When Broken Glass Floats_ Growing Up Under the Khmer Rouge - Chanrithy Him [115]
She rejects the idea and suggests that I give the gold I’ve brought to bang Vantha. She explains that we can live off the profits from bang Vantha and Than’s trading. Looking into her eyes, I realize there’s no point in arguing with her. For the moment I accept Ra’s suggestion and hope that I too can depend on Than and bang Vantha, a stranger, with my gold.
Than and bang Vantha embark on a new business. After our meal, Than and bang Vantha seek out customers and bring them to our shack. They are middlemen, exchanging gold for Thai money, then we exchange this money at a higher rate with travelers who buy goods to take back to their respective provinces.
My role is to inspect the authenticity of the gold and weigh it, using our little brass scale. I’m good, Ra and Than tell bang Vantha, at distinguishing the twenty-four-karat gold from the fake jewelry or the nongold sheets. I’ve learned from the other traders as well as from my own observations the appropriate heaviness and color of the gold.
When in doubt, I’ve learned to place the jewelry or the so-called gold piece on the embers in a cooking pit or set it on fire with lighter fuel. If it’s real gold, the color remains the same, bright gold. If not, it turns black. So far, I haven’t been swindled.
Rumor has it that we’ll be moved into a camp inside Thailand. Ry and Map are still in Sala Krao. If we are moved, we’ll be separated forever, we fear.
A few days later, I’m relieved to hear Than’s offer to go back to Sala Krao to bring Map and Ry here. If they start moving people out before he returns, Than emphasizes, Ra and I are not to leave.
While Than is gone, Ra confides to me that she and bang Vantha have decided to get married when we are moved to the new camp. She says, “If I don’t marry him, don’t love him, he said, he’ll go back to Kompong Cham to his parents. If he’s gone, who’s going to take care of us? Cambodian elders would say it’s good to have a man to support the family. I want you to be with me when we get married.”
At night Than arrives with Map on his shoulders, a human bundle whose hands are draped over Than’s head, about to slip off at any time. Than lifts him up and puts him down on the mat near Ra and me. Map is quiet. No word, nothing, comes out of his mouth. He sits still, his eyes sad, exhausted.
Getting up from the mat, I peer along the alley in front of the shack, but there’s no Ry. “I left her,” Than fumes. “She walks slowly and carries nothing. Walks a little bit, stops. Walks a little bit, stops. Rest, rest, rest…. Since we were near here, I didn’t want to wait for her.”
“So where is she?” I ask.
“I don’t know! She wanted to rest, so I left her. I carried Map because he couldn’t walk, and he got heavier and heavier. I’m also tired, but I kept on going, but she kept wanting to rest….”
Worried, Ra says, “She doesn’t know her way around here. You should have waited for her.”
Sitting down on the mat, Than is quiet. His head rests on his arms atop his knees.
“Athy, tomorrow go look for her. Look around the entrance to the camp and you should find her.” Than speaks tiredly, his voice now composed, concerned.
When the light streaks the morning sky, I spring up from the mat. Ry is the first thing on my mind. I trot and run, hoping Ry hasn’t gotten up and begun to look for us.
Along the grassy path flanked by clumps of trees, I search for Ry. I check once, twice, three times, walking far out of the camp, yet I can’t find her. The fourth time, on my last attempt, I still don’t see a trace of her. I cry.
Standing against a makeshift fence of freshly cut logs encircling a large open field of stumps and thickets, I watch young, skinny men in civilian clothes who are leaping over the stumps, each making a stabbing-shooting gesture with a piece of wood. One stumbles and plunges to the ground. Laughter erupts from the other side of the fence. When I turn to look, I see a group of children giggling among a few chuckling