“So, why are you here?” he asked, which surprised me considering he’d invited me.

“Because you need me?” I said.

He’d lost some weight and some hair since last we’d met. Jungle life took its toll on all of us one way or another. I’d long since forgotten the joy of hearing a solid stool thundering down to earth at our outdoor latrine.

“You are quite correct,” said Civilai. “There was sympathy within my group when I told them of my findings. But when I asked for a team of commandos to accompany me here, they pointed out quite rightly that they were more likely to throw themselves under a tank than to accede to my request.”

“Given the title of our assignment,” I said, “you don’t see it as a little ironic that two Lao would take it upon themselves to carry out a mission on behalf of the Vietnamese?”

“Let’s just say that if we’re successful—and I really hope we are—our little country will be owed a great debt of gratitude. One that I shall claim back over and over until the favor bucket is dry.”

“How dangerous do you consider this to be?”

“At the very least we could be tortured and shot.”

“In that case I doubt one jug of beer will be enough,” I said.

Half an hour later we walked, perhaps a little unsteadily, the four steamy blocks to the National Museum of Saigon. We stood admiring its grand pagoda-like façade. There was a thick layer of gravel on the driveway, and we each selected the best specimens and put them in our trouser pockets. We paid our piasters to the indifferent young guard at the desk and put our names in the visitor’s book. It hadn’t been signed for four days. Oddly, considering what we were about to do, we gave our actual names. Civilai took time to write a comment.

We looked at the little map on the central beam and made our way to the north gallery. The guard didn’t follow us, and there were no attendants in any of the rooms. So, there we stood in the middle of the Ly Dynasty: the golden age of Vietnamese art. Its ceramics were praised and sought after throughout the world and rightly so. The pots in front of us were elegantly slender with their emerald and light-green glazes and their distinct motifs. Every one of them was a work of art and literally priceless.

“They’re beautiful,” I said.

“Hard to believe they’re over nine hundred years old,” said Civilai.

“Hard indeed,” I agreed.

“I’m guessing that the big grey-green one up there on the shelf will be the loudest,” said Civilai.

“You think they’d mention volume in the tourist guide book.”

“Perhaps nobody’s ever tried to get a sound out of them before,” said Civilai.

“Then let us be the first,” I said.