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<strong>Chapter</strong> 10<br />
An elderly Dutch couple looking for a three month rental with pool had contacted<br />
Dharma, who told Nol to show them the available properties. After inspecting each<br />
house, the husband and wife put on their bathing suits and bathing caps to try the pool,<br />
swimming back and forth with stately breaststrokes. In one pool, the old man lingered<br />
with a blissful expression, and Nol suspected he was relieving his bladder.<br />
As they poked around one furnished house, a sweaty salesman pulled a suitcase<br />
on wheels to the door. He was full of hope and wide of smile "House products," he said<br />
to Nol who answered the knock. "Shampoos and detergents cheaper than what you can<br />
get at the discount stores."<br />
Nol went through the products, asking prices, asking questions: You go door to<br />
door? How many sales do you get? How often? Where do you get your supplies from?<br />
The salesman's answers came slower and turned truculent. "Are you going to<br />
buy?"<br />
"Oh, I don't live here. I'm just a driver."<br />
The salesman packed up and left in a huff.<br />
The Dutch couple wandered out of the kitchen, looking pleased. "It's very nicely<br />
furnished," the husband said.<br />
It occurred to Nol that the house was too nicely furnished, with family photos on<br />
the fridge. He texted his uncle. "Are you sure this house is available?"<br />
Dharma replied: "Renters are out of the country for six months."<br />
Nol imagined them coming home from the airport late one night only to find a<br />
strange couple in their bed. Before the Dutch clients could put on their damp bathing<br />
suits, he pointed to a thick hibiscus hedge. "Many snakes live there."<br />
"Slangen!" the woman said with a shiver. She couldn't leave fast enough.<br />
Nol again texted his uncle, informing Dharma that the couple were having an<br />
island tour at his expense. Dharma said he'd meet them at the last house on the list, and<br />
there he was, exuberant and charming and speaking Dutch. He could talk real estate in<br />
English, Japanese, German, French, Dutch and was getting proficient in Russian. The<br />
couple beamed with pleasure, and after Dharma showed them the house and pointed out<br />
the view they had of the top of a temple across the road, they handed over a thirty percent<br />
deposit on the spot.<br />
"You can put a hen in a cage," Dharma said to Nol, "but the trick is to get it to lay<br />
an egg."<br />
"Uncle," Nol said, "you have a smudge of lipstick on your ear."<br />
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