Chapter One - Richard Lewis

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."
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