The Lizard Cage (21 page)

Teza feels the thunder in his teeth, but the storm is inside. Four men search for something they cannot find. The prisoner is their center and they cut around him, kick apart the old sleeping mat, tear through his clothes, swearing all the while, making ugly jokes about the latrine pail. Handsome sticks his finger into the seam of the singer’s single collared
shirt and rips the collar off. Nothing is curled up and hidden there. A ball of clothing hits the wall, falls into the water pot. One warder, his face still soft, curved with youth, lifts up and dumps out the food parcel. Handsome begins to tear open each of the remaining seven fish. He glances repeatedly at Teza, who, head down, watches the show through the fringe of hair hanging in his eyes. The smell of salty, dried fish fills each man’s nose. Inside the fish there are only delicate bones. Handsome drops the ruined pieces one by one on the floor.

“You can’t hide anything from us, Songbird.”

“That’s because I don’t
have
anything to hide from you, sir.”

“What did you say?”

“I said I don’t have anything to hide from you, sir.”

The jailer approaches. “Lift your head. Lift your ugly head!” With only one word in his mind, Teza raises his chin.
Breathe, breathe, breathe
. On the exhalation, eyes closed, the hammer of knuckles lifts and falls, striking his cheekbone. The skin does not split, but the singer knows humans are different from animals. There doesn’t have to be the smell of blood to incite bloodlust. With the first act of physical violence, the close air of the cell immediately changes, assuming a higher charge of danger. The men move more quickly. Fingers probe the corners, flat-palmed hands run over the bricks, search for the dug-out fissures, hiding places. Behind Teza’s back, one of the men kicks over the water pot. Water sloshes against the wall and the singer imagines his stomach being kicked. From the corner of his eye he sees another officer upend the latrine pail over the mutilated fish. The officer spills gingerly, slowly, careful of his trousers. The smell of shit and urine mixes with that of fish.

While the warders perform the search, Handsome cleans his hands on one of Teza’s shirts. He watches his men and keeps his eye on the prisoner; he scans the cell, its floor, the walls, the ceiling-without-lizards, Teza’s hands hanging at his sides. Walls again, brick by brick. Back wall. Air vent.

Teza feels Handsome looking at the air vent, measuring the distance and the height with his eye. The staccato of rain is a many-layered sound the singer would like to crawl into, disappear inside.

Handsome begins to laugh, long on the exhalation, hiccuping on the inhalation. The smile on his face is that of discovery, the pleasure of sudden comprehension. The warders stop their work to look at the jailer.
They’re not in on the joke yet. Teza keeps staring at his feet; he understands only too well.

“That’s good, Songbird. Why didn’t I think of it right away? I’m surprised at myself.” Handsome approaches Teza, nodding, but addresses one of the warders. “Come with me. We’re going on a treasure hunt.”

Two minutes later Teza and the two warders inside the coffin hear Handsome and his helper outside in the rain. The warders stare at the air vent. Teza stares at his feet, filled with regret for their nakedness. They’re like twin children he cannot save. Handsome’s voice splices into the drumming rain. The other man’s voice is not loud enough to hear.

“You forgot the fucking umbrella.”

“… through this puddle.”

“No, it wouldn’t … far. Here. Here.” The squelch and slide of the boots is lost to the listeners inside the coffin. “Is that …? No, there, in the mud!”

“Stupid bastard …” and then some more words the men inside the cell cannot make out. Teza’s gut turns over inside him like a jellyfish. He should have told them at the beginning. They have license to beat him more savagely now, for lying.

The boots return, at a faster clip, almost running. Teza glances at the warder closest to him. Their eyes meet for an instant. He is the young one. The simple beauty of his youth is jarring, dissonant. He doesn’t yell at Teza for lifting his head but immediately looks away, to the still-open door of the coffin.

There is no pause at the threshold. Handsome is suddenly back in the coffin, his fists bunched under Teza’s chin, gripping the threadbare cotton shirt. “Where is it? Where did it go?”

Teza begins to cough violently. He puts on the show as well as he can, stealing a few seconds to decide whether the question is a trick, to make him lie again, to implicate him further. Handsome found the pen, didn’t he? Didn’t he? How could he
not
have found it? Teza closes his eyes to reply. “I … I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir.” The hammer again, in his face, against his nose, which begins to bleed before the jailer has lowered his arm.

