SLEEPING IS AN INVITATION TO THIEVES

Back at Sriphat Hospital, of course there were few parking spaces available—it was in the middle of the day, after all. But Ladarat would not let that bother her. She’d had a most productive morning and could easily afford to spend a few extra minutes walking from the edge of the lot. She was so complacent, in fact, that she didn’t even bother looking for those nearer spots that she knew must exist. Instead, she just drove to the very edge where there was an entire row free. She parked right in the middle.

That sense of calm lasted only for another nine minutes, until she stepped out of the elevator and walked down the hallway to find the door of her office open.

Wide open. That was strange, because Ladarat was certain she hadn’t left her door in that state. Nor had she left it inhabited by her assistant and Ukrit, who seemed to have taken up residence.

The two of them seemed to be engaged in some sort of argument, although it was clear that poor Ukrit was getting the worst side of it. He had the hangdog, droopy look of a child getting scolded, which, come to think of it, was a pretty accurate description of what was going on. Ukrit was perched on the single chair in front of Ladarat’s desk, and her assistant was standing over him as a schoolteacher might over a wayward student. It was Sisithorn who noticed Ladarat first, and she was the first to offer a wai of apology.

“Khun Ladarat—we’re sorry to take over your office like this. But it was an emergency. A true emergency.” The poor woman was breathless, but whether because of concern for this “emergency” or because she had been berating her boyfriend without pausing for breath, it was impossible to tell.

“I’d given Ukrit a ride from the bus station, as I told you, and we were going to ICU rounds, when Ukrit said he felt unsteady on his feet.”

Ukrit offered a clumsy wai and managed to look sheepish at the same time.

“So since we were in this hallway, and your office was handy, we decided …”

“Naturally. Of course that was the right decision, Khun. You should of course feel free to use this office when an emergency of that magnitude occurs.”

Hopefully such emergencies will be few and far between, lest she find her assistant getting used to having this office for her own.

It was odd, though, that the conversation Ladarat interrupted a few moments ago didn’t seem to be one of a concerned girlfriend asking after her boyfriend’s well-being.

“So we came in and Ukrit sat down and I called Dr. Jainukul.” Suphit Jainukul was the director of the ICU, and Ukrit’s supervisor, a cheerfully rotund doctor who waddled when he walked, but whose easygoing manner belied an intense devotion to his patients.

“That’s when Ukrit told me he lost all his money on the bus!”

“He lost …?”

“He was robbed, Khun, do you see? He fell asleep and was robbed. That’s why I was telling him that to fall asleep is an invitation to thieves. It’s like leaving money on the ground, I told him. It gives thieves an opportunity they can’t resist, so it’s ethically wrong.” She paused to catch her breath. “Don’t you agree, Khun?”

“It’s morally wrong to … fall asleep?” Ladarat glanced at Ukrit, who shrugged.

That seemed rather harsh. Perhaps this was yet another problem to ponder over a solitary meal sometime.

Ukrit at least knew better than to argue a point of moral philosophy with his girlfriend.

“Of course you’re right, dear. You are an ethicist—you know about those things. Although it’s strange, I’ve never done that before. I usually find it very difficult to sleep on buses and planes. But last night I had no trouble. And I suppose that was the invitation that a thief was looking for.”

His apology was interrupted by the arrival of Dr. Jainukul. Comfortably dressed in a rumpled shirt and baggy white coat, he offered them all a series of informal wais as he entered Ladarat’s now quite crowded little office. Smiling, he greeted the young couple and Ladarat, but he turned quickly to Ukrit.

“A few silly questions, you know the routine. What’s your name? Where are we now? What day is it? What year is it?”

During this exchange, Dr. Jainukul’s eyebrows edged closer together. Ukrit got his name right, and he knew that he was in Sriphat Hospital. But he missed the day by one and the year by two.

After a cursory exam, tapping for reflexes and asking Ukrit to follow his finger with his eyes, Dr. Jainukul perched on the edge of Ladarat’s desk. He looked down thoughtfully at Ukrit, who seemed to be waking up gradually.

“Is it possible—just possible, you understand—that someone may have given you a drug … surreptitiously?”

