'Where on earth did you get it?'
'She came to me, darling. Like all the creatures do. Like Mohammed, she floated down the river on the bulrushes. I pulled her from the water and gave her resuscitation.'
I cringed at the thought of Mair applying mouth-to-mouth to an almost-dead dog.
'And look,' Mair went on, 'she survived. All the sick and dying creatures of the earth will find their way to me.'
I had no choice. I folded the creature into the poncho pocket, still wrapped in the hood, and left Mrs. Noah standing in the rain waiting for the giraffes to arrive. I stopped at the bridge, surprised at how quickly the humble stream had swollen to a gushing torrent. I wished then that I'd bought an iPhone when I still had an income back in Chiang Mai.
Discovery Channel paid well for home videos of natural disasters and I sensed the Gulf Bay Lovely Resort was about to become one.
'What's that moving in your pocket?' Aung asked.
'Dog,' I said.
'Beer' was feisty for a dying pup. She was mad at all the shots Dr. Somboon had speared her with and the pills he'd forced down her throat. I couldn't blame her. I'd named her Beer because the vet was drinking a can of Singha when I arrived. I think he'd had a few. It was just a stop-gap name. I couldn't imagine her surviving the night. Not in this weather. To his credit, Aung didn't ask me why I had a dog in my pocket. He wasn't shirtless today, but he was soaked to the skin and his T-shirt stuck to his muscles like paint. I fought back my urge to rip it off him with my teeth.
'Aung,' I said. 'I know you don't trust me.'
Throw that line at a Thai and he'd be on his knees denying it. Aung's expression said, 'Yeah. You got me.'
'But here's what I think,' I continued. 'I think Burmese are being kidnapped and ferried out to deep-sea vessels, where they're enslaved, ill treated, and killed if they make too much trouble. I think the head that arrived on our beach was just one example. I think you and your community know about this, but you feel helpless because you aren't able to do anything about it. I think you all live in fear that one day it'll be you or your wife whisked away.'
A long silence followed.
'So?' he said.
'That's all I get? A 'so'?'
'Look. Even if you know. Even if you have proof. Even if you're out there on the big boats taking photographs. What do you think you could achieve? What Thai prosecutor really wants to go to the trouble of prosecuting Thais for crimes against the Maung? We're dispensable.'
'Well, that's one thing we can achieve. Make you less dispensable. Put names and faces and family backgrounds to the slaves. Talk to loved ones. Show that-'
'Nobody would give you a name.'
'OK. So I'd make it up. Photoshop a loved one. Hell, who's going to rush down here to prove me a liar? Aung, this is Thailand. We manipulate public opinion all the time. The masses feel what Channel Nine tells them to feel. If I couldn't splash up a wave of sympathy for the poor country boys chained to the oars of a galley, I wouldn't be much of a journalist, would I now?'
'Who do you work for?'
Damn, the man just refused to get caught up in the splendor of the rhetoric. And he'd hit another nerve.
'I'm freelance. That means I can work for anybody.'
'Or nobody.'
I was starting to see why we hated the Burmese.
'All right. Here's the deal. My family and I are going to fight this. We had a grenade thrown at us because we refused to give in to bullies. If you aren't into human rights, fair enough. Somehow we'll get evidence and somehow I'll write about all this and somehow it'll make the eyes of the world. And I do this with you or I do it without.'
Clint would have put some background music in there.
Violins rising to a cello and kettledrum crescendo is my guess. All I had for emphasis was the belch of a tugboat horn. I hoped it would be enough for Aung to sense my sincerity.
'Good luck.'
'That's it?'
'You'll need it. You don't know what you're up against.'
'So I can't count on any help from you?'
'I didn't say that. I'll give you information when I can. As long as it's off the record.'
'That's big of you. All right. Information. Give me some now. Explain how your people are lifted from the street in broad daylight without anyone seeing.'
'Are you serious?'
'Sometimes.'
'Then why do you think nobody sees?'
'Thais down here may be stubborn, proud to a fault, but they have a sense of justice. If they saw someone being bundled into a truck, they'd do something about it.'
'Not if that truck was brown and cream with a flashing police light on top.'
'What's that in your pocket?'
'Dog.'
'You don't say. How does it breathe in there?'
'I lift the flap from time to time.'
'If it's a shih-tzu, I'll take it off you.'
'You like shih-tzus?'
'Who doesn't? Those broken little Chinese noses. Those pus-filled squinty eyes. And they do so attract the boys. 'Ooh, what a lovely little doggie.' '
I was having lunch with Chompu at Pak Nam's famous chicken and rice restaurant, called The Chicken and Rice Restaurant. The chicken and rice were average, but the sauce-passed down through Yunnan dynasties-was what brought in the customers. They traveled from as far away as Lang Suan to eat there. The place was never empty.
'Even so, it appears to be quite agitated,' Chompu observed.
'Look, will you stop whining about the dog? It's a survivor. I'm asking about the Pak Nam constabulary picking up Burmese off the street.'
'Happens all the time.'
'Ha. You admit it.'
'Hard to deny. Random ID checks. Work cards. It's policy.'
'To harass?'
'You know? With the right interior decorator, they could really make something of this place. I'd go Japanese. Bamboo on the wall. Short-legged tables with-'
'Chom!'
'Perhaps we harass a tad. But nicely.'
'Why?'
'Well, those without work permits hand over a fine.'
'Which is signed for, paid into the police fund, and sent to the police ministry in Bangkok, naturally.'
'Which goes directly into the wallet of the harassing officer to be spent on base desires such as karaoke.'
'And you think that's OK?'
'We aren't paid very much, you know? And it's better for them than going to jail. Paying the fine is the penalty they opt for when they decide not to go through legal channels. They know the risk.'
'I have witness statements that Burmese were stopped on the street and bundled into police vehicles, never to be seen again.'
'Uh-oh. Hold the Pulitzer. That isn't exactly a secret either. It happens every day, darling. After our random
