Figurehead (9 page)
The gates of the palace lay open. A couple of guards stood to attention. Inside the grounds, several rows of soldiers, most of them children, engaged in manoeuvres. As the jeep stopped, Monique opened her eyes just in time to see a pig saunter past.
Kiry led them to a guesthouse, a pleasant free-standing building several hundred metres from Sihanouk and Monique’s usual sleeping quarters. Monique had never been inside this building before. She was shocked by how small it was: a living room, with a table at one end and a couch at the other, two bedrooms (the second barely bigger than a cupboard), a bathroom and a study.
Sihanouk was more familiar with the guesthouse. Over the years he had rendezvoused here with certain ‘special friends’. It was best not to mention that now, he decided. ‘I never knew this place even existed. What a ... delightful bedspread,’ he said morosely.
‘Yes, I’m sure you’ll be very comfortable here,’ Kiry said.
‘But what now?’ Sihanouk said.
‘If we need you we will send for you. And of course, you may ask to speak to me at any time. If I can manage it, I will visit. But for now, you must be hungry. I will arrange for food. And then, no doubt, you will want to rest.’
‘But surely there will be a reception to mark Sihanouk’s triumphant return to Phnom Penh,’ Sihanouk said. ‘Today is a great and historic day for Cambodia. I want to meet the members of the new government. Aren’t they eager to see me so we can congratulate each other on our joint victory? Don’t they want to hear Sihanouk’s report on the outside world’s views and opinions towards our regime?’
‘Life is very busy in the new Kampuchea. We are making a new history and there is not a moment to spare. Perhaps at some time in the future there will be a chance to formally welcome you home. But not today, alas. And not tomorrow.’
‘But I have written a speech.’
‘You can give that to me,’ Kiry said. ‘I’ll see that it is circulated, if appropriate. Now: I am busy for a few days. But after that I will return to brief you about your responsibilities. There is much important work for you to do. First, you must go the United Nations and put a stop to all the hateful rumours. Then you will go on a world tour to thank our friends and allies for their unwavering support.’
‘And then?’
‘And then you will return here, of course. To your home, where you belong.’
After Kiry left, Sihanouk lay on the bed with his hands covering his face and wept.
‘What have I done?’ he cried out.
Monique patted his thick thigh a couple of times. Then she slid her hand down the front of his trousers.
‘What have I done?’ Sihanouk cried out again. ‘Why didn’t you stop me?’
Monique bunched her hand into a fist but thought better than to strike. She pulled her hand free, wiped it on the bedspread, stood and walked to the window. She watched as the boy soldiers advanced on the pig, who stood with its backside facing them, eating grass, oblivious.
Happy days are here again! The murderous Khmer Rouge are gone, run out
of town by the good sheriff Vietnam. Although information about the goings
on in so-called Democratic Kampuchea has been scarce these last years, we
have known that life was tough. But the truth is more horrific than any of
us could have imagined. A million dead, maybe more. Mass starvation
and illness. Widespread and wanton executions. Some of us – I, Edward
Donald Whittlemore, stand before you as guilty as any man – did not predict
the savagery of the Khmer Rouge. But nobody could have prophesised
such mass depravity and anybody who claims otherwise is taking shameful
advantage of a terrible situation. Things could have been, should have
been, so much different in Democratic Kampuchea.
—Edward Whittlemore, ‘As I See It,’ syndicated column
Ted Whittlemore simmered in his own diminishing juices as the minivan passed through the Vietnamese military checkpoint at Moc Bai and entered Cambodia. The driver, Tung, rhythmically chewed a wad of gum. Whenever the flavour faded he would add another stick, switching flavours at random. Much later in the day, as they crossed Vietnam Bridge and entered Phnom Penh, he wound down a window and spat a wad the size of a golf ball into the Bassac River.
Ted stared out the window at a countryside that had seemingly expelled all life. How had this happened? he wondered. The pocked land was barren but for irrigation walls that reared out of the dusty fields and an occasional pile of rubble that had once been a rest station or a village. The only signs of life came from inside the minivan, where the occupants grumbled and panted and slithered across the vinyl seats.