“Don’t lie to me, you little fucker. Don’t you lie to me! Remember, we can kill you. We can kill you just like that.” A glistening lock of pomaded hair spills onto Handsome’s forehead as he yanks the wooden truncheon
from his belt, brandishes it threateningly. He hits the wall beside him, leaving a pink mark where the brick skin chips off. The jailer spins away from the singer, looks wildly around the cell, and screams, “Tear these open,” to the young warder. He rams the truncheon back into his belt, then kicks the packets of peanuts and deep-fried beans to the young man’s feet. The two other warders, halting their fruitless search to watch, form an audience.

The singer realizes the young man is being trained. Perhaps he has never done a search before. Teza recognizes the mouth clenched against its own inarticulate protest. He speaks quietly, not to Handsome but to the young warder. “If the bags are sealed, how can anything be hidden in them?”

Handsome shouts, “What the fuck did you say?”

Ignoring the junior jailer, Teza holds the young officer’s frozen gaze. “I said, how can anything be hidden in the packets? They are machine-sealed. Why do you have to tear them open?”

Handsome gives the order. “Hit him.”

Rain drums the roof.

“Ko Tint Lwin, hit the prisoner! I command you to hit him! Now!” Handsome turns away from Teza to face the younger man. “Tint Lwin, fucking hit him! Hit him!” In a single motion, Handsome grabs the truncheon from his belt, takes a step backward, and strikes the wall again.

“Ko Tint Lwin, you don’t have to hit me. You could refuse him. You are not a dog, and he is not your master. You are free to make your own—”

“You stupid cunt!” The blow from the truncheon knocks Teza against the back wall of the coffin. His knees buckle, but his fingers grip the bricks behind him. He does not fall.

“But sir, you know I’m right. Even you don’t have to do this, you are a Buddhist, it is the First Precept, we must not harm another living—”

“You fucking political prick, you are not a living being, you are just a mouthpiece for that colonialist bitch, shut the fuck up or we will kick your guts out your mouth!”

Terror has been loosened now, the tether slipped from its leg, and frantic wings beat around the cell. Handsome screams at the two other officers, who add their fists to the blows of his truncheon.

After a few well-placed hits on Teza’s head and back, the jailer stands away and yells, “Ko Tint Lwin, get in there! Now! Or you will be court-martialed, you will be sent up north as a sympathizer!”

Teza is on the floor now, his eyes hidden. The young man begins to kick him. Tint Lwin, twenty-two, feels the tears coming and keeps them from his eyes by kicking. He will never again eat dried fish of any kind. The slightest whiff of it will tighten his throat to retching and remind him of this terror that is not Teza’s. The singer has already retreated deep into his writhing body, though somehow he throws his voice up like a rope, and each of them, Buddhists all, hears his words, twisting as his back twists: “You will remember. You will remember breaking the First Precept. What merit can you make for this?” Now the terror in the cell belongs to the four men, whose transgressions have been witnessed by their victim and given back to them whole. When the question comes again—“What merit, what merit for your crimes?”—Handsome kicks harder.

Teza cannot tell which direction the blows will come from. He twists away from one boot and another cracks against his ribs. He does not try to shield his body, only his head, his face, his mouth. A nail of pain shoots behind his eyes, pounded deep into his ear with one stroke. Everything rings, rings, as though the iron-beater were close by, counting out the hours. Three minutes swell into four, five. Teza whimpers, groans.

“Stand up! STAND UP!” Handsome’s voice. The men back away from the body at their feet, whose breath scratches the floor like an insect.

“Stand up.”

In Teza’s ears, Handsome’s yelling reverberates as an insulated, high-pitched ringing. When he moves his head to try to turn off the ringing, a pain stabs so deep in his ear that he wonders if someone has kicked him again. He manages to push himself up onto his hands and knees, but he knows he won’t be able to stand. There are other pains in other places—a jaw mauls his lower back, the teeth driven deep into the muscles at the base of his spine. His legs have begun to swell already. His longyi has come undone and fallen down his legs. He rests more of his weight on his knees, to free one of his hands. Very slowly, he pulls the bloodied white sarong back over his buttocks and legs. When his weight settles into his feet, he realizes that something has happened to his toes. He pushes himself up onto his knees and drags one leg forward, bends it as though to launch himself into a standing position. But the pain is literally breathtaking. He cannot flatten his foot; several toes are broken. A dark liquid drips on the floor.

