“How do you mean?”

“I don’t know. I just get the feeling he’s making stuff up.”

“I thought you liked fiction.”

“I do, in its rightful place. And I must say I’m getting fond of the introduction of make-believe in government reports. But this is supposed to be a diary. Listen to this.”

Siri flipped to a page he’d marked with a sliver of paper and read.

“‘I’ve noticed how Corporal Yatsusuki continues to gain weight. Yatsusuki is a builder and carpenter. We’d just completed a dormitory building for officers and as we were leaving, Yatsusuki got himself stuck in the doorway. It took four of us to unwedge him.’

“See, Phosy? How many people do you know so wide they get stuck in a doorway? And there’s this.”

He turned to another marker.

“‘I was looking for Taigou’—that’s the dog—‘and I found him behind the mess tent. He had another teakettle stuck on his head.’ What do you make of that?”

“That dogs are stupid?” suggested Phosy.

“No. It means Toshi is so bored with his own diary that he’s started to invent stories. His life is so uneventful, so perfect, that he has to make negative things up. And here I am reading it waiting for the punch line, sure that something devastating is going to happen, but when it does I won’t know what’s real and what’s not.”

“Then stop reading it.”

“Of course I can’t,” said Siri. “Daeng wants us to go to Thakhek to walk in Toshi’s footsteps but his feet aren’t going anywhere I’m interested to follow.”

“You could always . . .”

“I am not turning to the last page.”

“Up to you.”

“But we do plan to go to Thakhek regardless. Perhaps you’d be kind enough to write us up a couple of laissez-passers.”

“Are you going on police business?” Phosy asked.

“In a way.”

“What way would that be?”

“We’re friends of the chief inspector of police?”

“Is that why you came here?”

“In part.”

“Then I hope you have better luck with the other part.”

“Right. Well, because you are the least corrupt man ever to sit at that very expensive desk, we assumed you wouldn’t write us travel documents. I would have been just a little bit disappointed if you’d agreed. But we still plan to go and now you owe us a favor.”

“I do?”

“Yes. You’re forcing us to travel to another province without laissez-passers, so we need you to find us transportation that doesn’t involve paperwork.”

“Siri?”

“You can do it, we know you can. You of all people can circumvent the awkward bureaucracy and send us on our way legally.”

Phosy laughed.

“I’ll ask around,” he said. “I can’t promise anything.”

“That’s all we can hope for.”

Phosy escorted Siri to the door, his arm around the old boy’s shoulder.

“How did things go in Vang Vieng?” Siri asked.

“Ah, that’s why I was late.”

“Sihot couldn’t find the girl?”

“We don’t know.”

“Why not?”