James Fenton(b. 1949)
Dead Soldiers
When His Excellency Prince Norodom Chantaraingsey1
Invited me to lunch on the battlefield
I was glad of my white suit for the first time that day.
They lived well, the mad Norodoms, they had style.
The brandy and the soda arrived in crates.
Bricks of ice, tied around with raffia,palm fibers
Dripped from the orderlies' handlebars.
And I remember the dazzling tablecloth
As the A P C s 2 fanned out along the road,
The dishes piled high with frogs' legs,
Pregnant turtles, their eggs boiled in the carapace,shell
Marsh irises in fish sauce
And inflorescence3 of a banana salad.
On every bottle, Napoleon Bonaparte
Pleaded for the authenticity of the spirit.4
They called the empties Dead Soldiers
And rejoiced to see them pile up at our feet.
Each diner was attended by one of the other ranks5
Whirling a table-napkin to keep off the flies.
It was like eating between rows of morris dancers6—
Only they didn't kick.
On my left sat the prince;
On my right, his drunken aide.
The frogs' thighs leapt into the sad purple face
Like fish to the sound of a Chinese flute.
I wanted to talk to the prince. I wish now
I had collared his aide, who was Saloth Sar's brother.
We treated him as the club bore. He was always
Boasting of his connections, boasting with a head-shake
Or by pronouncing of some doubtful phrase.
And well might he boast. Saloth Sar, for instance,
Was Pol Pot's7 real name. The A P C s
Fired into the sugar palms but met no resistance.
In a diary, I refer to Pol Pot's brother as the Jockey Cap.
A few weeks later, I find him "in good form
And very skeptical about Chantaraingsey.
"But one eats well there, I remark.
"So one should, says the Jockey Cap:
"The tiger always eats well,
It eats the raw flesh of the deer,
And Chantaraingsey was born in the year of the tiger.
So, did they show you the things they do
With the young refugee girls
And he tells me how he will one day give me the
g en -inside information
He will tell me how the prince financed the casino
And how the casino brought Lon Nol8 to power.
He will tell me this.
He will tell me all these things.
All I must do is drink and listen.
In those days, I thought that when the game was up
The prince would be far, far away—
In a limestone faubourg, on the promenade at Nice,9suburb
Reduced in circumstances but well enough provided for.
In Paris, he would hardly require his private army.
The Jockey Cap might suffice for cafe warfare,
And matchboxes for APCs.
But we were always wrong in these predictions.
It was a family war. Whatever happened,
The principals were obliged to attend its issue.
A few were cajoled into leaving, a few were expelled,
And there were villains enough, but none of them
Slipped away with the swag. 0\00t
For the prince was fighting Sihanouk,1 his nephew,
And the Jockey Cap was ranged against his brother
Of whom I remember nothing more
Than an obscure reputation for virtue.
I have been told that the prince is still fighting
Somewhere in the Cardamoms or the Elephant Mountains.
But I doubt that the Jockey Cap would have survived his good
connections.
I think the lunches would have done for him—
Either the lunches or the dead soldiers.