Missing Louise

by Nicholas Frankcom

  To his side, Rusty had been carefully edging around the old wrecked Cessna. He was warily watching the gun, not yet sure what to do. He was in total confusion, not knowing if this was bad or a shade above bad. When he heard Mike speak, he stopped, stunned by what he had just heard. Was this the girl! In the end she had ironically found them, the ever-mysterious Louise. He went to move forward, hoping to get a clear view of the girl they had been tracking for hundreds of miles. He could clearly make out the straw blonde hair, longer than what Mike had described. The ends tangled with the heat forming soft knots. It gave her a rustic beauty. A stern prod in his direction from the Kalashnikov was enough to return him to the plane.

  For a few seconds nobody uttered a sound. Even the crickets seemed to silence their continuous vocal onslaught. The scene was set like a medieval battle before the armoured knights got to charge in, war-hammers at the ready. Each side was weighing the other up, not sure what to make of the freak encounter. It was Mike who broke the uneasy silence. In his head he had been constantly planning ways to track Louise down. Now she had found him. What he was not in the reckoning of things was how he would open the conversation on their first encounter. It was difficult to know what to say to an ex-girlfriend in the Laotian jungle surrounded by possible terrorists. He didn’t even know if she was part of their wandering tribe or some kind of exotic hostage. There was no precedent for any of this at all.

  “Are you OK there Louise? I guess you’re wondering what I’m doing here, although I could ask you the same question. I mean, we’re not exactly on a scout camp here are we!” Mike was unaware he was scratching his chest as he spoke, unable to disguise his sense of bewilderment.

  “Do you know this man?” It was Pin who spoke, slightly turning as he did so.

  “In another lifetime yeah. But bloody hell Mike, just what are you doing?” Louise replied, her eyes flickering with anger.

  “Well, let’s just say that it’s not quite coincidence. I seem to have been temporarily reincarnated as a private investigator. The guy to my side goes by the name of Rusty. I was sent over here to look for you, just to make sure that you were all right. It was your parents who contacted me in fact. They figured that I might have half a chance of finding you. You went off the radar you know, simply disappeared. People were worried!”

  “So you came here to spy on me! Sent by my parents of all people. You never got on with them anyway. How could you interfere so much Mike. You have no idea, no idea at all what is going on. And to be perfectly frank it’s none of your business.”

  “I’m not snooping on you. Like I say, people got worried. I’m not even going to force you to contact them. All that I have to do is report back that you’re safe. They’re worried sick and needed to know where you were. Nothing more than that. I mean come on Louise, like you say I don’t even get on with your folks. Why on earth would I be spying for them!”

  “You’ve got a lot of explaining to do Mike, and it had better be believable.”

  “From the look of things we all have a few stories to tell.”

  It was Pin who stepped in. He decided to quickly draw the conversation to a close. He saw little point in any further bickering. He was already edgy about being here and his mind was racing, working out what was going on around him. His instinctual danger sensor was picking up a lot of unease leaving his nerves jangling. If the smoke and gunfire weren’t enough he now had an old friend of Louise skulking around the jungle with his beach-bum mate. The story he gave was open-ended and could have been thrown together on the hoof, but Louise knew the guy, leaving him little choice other than to trust him for now. It still didn’t change the small matter of some kind of war taking place on the highway. The sooner they got out, the better.

  “We should not hang around here. It’s not safe. We’ll get going back. There’s something happening out on the main road.”

  “Tell me about it!” Mike replied, a thread of exasperation in his voice. “We were caught right in the crossfire. Our bus was forced off the road by gunfire.”

  Pin looked around uneasily as he beckoned them forward. “I already have men on their way. Quick, we need to move now. You can tell me more as we walk.”

  As they made their way along a single-track route through the thick vegetation, Mike elaborated further on their encounter with near death earlier on the bus. Around him all fell silent. As they listened their only distraction was the chorus of unknown insects, a reminder of how deep they had penetrated beyond the tree line. Mike skipped few details as he told of their brief journey. There seemed little point in holding back on any darker pieces that might otherwise be omitted from a dinner party discussion. He went so far as to describe the tobacco-chewing woman, who spent her last journey sharing the back seat with them, finishing with Rusty and his lucky escape and their fears for Jean. It was Pin who asked any questions, anxious to know numbers and descriptions of their attackers. The picture that Mike was painting left them all absorbed in morbid reflection on how bad things must have been. When he had finished they remained silent. There was the unspoken knowledge that the highly dangerous hijackers were loose and possibly looking out for new victims. They would be hyped and have the fresh taste for killing feeding them. These weren’t common-garden Laotian criminals strapped for a bit of cash that might be talked around or bribed with a gold watch. They were close to a gang of bloodletting maniacs who took pleasure in killing whatever their true purposed. If they didn’t take great care each of their lives would be on the line, despite the presence of a few hefty looking partisans.

  Pin had already sent a man to check on the aftermath of the hijacking. It was probable that he would return with nothing more than a body count and a visual update on how grim things were looking on the highway. The scout was eager to visit the sight and make a judgement call on who might be responsible. Although it would be obvious who Jean was given the absence of farang in these parts, he was given a sound description in case she could be accounted for at the roadside amongst any survivors. Secretly Pin believed that if there were any stragglers left over from the hijack they would be pretty stupid to hang around and put themselves in the line of fire again. Most likely they would have run blind like a frightened animal, getting as far away as possible. By now they were either dead or lost. A few might be picked up by the authorities, mopped down and paraded in front of cameras. Only a few though.