Ukrit shook his head emphatically. “No, Khun, that would have been impossible. I ate at a market stall with a friend in Bangkok, then went to the bus station. No one gave me anything.”

Dr. Jainukul didn’t seem convinced. “Well, it used to happen all the time on the train. We’d go down to Bangkok for the weekend, you know? As residents? This was a long time ago, although”—he winked at Ladarat—“not so very long ago. Anyway, we’d take the bus down Friday night and spend all day Saturday and Sunday, then take the bus back Sunday night. And on the bus, well …”

The good Dr. Jainukul smiled in fond reminiscence. “You’d meet a girl, have a few drinks and then … you’d wake up with no money.” But he was still smiling.

Somewhere in the middle of this story, like a storm front moving across Chiang Mai, Sisithorn’s face had grown blank, then troubled, then cloudy and threatening.

“A girl, Dr. Jainukul?”

Even in his feeble state, Ukrit sensed that he needed to be very, very careful.

“But there was no girl, I swear it! None! No one.”

“Ah,” Dr. Jainukul said. “But perhaps you don’t remember. Some of these drugs have an anterograde amnesic effect, as you know. You forget what happens. The last thing I remembered was …”

“Getting on the bus,” Ukrit said sadly.

“Exactly so. So who knows what happened?” Dr. Jainukul asked him cheerfully. “Perhaps you met the love of your life,”—he laughed—“who robbed you blind and left you. Still, a small price to pay for true happiness, don’t you think? Even for a few hours?”

Dr. Jainukul seemed blissfully ignorant of the domestic conflagration that his witty recollections were causing. But fortunately he was also quite busy, and soon he was gone, promising to check on Ukrit that evening, and advising him to take the rest of the day off.

“And no more liaisons on buses!”

Soon Sisithorn and Ukrit were gone, too, and Sisithorn offered to drive him home—somewhat reluctantly, it seemed.

Finally, Ladarat had her office to herself. The day was almost over, but it wasn’t too late to get some work done. She pushed aside all thoughts of drugging and mysterious disappearances, and sleepy doctors, and pulled a pile of charts closer to her.

She thumbed through the first few charts, setting them aside. Ladarat was looking for charts from the palliative care unit. She’d look at a couple of them, just enough to have something to talk about with Dr. Taksin.

And yet, something was wrong. Ladarat put another pile of charts on top of the first. And then another. And another. That was about twenty-five charts in all, including those she’d already reviewed, about half of her little library of charts, which made a stack about thirty centimeters tall. Only then did she find a chart from a patient who died in the palliative care unit. Just one.

Curious, Ladarat leafed through the other charts on her desk and came up with only two more. So that was only three patients who died in the palliative care unit, compared with almost fifty who died elsewhere in the hospital.

Wasn’t that strange? Why weren’t more patients dying in the palliative care unit? Hadn’t it been almost full the last time she’d visited Mrs. Double?

Not everyone on that unit would have died there, of course. Some were still receiving treatment, and many would have been discharged. But to have almost no one die there … well … that seemed statistically unlikely.

Still, at least now Ladarat had her patients for a conversation with Dr. Taksin. That’s what she needed. After reading through the charts and making a few notes, she’d done everything that she could do that day.

Besides, her evening was just beginning. She had an essential errand to run, and then a cooking class that, hopefully, would not be as bad as the first. She would cook … something, and it would be edible. That was her goal. A modest goal, perhaps, but it was best to begin with goals for which one could be reasonably certain of success. And why shouldn’t she be successful?

Parking spots were easy to find in this area. That fact alone should be a warning to the unwary. This was a not-so-good part of town and, admittedly, not the sort of neighborhood where the nurse ethicist at the best hospital in northern Thailand would want to be seen.

It was safe enough, of course. This was Chiang Mai, after all, not the South Side of Chicago, or even Bangkok, where people with billions lived next to people with nothing, which was a recipe for crime.

No, this was safe, Ladarat knew, but it felt creepy to her to be walking down this street alone. Alone, but for the presence of a few dozen men wandering in packs, because this was Chiang Mai’s small sex district.

It was nothing like Patpong in Bangkok. All of the sex workers in Chiang Mai could fit in a tiny sliver of Patpong. Still, it seemed like every farang man in Chiang Mai had migrated here tonight, even though it was a slow Tuesday. Most were Americans and Australians, although she heard snatches of German or maybe Dutch, and what sounded like Spanish, and maybe Russian.

