King Bhumibol woke up with a jolt from a dream
in which a black sun struggle to get out of the
aerial roots of a Buddha bo tree and the White
Raven’s wings glinted like metal as they flapped
across the pond toward the study where, when
he was in residence at Chtiralada, he had been
lately preparing for his ordination as a monk and
pondering Buddhist laws. He remembered the
law that every action generates a force of energy
that returns to us in like kind. He had been told
nothing about the executions.
The public heard first through marketplace
gossip. This allowed Phao a final touch of cruelty.
The unsuspecting families continued their usual
early morning routine of making the rounds to
plead for their men’s lives. The dragged-out fight
had beggared them. The bureaucratic processes
required them to go on foot or bicycle from office
to office. Finally they made their way to revisit
the prisoners.
The man at the gate said, ‘It’s too early to
pick them up.’ Senator Chaleo’s daughter misunderstood.
She thought she had come too early to
escort her father once more to freedom. The
man corrected her: ‘You’re too early to pick up the
bodies.’ Then she knew that all morning she had
been trying to save the lives of the already dead.
No official notification was issued. The king
hurried back from Far-From-Worry when the
rumours reached him. He had let the months pass
without interfering with the due process of law,
thinking he had won his demand for a strong and
independent judiciary. In his silent rage, he saw
how powerless he really was. He had insisted that
every citizen had the right to petition him directly.
Now he discovered that attempts to reach him by
the scapegoats’ families had been stopped by
courtiers subverted by Phao’s police.
Phao circulated reports that the king had
approved the executions because he wanted to
end speculation about his part in the murder. On
Phao’s desk remained the last written appeals
from the dead men for a king’s pardon.