An hour inside Cambodia the muffler on the minivan came loose and began recording the route in the dirt. Tung manoeuvred over a particularly large hole in the road, wriggled under the vehicle and set to work with a couple of tools and a roll of masking tape. The journalists all piled out except for the BBC fellow, who slept. Ted peered at him suspiciously. In Ted’s experience, dozy reporters somehow saw everything.
Du, the Khmer-speaking guide from Vietnam’s ministry of information, stood guard at Tung’s feet, devouring cigarettes. Ted peeled the sodden shirt from his back and held it above his head, hoping to catch a breeze. Phillip Fraigneau, a freelancer, touched his toes a couple of times then dropped to his haunches. Masami Itoh from the
Tokyo Daily
, fearing landmines, stood on the road facing Vietnam and pissed between his feet. Hugo Reisch, senior writer for a glossy German weekly, rubbed cream into the stubble rash on his neck.
‘Is that antifungal cream? Is it an antiseptic?’ Phillip asked. ‘Can I have some for between my toes?’
‘It’s toothpaste. It’s all I’ve got.’
‘Give me some.’
‘Please.’
‘All right, don’t then.’
‘Can’t you people show some respect?’ Ted said. ‘Look around you.’
‘Stuff you, Mr Vietnam, we’re coming too. You don’t get Cambodia to yourself and there’s not a damned thing you can do about it,’ Phillip said.
‘Oh, leave him alone, he’s just embarrassed,’ Hugo said.
‘He should be, too. Mr Complicity. Mr Trust-me-Pol-Pot-won’t-be-so-bad-you’ll-see-it’ll-all-be-roses-and-universal-healthcare-and-full-bellies-and-perfect-equality.’
Ted turned away and spoke to Du in Vietnamese. ‘How long is it since you were last in Cambodia?’
‘Do you think I want to be here?
Do you?
My brother died in this shit-hole.’
The BBC man opened his eyes and wound down the window. ‘What did he say, Teddles?’
‘He said that although he would prefer to stay in Cam Ranh with his family, he is proud to be serving the cause of liberating the innocent Cambodian people from the murderous Pol Pot clique.’
‘Yes, correct,’ Du said in English.
‘And stop calling me Teddles.’
Tung emerged, shaking himself free of road dust, and got behind the wheel. ‘Bad,’ he said in Vietnamese. ‘Very, very bad.’
‘What did he say?’
‘He said, “We go now okay,”’ Du said.
Two hours later, they encountered their first Cambodians. Tung braked hard, showering them with dirt. They were, it seemed, the remnants of a family: two women of indeterminate age, a man perhaps thirty years old who continually wheezed, and three hollowed-out children. The man and one of the women pulled a cart made of a house door attached to wooden wheels; two of the children pushed. On the cart sat a few clothes, a hoe, a small bag of rice, a cooking pot, the other woman and the smallest of the children. Exhausted and hungry, the Cambodians looked at the foreigners with polite and thorough indifference.
Phillip climbed onto the roof of the minivan, rummaged through his bag and came down with a large chocolate bar that had turned to oil in the heat. He gave it to the children. They rubbed their hands in the goo and licked their fingers.
The journalists closed in on the Cambodians, staring, blocking their path, worshipping them with cameras and notebooks and tape recorders. ‘Give them space. Don’t frighten them,’ Ted said. But he too wanted to inspect them and when the BBC chap tried to push past him he stuck out an elbow. Ted snapped photograph after photograph of the survivors, partly to prove to himself that he really had seen the protruding skeletons and furtive eyes, the bruises and scabs, the rags for clothes; and partly because he’d always wanted to get one of his photos onto the front cover of the
Far Eastern Economic Review
.
The journalists supplied Du with questions to ask. Du and the older woman talked back and forth, his questions and translations taking longer than her replies.
‘Ask them how they are feeling,’ Masami said.
‘Are they diseased? Contagious? Can we touch them? When did they last have a proper feed?’ the BBC chap said.
‘Where are they going? Where are they coming from?’ Ted said.
‘They are walking from Pursat Province,’ Du said. ‘They are—’
‘How long have they been walking?’
‘Many weeks. They stop and start. They are returning home. They hope they will be there very soon, two or three days more only.’
‘Ask her about the children,’ Hugo said.
‘The two girls belong to her younger sister. She is hoping to reunite them, but—’
‘What if she doesn’t?’
‘I do not ask her this.’
‘And the little boy?’
