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announces the beginning of the penitentiary’s extensive estate. Hold it, though—what is that terrible stench? Oh, that’s the raw sewage vat in which they make difficult prisoners stand up to their necks for hours, sometimes days. Not a great place to drown. Hold your nose, and we’re being patted down by the rock-faced screws and led to the visitors’ room, where we sit on a single wooden seat while they bring in Yammy in cuffs and leg irons: a slim, rather handsome Japanese in his midforties with an attractively receding hairline and the sullen determination of a true artist, in an age when true art is beyond the cultural pale. There’s no seat for him so he has to stand. I am delighted to be the bringer of fantastically good news and feel that I must be well in with the Buddha, since I am the instrument of his salvation. Imagine my consternation, therefore, when, after I have outlined in broad strokes Vikorn’s irresistible business plan, he says, “No.”
    “But Yamahatosan,” I say, “perhaps I have not expressed myself with sufficient accuracy. Let me be clear. In a few short weeks from now your case will come to trial. It makes no difference if you plead guilty or not—the evidence against you is overwhelming. And even if it wasn’t, Colonel Vikorn knows how to get a conviction. You will be sentenced to death, and while spending the usual few years on death row, you will be gang-raped by
farang
and thereafter deemed an unlucky pariah by the Thais, who will cut off your supply of fresh cockroaches, thus depriving you of your only source of protein. You will probably be terminally sick long before they strap you down and get you ready for the long needles—”
    “Stop!” says Yammy. “You can’t scare me. I’ve decided to kill myself.” He makes a samurai-like gesture with his left thumb across his lower intestine. “I’ve got the knife already.”
    “But Yamahatosan,” I say, “I thought I’d already explained, you don’t need to kill yourself. I’m here to get you out.”
    “I don’t want to get out. What’s the difference? You Thais know nothing of honor. I was going to kill myself anyway if I couldn’t make a feature film. If you let me out, what will I be?”
    “A well-paid pornographer.”
    “I don’t want to be a fucking pornographer.
I’m an artist.
”
    Flabbergasted, flummoxed, exasperated—and impressed—I fish out my cell phone to call the Colonel.
    “So let him be artistic,” says Vikorn. “He can use ten cameras at the same time if he likes. He can cut to the fucking moon landing in between fellatio. He can have flowers and ink-block prints all over the stupid studio. He can have complete artistic freedom, just so long as he gets the cum shots right and the junk sells in America and Europe.”
    I translate all this to Yammy, whose glower slowly lifts. “I’ll think about it.”
    “Here, take my cell phone,” I say with saintly self-control. “If you decide to graciously accept our humble offer of employment, please press this autodial number, which belongs to Colonel Vikorn.”
    Back in the cab I borrow the driver’s cell to call Vikorn, who bets five thousand baht Yammy will call within the next five minutes. I bet the same amount he will not call before I reach the station, because he’s a stubborn, suicidal Japanese whose honor will take at least half an hour to collapse.
    Vikorn and I sit amazed in his office, waiting until after nine in the evening. Finally the phone rings, and Vikorn hands it to me because Yammy speaks no Thai.
    “I want the right to introduce my own story lines. Most porn has the stupidest, corniest story lines, if any. I want real plots.”
    Vikorn waves a weary hand of resignation when I have translated.

6
    Damrong came to me last night. I guess I knew she would whatever color pajamas I wore, and no matter how many times I
wai
ed the Buddha in our little homemade shrine with fairy lights: Chanya’s idea. I was aware of her and the