Steers' Innocence

Mid-morning, the lobby bar of the old Hotel Erawan, one of the most traditional Bangkok establishments, was empty except for a group of three men sitting in deep leather chairs around a low table.

The head registration clerk, an elderly Thai, stood in the office door, watching the three men. They were immersed in an animated conversation—no doubt some business deal, for at this hour men could have had no other reason to sit in the empty bar. Pipe smoke hung over them; its distinctive, sweet-pungent aroma carried all the way across the lobby.

The faces of the three men could not be made out, since they sat against the luminous green background of the hotel park dripping in the monsoon rain behind a picture window, but the head clerk knew, of course, that the man in the middle was Lung Sa, an old Chinese from up-country—an immensely wealthy man, the sort of person of whom it was safer not to ask what business he was in, who came several times a year to the Erawan, accompanied by two of his security men, always the same pokerfaced Koreans, and always insisted on the Royal suite. He was taller, and his traits finer than those of the Thai or of the Cantonese, Hakka or Fukienese one finds all over Southeast Asia. And unlike most Asians, he spoke English without the trace of an accent, "r" s and "l" s pronounced correctly, and also—or so the head clerk was told—flawless French from the days when he had served as a Kwomintang agent in Cholon and then in Paris.

The other two men were Europeans. One, Simoni—a Frenchman, or at least traveling on a French passport even if his name sounded Italian: perhaps a Corsican—was also a frequent visitor in the Erawan. He supplied the hotel and other first class Bangkok establishments, including the royal household, with Dom Perignon Champagne and the best French wines and brandies. His companion was a true Italian, Gianbattista Gentile, a small, middle-aged, gray haired man in impeccably tailored clothes and alligator shoes. The head clerk smiled as he thought of how inappropriate that name was for the Italian. There was in fact nothing gentle about Gentile: the first day, when he had removed the dark glasses he always wore, even at night, to fill out the hotel registration card, for he had never stayed Erawan before, the clerk had been struck by his eyes: small, bird-like, as black as coal, transfixing him briefly with a cold, cruel, malevolent look. An unpleasant person. The head clerk wondered what business he could have with a gentleman as wealthy and as civilized as Lung Sa.

At that point the old Chinese looked up and paused in mid-sentence: a man, followed by a hotel porter carrying two Vuitton suitcases, had walked through the main entrance and stepped to the registration desk. The head clerk rushed forward to greet him. The two men spoke briefly. Then the clerk extracted a manila envelope from a stack of guest correspondence and handed it to the new arrival before giving the porter the room key.

The man walked straight to the elevator bank, looking neither right nor left, and wiping the rain from his hair and forehead with a handkerchief. He was tall, dark haired, dressed in tailored safari jacket and slacks, and walked with the firm step of a man accustomed to command and success.

Lung Sa sat back, his eyes following the new arrival as he crossed the lobby. "Ah... " he said. "Steers. Thomas Steers."

The other two remained silent. It was evident from the way they looked at Steers, and then at Sung La, that they did not know who the man was.

"American success story," the old Chinese explained. "Once a banker—that is when I first met him: he handled the South Asian portfolio of Metrobank, out of Tokyo—but now a rising political star in the United Nations... you know the United Nations, of course: that thing, 'ce machin,' as your General De Gaulle is fond of saying."

"His General... " Gentile protested, pointing his chin at Simoni. "Not mine. I'm Italian, not French."

Simoni glared at him: "Nor mine either. The bastard has given away Algeria, and... "

"Alright," Lung Sa interrupted. "This man Steers spent the past six months shuttling between New York, Canberra, Jakarta and New Guinea to organize the West Irian plebiscite. Irian Yaya, they call it. Steers did it the right way. He's obviously no fool, and has better political sense than most Americans. In the end things came out the way the Indonesians wanted... and I as well. One of my Indonesian companies already owns a controlling interest in the main copper mines, and... "

"So you paid him off."

"I might have tried. But I didn't have to."

Simoni raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. "Is there anything--or anybody you couldn't buy?"

The old Chinese smiled. "Not really... I could buy this hotel, for instance. Any day. Breakfast money, as you say. But I don't need to. Twenty years ago the registration clerk would have had me kicked out by his Gurkhas... imagine a Chinese intruding in this white sanctuary! Now they give me the Royal suite." He lit a cigarette. "No... I may one of these days go into the hotel business, but in my corner of the country, not here, with all these government leeches."

"The Golden Triangle Palace, I suppose! Swimming pools, gambling, big game shooting, a tropical golf course, women—the best women in Asia; twelve-year old Burmese virgins—or little boys. And heroin courtesy of the house... all protected by your personal army."

Lung Sa laughed. "Precisely. Honey for rich Japanese. In a few years they will dominate the world. Co-prosperity, they once called it! But this time without armies. And that, gentlemen," he went on, suddenly serious, "that brings us back to what I was saying. Japan will soon be our principal market. So we better be prepared."

The two Europeans looked at each other. "But the Japanese don't go in for drugs," Simoni said. "At best amphetamines, and perhaps some cocaine." Gentile nodded: "Heavy drinking, yes: but Japanese society... "

Lung Sa smiled. "You Europeans will never understand Asia. Japanese society is not what it was. Japanese may seem meek and overly polite, or they may seem arrogant. But they— especially their young—are frustrated, neurotic, lost, their values and family structures breaking down. And worst of all, they no longer know who they are, and where they belong: they despise and nevertheless admire Americans and Europeans. Since war— courage, samuraihood, Bushi-do—is out, the only way to escape their frustration will be to break out of their confined space into a world of dreams, real dreams... in other words: the world we can open up for them... "

"Perhaps coke, " Simoni mused: "there is a certain aura about it: it has long been the drug of artists, intellectuals, poets... "