‘They do not know who he is. They found him on the way.’
‘Who are the other adults?’
‘Her neighbours.’
‘What do they hope to find in their village?’ Ted asked.
Du asked his question, listened to the answer and shrugged.
‘What? What did she say?’
‘She says she has heard that her husband is killed but she does not know this for certain. Someone she met on the road told her one of her children was still alive six months ago but she does not know about her other children. She knows one of her brothers is killed. Her other brothers, her other sister, she does not know. Her parents, she does not know.’
‘How does she think these people died?’ Phillip said.
‘She does not know.’
‘Didn’t you ask her?’
‘She says Pol Pot killed them.’
‘Ask her who she thinks Pol Pot is,’ Hugo said. ‘Here, show her this photo. Look, that is Pol Pot, see? Pol Pot: there, there. What do you think of him?’
The woman looked at the grainy image and muttered a few words.
‘She says he looks Chinese,’ Du said.
‘Ask her if she’s heard of Karl Marx,’ the BBC man said.
‘Did she witness any massacres?’ Masami said.
‘I do not ask her anything more,’ Du said stubbornly. ‘Now we are late.’
After they took Phnom Penh in ’75, the Khmer Rouge refused to let me visit.
At the time, I was beside myself with rage. After all I’d done for that bastard
Nhem Kiry – who I assumed was running the show – he wouldn’t even let
me come and witness the victory. All I wanted was to walk the streets of liberated
Phnom Penh, to take photographs and conduct a few interviews,
maybe land a scoop or two. And to toast the new peace with Bun Sody.
Now I know how lucky I was. If I’d gone to Phnom Penh, actually set
foot in the place, if I’d given Pol Pot the benefit of the doubt and praised
Democratic Kampuchea as a colourful work-in-progress, my reputation
would never have recovered.
I must have applied for a visa twenty-five or thirty times. I tried to sneak
in with Sihanouk and Monique but I never got near the plane, thank
Christ. I pleaded with every contact I had in China and Yugoslavia to put
in a good word for me but nobody would – or could – help. It was as if the
Khmer Rouge had wiped Cambodia off the map and removed themselves
from the world. A heavy silence descended until the refugees started appearing
on the border.
The minivan entered Phnom Penh close to dusk, its inhabitants dulled and dehydrated, sick of their own smells and small talk. Ted stared out of his window, as shocked as if he had stumbled upon the corpse of a friend. The Phnom Penh he remembered – his Phnom Penh – hummed and broke into frequent song: people laughed and argued and bartered; fish and poultry flapped to demonstrate their freshness and their firm flesh; pigs squealed and pork fat spat in intricate patterns from hot grills; cars and trucks gossiped incessantly; cyclo wheels squeaked and their drivers called out, ‘Where you want to go?’; rice pots bubbled; one dog barked and a thousand harmonised; the wind cavorted through narrow streets, rattling windows and tin roofs; the sky was deep blue except for the fluffy white opium clouds that announced the beginning of the cocktail hour; wine bottles burped their corks free and glasses clinked along the riverside, where salacious yet sophisticated women strolled under parasols. Best of all there was Sihanouk, a human fireworks display. Back then Bun Sody was forever reminding Ted that the city had slums and backstreet assassinations. Ted knew Sody was speaking the truth but that just made him love Phnom Penh all the more.
This new Phnom Penh was a ghost city, the silence broken by occasional sounds and movements that jarred and echoed. As they drove towards the city centre there were occasional pockets of people but no crowds. The minivan passed by a row of shops that had once contained Ted’s favourite French bakery. It was a shell, its windows glassless, its interior stripped. Two blocks further on, Tung braked to allow a truck laden with Vietnamese troops sitting on sacks of rice to pass between them and the skeleton of a rusting car. While they waited, Ted saw a young woman standing in a doorway. At her feet, flapping about on a dribble of water on a pan, were two small catfish. He opened a window.
‘Hello, miss. How much?’ he called out in his basic Khmer.
The woman stepped back into the shadow of the doorway, but first she rewarded Ted with a smile and a dip of her eyes. He savoured the contact.
‘You’re in with that one, my friend,’ Phillip said. ‘Buy the fish and she’ll probably fuck you, no extra charge.’
Soon they reached the Royal Hotel, which the Vietnamese had renamed the Samaki.