Chapter One - Richard Lewis
Chapter One - Richard Lewis Chapter One - Richard Lewis
One had to be careful, for many of these girls were consummate actresses, but her distress seemed genuine. Nol extracted the man's wallet from the trousers and pulled out a hundred Euro note. "Hey!" the man said in outrage. "I already paid! What is this? Extortion! Corruption! I'll report you!" Nol pointed to the photo in the wallet, a pleasant looking woman and two teenaged sons. "And I report you?" The man slumped sullenly. "I'm here on business. This is just a wee bit of harmless fun." Nol tossed him the wallet and trousers. "Get out. Go. Next time I arrest you. TV camera." The man hurried into his clothes and out of the room, shirt tails and shoelaces flapping. Nol gave the girl the hundred Euro. "This should get you home. Change it at the Majapahit money changer on Market Street. They're honest. The others will cheat you. Now hide in the closet." The girl took the money. There was a crack in her eyes, a little glint in her tears that could have been gratitude but could also have been greed. Nol raised his baton. "If I see you again, you get this." She pressed her hands together. "Oh, thank you, older brother." A short while later, the HANSIP men crowded around a local coffee stall down the road, joking and laughing and celebrating the raid. Success at last! Dharma's cell phone buzzed. With a finger stuck in one ear, he listened and then hung up and clapped his hands. Everyone fell silent. "We're not done yet, men. We have to go the beach. Somebody found some bones." In the last of the seaside coconut groves, police had cordoned off the entrance to a construction site. Two cops blew whistles and kept the early morning rubberneckers moving along road. Once through the cordon and gate, the pickup rattled down a long driveway. A two-story mansion was still under construction, sprouting pipes and wires, and the grounds were raw with unfinished landscaping. The pickup stopped by a backhoe, its yellow arm crooked like an insect leg. Dharma ordered his men to the beachfront boardwalk to help the police hold off a crowd of onlookers. Nol gawked as he walked past a large hole in the ground, where two workers with shovels were clearing soil away from a jumble of bones. More bones were gathered on a plastic tarp, with several skulls lined up in a tidy row, their hollow lifeless sockets giving Nol an uneasy pricking. By an ambulance backed up to the tarp, several men stood close in quiet discussion. Anak Agung Mantera leaned on his black ironwood cane, a towel draped over his bare thin shoulders, his long shorts still damp. He and several cronies his age often swam in the lagoon for the exercise and to warm their blood in the rising sun. Two of those cronies were wrapped in towels, one a high caste Brahmana and the other a low caste but powerful member of the local parliament. Dharma approached the group, which widened to accept him. Mantera asked him a soft question that Nol didn't catch, and he couldn't make out Dharma's rumbling reply. 20
By a renovated rice granary that was intended to be a poolside hut, an agitated Australian with a sweaty pink face and a sweaty red scalp waved his arms at the general contractor. "Jesus Bloody Christ," the man bellowed. "You're already three months late. How long of a delay is this gonna be?" The contractor glanced at the bones and the small gathering of the elite. "One hour," he said soothingly. "An hour? Are you crazy? This is a killing field. You see those skulls?" He made a vicious chop to the back of his own head. "Bam!" "No problem," the contractor said. He caught Nol's eye, his expression somber. Both of them knew that history best left forgotten had been accidentally dug up. Considering that tight circle of powerful men with faces like closed doors, it was evident the history going to remain forgotten. Nol joined his comrades at the boardwalk, his uneasiness spreading to his liver and guts. When Nol's father was executed, the Red Berets refused Dharma permission to retrieve his brother's corpse. For the cremation rites, Dharma had made an effigy, as did many other families for their disappeared ones, but those families had carried out the cremations in secret. Not Dharma. He roared and bellowed his brother's innocence and bullied the village into letting him use the pura dalem, Durga's temple for death rites. Even so, there'd been no body, only an effigy, and the cremation had left everyone unsatisfied, as if they'd eaten a cardboard photo of meal instead of real rice. A slender man in a fine suit cut through the crowd on the boardwalk and ducked under the police tape. The police stepped aside, for this was none other than Anak Agung Gdé Raka, S.H., B.A., M.B.A., Mantera's son and scion of the palace, recently returned from some fancy business school in America. Raka carried his usual air of having been anointed by the gods, and if the gods happened to be too busy that day, then no problem, he would anoint himself. He'd been this way for as long as Nol had known him. They'd gone to grade school together. Raka's gaze swept down Nol's green uniform and past his bulging belt to his ponderous black boots. Amusement curled across his handsome face. "Hello, Nol, been busy catching dangerous men?" he said as he passed. Nol ignored him to push back at an eager Balinese teen trying to get a look at the bones, his eyes wide with avid curiosity. The kid was a local surfer who worked at a jetski operation, a beach boy who had no idea, no idea at all. But there were also present men and women of an older generation. They knew, oh yes they did. Nol saw on their faces a mix of grim determination—it was distasteful but it had to be done—and righteous pride— I did my part to save my country. But a few had a stunned and terrified look, as if something hideous had slithered back into their lives. One crooked street sweeper was panting and sweating, having run here from the main road. Tears suddenly filled his haggard eyes and he turned away. There rose a screeching voice. "Let me through! Let me through!" Men Djawa scratched a path through the throng. Her lips worked furiously, and her eyes were razors under white brows. One of the tourists holding high a video camera said, "God, look at that, a skull." 21
- Page 1 and 2: NOTE: A version of this novel is av
- Page 3 and 4: Chapter One The backhoe operator di
- Page 5 and 6: Chapter 2 The previous evening, Mad
- Page 7 and 8: The abrupt change of topic made Nol
- Page 9 and 10: An assistant professor at Stanford,
- Page 11 and 12: A good host, Reed saw his guest to
- Page 13 and 14: Chapter 4 The VW Safari's headlight
- Page 15 and 16: Chapter 5 Fifty million nightmares
- Page 17 and 18: "The personnel manager said she'd l
- Page 19: "I'll be at the market," she said.