And of course Chinese. A couple of crowds of Chinese businessmen huddled together and leaned on each other for structural support. The night was young, but they’d obviously been hard at work drinking for quite some time. She gave them a wide berth.

But her favorite fruit seller was an oasis of calm, Thai normalcy.

“Sawat dee krup, ajarn.” He often addressed her with the honorific ajarn reserved for teachers, and Ladarat had never bothered to correct him.

“You are enjoying your new car? I told you—very reliable, very safe!”

“Ah, yes, Khun. It is a very … satisfactory car.” That was the best that one could say about that car. But the fruit seller nodded enthusiastically.

A few minutes later, Ladarat hefted the bananas in the plastic bag he’d given her. (“Free! No charge! Special for you!”) Then she made her way down the small soi, toward the Tea House.

Halfway down, the businesses seem to lose their focus. There was an electronic repair shop, a small crockery store, and a kitchen supply warehouse. Beyond that was another plain storefront that announced itself simply as “The Tea House.” That business had the same stylized woman’s figure in the lower right-hand corner of the door, but that little sign was the only indication of what went on inside. And that, Ladarat knew, was exactly the way that her cousin Siriwan Pookusuwan wanted it.

The Tea House belonged to her cousin, who, like Ladarat, had grown up in the northwestern part of Thailand near Mae Hong Son, up in the mountains near the border with Burma. They’d grown up together, played together, gone to school together. But eventually their paths diverged. Ladarat became a nurse and an ethicist. And her cousin became, well, you could most charitably say she became a businesswoman.

But at least her cousin was honest about what she did, and Ladarat should be, too. Truthfully, her cousin became a mamasan, the owner of one of the cleanest and most well respected brothels in Chiang Mai, and probably in all of Thailand. She treated her girls like family, making sure that they saved most of what they earned. She kept them away from drugs and bad men, and was ruthless to any client who was less than a gentleman. In truth, she was probably more compassionate than many people Ladarat worked with every day.

She pushed through the double doors, and as her eyes adjusted to the dark, the contours of the large room emerged, stretching back into its dim corners. There were century-old teak floors and white plaster walls, with a large sunken table more than five meters long in the center. Wood carvings and silk tapestries lined the walls, and a Buddha to her right watched over the entrance.

That Buddha was the ubiquitous Thai Hing Phra. Many places of business had one inside, just as they had a Saan Jao, or spirit house, outside. It was a balance that Ladarat found comforting. Outside you’d pray for luck and good fortune or good crops—all materialist things. Inside you’d pray for harmony and enlightenment. She paused and knelt, depositing the bananas as an offering in hope of her own enlightenment regarding matters of detection.

As she rose, out of the darkness a man materialized in front of her. A blond farang, the biggest she had ever seen, he was easily two meters tall, with broad shoulders and a crew cut. He looked like the sort of man that a Thai director would look for if he wanted someone whose very appearance from a hundred meters away would say “Over here! Here is an American!”

The man smiled broadly. “Hello, so good to see you, Khun Ladarat.” He offered a high wai, which she returned. “And how have you been?”

“Well, I thank you, Khun Jonah. And you? And Krista?”

“She’s well, thank you. The first few months were a little rough—she had to take time off work.”

Jonah’s wife was a teacher at one of the schools for farang in town. She was pregnant—six months? Ladarat couldn’t remember.

“When is she due?”

“In January.” So in just a few weeks.

“Are you ready?”

Jonah shrugged. “I suppose. But nervous.” He laughed. “Well, very nervous.”

“I’m sure you’ll be excellent parents.”

“Thank you, Khun. Perhaps you’re right, but I’m less nervous about being a parent than about being a son-in-law, if you follow me?”

Ladarat didn’t.

“Krista’s parents just came to stay with us,” he explained. “We only have a small apartment and … well … there’s not much room for extended family. Of course we appreciate the help, but …”

“And Krista’s parents, have they ever been to Thailand?”

Jonah just shook his head.

“Have they ever been out of the United States?”

