Mosquito
Our rendezvous, the Café Gung-Ho: he, iridescent in the one shaft of light to breach its Happy Hour shade, and I, seeing that beauty for the first time, poised in the doorway, thinking, Fatal, oh so fatal. The bar was deserted, save Harry, a few girls (humans, no gynoids; Harry is a purist), and the radiant one, tall, blond, and cobra-eyed. Breathless, I went to meet him. Dressed like a man, I tried to walk like a man. But I was restive; I wanted to flirt. My alter ego, imprisoned by day within this safe-house of masculinity, rattled the bars of her cage and sulked.
“Kuhn Harry, I sorry,” I said in my best Charlie Chan, “Zipper not tell me you want. I come straight here.” We assumed our roles. I played the all-purpose Oriental; Harry, the street-smart Brooklyn babe to whom, far from home, unsure of yourself, you could confess your appetites and trust your money.
“Yeah. Don’t worry about it. Lord Chandos don’t want to hear about Zipper.” I had abandoned myself to Milord’s bodice-ripping eyes. Harry, who was acquainted with my schoolgirl crushes, briskly continued, “Let’s talk business,” and ordered drinks. I made the wai, sat down; a Mekong appeared before me.
“Lord Chandos wants to take a girl back to London.” The boss paused for sales-pitch effect. “A dtook-gah-dtah.” Of course. Why else was I here? Milord wanted a windup toy, a doll. I stole them; Harry fenced them. Our customer—despite the insistence of his beauty—was just another farang exhausted by human love, one whose lack of credit had led him east to seek the services of a rustler. But what beauty it was: a beauty from the land of ice and snow where, once, I had been happy.
“Dtook-gah-dtah?” I said. “No problem. My speciality. What kind of girls you like, sir?”
“Bad girls,” he said, deadpan. “And call me James.”
“Yes, Mr James. Cartier? Rolex? Tiffany? All fake, of course. All imitation. But very good quality. Very reasonable price.”
“Harry tells me half a million gets me Cartier.”
“You have good taste. Cartier doll very nice. Very Déco. Very bad. But doll have no right, no civil status. You need passport or you never get her out of country.”
“Passport’s my department,” said Harry. “It’ll need a visa, too. I do both for two hundred thousand baht.”
The Englishman sighed. “I’m no longer a wealthy man, Harry.” Sweet farang, I could believe it. You seemed one of those ruined European aristocrats who, impoverished by debts, sought out cheap imitations of the toys to which they had become addicted but could no longer afford. Automata were the playthings of the rich; but here in sex city (where the boys are so pretty), city of angels, dolls, and of night, we fake everything—TVs, software, designer jeans, life.
“In all the world,” I said, “you cannot get better price. And anyone tell you Mr James, Thai lady dolls are number one.”
“We’re putting ourselves at considerable risk. Apart from the trouble of lifting a doll, the Eurobunnies—sorry, James—are down on us for copyright infringement. Someone out there has killed three doll rustlers this month alone. It’s hot: we don’t do this for fun.” Our customer looked uncertain and Harry proceeded with the hard sell. “Mosquito’s just amazing. He’ll get you a Cartier doll, no sweat. He can pass through the pornocracies—Patphong, Nana, Cowboy, Suriwong—like a ghost through walls.”
“As you say,” said the stranger, inhaling languorously on his cigarette, “amazing.” He looked askance, ready to snare my reaction, adding, with studied disinterest, “What’s the secret?” Against my will, ravished, a sad, sad slave to lust, I smiled conspiratorially. Harry saw (he knows my little ways) and drummed his fingers on the table.
“Secret is seven hundred thousand baht. Half of it up front. Secret is no one knows outside this room. Secret is letting us do our job with no questions asked. Then you get your dtook-gah-dtah and everyone’s happy.”
Milord swept back his golden hair. “Seven hundred thousand baht,” he reflected. “I’ll have to think it over.” Harry’s lips didn’t move, but his face screamed, Time waster! The stranger pushed aside his glass and rose. “I’ve some things to do… Nice bar you have here.” Harry picked up a copy of the Bangkok Post and pretended to scan it.
“You know where you can find me…”
“And good to meet you, Mosquito.” His right hand was gloved, concealing, perhaps, a prosthesis. Teasingly, he squeezed my arm. It was an intimation of fellowship, of understanding. “Mosquito: Why do they call you that?”
“Just a name,” I said, “a silly name.”
And then he was gone.
When he had touched me, I had felt a pinprick in my arm, like a discharge of static. I lifted my shirtsleeve and recognized the telltale mark—like that of an insect bite—left by an epidermic tracer.
“What’s wrong?” said Harry.
“Mosquito bite Mosquito,” I said, scratching. Harry burrowed into his paper. A nasty, unidentified virus simply called klong fever was ravaging Bangkok. It was said to be transmitted by insect bites, only affect males, and leave its victims impotent. But since no farang had been known to succumb, Harry had shown little concern.