- Page 23 and 24: absentminded. In high school, Catra
- Page 25 and 26: captain, having taken away her husb
- Page 27 and 28: Nol. Nol didn't understand why. One
- Page 29 and 30: Nol tried to grab it, but Gong toss
- Page 31 and 32: 1965 The Den Pasar ice factory that
- Page 33 and 34: Was she teasing? Reed couldn't tell
- Page 35 and 36: formal sitting parlor visible throu
- Page 37 and 38: "Nothing would give me greater plea
- Page 39 and 40: Hotel. The officers liked to flirt
- Page 41 and 42: "You know," Sudana said, "I have a
- Page 43 and 44: "What was found is in safe keeping
- Page 45 and 46: have the bitter past full of injust
- Page 47 and 48: "Your mother's never gotten over it
- Page 49 and 50: Chapter 9 In the hallway of Tina's
- Page 51 and 52: Chapter 10 An elderly Dutch couple
- Page 53 and 54: "Some American woman came by earlie
- Page 55 and 56: Nol knew next to nothing about song
- Page 57 and 58: "Your uncle put together the deal o
- Page 59 and 60: Chapter 11 Nol and Sudana took turn
- Page 61 and 62: "He was a surfer punk harassing Mis
- Page 63 and 64: Arini replied with a nod, tucking t
- Page 65 and 66: Chapter 12 After early morning flag
- Page 67 and 68: The blond girl shrieked and ducked
- Page 69 and 70: one." "And you want to be an actor?
<strong>One</strong> had to be careful, for many of these girls were consummate actresses, but her<br />
distress seemed genuine. Nol extracted the man's wallet from the trousers and pulled out<br />
a hundred Euro note.<br />
"Hey!" the man said in outrage. "I already paid! What is this? Extortion!<br />
Corruption! I'll report you!"<br />
Nol pointed to the photo in the wallet, a pleasant looking woman and two<br />
teenaged sons. "And I report you?"<br />
The man slumped sullenly. "I'm here on business. This is just a wee bit of<br />
harmless fun."<br />
Nol tossed him the wallet and trousers. "Get out. Go. Next time I arrest you. TV<br />
camera."<br />
The man hurried into his clothes and out of the room, shirt tails and shoelaces<br />
flapping.<br />
Nol gave the girl the hundred Euro. "This should get you home. Change it at the<br />
Majapahit money changer on Market Street. They're honest. The others will cheat you.<br />
Now hide in the closet."<br />
The girl took the money. There was a crack in her eyes, a little glint in her tears<br />
that could have been gratitude but could also have been greed. Nol raised his baton. "If I<br />
see you again, you get this."<br />
She pressed her hands together. "Oh, thank you, older brother."<br />
A short while later, the HANSIP men crowded around a local coffee stall down<br />
the road, joking and laughing and celebrating the raid. Success at last!<br />
Dharma's cell phone buzzed. With a finger stuck in one ear, he listened and then<br />
hung up and clapped his hands. Everyone fell silent. "We're not done yet, men. We have<br />
to go the beach. Somebody found some bones."<br />
In the last of the seaside coconut groves, police had cordoned off the entrance to a<br />
construction site. Two cops blew whistles and kept the early morning rubberneckers<br />
moving along road. Once through the cordon and gate, the pickup rattled down a long<br />
driveway. A two-story mansion was still under construction, sprouting pipes and wires,<br />
and the grounds were raw with unfinished landscaping. The pickup stopped by a<br />
backhoe, its yellow arm crooked like an insect leg. Dharma ordered his men to the<br />
beachfront boardwalk to help the police hold off a crowd of onlookers. Nol gawked as he<br />
walked past a large hole in the ground, where two workers with shovels were clearing<br />
soil away from a jumble of bones. More bones were gathered on a plastic tarp, with<br />
several skulls lined up in a tidy row, their hollow lifeless sockets giving Nol an uneasy<br />
pricking.<br />
By an ambulance backed up to the tarp, several men stood close in quiet<br />
discussion. Anak Agung Mantera leaned on his black ironwood cane, a towel draped over<br />
his bare thin shoulders, his long shorts still damp. He and several cronies his age often<br />
swam in the lagoon for the exercise and to warm their blood in the rising sun. Two of<br />
those cronies were wrapped in towels, one a high caste Brahmana and the other a low<br />
caste but powerful member of the local parliament.<br />
Dharma approached the group, which widened to accept him. Mantera asked him<br />
a soft question that Nol didn't catch, and he couldn't make out Dharma's rumbling reply.<br />
20