of Health. Stories in Vientiane spread\u003cbr\u003elike atomic bomb fallout and word very quickly found its way to\u003cbr\u003ethe morgue where Dr. Siri and his staff had been sitting lifeless\u003cbr\u003efor several weeks. Almost immediately, Siri had set off to visit the\u003cbr\u003eschool on his Triumph motorcycle with his faithful nurse Dtui\u003cbr\u003eand lab assistant Geung squashed together behind him. As religion\u003cbr\u003eand superstition had no place in the new regime, nobody\u003cbr\u003evoiced what everyone suspected: that the school was haunted.\u003cbr\u003eBoth doctor and nurse feigned indifference when they arrived,\u003cbr\u003eeven though both were keen to discover a supernatural source for\u003cbr\u003ethe peculiar epidemic. Dtui was one of only a half-dozen people\u003cbr\u003ewho knew of Siri’s dalliance with the beyond and she had no\u003cbr\u003edoubt in her mind that there was a malevolent ghost at play in\u003cbr\u003ethe school.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAccording to the head teacher, every day after morning assembly,\u003cbr\u003eup to forty children would become zombie-like, ranting and\u003cbr\u003edrooling and shaking without control. At first she’d considered\u003cbr\u003ethat this was merely a student prank to get out of studying Marxist-\u003cbr\u003eLeninist theory during the first period. A number of other ruses\u003cbr\u003ehad been uncovered by the embedded political spies from the\u003cbr\u003eyouth league. But this was too elaborate. Some of the children\u003cbr\u003ehad even begun to utter obscenities in voices that, without question,\u003cbr\u003edid not belong to twelve- and thirteen-year-old children. To\u003cbr\u003eSiri it sounded very much like some mass shamanic hysteria. For\u003cbr\u003esome reason, the pliable minds of the children were being hijacked\u003cbr\u003eby wayward spirits. But there had to be some unseen intermediary\u003cbr\u003eto channel the demons.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Tell me,” he said to the head teacher. “What normally happens\u003cbr\u003eduring your morning assembly?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“The usual ceremony, Doctor,” she replied. “The children line\u003cbr\u003eup in their grades, I make announcements, the flag is raised and\u003cbr\u003ethe school band plays the new national anthem.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe new socialist national anthem, coincidentally, had the same\u003cbr\u003etune as the old royalist national anthem. Only the words were\u003cbr\u003edifferent. Although badly metered and slightly misleading, as far\u003cbr\u003eas Siri could ascertain there was nothing inherently evil hidden\u003cbr\u003ein the new lyrics. So he asked to look at the musical instruments.\u003cbr\u003eThe head teacher unlocked the music department footlocker and\u003cbr\u003eit was there that Siri found the culprit. He pulled out the exorcism\u003cbr\u003etambourine with its tassels and bottle cap rattles and smiled\u003cbr\u003eat Nurse Dtui.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Do you know what this is?” he asked the principal.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A tambourine?” she guessed.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“A shamanic tambourine, Comrade, used in séances,” he said.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“And fully loaded, I’d say. Any idea how it fell into your possession?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Someone from the regional education office brought it,” she\u003cbr\u003erecalled. “Said it had been confiscated from some royalist. Why?”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“I’d wager this is what’s been causing the hysteria,” he told her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“But . . . but it’s just a musical instrument,” she protested.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eSiri smiled at the Mao-shirted woman. She was a cadre from\u003cbr\u003ethe northeast with a black and white upbringing and no tolerance\u003cbr\u003efor dimensions beyond the usual three. And so it was that\u003cbr\u003ein both Siri’s report and that of the head teacher, the problem\u003cbr\u003ehad been attributed to tainted sweets sold by a rogue vendor\u003cbr\u003eoutside the school gates. Yet, once the tambourine had been\u003cbr\u003eremoved there was no repeat of the insanity.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe instrument now sat on Siri’s desk at the morgue and he\u003cbr\u003eflicked the little bells from time to time just for the hell of it.\u003cbr\u003eNurse Dtui and Mr. Geung would look up from their unimportant\u003cbr\u003etasks and sigh. Siri would apologize then ring it again. His\u003cbr\u003eonly other annoying habit had been pulled out from under him.\u003cbr\u003eDtui had removed the clock from over their office door because\u003cbr\u003ethe doctor had begun to count down the minutes to his retirement\u003cbr\u003ein reverse order.