“It’s funny,” said Kyoko. “When I first met Dr. Siri I knew he was the type of man who’d be married to a remarkable woman. I’m always right about these things.”

If there had been even an ice cube of doubt in Daeng’s mind that Kyoko was extraordinary it melted right there and then.

In the boat to the caves, Siri and Daeng didn’t bother to shout above the roar of the engine because they were both lost in their own thoughts. Siri was imagining Toshi’s life in Laos. He had decided to give some credence to the fact that Toshi had changed the names of his friends and himself as a sort of protection. Perhaps they had something to fear. He was based so far from the fighting it would have been easy to forget there was a war at all. He obviously enjoyed his time here. Perhaps there was a girlfriend, but there was also a wife and children back home he’d only mentioned once in the entire diary. Perhaps he had deserted from the army and moved into the jungle. Many had.

But Siri felt the key was not in what they knew already but in what they did not. It lay in those missing years before the diary began, somewhere around Toshi’s arrival in Indochina. The five pages torn from the diary. The end of the love tunnel. And, in his soul, Siri knew there was more to be learned about the tragic day at the end of the invasion when twenty Japanese officers killed themselves for honor.

To fill some of those gaps, Siri had asked Beer to stay on the Thai side and contact Cindy at the US embassy in Cambodia. He was to ask whether she’d been able to find any records pertaining to Hiro Uenobu, the pilot. He should also return to Kyoko’s office later to see whether her sensei had been able to put more names to demons. It was just as well that Beer felt as comfortable in Thailand as he did in Laos. He had friends on both sides. But there was another reason Siri preferred Beer not accompany them to Sawan on this occasion. He was certain their Vietnamese guide and the teacher, Satsai, knew each other, and that the relationship was not warm enough for either of them to admit it. On this trip to confront the teacher, Siri didn’t want any added complications.

Daeng was in a world of her own.

“What are you thinking?” Siri shouted.

“Nothing,” yelled Daeng.

“Not true.”

“Perhaps I’m wondering how I can replace Civilai in your life,” she said. “Your jokes that only old men with a French education can understand. Your cultural references that we country Lao are baffled by. Your intellects. Your world knowledge. I could never match him for all that.”

Siri took her hand and held it to his chest.