Missing In Rangoon

“The Colonel?”

“The one you were with in the lobby?”

He’d forgotten that Saxon had introduced Calvino by his job description and Pratt by his rank.

“Yeah, the Thai guy. He’s playing the saxophone at a club tonight. Join us if you want. Bring your friend…”

“Anne.”

“Her name was on the tip of my tongue.”

He put on his shoes and combed his hair. He lay down the brush and walked past her onto the balcony.

“It is a great view,” he said.

She had slipped out on the balcony and stood close to him.

“What’s his name, your Thai friend, the Colonel?”

“Pratt. Everyone likes him, especially women—they seem to love saxophone players. There aren’t many Bangkok cops who can play the sax. He’s jamming with a local band.”

“He’s a cop? Is he helping you find the missing musician?”

Calvino shook his head and drank from his wine glass.

“He’s doing his own thing.”

“Your other friend, Jack, will be there too?”

She cupped her hand over Calvino’s hand, resting on the railing. He stared ahead, calculating the situation. He tried to concentrate on the thin traffic on the road in the distance, counting the cars. She stood close, her hip touching his. When he glanced back at her, what caught his attention was a perfectly formed white patch on her skin just below her throat. It was in the shape of a cross. It was the kind of evidence most people overlooked. He wanted to ask her what had happened to the crucifix she’d worn around the throat, about the beach where she’d tanned and whether she’d touched hips lying on the sand next to her last man. But he wasn’t sure he wanted to know any of those things. Not yet, anyway. It was better to register the clues and slowly build a profile of this woman who had mysteriously come to his room.

“Jack’ll be there, too. Wherever there’s a pool table, cold beer and a sports channel, sooner or later you’ll run into Jack.”

“Jack is a man’s man,” she said.

Jack Saxon hadn’t been in her life more than five minutes, and she already had him figured out.

The sky was washed with streaks of languid orange cloud that brushed the vast tree canopy. Calvino stood next to Bianca on the balcony, looking out at the ancient forest enveloping the heart of Rangoon—a deep green in the fading light. He slipped his arm around Bianca’s waist. She leaned in closer, brushing his body with hers. Off to the right was a colonial mansion with a red roof—a portico as erect as a headwaiter at the Savoy—a testament to the past, when British rulers built structures that announced, “We are here,” and now added, “Remember that all foreign rulers disappear into the sunset.”

“It’s all going to change,” she said.

“But not tonight,” he said.

Rangoon was a vast forest with buildings scattered through it. Calvino tried to imagine a Bangkok-like city sprawling out in place of the trees. The way things worked, he knew she was right. The forest would fall soon enough, and the tall, shiny buildings would take its place.

Not tonight, though. Tonight still belonged to the cartwheeling birds appearing in ones and twos and finally in waves. First the pigeons going to roost, then the swallows, feeding, and finally the bats. They looked out over a city virtually untouched by the world of developers, bankers, lawyers and consultants, with their plans and blueprints for high-rises, shopping malls, condos and supermarkets. Rangoon would soon leave one world and join another.

Bianca slipped her arm around Calvino. They stood holding each other, looking at the sky.

“What happens when the Chinese arrive and want their room with this view?” asked Calvino.

She glanced up at him and shrugged. “They can start a new cultural revolution in the lobby.”

He laughed, brushing back her hair with the back of his hand.

“You could give them your room and stay here.”

“I don’t think Anne wants to share a room with the Chinese.”