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“Only seventy thousand five hundred and forty-five minutes to\u003cbr\u003ego,” he’d sing. Dtui knew that the effects of this after a day or two\u003cbr\u003ewould have driven them all into the same moronic stupor as the\u003cbr\u003epupils at Thong Hong. So she’d come in early one day and had\u003cbr\u003ethe hospital handyman take down the clock. She’d told Siri it was\u003cbr\u003eoff being serviced. As she never lied, he didn’t question her.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAt her desk, Nurse Dtui had her Thai fanzine open in front\u003cbr\u003eof her. To anyone walking unexpectedly into the office it would\u003cbr\u003eappear she was merely fantasizing her size fourteen frame into\u003cbr\u003ea size seven swimsuit as worn by the Bangkok television starlets\u003cbr\u003eon photo shoots. But hidden between the pages of her\u003cbr\u003emagazine were her Med. 1 Gynaecology notes in Russian. Despite\u003cbr\u003ea sudden unexpected pregnancy and the arrival of Malee, now\u003cbr\u003efive months old, Dtui had yet to give up her hopes of studying\u003cbr\u003ein the Soviet bloc. Unsolicited initiative was considered by the\u003cbr\u003ehospital administration to be a suspicious characteristic, a sign\u003cbr\u003ethat you were not satisfied with your role in the new republic.\u003cbr\u003eSo she studied surreptitiously. Even though she had no intention\u003cbr\u003eof abandoning her baby or her husband and running off\u003cbr\u003eto Moscow, she continued to prepare herself for that far-off day\u003cbr\u003ewhen she might take over the morgue. When times were hard,\u003cbr\u003eit always helped to have a dream. And times in Vientiane were\u003cbr\u003ecertainly hard.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut not for some, it seemed. In the corner of the office, behind\u003cbr\u003ea desk and a chair he rarely used, Mr. Geung stood rocking gently\u003cbr\u003eback and forth in a blissful Down’s syndrome trance. His condition\u003cbr\u003ehad one of two effects on onlookers. Some were appalled that a\u003cbr\u003emoron should be allowed to work at a hospital. Others, like his many\u003cbr\u003efans around Mahosot, were envious of the apparent lack of complication\u003cbr\u003ein his life. Devoted to his work. Loyal to a fault. Friendly and\u003cbr\u003ehonest. Mr. Geung seemed perfectly happy with a no-frills, budget\u003cbr\u003elifestyle. But they all wondered what was going on in his head. How\u003cbr\u003ecould a middle-aged man with such a terrible affliction seem so at\u003cbr\u003epeace? And recently his serenity had risen to a cloud way beyond\u003cbr\u003ethat elusive number nine. Only Siri and Dtui knew the reason for\u003cbr\u003ethe elevation. Although Mr. Geung himself was not letting on, his\u003cbr\u003emorgue mates could tell. It was romance. Birds did it. Bees did it.\u003cbr\u003eAnd, clearly, Mr. Geung did it too.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eOthers might have interpreted the marks on their friend’s neck\u003cbr\u003eas an allergic reaction to the washing powder in his shirt collar.\u003cbr\u003eBut Siri and Dtui worked in the morgue. They knew teeth marks\u003cbr\u003ewhen they saw them. They didn’t exactly condone the practice.\u003cbr\u003e“One step away from vampirism,” Siri had called it. But neither\u003cbr\u003ebegrudged Mr. Geung his first taste of romance, albeit in bitten\u003cbr\u003eform. Tukda’s arrival at the staff canteen had at first enraged\u003cbr\u003eGeung.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e“She’s Down . . . Down’s syndrome,” he’d said, with the same\u003cbr\u003econdescending tone he’d heard all his life. “Sh . . . she shouldn’t\u003cbr\u003ebe working here.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBut there was no mistaking the fact that Comrade Tukda was\u003cbr\u003ea pretty young lady and sweet natured. None of Mr. Geung’s\u003cbr\u003eprotestations persuaded his coworkers that he didn’t find her\u003cbr\u003eattractive. And Geung and Tukda, through those mysterious corridors\u003cbr\u003eand hidden passageways of the syndrome, found each other.\u003cbr\u003eWhat they did and where and how and if, nobody knew. Only the\u003cbr\u003ewashing powder allergy on Geung’s neck, and the sappy grins when\u003cbr\u003ethey mentioned her name, gave anything away. He answered no\u003cbr\u003equestions on the subject. Denied all accusations. It was his . . . their\u003cbr\u003esecret. But there was no doubting the fact that Mr. Geung was\u003cbr\u003ea very happy man.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd this was how the members of the morgue team filled their\u003cbr\u003edays. Siri counting minutes. Dtui conjugating. Geung rocking.\u003cbr\u003eThen, all of a sudden, on one hot July morning, a note arrived.\u003cbr\u003eThat such a flimsy slip of paper could have the effect it did would\u003cbr\u003ehave been hard to imagine.","brand":"Soho Crime","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46300988932325,"sku":"NP9781616951788","price":16.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9781616951788.jpg?v=1767736746","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/products\/slash-and-burn-isbn-9781616951788","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}