Cambodian Book of the Dead (23 page)

“For Sambat, my brother.”

She gently smiled at the old man and brushed his silver hair straight.

“Raksmei, you know who I am?” Lorenz asked with an uncertain tone in his voice. It didn't suit him.

She did not answer.

“How long has he got?”

“He can talk thirty minutes. Then one hour quiet. Then dead.”

Carissa untied Les from his chair. The American was conscious.

“Is it over, Maier?”

“It is all over. We will say goodbye to Bokor now.”

Without turning around, Carissa and Raksmei grabbed Les and led him outside, into the sun.

Lorenz's eyes followed his daughter in silence.

 

“I was a good man. A friend of the people. When the Vietnamese invaded in '79, I could have hidden in my embassy. I would have been safe there. But I fled with Tep. I knew that my career in Yugoslavia was finished. I knew I would risk my life. But I could not let Tep down. He was a good soldier and he took our mission seriously. He was my friend.”

Maier sat back into his wheelchair. Slowly, ever so slowly, he was beginning to relax. For the first time in a week, he wasn't in mortal danger and he knew what was going on. The White Spider was drooling. Paralysis was slowly setting in. He was watching a man die.

“After Phnom Penh had fallen, we came down here and slept in a cooperative. In the morning we planned to head west to the Cardamom Mountains, as good a place as any to disappear for a while. Just before we left, Tep caught a woman roasting some animal over an open fire.
Angkar had forbidden any such act. Tep was as loyal to Angkar as I am to him. That's how it is in war, Maier. Even while we were being chased by the enemy, he took a hammer and killed the woman. Her husband worked in a field nearby with his daughter. Tep walked up to the man. I stood on the edge of the field and saw exactly what he did. He said something about Angkar to the little girl and hit her father. The man fell to the ground. He gave the little girl the hammer. These are the moments, Maier, on the edge of everything, when we get close to the gods. I had some moments like that in Croatia.”

The voice of the old man was getting weaker. His eyes had glazed over.

Outside, in front of the police station, Maier could hear the flapping of leathery wings.

“I'm almost gone, Maier. Not even my daughter wants to watch me die. No one will bury me. Tep will not let you get away, but even that no longer matters now. The Kangaok Meas Project is running. My last engagement. You see, the girl who killed her father in the rice-field, her name was Kaley. Tep took her with us. He gave her to me as a present and thus saved her life. I took her the same afternoon. She could not have been much older than twelve. Raksmei and Sambat are my children. My children with Kaley. She was the reason why I came back to this small, primitive, insignificant country. Her sister also came back from Germany to find Kaley. Tep got rid of her.”

The White Spider gasped for air. Then he calmed and let the toxin work its way to his core.

“And as you may know, Maier, Tep married Kaley off to his oldest son, who was killed by Kaley's youngest daughter, Poch. With a hammer, I might add. When Tep tried to train the girl as one of our assassins, she ran in front of the jeep of that young German guy. The little girl lived like Kaley, following only her own laws. Just like Raksmei, who just killed her father. Everything repeats itself again and again, like in the old story about the Kangaok Meas, which these uneducated half-people keep alive with their superstitions.”

“Does Raksmei know who her parents are?”

The old man coughed up some blood and shook his head.

“No. Tep insisted that Raksmei and Sambat should grow up as orphans. The Khmer Rouge often separated children from their parents. Later, when Raksmei had grown up a bit, shortly after I came back to Cambodia, he tried to seduce her. She must have been the same age as Kaley, when she gave birth to my children. It almost broke our friendship. Now I wonder why I was so cross.”

The White Spider laughed.

“But she is not stupid, this daughter of mine. She was never scared of me. When she was brought to the temple a few weeks ago, I was sorely tempted to tell her the truth. But I would have had to tell her everything, including the fact that I was responsible for the death of her brother. Tep was sure she'd be reliable and she knew something about drugs.”

The voice of the old man seemed to drift away from him for a moment. His lips barely moved.

“But in her heart, she always knew. Do you really think a woman like Raksmei can kill her own father without recognising him? I am proud of my daughter.”

“Does Kaley know that she is Raksmei's mother?

The old German laughed, just.

“She knows nothing. After the birth, Tep took the kids away from her and had them sent back to Kampot with the Khmer Rouge. She thinks her children are dead. Do you understand why I returned to Cambodia as soon as possible? I wanted to make sure my children had a chance.”

