The Burma Effect by Michael E. Rose Page A

watchman said, looking intently at Delaney. “Mai will tell you if you don’t know.”
    â€œLots of visitors for Mai now?
    â€œYes.”
    â€œPeople you know?”
    â€œSome of them.”
    â€œPeople Mai knows?”
    â€œSome.”
    Delaney could see Mai through the screen door of the apartment as he removed his shoes and placed them on a low stand in the corridor outside the entrance. She was sitting on a large Thai reclining platform, resting against triangular upright cushions and stroking two tiny kittens. A big-screen TV flickered CNN images silently in a corner. The place was very dim. Even in the dim light Delaney could see she was as heartstoppingly beautiful as ever. She did not get up.
    â€œKuhn Frank,” she said.
    â€œMai, my friend.” Delaney pushed open the screen door and moved across the coolness of the shining waxed floor to shake her hand. She offered up a cheek and he kissed it, feeling a breath of fine silky hair on his own cheek as he did so. The cats scattered.
    â€œWhere is Nathan, Frank? Where has he gone?” Mai immediately started to cry softly. “He has never been away so long without calling me.”
    â€œI know that, Mai.”
    â€œHave you come to give me some news?” she asked.
    â€œNo. I’ve come to find out where he has gone,” Delaney said.
    â€œOh good. Good,” she said. “I miss him, Frank. I am worried this time.”
    â€œWe’ll find out what he’s doing,” Delaney said.
    â€œPlease.”
    Mai made him tea.The cats chased her bare feet and legs as she padded around the apartment getting things ready. Delaney could not keep his eyes off her. She moved with fantastic grace. That alone would capture any Westerner’s eye. She was older than most of the girls living with Western correspondents in Bangkok, at least the ones Delaney knew. Late twenties, thirty maximum, or so Delaney had been told. But looking far, far younger.
    There was a lot to discuss. Mai told him that Kellner had not appeared worried or distracted in the days before he left. He was always working on something or other, she said, and often he did not tell her much about what that might have been. Kellner and Mai had a quiet lifestyle in their dim, immaculate apartment, she said. Visitors often came from embassies, particularly Asian embassies, often people who went into Kellner’s study with him and closed the door. Usually men who carried with them cartons of cigarettes and bottles of Johnnie Walker as offerings when they arrived.
    But these visitors did not stay to eat or drink after such meetings. Occasionally another Western correspondent would come, usually with a Thai girl like Mai. There would be food on those occasions, prepared by Kellner’s housekeeper before she left for the day, and then lots of marijuana. And vodka and beer for the men. There would be much talk of journalism and Asia and travel and there would often be video movies on the giant TV screen and more marijuana and vodka and beer. Sometimes the guests would sleep in the guest bedroom, sometimes not.
    Kellner worked from home. Delaney wanted very much to look closely at what was on his desk and in his desk and in his appointment book if that had been left behind. He had not decided whether to ask to do this later that day, on the first meeting with Mai. He wanted first to hear everything she had to say about how Kellner had disappeared.
    â€œHe went out to play badminton that day,” she said. “He came home and we smoked some Thai stick and he drank his vodka. We went onto the bed.”
    Delaney always marvelled at the sexual frankness of young Thai women.
    â€œAfter we had our bath he got ready to go out. He said he had to say something at the press club.” “Say something?” Delaney said.
    â€œLike a speech maybe,” she said. “He got ready to go out, like anytime, and then he went out. And he has not come