Paying Back Jack Read Online Free PDF Page B

hotel, beautiful ying in front of the spirit house … what’s not to like? Calvino thought as he worked himself down the list of possibilities: A ying could be good or bad, young or old, educated or illiterate, ugly or beautiful, kind or mean, available or unavailable. He gave this ying a high score. It was the start of a perfect exile—or vacation, depending on a man’s point of view. It doesn’t much matter which, he thought, as a smile crossed his lips. He started to approach the woman but stopped short. Some basic instinct told him to pull back, wait a little longer before making his move.
    Looking as if transported from the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem, the woman moved her lips in prayer. Below the ice Calvino sensed trouble, and the feeling had been strong enough for him to abort his approach. He reminded himself of Calvino’s law: Act on impulse when betting on a horse, but never with a woman. A horse never drags a man into its life. It either wins or loses the race. A man can spend an afternoon at the track and, eight races later, count his money and know whether he has won or not. With a woman it’s never that simple. With a woman the numbers never add up.
    A seagull landed on top of the spirit house. Its belly fluted with gray feathers, it walked along the roof and dropped down beside a plate of oranges. Opening her eyes, the woman saw the seagull and smiled. The bird flew off with a wedge of orange in its beak. After the seagull had flown away, she sensed someone watching her and, turning around, had seen Calvino. For a brief moment, their eyes had locked, and she had smiled. It had been the most human ofconnections, fleeting, without demand, without flirtation, and it had lasted only an instant.
    Don’t be a fish blowing bubbles close to the surface, he told himself. Besides, vacations are about leaving problems behind. Who had caused that woman’s great expectations about life to dissolve into a cocktail of anxiety with a superstitious chaser? He didn’t really want to know. Why spoil the rare opportunity to be free of other people’s problems, aches, pains, disappointments, and regrets?
    At the front desk the receptionist looked up his name and pulled out a couple of pieces of paper. Reading through them, he nodded and told Calvino he’d been upgraded. Bless General Yosaporn, Calvino thought. He’d pulled the strings to put him in a suite.
    Upstairs, Calvino slipped the keycard into the door and walked into a large suite with a separate sitting room and bedroom, a flat-screen TV in both rooms, and a bathroom the size of his bedroom in Bangkok. This is what a vacation is supposed to be, he thought. A temporary escape from reality. He’d rarely been in such a large hotel room except to meet a client. Outside the door he’d noticed a bronze plaque declaring his new digs the “Regency Suite.” If he had to lie low, this was definitely the way to do it.
    Calvino had the bellhop set the case of whiskey on the table and pull back the curtains. Then he tipped him a hundred baht. Looking out at the blue sky, the ribbon of white sand, and the dolphin-gray sea dotted with Jet Skiers, fishing and pleasure boats and, on the horizon, cargo ships, he felt like a high roller at Atlantic City who’d been put up in style by management. All that was missing was a high stack of chips and some playing cards.
    Calvino’s good mood lingered like a familiar song as he sat alone on his balcony overlooking the sea. There were a lot of fish out there—but he had in mind the two-legged variety who strolled along Beach Road as the sun came down over the water. Pattaya was stretching, arms out, waking up and getting ready for the night, putting the line out for those hungry mouths moving in the far distance.
    Now was the time to catch up on doing nothing. Sit back and read a good book or two. He’d packed Graham Greene’s
The Quiet American
—on the basis