“No, I don’t think they have. When Krista and I got married, we went back to Utah for the wedding because they didn’t want to travel.”

“So they are … learning a lot.”

Jonah laughed. “Yes, I suppose you could say that. But as for shopping and dealing with the trash collection, and bribing the water delivery man to climb two flights of stairs, well, all of that is still up to us. And her father likes to be busy. Always doing things, building things, fixing and mending. I’m not sure what he’s going to do with himself. That’s why I’m here early; it’s a way to get out of the apartment.” He looked glum for a second, but only a second.

“Ah well,” Jonah said, “I’m sure they’ll learn to help. And it will be an adventure for them.”

Ladarat agreed that was probably the truth.

“Please have a seat. I’ll let Khun Siriwan know you’re here. Would you like tea?”

“That would be wonderful.”

Jonah nodded as he moved quickly toward the back door that led to the kitchen and offices.

Jonah had had a rough life. As a tourist just out of college, he’d gotten involved in a scam to run drugs out of Bangkok to Koh Samui to make enough money to travel on to India. But as many unsuspecting farang are, he’d been caught in Bangkok’s airport and sentenced to prison for five years. He’d gotten hepatitis in his third year and been transferred to Sriphat Hospital, where she’d met him when his family had come over to try to get him released. She had translated for those meetings and, much to her surprise, their director had gotten involved and had intervened to get him released.

Eventually he’d found this job with a little help from Ladarat. He was sort of a bouncer and sort of a handyman. And he was so devoted to Krista and Siriwan that he was beyond the temptation of the beautiful young women all around him.

Ladarat followed the path Jonah had taken, into a very large, open room, with high-beamed ceilings from which lazy fans stirred the air. The floors were cool tile, still damp from a recent scrubbing. Small, intimate tables were scattered around the large table in the center, and comfortable rattan sofas ringed the edges of the room. There was a small bar in the back, but it seemed to have been added almost as an afterthought.

Indeed, Siriwan had told Ladarat once that the most popular drink among her “guests” was, as the establishment’s name suggested, tea. Virtually all the men who came here found this place through word of mouth and referrals from friends. Siriwan kept her secrets well, even from her cousin. But she’d let it slip once that some of her best clients were high-ranking foreigners in the non-governmental organizations that worked in northern Thailand, Laos, and nearby Burma. And visiting professors at Chiang Mai University Medical School, she’d hinted.

One of the girls greeted Ladarat, seeming genuinely pleased to see her. A beautiful girl in her very early twenties, with a broad, round, open face of the Isaan farmland of eastern Thailand. Kittiya—Ya—brought a cool towel and a pot of tea, and Ladarat thanked her as she disappeared.

Months ago, Ya had asked Ladarat whether she might make a good nurse someday, and without really thinking, Ladarat had said yes. She’d even offered to write her a letter of recommendation.

Certainly that was the compassionate thing to do, and no doubt she’d earned much Buddhist merit from that offer. But she’d had cause to think about that offer many times since then.

Would Ya really be a good nurse? No doubt. But would she be able to endure nursing school? And the challenges of nursing work? Those were other questions entirely, and perhaps Ladarat didn’t do well to encourage her. But only time would tell—that wouldn’t be Ladarat’s decision to make.

And didn’t Professor Dalrymple say that the best attribute of a nurse—or a doctor—was an ability to discern a person’s needs? Surely Ya had that ability to a degree that was far beyond any other aspiring nursing student.

“Ah, cousin.” The woman who floated across the room surprised Ladarat every time she saw her. Below Siriwan’s flowing Lanna dress, her feet seemed to glide across the floor without actually touching the tiles. Siriwan was taller than Ladarat by ten centimeters. She was taller than most Thai men, which perhaps explained why she’d never married. That and her vigorous independence.

Her cousin’s long black hair, lightly streaked with gray, actually seemed to complement her complexion in a way that normal or mortal women could never manage. Even her face—long and angular, yet soft—succeeded in being graceful.

They exchanged greetings, wais and then hugs. In a fluid movement, Siriwan settled at the little table across from Ladarat, adding a splash of tea to Ladarat’s cup before pouring her own.

Despite their differences—one was a respected nurse ethicist and the other was a brothel owner—they’d always been close. Perhaps that was because they had no other family to speak of. And neither had children. They were all of the family that each one had.