“I can’t.”

“Stand up!” Handsome kicks him in the stomach and he collapses again.

The jailer waves his hand. Tint Lwin and the second officer pick the prisoner up. This is another reason that the young man will never again be able to eat dried fish; its scent blends with the animal smell of Teza’s blood, which flows from his nose, his left ear, and the gash above it. He sees up close Teza’s raw face, already several shades darker with contusions, the cheeks puffed out and soft like bruised mandarins.

Handsome growls, “Where are the contraband items?”

“There’s nothing here.” Teza works to keep the slur out of his voice. His toes—they’ve done something to his toes; he will fall, he is so dizzy. He leans back on his heels and reaches for the wall behind him. “You searched …”

“Where are the pen and paper? Where are they?”

“Sir?” Teza’s voice is clearer now. Handsome and the three other officers wait expectantly. The singer continues. “Do you ever say our Buddhist prayers?
Sabbe satta abyapajjha hontu
. Whatever beings there are, may they be free from hurtfulness.”

“You motherfucking asshole, what do you think you are, a holy man? Is that why you think you’re here, you cunt?” Handsome slaps the prisoner across the face, then wipes his soiled hand on his leg.

Teza sways like a tree about to go down, but he does not go down.

Handsome steps close to him and roars spittle into his face. “Where is the paper? Where is the fucking pen? Where are they! If you stuck them up your ass, we’ll find them!”

“
Sabbe satta avera hontu.
” Teza continues to recite the Pali prayer. Whatever beings there are, may they be free from enmity.

Handsome slaps him again.

Teza lets his head hang down. Watching two different streams of his blood drip onto the floor, he thinks of another line in the prayer.
Sabbe satta anigha bontu
. Whatever beings there are, may they be free from ill health.

Handsome nods with his chin toward the youngest warder. “Check his asshole. Maybe the pen’s up there.”

Tint Lwin looks from Teza’s head to the junior jailer to the floor.

“Are you fucking deaf? Check his ass. Stick your finger up there.” To Teza, Handsome barks, “Drop your longyi!”

The singer doesn’t move. Though leaning against the wall, his legs shake from the effort of standing. His head is so heavy. But slowly he lifts it and opens his eyes.

Handsome’s face has purpled; the veins in his neck and forehead bulge out. Tint Lwin is frozen, staring at Teza. The singer is covered in blood and swaying. The warders exchange nervous glances; the Chief Warden told them to exercise restraint.

Handsome notices their hesitation and gets angrier. “Didn’t you hear what I said? Or are you deaf too? I’m surrounded by fucking deaf-mutes.” He takes a step closer to Teza, who keeps his head up, his eyes on the jailer’s eyes. But Handsome does not really see him. He screams, “Drop your longyi, you little bitch! Then turn around and bend over! Now!”

Teza astounds them all. He utters three small words. “Ma lok boo.”
I will not
.

“How dare you! I’ll find that letter! I’ll find that fucking pen! Is it up your ass? Here, I’ll help you turn around, you stupid fuck!”

The warders watch the sudden arc of Handsome’s arm, rising, cutting through the air. Tint Lwin thinks
skull
and holds in his own cry as Handsome’s truncheon whacks the singer’s face. Teza’s jawbone cracks loudly, like wood split with a machete. Catapulted sideways by the force of the blow, the singer is thrown hard against the wall, his head leading the trajectory of his body. He slides to the floor, his mouth falling open, full of blood. His mind hauls off, deep through the great banyan trees, into the dark.

H
andsome is filled with a palpable desire to break the palm-reader’s fingers one by one. How difficult could it have been to give a desperate political prisoner a few sheets of paper and a pen? It was the simplest of arrangements. The contraband would go to the prisoner in his food parcel, he would write a letter to Suu Kyi, just like the politicals in Hall Three, and then the whole filthy lot of them would get a sentence extension for breaking prison regulations. It was to be the Chief Warden’s personal way of celebrating Suu Kyi’s release from house arrest. Sein Yun, for his work, would get to leave the cage in eight months instead of two years. Handsome would get his recommendation to the MI. What the hell happened? Stupid palm-reader. Handsome is wondering how to explain the fuck-up to the Chief when one of the warders pipes up, “Do you think he’ll croak?”