Almost a week had passed. The journalists had departed and the city went back into social hibernation. The border was still closed. At the market, for the equivalent of a dollar you could get a potato or a lifetime supply of marijuana. The appearance of cooking oil caused a stampede. In the end-of-year review, someone calculated that the country had fourteen thousand kilometers of road, most of which was impassable in the wet season. Another thousand cooperatives had folded and industry still comprised one percent of the economy. There were three unexploded ordnance incidents a day, many of them fatal. The schools still had no textbooks, and the teachers were being paid in rice because the budget didn’t stretch to education.

Civilai would have had some sarcastic comment to make about it all. Nobody of any personal importance to him attended his state funeral. Even Madam Nong had to pull out at the last moment due to a touch of migraine. She was replaced on the bleacher by somebody who looked a little like her. A lot of photographs were taken and there was an article about Comrade Civilai in the Pasason Lao newsletter and a forty-minute special on Lao radio. But the live turnout was sparse and the sincerity shallow. Civilai had always spoken his mind and socialism wasn’t cut out for such foolishness. That final speech had raised hackles throughout the Party.

Probably the most pertinent news of the week was that there had been no sign of the murderous Thai. The chicken ropes that crisscrossed Siri’s backyard had broken his fall from the upstairs window. Where he went from there was anyone’s guess. Once Phosy was alerted, every available policeman was on the streets looking for a plump young man, probably hiding his blond hair beneath a cap. He hadn’t turned up for his booked flight on the day he attempted to cremate Siri and Daeng. He wasn’t seen at any guard posts along the roads leading from the city. There were no sightings of him crossing the river. He’d just vanished. Neither had Dr. Porn’s body been recovered. But the Mekong was a huge winding stretch of water with no end of crevices and gnarled roots to trap a body.