“And then you killed your son? What chance did he have?”

“A misunderstanding. War is never simple. As soon as the first shot is fired… Sambat was here and watched the Kangaok Meas ceremony.”

“What ceremony?”

“Maier, Tep found out that my son was here and Viengsra killed him and threw him in the sea.”

Maier looked at the dying man without pity.

“He did not kill him. He drowned your son alive. He tied stones to his feet and drowned him.”
For the first time, Maier could detect particles of pain in the eyes of the old man. He didn't have much time left.

“And where is Kaley now?”

“Maier, you did not understand me. The Kangaok Meas is a concept of the Immaterial, a manifestation of the sensuous, a golden peacock, reborn in each generation. And in this life, Kaley belongs to Kep, to Bokor. She is the whore of Cambodia and all who sleep with her will experience a violent end. That's what the locals believe. More importantly, that's what Kaley believes.”

What had Rolf said? There had to be a way to free people from the darkness of tradition, even from superstition.

Maier was less idealistic. People, whether highly educated or illiterate, always stayed the same. The killing technique changed, but the thought was the same.

The White Spider coughed blood and slid deeper into his chair.

“When I slept with Kaley, she was still a child. You must understand. We were at war. There was nothing to eat. And Tep and I saved her. At that time, we could not see that she was the Kangaok Meas. We only realised that later.”
Lorenz fought for breath.

“Lift me up, Maier. Don't let me die like a rat. Please do me one last favour and call my daughter back in.”

Maier shook his head.

The White Spider stared up at him, his gaunt long face wracked by pain and anger.

“How many people have you poisoned, Hilmar Lorenz?”

Maier wanted to kick him, but one did not kick dead people.

The White Spider's phone rang. Without turning, Maier left the former police station.

 

DEATH IN THE TEA PLANTATION

 

“The butchers will be here in a few minutes and they will be looking for us.”

“I know a trail, past the old jail and into the jungle. It's difficult to follow us there.”

Les sat against the wall, almost passed out.

“Will he be able to make it?”

Raksmei looked at Maier. She nodded.

Les groaned. The young woman had a syringe in her hand. The White Spider's daughter looked breath-taking and deadly. Suddenly Maier felt like a human being again. A human being pumped to the gills with amphetamine.

“That's my last one. He will make it with this shot.”

Raksmei tied off the American's arm. A dog started barking. Carissa and Raksmei helped the battered war veteran to his feet.

The trail led downhill. After a few minutes they crossed two narrow streams and Les managed to walk without help.

Below the police station, the path got steeper. Les walked silently and, despite his injuries, overtook the other three.

After an hour they reached the bottom of a valley. An overgrown, barely visible building lay off to the left of the trail.

“The old prison.”

Raksmei made no effort to stop and followed Les along the narrow trail that led between tall grasses.

“The trail will divide a bit further. The left path leads back to the Black Villa, the right trail drops down into the jungle. We go right. The road is bound to be guarded.”

Carissa and Raksmei crashed into Maier, thrown to the floor by the power of the explosion, which pressed them into the soil. Just ahead, a round hole had been ripped from the trail. Raksmei had blood on her face, but she started to get up. Someone was screaming behind them. The hunters were on their way.

Maier knew that they had only seconds. They had to leave.

“Carissa, take Raksmei into the jungle. I will see you in Kampot. Rent a car to go to the border. I will distract the dogs and meet you tomorrow.”

Carissa was unhurt. She grabbed the young Khmer woman's arm.

“If there are more mines on this trail, we are fucked.”

But there was no time to ponder. Tep's men were barely a hundred metres behind them.

“Let's go.”

The two women ran down the hill. There was no sign of Les. The bushes were dripping with blood. The American could not have survived. Before Maier could take a step, the boy and Viengsra stood behind him.

The inspector smiled like a toothless child and spoke first. “M Maier, my dog found you.”

The boy had his finger on the trigger and grinned.

The two men led Maier across to the overgrown prison.

“We mine the trail this morning. Otherwise you escape. Someone wait for the girl at Black Villa already. General Tep very angry. You kill his friend.”

