“I set the mental son on him. I have to tell you there was always something scary about the boy. He was crazy about me to the point that he’d have done anything I told him to. In fact, he was clingy. Deranged, I’d say. I told him me and his whore mother had a disease. Got it into his head that Paiboun was responsible for us dying. She’s not dead either, the mother. She’s still putting it out there for old geezers. I see her slumming around the bars some nights. The boy was easy enough to stir up. I arranged for his scholarship to be cancelled, blamed Fake Dr. Siri for that too. So I knew he’d be pissed, knew he’d find a way to get revenge on behalf of his dead mother and dear old Uncle Henry. He promised me in the last letter I got from him. That’s when I ‘died’ and left him in vengeance limbo. The guilt would have been too much for him not to go through with it.”

“Ah, I hear my name,” said Siri. “You must have got to the meat in the sandwich. We’re not far from the end.”

Dom’s weapon was on the ground beside him. He was leaning with both fists on the refrigerator, blocking half the picture. The bar conversation continued.

“So, what have you been living on all these years?” the woman asked.

“I’m surprised you haven’t heard,” he said. “I run a very profitable import-export company here in Ubon. Made quite a fortune off of it. Of course, I’m still very active in the international peace movement.”

“There really is no end to you, is there?” said the blonde.

“Look, this is a bit embarrassing,” he said. “I’ve left my wallet in the Benz. Could you get this and we’ll go somewhere quieter.”

“Sure,” she said.

“You’re staying at the hotel, right?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“What say we get another bottle and burn off some calories over there?”

“Sounds peachy,” she said. “But, hey. Do you mind if we take those two guys sitting at the end of the bar?”

She nodded in that direction. The man followed her gaze.

“What?” he asked.

“Yeah, we kind of came together,” she said.

Two Western men in casual clothes appeared in the picture, grabbed Henry by the arms and stood him up. Their heads were all out of the frame now.

“What are you doing?” said the man.

“First I’ll retrieve my camera from my overnight bag and make sure it’s working.”

The woman approached the camera. The picture went dark briefly then returned. She was holding the camera now and pointing it to another table where two Thai men sat drinking beer. They made V signs.

“If they could speak English,” she said, “those two plainclothes Thai police gentlemen would probably say, ‘You’re under arrest.’”

“On what charge?”