A Well-tempered Heart (23 page)

“What would you like to know?”

“How did Nu Nu and Ko Gyi get along without Thar Thar?”

“They tried to survive together. They did not succeed.”

“Is Ko Gyi dead, too?”

“No, but the two of them, inseparable for fifteen years, began suddenly to quarrel. Odd, isn’t it? The dutiful Ko Gyi neglected his obligations. He refused to go with his mother to the field. He preferred instead to go to pagoda festivals in other villages, from which he always came home drunk.

“Khin Khin believes that he never got over the shock of learning what his mother was capable of. She seemed to him now strange and sinister. In his inebriation he often claimed that Thar Thar was stalking him. Said he was sitting by the fire with them. Going with them to the market, watching them cook and eat. He spoke less and less, and in the end he wished that she had held on to his brother instead of him. After three years most of the field was overgrown. The hut deteriorated, and Ko Gyi decided to move to the nearest city to look for work.”

We had arrived at U Ba’s house. He fetched water from the yard, lit candles, and asked if I would like another tea.

I thanked him but declined and lowered myself onto the sofa beneath the kitschy oil painting of the Tower of London. He sank into the armchair and continued the story.

“Ko Gyi soon relocated to the capital and found employment as a sailor on a freighter. He made good money and sent some of it to his mother at irregular intervals. Not
much, but enough to survive. Nu Nu eventually moved in with her younger sister who had no children and whose husband had died young. They came to Kalaw together a few years ago because no one knew them here and because the place held no memories for them. She was a broken woman.

“On the day Nu Nu died, she and Khin Khin were on their way to the market. They ran across a young man whom Nu Nu took for Thar Thar. The shock was so great that her heart ceased to beat. I think I mentioned that incident in my letter.”

I nodded.

“Khin Khin reported that Nu Nu’s health had been failing for years. She had begun to imagine things, her memory failed her, she would go for a stroll and lose her way back to the hut. The moment she spotted soldiers or even just a military Jeep, she would be frozen with terror. She could not bear the sight of black boots. She frequently woke in the night screaming loudly, disconsolate. Her body was completely covered with red splotches. She ate very little, as if trying to starve herself to death. Her heart was weak. A troubled spirit. Her death was no surprise. Only the circumstances were out of the ordinary.”

“And Ko Gyi? Why didn’t he return to look after her?”

“The last they heard from him was five years ago, when he contacted them from Australia and sent them some money. Apparently he has settled there. No word since then. Though it’s possible that his letters have gotten lost or been opened.”

My brother’s eyes drooped shut, and I, too, felt overwhelmed by a profound weariness.

“Would you like to listen to some music before going to bed?”

“I’d rather not.”

For a while we said nothing. For the first time I found the silence between us pleasant.

“Do you think that the voice inside me has been silenced?”

“I don’t know.”

“Of course not. But what do you think?”

“We shall see,” he replied evasively. “Did she have anything to add during Khin Khin’s story?”

“No.”

“That’s a good sign, don’t you think?”

I shrugged, clueless. “I guess so.”

With effort he stifled a yawn. “Forgive me. I’m dreadfully tired. The day has taken a toll on me.”

“On me, too.”

“Do you need anything else for the night?”

“No.”

He rose and approached me, took my head gently in his hands and kissed me on the forehead. “Sleep well.”

“You, too.”

“Wake me if you have any bad dreams.”

I WAS AWAKENED
in the night by a loud whimpering. Was that my brother crying? I got up and felt around for the flashlight next to the sofa. In its dim light I tiptoed to his room, where I could hear behind the curtain the peaceful, even breathing of his sleep. Had I imagined it? Or had the voice returned? Had she woken me? I listened intently. Insects. A dog barking in the distance. Another barking in reply. Silence.

I lay back on the couch, listened for another minute, and then fell back asleep.

When I woke for the second time that night, it was the voice that roused me.

Where’s Thar Thar?

I sat bolt upright and stared into the shadows. It sounded as if someone were speaking to me out of the darkness.

What’s happened to my son? What have they done with him?

A chill ran down my spine, and I groped for the flashlight but could not find it.

Why didn’t you listen to me? Why didn’t you go back to New York? This is not going to end well.

Suddenly the light came on, and there was U Ba standing in front of me.

“What happened?” he asked in a worried tone.

I was too surprised to answer.

“You cried out in your sleep.”

“The voice.” I peered around the room. “I heard the voice.”

He sat down beside me. “Are you certain?”

“Yes. No. I don’t know. It sounded like her.”

“What did she say?”

I was too wound up; I couldn’t concentrate.

“Did she want to know where Thar Thar is?” my brother asked.

“Yes.”

“What else?”

“She said I had better go back to New York. That our search would end badly.”

U Ba nodded. “How did she sound?”

I tried to recall the tone of her voice, but began to doubt myself.

“I’m not sure anymore. Maybe,” I hesitated a moment, “maybe it was just a dream.”

“I don’t think so.”

It was cold. I pulled the covers up to my chin and slid deeper and deeper into the cushions, lowering myself gently to the side until I lay with my head on his knees. I
was simultaneously wide-awake and dead tired. Had everything been for naught? Had the monk been mistaken, or had I been too gullible (“two souls in one breast”) in following a silly superstition?

