Free Slash and Burn by Colin Cotterill

senior interpreter for the mission, yet since their arrival in Phonsavan he’d avoided all contact with the aliens. The judge suggested this was because of Vinai’s laryngitis and that he wanted to preserve his voice for the first day of activities. That day had arrived and he had supposedly translated General Suvan’s opening address word for word from his own script.
    To Vinai’s left at the VIP table, which was resplendent with plastic hibiscus, sat General Suvan in full dress uniform. In fact, Lao full dress uniform was not as impressive as it sounded. He might have been mistaken for a postman in any other country. Although the same age as Siri, the balding old man made the doctor look like a teenager. His movements were languid and his reactions showed a lack of reflex. In front of him on the table was the three-page speech he’d just delivered. It was dog-eared and crumpled so he’d either slept on it or it was a well-used address. Vinai had his own copy. During the speech, the fried eggs and crispy bacon and steaming pots of instant coffee arrived and, as there was still a pervading atmosphere of nervous cultural tension between the two groups, nobody tucked in. So the guests watched their food slowly cool in front of them. Another half an hour would render the meal inedible which probably explained the brevity of the American major’s own greeting. But, to their horror, Judge Haeng seated to the general’s left reached into his own briefcase and pulled out a wad of paper twice as thick as that of the general. Cousin Vinai produced a translation of equal thickness. The judge slid back his chair but Siri got to his feet before him.
    “With respect, Judge,” he said, wondering whether that counted as an oxymoron. If looks could kill, Judge Haeng was standing over Siri’s body with bloody fingers.
    “As this is a special occasion,” Siri went on, “I suggest that it would be a courtesy to our American guests if we followed their culture and ate while we listened to your probably insightful and humorous early morning discourse.”
    He still had little idea about American culture or whether they ate during speeches in the United States—Henry James certainly didn’t—but he was hungry. Judging from the ensuing round of applause once the translation had reached the visitors’ table, they were hungry too. And so, Judge Haeng’s speech and its purportedly English translation were all but drowned out by the clattering of American knives and forks and the hum of conversation. Nobody failed to notice the fact that Haeng glared at Siri the entire time. Siri seemed not to care. He was taking the opportunity to study the colorful assembly of Americans opposite.
    The retired major, Potter, wore a large flowery Hawaiian shirt, green shorts with an impressive collection of pockets, huge boots, and a Dodgers baseball cap. Siri could think of no better word to describe his complexion than “ripe.” He was flushed and bloated like a man dropped into boiling water and left there to simmer, the result of blood vessels expanding. His nose was a crimson golf ball. He was, Siri decided, a man lost to alcoholism. This voracious appetite extended to food. Peach, seated beside him, looked on in amazement as he forked a mountain of potatoes into himself.
    “Honey,” he said.
    Peach looked around for the bar girl he might have been soliciting. She saw nobody.
    “Are you talking to me, Major?”
    “You’re the interpreter, right?”
    “I am.”
    “Then shouldn’t you be telling us what these two guys are saying?”
    “Well”—she looked over her shoulder—“one of these guys is Judge Haeng and he’s giving a long talk about the tolerant nature of the Pathet Lao to former imperialist oppressors. And the other guy is translating it into English.”
    “What?” The major put down his fork for the first time and cocked an ear in the direction of cousin Vinai. “That’s English?”
    “Apparently.”
    “I can’t