Maier stumbled ahead of the two men. Suddenly the boy grabbed him by the shoulder and pushed him into dense undergrowth, past the abandoned building. A trail opened and they stood in front of the main entrance of the old French jail, its door flanked by two handsome pillars. Maier fell up the slippery stairs.

“We wait for Tep. He want to see you die. He want to take you life, M Maier.”

The boy pushed Maier inside the building. The roof had partly fallen in, but a few of the cells beyond the entrance hall looked intact.

The first thing Maier saw was a red head which jumped up and down behind a barred window.

“Maier, you're still alive? I never would have thought.”

The boy opened the only functioning cell door and pushed Maier inside.

Pete was pale and looked bewildered. He was unshaven and his gaunt cheeks had become more hollow. His voice was so hoarse that Maier had problems understanding him.

“Yeah, Maier, I haven't eaten for days. These fuckers simply forgot about me. Maier, do you have anything to eat?”
The steel door slammed shut behind Maier.

“My liver?”

The English man didn't smile.

“Maier, I've seen it before. You can't eat anything for days after, if you see something like that.”

“They'll take your liver too, Pete.”

The cell was empty. Small trees sprouted from the broken moss-covered walls. In a few years the roots would crack the wall open and the building would collapse. Not soon enough.

Pete staggered around in circles, shaking with panic. Maier looked around. The roof had holes, but it was more than four metres away. There was no getting up there.

“Have you got a fag?”

“I don't smoke.”

Pete looked at him with unfathomable anger, before he began circling the cell again. The round smooth face of the policeman appeared at the cell window. Inspector Viengsra was chewing betel. He lost a thread of red spit and smiled.

“The White Spider show Tep and his son how to skin people.”

The man was so simple, one had to be scared. But Maier didn't want to give up. One hour.

“I hope I not watch. Sometime they go too far, too far, M Maier.”

“Watch?” Maier asked, not expecting an answer, and stepped up to the window to laugh in the inspector's face.

“They will roast you and your dog as well, Inspector. The White Spider is dead and we got away. You have failed. It will all be your fault when we are dead. You will see how Cambodia gets rid of people who fail.”

For a moment, genuine worry spread across the moon-shaped face of the policeman as he looked down at the prisoners. Then he laughed carelessly.

“I help him grill. He need my help. Tep not eat three liver, for sure.”

Suddenly the boy called out in front of the prison.

“Viengsra?”

Someone fired a shot.

The policeman's crying eyes blinked in panic and he pulled his weapon. Pete ran to the cell window and tried to look past the inspector. Viengsra started to shoot, wildly. After a few seconds only the click of the empty gun was audible.

“Shit, the boy is dead.”

Pete stepped away from the window.

“Tep wouldn't kill his own son, would he?”

Two more shots rang through the entrance hall of the prison.

The power of the bullets threw Inspector Viengsra to the cell window.

The cell door opened and the next bullet caught Pete in the forehead.

Maier remained standing in the middle of the room.

“Yes, young man, wrong time, wrong place.”

The Russian grinned, bowed theatrically and raised his weapons.

“I thought all the while you were involved in something up here. Should I shoot you straight away?”

Maier had put up his hands.

“What are you doing here, you damn
gopnik
? Correct answer please, your life hangs by the proverbial thread, a thread so delicate even the king of Cambodia has never seen it.”

“I am a private detective. From Hamburg. I work for a family in Hamburg, to bring their son back to Germany. Rolf is the son.”

Mikhail laughed, pushed his grey locks out of his face and carefully lowered his weapons.

“Good answer, Maier. I know all this already. And good thing too you got rid of the old Nazi. But things like that, they make waves. And I don't like waves. That's why I live up here.”

Maier knew it was pointless to ask the Russian what he was doing in Bokor. One could not ask a man like that questions.

“I am looking for the Kangaok Meas.”

“Usually everyone runs away when that name is mentioned. Rolf will never get the girl. But he will try. People are like that. They believe in things they know not to exist. As a Russian, I sympathise. But you, you man, you have the East in your eyes. That's why you will manage to solve your case, detective.”

The dog of the policeman had pushed into the cell and sniffed at Maiers legs.

“It's better we disappear. This place will be swarming with black shrimps soon.”

“The road is blocked. The trail through the forest might be mined.”

“I know that, Maier. I found Les outside. Poor man. Survived three wars and then died up here in the great nothing.”

Mikhail shot the dog.