“The monk said that the voice would stop when I found out who it belonged to and why she died,” I said. “We’ve done that. Do you think he was wrong? Or that we got the wrong person?”

“Neither nor.” My brother was silent for a long time, then continued: “But I think that she will not go away until we know the whole truth. How else can this restless soul find peace?”

“The whole truth? Did Khin Khin lie to us?”

“No. But we have to find out what happened to Thar Thar. A mother wants to know how her child died. She wants to know where he is buried. She won’t let go of it until then.”

U Ba brushed my hair out of my face and looked at me pensively.

“Is there some clue you haven’t told me about yet?” I asked cautiously.

“Not a clue. More of a rumor. Khin Khin alluded to something that I did not pay much attention to yesterday.”

“What was that?”

“It is said that one of the boys later escaped. Such attempts seldom succeed. No one in the village, she said, would ever discuss the details or let on that they knew anything. Death awaits all deserters, their families, and anyone who assists them. But still the rumor persists.”

My brother was suddenly agitated. He stroked my head a couple of times more, but his thoughts were elsewhere. I heard his breath quickening, his stomach growling. Suddenly he stood up and disappeared into his room without a word, only to return moments later fully dressed.

“The sun is about to rise. I need to talk to Khin Khin again. I did not inquire about it yesterday. Perhaps she knows the fate of this boy.”

I did not wish to be alone. “Can I come along?”

U Ba shook his head. “I think I had better go alone this time. I won’t be long. Wait here for me. Should anyone come and ask for me, no matter who it is, tell them you don’t know where I am or when I’ll be back.”

I nodded uneasily.

He scurried down the steps and across the yard.

Through the open windows the first light of day was spilling into the house. Roosters were crowing, and the pigs below the house were awake now. I wanted to get up, light a fire, boil water, and make a little breakfast, but I felt too exhausted. Instead I just crawled deeper under the covers. I couldn’t get Thar Thar out of my head. He must have been an extraordinary individual. About my age. I wished I could have met him.

I was reminded suddenly of my brother and my mother. We had spent a lot of time together just the three of us, because my father frequently traveled or worked late. I remembered the events of a particular summer’s day. My mother, my brother, and I were at the beach on Long Island.
I must have been six or seven years old. I saw them before me sitting on their towels and applying sunscreen on each other. Backs. Arms. Legs. Faces. Then they stood up and ran to the water, forgetting all about me. I ran after them and floundered in the waves, and while they swam farther out, I dug holes in the sand. That evening my thighs, arms, and nose were so red that my father took me to the doctor.

First- and second-degree burns.

More than skin-deep.

We weren’t close. Never had been. My brother and I, definitely not. But not my mother and I, either. Why, I never knew. I suspect that she didn’t, either. Maybe I, like Thar Thar, had crashed a party for two. I wondered whether they had planned to have me or whether I had been an “accident.” I didn’t know. It was not something anyone in the family ever talked about.

A full-grown New Yorker? With a small heart? Without much room to spare? But it was the only one she had.

I still lay wrapped up on the sofa when I heard U Ba coming back. He was out of breath and more excited than I had ever seen him. I detected a shadow of disappointment in his eyes when he saw that I was still in bed.

“She thinks the rumor is true.” He took a deep breath.

“One of the boys managed to get away?”

“Yes.”

His eyes turned to my big backpack.

“Can you pack just a few things for a short trip in your small bag?”

“Sure. Why?”

“We need to be on our way.”

“On our way? When?”

“Now. At once.”

“For how long?”

“A couple of days.”

“Where to?”

He considered it for a moment. “To the island.”

“Which island?”

“
Thay hsone thu mya, a hti kyan thu mya a thet shin nay thu mya san sar yar kywn go thwa mai
,” he said in Burmese.

“I don’t understand a word of it.”

WE DIDN’T HAVE
much to go on. The man we were looking for had apparently lived for years in Thazi, a city on the rail line between Rangoon and Mandalay, five hours by bus from Kalaw. He was married, had two or three kids. His father-in-law owned a garage on the main drag, where he supposedly worked as a mechanic. He was one of the young men hauled off by the military that morning in the village. After a few years he had managed to escape. Would he be able to tell us anything about Thar Thar?

We hitched a ride in the next pickup truck to Thazi. U Ba clambered onto the roof, where half a dozen young men were crammed among shopping bags and sacks. Someone lifted me onto the bed, where there seemed at first to be no space at all. The other passengers pushed closer together; a child sat on his mother’s lap, and I squeezed in between them and an old woman on a wooden pallet. We
were so cramped that I began to sweat immediately and felt short of breath.

The road wound steeply in tight serpentines into the valley below. My anxiety increased with every turn. I felt sick and was on the verge of throwing up. Out. I had to get out. At the first stop I pushed my way into the open and climbed onto the roof with my brother. We sat in the very front above the driver, clenching the grill that we were sitting on. The vehicle was desperately overloaded. It leaned threateningly on every curve.

The road was full of potholes broadened by the rainy season. The shoulders dropped off precipitously. There were no guardrails or any other kind of safety structures. In the brush below us we could see the occasional wreck. My increasing panic was threatening to overpower me any moment. My brother sensed my fear.