“I’ll wait for you here,” said Calvino.
The Colonel broke into a smile. He was amused by the thought that Yadanar might have as many musical instruments scattered through his house as he had paintings. Calvino saw the smile and thought that Colonel Pratt was handling the party better than expected. His cop’s haircut and conservative shirt and trousers, along with being more than a generation older than most of the people in the house, made him stand out like a father at a high school prom. He’d done his best to blend into the crowd. He’d warned Calvino that a cop wandering through rooms of guests smoking dope and doing drugs had the potential of going pear-shaped. In Burma that was the one shape of fruit that was best avoided. But he’d relented. After all, Saxon owed him for helping spring his brother. That was the only piece of evidence the Colonel clutched to himself against the possibility that he was walking into a setup.
Colonel Pratt worked his way through the groups of smart young people at Yadanar’s birthday party, and the escort assigned by Yadanar led him into a room with three saxophones on a table. The Colonel picked up one of the instruments and played a couple of runs. He continued with the other two saxophones, taking his time to choose among them.
As Colonel Pratt was picking a saxophone, Calvino followed Yadanar down the upstairs corridor, passing several closed doors.
“Where’s Mya?” Calvino asked.
“She’s here. Waiting for you.
“Jack says this is your going-away party. Mya says it’s your birthday party.”
Yadanar approached a door at the end of the corridor and stopped in front of it.
“They’re both right,” he said.
A Burmese man stumbled out of the room, wiping sweat from his face. The blood had drained from it. He looked ghost white.
“This is Thiri Pyan Chi,” Yadanar said.
But Thiri Pyan Chi didn’t stick around to exchange business cards. He rushed past them and down the corridor and disappeared down the stairs.
“He’s in a hurry,” said Calvino.
“Like everyone in Rangoon. And that is a problem. I’m afraid your friend Rob got mixed up with a Thai named Somchai. He’s been in town to see Thiri Pyan Chi. I asked Thiri Pyan Chi to invite Somchai and his two bodyguards over to his house for a business discussion. I sent over a few men to bring the four of them to my party.”
“Thiri Pyan Chi was running a business with Somchai behind your back,” said Calvino.
“That’s just one of his big mistakes,” said Yadanar. “I told Thiri Pyan Chi how disappointed I was to find out about his side deal with Somchai. You know what he said?”
“He was going to tell you when the time was right.”
Yadanar’s face lit up.
“I like you, Vincent. You understand how Burmese people think. Mya told me that about you. She was right to invite you tonight.”
Calvino caught a glimpse of Thiri Pyan Chi wandering around downstairs, ready to vomit. He looked like he was going from one wall of dreams to another, looking at angels, demons, fairies, gods, warriors and peacocks.
Calvino and Yadanar still stood in the corridor outside the door Thiri Pyan Chi had emerged from.
“He doesn’t look so good,” Calvino said.
“People who fuck up never do.”
Calvino thought about Thiri Pyan Chi downstairs, eating snacks, drinking his way to some courage and trying to engage in conversation among the guests whose faces looked ten, twenty years younger than his own. No doubt he felt like a senior citizen.
It was nearly midnight.
“Time for the party to start,” Yadanar said.
Yadanar opened the door and nodded as Mya rose from a sofa and walked toward Calvino. She wore blue jeans with tears in the knees and a fresh black T-shirt that had Burmese script on it, and underneath—“STOP Killing Press.” Red was used for the word “STOP” and white for “Killing Press.” Her political activist self had surfaced and found its way to Yadanar’s party.
Calvino understood why Yadanar had sent Colonel Pratt off to find a saxophone. He hadn’t wanted a Thai police colonel inside this room. Two men, apparently Yananar’s good friends, stood aside to reveal they weren’t alone. Seated on the floor, tied up with black duct tape, were three men, their heads covered with white cloth bags. Above them was a large mural that covered most of the wall.
“You like the painting?” asked Yadanar.
The artist must have devoted weeks with his paints laid out on a table in the room, painting nats—the whole pantheon of Burmese spirits—as they hovered over the floating lotus on a languid, crystal-clear lake, diving and flying through an enveloping, brilliant blue sky. Canary-eyed dragons flew above an open sea. House lizards as large as dragons crawled over a table with books, incense sticks and candles. Bats, owls and eagles darted in and out of bonfires. Rows of monks disappeared along the shore into an infinity of mirrors. Dismembered bodies littered the sandy beaches with large tree roots extending into the earth. Elephants on stilts walked over a wooden bridge that led to an ancient temple.