Jane Vejjajiva by Unknown Read Free Book Online

‘city girl’. He would paddle his boat over to play with her often. That day he had come over to the house in search of his playmate and had followed them to the old walnut tree. His boat appeared just after an enormous lightning strike. Tong was as strong a rower as any of the children whose homes were by the water. So it was no great task for him to steer the boat in which Kati sat back to the pier and safety. He had picked Kati out of the boat and placed her right in Mother’s lap.
    ‘Like a mother cat with a kitten,’ said Mother, smiling through her tears at the picture they’d made – Tong, skinny and small for his age, bearing Kati who was round and chubby. Mother had hugged Kati close, and Tong too. She had been crying and laughing at the same time, there in the middle of the pouring rain, before they climbed the steps to take cover in the little shelter.
    Before long Grandpa and other men from the community had braved the storm in their boats to come looking for them, calling for Mother and Kati. They brought blankets and umbrellas, but Mother, Tong and Kati were already soaked to the bone. That night Kati took ill with a fever. The family had to sit up with her all night, bathing her with damp cloths. It was nearly dawn before her fever abated. As the morning light broke, Mother packed her bags and left the little house on the water without saying goodbye, never to return.
    Kati could imagine Grandma’s reaction – how distressed she must have been. Kati could also imagine Grandpa’s face as he said through set lips that Pat must’ve had her reasons to act in this way, and that some day she would tell them why. From that time on Grandpa had taken responsibility for caring for Kati.
    Kati felt something now biting away at her heart. She stopped digging her hole in the sand and turned to Uncle Kunn.
    ‘Can I use your mobile phone?’ she asked.
    The morning they had left the house on the water, Tong had handed Kati a scrap of paper and said with a smile that it was the mobile phone number of his uncle, the abbot, in case Kati needed to talk to him about anything. Tong said to ring anytime because he was the one who took the calls.
    Tong’s voice, so familiar and so very pleased to hear from her, soothed the ache in Kati’s heart in an instant. Kati saw Uncle Kunn suppress a laugh when he heard Kati’s question. ‘Tong, it’s Kati here. Hey, do you want to hear the sound of the sea?’

Sea Pines
    It was hard to believe that tomorrow the sun would rise as usual.
    Mother had been running a temperature for a number of days now. Dr Pradit’s face was always serious when he left Sea-view Villa. Aunt Da said that the doctor wanted Mother to rest up in the hospital, whether the local one in Hua Hin or one of the big city hospitals back in Bangkok.
    ‘Even an elephant from Chopstick Mountain couldn’t drag her away from Kati,’ said Uncle Dong and his voice was shrill.
    The day before, Uncle Dong had taken Kati to Chopstick Mountain. They’d admired the view from the top, where you could look down and see the little white house off in the distance. At the foot of the
    6 6
    mountain you could have a ride on an elephant. Uncle Dong had complained high and low that having elephants at the seaside was totally inappropriate and out of place. There were only a few customers lining up for rides. They were all foreign tourists.
    ‘The mahouts are probably planning to drag them off to the forest and rob them, I shouldn’t wonder,’ said Uncle Dong.
    Uncle Kunn whispered to Kati that it was just as well Uncle Dong didn’t work in the tourist industry or he’d have lost the country billions with his mistrust of small business. Uncle Dong must have caught something of this because he went on for some time about how they could hardly be called small businesses when elephants were involved.
    The thing Mother most wanted to avoid was being on a respirator, a machine which would do her breathing for her. Her gaze