The Fear Artist

the paper with almost no hesitation and drew it toward him. It said, Meat, right? You look like you eat meat. He’d raised his eyes to hers and burst out laughing.

She’d laughed with him and then widened her eyes and fanned her face as though to say, Near escape.

“I’ve eaten Italian before,” he said, and then qualified it, “Pizza.” She’d started to laugh again, and he’d added, “And spaghetti.”

Her gaze on his lips felt like a cool breeze. He said, slowly, “A lot of spaghetti,” just to prolong the feeling.

They’d traded spoken words and written notes through three courses, dessert, and a bottle of wine. In his memory the entire evening seems to have been candlelit. A high, silent room lit by candles with Anna in the center of it.

He still can’t believe how much he learned about her across that table. It all felt so natural, so effortless that he can almost hear the tone of her voice as she told him about herself, although of course she never spoke a word. Forty-three, divorced, the mother of a twelve-year-old boy whose much richer and higher-ranking father had simply taken the child. The boy, she’s told, is beginning to be a problem, but she’s not being consulted on how to help, which seems to be the only aspect of her life that frustrates her.

Like Noi, she was born and educated in the city, first at schools for the deaf and then, defying all predictions, at Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok’s best. Unlike Noi, who’d quit not only school but her entire family to marry a policeman, Anna had graduated and then won a doctorate from their school of education.

She’s been deaf her entire life. Arthit’s immediate reaction when she told him that was, She’s never heard music. It was the only moment of pity he’s had for her since they met. She’s too capable and too complete to pity. And it occurred to him on their second night together that she’s been spared the clashing, senseless, cacophonous sound that Bangkok is rich in. She lives, he’d thought, in a bell of silence.

The car purrs to a stop, and he waits for her to lift her head from his shoulder and tilt her face to his. She’s done it two nights running, and tonight makes it three. He kisses her lightly on the lips, and she reaches up and squeezes his earlobe. He wraps his fingers around her wrist, turns her hand toward him, and kisses her palm, directly below the thumb. He says, in English, “Mount of Venus.” Then, in Thai, “It tells me whether you have qualities like kindness, harmony, love. And sensuality.” He presses it experimentally with his fingertips and shakes his head. “Oh, well. You could still go into politics.”

She blows a puff of air at him, but it turns into a laugh. He opens his door, patting the air with a palm, meaning Stay there, and gets out. He goes around and opens her door, and she extends a hand, half appreciatively, half in parody of the helpless, well-bred lady who needs assistance getting out of the car. When she’s standing upright, she sags against him and taps her fingers over her heart.

They’re halfway up the walk when the front door opens. Pim’s smile of welcome fades when she sees Anna, but she manages a nod before turning around and retreating up the hallway and into her room. Anna watches the girl go, looking perplexed.

Arthit says, “Coffee?”

Anna shakes her head, still looking down the hallway. And, as if she’d felt Anna’s attention, Pim sticks her head out of her door and calls, “Did your friend show you the charts?”

Arthit says, “Which friend?”

Her forehead wrinkles. “Ummm, Prem? He works with you.”

Arthit says, “Prem?” All the joy of the evening vanishes. “Please. Come in here.”

She moves reluctantly down the hallway toward them, stopping without actually coming into the room.

“This man, Prem. Did he phone?”

“You didn’t talk to him?”

“Pim. Tell me what happened.”

She blinks at his tone. “He came here about ten minutes after you-”

“This morning?” He steps forward but stops, seeing that he’s frightening her.

Pim says, “Yes.”

“Describe him.”

Suddenly Pim’s face is white, and she’s squinting as though she expects a slap. “Tall,” she says. “Handsome. Combs his hair …” Her voice falters.

“Straight back,” Arthit says, and Anna, reading his lips, releases a sharp sigh that just misses being a cough. “What did he do?”

“I had … uhhh, I’d spilled something.” She’s tugging at her frizzy hair with one hand. “And he … he helped me-”

“What charts?”

“Charts, he said, he said you wanted-” Her chin crumples into a pattern of dimples, and a tear slides down her cheek. “Hotels, charts of hotels. He tricked me.”

Arthit’s face is rigid. “Tricked you how?”

“I don’t know how he did it-”

“Did what?”

Anna can’t hear the tone, but she sees Pim step back.

“I told him-I think I told him-that Poke was around Khao San. In a cheap hotel near Khao San.”

“Which hotel?”

“I didn’t know that.” She’s crying openly now, not even trying to hide it.

Anna puts a hand on Arthit’s arm, but he shrugs her off.

“You’re certain.”

“Yes, yes, I don’t know where he is, where he’s staying. I mean, Prem acted nice, and he knew all about you, and he … he helped-” She backs up a step, and Anna follows her, a hand outstretched, but Pim looks down at it and then wails, running into her room and slamming the door.

Arthit says, in English, “Shit.” To Anna, in Thai, he says, “Wait here for a minute. Right back.” He goes down the hall and into the bedroom. When he comes out, a moment later, he has a transparent zippered plastic bag in his hands with what looks like oversize pieces of confetti in it.

“SIM cards,” he says. “Out of confiscated phones.” He sits on the couch and pulls out his phone and opens it. He slides the back off and tries to work the SIM card out, but his hands are shaking, and Anna takes it from him as she sits. She slips a nail under the edge of the card and pops it out, then holds out her hand with the card in it.

Arthit takes it and puts it on the table, then replaces it in her hand with one from the bag. A few seconds later, she closes the phone and hands it back to him with the new card in it.

Arthit takes a deep breath and says, “I hope this is the right thing to do,” and dials the number of Poke’s throwaway.

15

A Landscape of Broken Glass

The kid at the desk, who looks all of seventeen years old, barely glances at him.

Rafferty briefly considers the elevator, which is tiny, slow, and noisy. He’s pretty sure no one has been here asking for him-the kid is totally absorbed in the Korean soap opera on the little television behind the counter. He’s got no telltale jumpiness; in fact, his eyes are drooping a little.

Still, the elevator takes too much time, and he has a sudden vision of being trapped in it between floors. So he pushes the button to open the doors and steps in just long enough to punch the button that sends it to the top floor, the eighth, taking it out of action for three or four minutes as far as anyone down here in the lobby is concerned. With a last look at the kid, who has paid no attention to him at all, Rafferty walks in a leisurely fashion