We’d decided nothing would be gained by telling him we were Lao Communists.

“Naturally we’ll have to verify these claims,” said the prefect. “And while we are doing so, I shall keep you all here under guard. These are serious accusations and I cannot proceed without recommendations from my superiors. I shall return when we know more. In the meantime—I don’t know—make yourselves comfortable.”

There followed a peculiar hour during which Civilai and I sat on a divan and Marchant took the velvet chair. Each of us had an armed guard at our back. We had a front-row view of the curator passing through various shades of anger and into the vivid hues of fear. We had not been banned from speaking, so Civilai and I caught up on the films we’d seen on our respective 8mm show nights and the duties of our wives. We weren’t careful about what we said. It was rare for foreign experts to come to the colonies and bother to study our languages. We were all supposed to speak French, so it didn’t occur to us that the curator might be a linguist.

Much later, we went back over our conversation from that hour and began to question how much information we’d given away—if we’d mentioned places or names or whether we’d said anything in our own language that could have led to us being traced. Because, just before Blazer returned, we witnessed the look of Satan in the eyes of the curator. He leaned forward, and in fluent Lao, he said:

“Monsieur Civilai, Dr. Siri, you may be feeling smug about this victory. But it is only temporary. What you did today promises to ruin me financially and professionally. The prefect will not find the local artisans on your list because obviously I could not allow them to live given what they knew. I found I am something of an architect when it comes to murder. There will be nothing to tie me to the deaths of a few old potters. I will not be executed—our government cannot afford such a scandal—but when I return to France, my life will not be worth living. The only thing that will keep me sane from now on is the thought of finding you both and your charming wives and your children and doing to you all what you did to the pots. I shall crush you and destroy you, and I shall enjoy every second of your pain. It will be the fulfillment of my life’s ambition to see you suffer.”