After exchanging pleasantries and news, Siriwan got to business quickly. It was early evening, and the Tea House was deserted, but it wouldn’t be for long. Even on a quiet Tuesday evening there would be guests arriving shortly.

“So … you said you had a favor to ask?” Siriwan smiled and took a sip of tea. “I hope it’s nothing like asking for help in finding a murderer. That was exciting, perhaps. But in my business, excitement is best avoided. So maybe something a little easier?”

“No excitement. And nothing to do with you at all. At least, not directly. You see, I need a spy.”

“A … spy?”

Ladarat was about to explain, but she took a sip of tea instead, savoring the moment. It wasn’t often that she was able to surprise her cousin. Given her line of work, Siriwan was an endless source of titillating gossip and intrigue: what this politician was doing, or how much that civil servant was being paid to look the other way. She had her ear to the ground of all of Chiang Mai’s best gossip. It was novel to be able to offer something small and unexpected in her cousin’s day.

“Well, not a spy, exactly. But an informer. You see, there have been disappearances that I have been asked to … investigate.”

Was that a smile? Sometimes with Siriwan it was hard to tell. But … yes, almost certainly, a smile.

“No, seriously, cousin. It is a potential mystery. Maybe.”

Even to Ladarat, that didn’t sound very convincing.

And still Siriwan was smiling. Yim yaw, the teasing smile. The smile that was used, for instance, when that boy you were warned about turns out to be just as untrustworthy as gossip promised.

Ladarat explained about the missing farang and Wiriya’s suspicions, and the possibility that the Magic Grove Hotel might be involved; also his realistic appraisal and his belief that, as with most unusual events, there was probably a logical explanation. His suspicions were most likely just that—suspicions.

“And yet,” Ladarat said hurriedly, before Siriwan could interject a note of caution, “it is possible, is it not, that something … nefarious is going on?”

Siriwan was silent for a moment, taking a long sip of tea.

“Of course it’s possible, cousin. Anything is possible. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if these people were disappearing. Perhaps because they want to, or perhaps even if they don’t. And the owner you’re suspicious of … Delia?”

Ladarat nodded, trying not to show her disappointment.

“What is it exactly that you’re suspicious about?”

What indeed? Nothing. And everything. “She just seemed like … she was hiding something.” She paused, looking at her half-smiling cousin.

“You think this is a waste of time?” Ladarat, at least, was starting to become convinced that it was, so she was surprised by her cousin’s answer.

“No, not really. Or maybe it is, but you never know. Who would have thought a nurse would catch a serial murderer?” She smiled. “Or that we’d even have a serial murderer in our midst. It always seems to me that we don’t pay nearly enough attention to things that are very unlikely. You never know, do you?”

Ladarat Patalung, the ethical nurse detective, was living proof of that. She nodded.

“But what sort of spying did you have in mind?” Siriwan continued. “You never told me.”

“I thought perhaps Jonah might be persuaded to take a part-time job. Just for a week or so, during the day. He has a baby coming, and would probably appreciate some extra income, and …”

Siriwan smiled. “And it would get him out of their small apartment during the day. Very good. I’ll make sure his responsibilities at night are minimal so he can get some sleep.” She nodded. “Of course, I’ll tell him it’s fine with me. Shall I call this woman, Delia? I can give him an excellent reference.”

A reference? Ladarat hadn’t thought of that. Of course Delia would want a reference. She nodded. “Perhaps it would be best if you suggested this … arrangement. You could say that you heard from me that the Magic Grove Hotel was in need of a receptionist …”

Siriwan nodded quickly, but whether because this was a good idea or because she wanted to conclude this business before her first guests arrived, Ladarat wasn’t sure.

Ladarat stood to leave, but Siriwan stopped her with a question.

“The woman who owns the Magic Grove Hotel—Delia. Is she married?”

Ladarat thought for a moment. She’d said something about a husband, hadn’t she? That she’d been married once?

“I think not now, but perhaps in the past.”

“So what happened to her husband?”

Ladarat stood very still, thinking.

“If you’re suspicious of her, that might be a good place to start.” She paused, smiling. “As you yourself know very well.”