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By Root 509 0

billboards, the signs exhorting the gaunt Burmese to even greater sacrifice. “Our country,” a cynical trishaw driver told him one day, “is run by a bunch of dopes.” Well, if you say so—the only thing Sonny knew for sure was that the generals cheated like bandits at golf. It shocked him at first, not just the cheating but their utter shamelessness, as if they were entitled to tee their ball up in the rough, or nudge it out from behind the trees or kick it back in bounds, puerile, bush-league, penny-ante stuff that should have been beneath their dignity as national leaders, though with time Sonny began to link another set of dots, a series of interconnecting lines between political power and the most banal sort of personality. He thought of the pro-am round he’d played years ago with George Walker Bush, back in the days when the future president was merely the affable front man for the Texas Rangers. “You know how it is with those Latin players,” the young Bush told Sonny with his trademark smirk. “The first thing they do when they get that big contract, they go out and buy their wives a new set of titties.”

“Dear Girls,” Sonny wrote in the next postcard to his daughters, “for the first time in my life I have bosses, and it has been very interesting to say the least. I have to work almost every day—I guess this is what I get for all those years of being a bum, ha-ha! But I have decided that being a boss is the best job to have. Study hard and make good grades so you can be the boss.”

Sonny could sense a sea change within himself, a difference of depth, perhaps a broadening point of view. He believed that he was starting to understand how successful people made their way in the world, his learning curve pushed along by the rounds he played with Merrill Hayden. Sonny paid close attention to his fellow American, noting his clothes, his physical ease, his slick diplomatic skills. There was, for example, the way he flattered the generals: Hayden never complimented them directly on the job they were doing, which might imply the possibility of a different opinion, but instead he insisted that they worked too hard, sacrificing their leisure for the good of the country. Yes, the generals would gravely agree, yes, it’s true, we live only to serve the people’s desire. The day after these rounds an envelope would arrive for Sonny from the Strand Hotel; inside he would find enough cash to cover his losses from the day before, rounded up to the nearest hundred.

It felt sleazy, but Sonny pocketed the envelopes, composing mental notes of apology to his girls. Late one afternoon he was crossing the clubhouse verandah when Hayden called out.

“Sonny, come have a drink.”

Sonny walked over. Hayden was sitting with another American, a muscular, compact man in his mid-thirties with short dark hair that covered his head like felt. Hayden introduced him as Kel McClure, from the Embassy. McClure added that he was with the political section.

Everyone sat. Sonny signaled the waiter for a beer.

“So you’re the Asian tiger,” McClure said.

Sonny had a duh moment. “Say what?”

“You’re the Tiger Woods of Asia.”

“Bro, the only Tiger Woods of Asia is Tiger Woods.”

“Sonny’s a very fine golfer in his own right,” said Hayden. “And a first-rate teacher—he’s brought General Myint’s handicap down four strokes already.”

“Excellent,” said McClure, grinning at Sonny. He had black co coons for eyebrows and a long, spatulate jaw. The bottom half of his face was blue with five o’clock shadow.

Just then Hayden’s cell phone rang. “Excuse me,” he said, checking the screen, “I really have to take this. Hello?”

McClure sat back and sipped his drink. He kept drilling Sonny with moronic alpha-male stares.

“You like it here?” he barked.

“Sure,” Sonny answered. “Last time I checked.”

“I hope you know the future of the country is in your hands.”

Sonny laughed.

“You think I’m kidding,” McClure said with a straight face, “I am absolutely not, the fate of the nation depends on you. If a peaceful civil society ever develops here golf is going to play a major role in