Dr Siri Paiboun 01; The Coroner’s Lunch

had anything that important to say? You aren’t keeping anything from me, are you?”

“I’ve told you all I know. And I’m sure the driver knew nothing. All he could have disclosed was how many kilometres to the litre his jeep did.”

“Well, if I was the driver I would have told them that at the first sign of danger. Wouldn’t you, driver?” The driver ignored him and concentrated all his energy on rounding potholes and scattering pedestrians.

At the reservoir they met the Nam Ngum district chief, who introduced them to the two fishermen who’d found the Trans. The second of these two poor fellows had been sitting in his boat minding his own business, when a Tran came shooting up out of the water like a missile. The brown, misshapen face looked right at the fisherman before flopping back down. It almost gave him a heart attack.

When Siri told the district chief what he had in mind, he knew there wouldn’t be a long queue of volunteers. Even the best divers in the district would baulk at searching for a three-week-old corpse. There was a healthy tradition of folklore and superstition around the lake villages, and the discovery of two bodies had shaken most folks up. But in a fishing community there’s always one old-timer who’ll do anything for a couple of kip. In this case it was Dun. Dun couldn’t even afford a boat. He usually just waded into the lake to his waist and cast his oft-repaired net into the water a few dozen times. He lived on the low-IQ sprats and water vermin that didn’t have the savvy to avoid him.

“Sure, I’ll do it…for five hundred kip.”

Since the devaluation in June, the kip had settled at two hundred to the US dollar. He was pushing his luck to ask for such a huge sum, but he fully expected the city fellows to bargain him down. They didn’t. They gave him half in advance. It was his lucky day.

The second fisherman took Dun out to where he’d been frightened by the sudden appearance of Tran, and Siri and Nguyen Hong stood on the shore with the chief. Dun put on the goggles Siri had brought from town and slid over the side of the boat still wearing his shirt. He wasn’t down for more than five seconds before he came up gasping for air. The chief explained it was a result of all the smoking he did. While Dun dove, and choked, dove and choked, Siri got the chief to fill in some of the details of the day they’d found the tattooed man.

“Exactly who was it that identified the marks as Vietnamese?”

“Oh, I was quite certain myself. But it was confirmed by this military chap. He said he’d been stationed over there in Vietnam, and he recognised the tattoos straight away.”

“Is he still around?”

“No. He wasn’t from here. He was just doing a survey.”

“On what?”

“Boat traffic back and forth to the rehabilitation islands, he said.”

They could see the two islands in the distance: Don Thao for the male villains and addicts, and Don Nang for the ladies. Siri dreaded to think what type of rehabilitation was going on there.

“Did you see his orders?”

“Goodness no, Doctor. People in uniforms don’t like to be bullied by laypeople, and he did have a big gun, so I didn’t ask.”

Out by the boat, old Mr Dun was starting to look like a drowning victim himself. Nguyen Hong was concerned.

“Do you think we should call him back in? I don’t think he’s going to make it.” Siri nodded and they were just about to yell to the fisherman, when Dun failed to resurface.

“Oh, shit.” They shielded their eyes from the glaring sun and scanned the water for any sign of Dun. The surface was smooth as glass and the man in the boat seemed unconcerned by what horror might be occurring below him.

Both doctors knew that in fresh water the diver had a little over four minutes. Nguyen Hong had been checking his watch. “Three. Why doesn’t the fisherman jump in and help him?”

Siri asked the chief.

“He says he’s not a very good swimmer. No point in losing both of them.”

It was a little over the four-minute mark when Dun popped out of the water, his face smiling and purple. It was dramatic seconds-to-spare stuff, like Houdini. Dun held up his hand to wave and to show he was holding something. It seemed to be the end of a rope. When he yanked on it, first a foot, then a leg rose out of the water. Hok had been retrieved.

In order to get at the body before the air had a chance to speed up the decomposition, the two coroners set up a makeshift morgue in an empty concrete room behind the dam. The chief’s wife kept running in and out with tea.

The findings for Hok were similar to those of the second Tran, but for two major discrepancies. Although there were signs of shock, there was also a huge wound, apparently from a gun fired at close range. It entered his chest a few centimetres from his heart, and exited by the shoulderblade. Nguyen shook his head.

“This really makes no sense. This wound alone should have killed him.”

“You don’t think it did?”

“Well, it couldn’t have. Look.”

Siri leaned over the wound and saw what had confused his colleague. The point of entry was still open and angry. But there were clear indications of scabbing around the exit wound. There was no doubt that Hok’s bullet wound was an old one, one that was still healing when he died.

“What’s he doing running around with delegations with a big hole in his chest? He should have been recuperating somewhere.”

“Question one,” said Siri. “And then there’s question two. Explain this to me.” He held up the rubber-coated electric wire that he’d just unwound from Hok’s ankle. “It just gets more and more weird.”

“You mean, if they had this stuff, why didn’t they use it to tie down all three?”

“There’s enough on this fellow for a whole regiment. Do you suppose it all means something?”

“That we’re being left clues?”

“Perhaps.”

“Then, no offence, but I fear they’ve badly overestimated us. I don’t have any idea what it all means. Do you?”

“Not yet. But I will. When we’re finished here, I think we should go have another chat with Mr Dun.”

Dun was sitting happily on the verandah of his packing-case bungalow, smoking and drinking his earnings. The thought of offering the doctors anything didn’t enter his mind.

“It was a bomb.”

“What kind of bomb?”

“The type the shithead Americans used to blow us all to nirvana and back. There was three of ‘em down there, half-buried in the muck. They had writing on ‘em.”

“Do you know what language it was?”

Dun laughed at the idea that he might have ever been blessed with the ability to read. “No. But I tell you what. There was a Chinese flag on one of ‘em.”

¦

“It isn’t my job, I tell you. I don’t have to do this. I’m putting in an official complaint to the embassy. This won’t be the end of it.”

Siri wondered whether there’d be an end to the complaining. The Vietnamese driver hadn’t stopped since they left Nam Ngum. Siri had to put up with the brunt of it because he was sitting beside him in the front of the limousine. “It isn’t…natural.”

“I know. Watch that bicycle, will you?”

The trunk of the car might just have been large enough, had it not been for the spare tyre and the eight litre cans of petrol. The armed guard had positively refused to have him on the motorcycle pillion. So there really had been no choice.

Mr Hok, wrapped tightly in canvas but still dripping, leaned stiffly against the back seat beside Dr Nguyen. Even with the air conditioner full on, the smell was quite overpowering. The driver had half a roll of toilet paper stuffed up his nostrils. Siri turned to Nguyen Hong.

“Do you speak French?”

“Some. It’s a bit rusty.”