Daeng poured them both a glass of homemade rice whisky, and they let it flow over their palates before allowing it to drop and burn holes in their livers. Around then, someone on the Thai side was apparently blown up by an illegal propane gas tank. They recognized the sound. It happened often.

“What I suggest . . .” said Daeng.

“Yes?”

“. . . is that we do absolutely nothing.”

“I thought that’s what we were doing.”

“We don’t want paranoia to set in.”

“Why does everyone on the planet think I’m paranoid?”

“Exactly. I suggest we just work on the small and solvable problems.”

“Such as?”

“I’m glad you asked,” said Daeng. “You remember Granny Far from the skirt bank?”

“How could I forget her?” said Siri. “We’re keeping her alive, aren’t we?”

The skirt bank was one of Madam Daeng’s many community projects. More and more women she knew were running into financial strife and were selling what items of value they had to keep their families fed. Many had already sold their silk phasin skirts for far less than they were worth. Their family heirlooms were lost forever. Siri and Daeng had come into some good luck as a result of a drug deal that went wrong. They happened to have been in the right place at the right time. It was no fortune. Enough, Siri thought, for a nice little car and sufficient petrol to run it for a while. But Daeng had convinced Siri that they should use that money to set up a loan service. The women could deposit their phasins at Daeng’s shop. She would give them a fair price for the skirt and, one day, when the spirits were in a more convivial mood, they could pay back the loan and reclaim their goods.

The spirits were obviously in no hurry to heap blessings on the hapless women because Daeng’s spare room was starting to look like a fabric warehouse. Mr. Geung, currently doing whatever it was that grooms did on their honeymoons at vegetable farms, was the curator of what he called the sin bin. He had no written records but he had a remarkable nose. If anyone returned and claimed their treasure he could sniff it out in no time.

Granny Far had long since lost her valuable phasin collection to unscrupulous dealers on the Thai side. But she still had an assortment of chain-link silver belts. Her children and grandchildren, and all but one nephew, had fled to the camps across the river. The anticipated arrival of money from her relatives in third countries had yet to materialize. So, from time to time, the old lady would ride her bicycle over to Daeng’s noodle shop, have a bowl of her favorite spicy number two and call Daeng to one side to discuss a little business.

That evening, the business had been entirely different.

“Her nephew,” said Daeng.