  Pin placed his other men in front and to the rear of the remaining party, just in case any hostile visitors attempted to wipe them out on the narrow path. The humidity and dense vines of the jungle made their journey slow, though the thick vegetation masked them from any prying eyes. Pin remained unconcerned about the speed of their progress. The camp was close by. It would not take too long to reach the comparative safety no matter how slowly they negotiated their way. There were checks in place to ensure the camp stayed safe. They wouldn’t be troubled there just yet. What worried him far more were the events up on the highway. Someone high and powerful either knew something or they had a bunch of bandits on the loose willing to use maximum force to lift a few dollars from a beaten-up bus. Neither of these outcomes looked good for his close-knit group of Hmong. For starters they had a few renegades in the area running wild with guns. Their home environment was threatened. As if that weren’t enough there would be the state response. He already knew that powerful elements in the Vientiane administration were watching for a wrong footing, itching for a piece of Hmong ass. His captive taken from the wreckage of the white pickup proved as much. Unfortunately the man had died on them before any serious information could be extracted. Doubtless they would get the blame, accusations of brutality under interrogation, yet this simply wasn’t his style. The agent would have died even with a team of elite surgeons and his very own Florence Nightingale. Their methods were persistent yes, but always gentle.

  Pin was all too aware of the possible outcomes now that a public bus was l
eft burning. Before too long hundreds, if not thousands of the armed idiots could pour into their enclave. Even if this weren’t staged as an excuse for shooting them, once a Hmong were in the sights of an army gun, most government fingers would be itching to pull the trigger. When they arrived safely back at camp he decided that he would prepare everyone for leaving. Their precious crop would doubtless be left to wither and ruin, the only source of income. But fortunes came and went. For now the fate of the fortune cookie looked to be on their side and with that the chance for a more lucrative way to make a living. One which held a higher degree of legality than their secretive farming. They were still waiting on the final piece, a last segment to their puzzle. Their contact in the museum archive was looking for the missing link, translated instructions; the final resting place for their prize. They would now have to move on without the exact co-ordinates. They knew the area to be searched. Clues had been in circulation for years, bits of gossip and witness accounts of clandestine activity. Before now the clues were overlooked because they could have no way of knowing what they referred to. Now things were very different. Even when they found the sealed document within the wrecked plan, it told only part of the story. Its astonishing text was typed in Russian, all significance lost on them for so long. Once they finally got down to translating the text they found that they needed the other piece. The museum archivists held it under their noses in Vientiane all of these years, the document slowly fading in a locked room, overlooked and forgotten. The two needed to go together, like an old merchant’s final testament having a leather case and a key. The resting-place needed two parts to the code. With the one half they knew where to go but not where to search. It would be a start. Lady luck was due to play a hand. To aid her enthusiasm to help them along he decided on sending his special envoy in Vientiane over to the museum where the archives were held. He might be able to find the very latest news, maybe walk away with what they sought. There was much risk involved. Hmong stood out in Vientiane. Authorities would be more than happy to take an interest. The plan was to leave it another week until they were stronger, go in under cover of darkness, but with the clock against them the time for planned risks was upon them. His envoy was to get in, then get the hell away and join them down the road. With bridges being quickly burnt Pin’s task was to lead their way towards the mystical “Plain of Jars”, the natural heartland for the Hmong.

  Nineteen

  Without warning the canopy of tall Asian Rosewood trees cleared to reveal a small camp, tucked into a clearing with expanses of rye grass separating the dozen or so huts. One end housed a chicken coup and farrowed earth, rice and fruit competing for space along the irrigation ditches. The furthest side captured much of the sun, the dry earth holding up wooden frames holding cut out targets and swinging sacks for bayonet charges. Some of the buildings were wooden, with corrugated iron roofs holding out the elements, though most were put together from blocks of baked mud. Mike imagined that the mud blocks would have a welcome cooling effect against the torrid heat and keep out much of the monsoon. They looked like the solid forts he once saw in North Africa, good for keeping out marauding tribesmen and Europeans for a few centuries. Most buildings lay haphazardly around a central long-house, finished off with a covered wooden veranda. This looked to be dual purpose in outlook, perhaps both community hall and school, given the variety of people coming and going through the double doors. Doubtless it doubled up as their parliament as well. The roof was adorned with netting, a feature many of the outbuildings sported as a necessary addition to save being spotted from the air. Shallow pits, probably filled with flammable liquids to ward off predators from both the animal and human worlds guarded the few paths that carved their way into the camp from the thick jungle. Security was a key ingredient in the make-up of the Hmong’s jungle home.

  Pin led the small group towards the central long-house. As they closed in, Mike could see another westerner, mid-twenties with pale skin and thin arms. He was lounging in a canvas hammock and had not seen them approach. Mike could make out the scraggly stubble of a dark beard woven with tufts of ginger. He wanted to ask Louise more about this unexpected character, but thought better of it. She had barely spoken to him since their encounter beside the stricken Cessna. Partly it would be her doggedness and stubborn temper, though she too would have sunk deep in thought, mulling over the ramifications of the day’s events.

  Pin vaulted the wooden fence enclosing the long-house and clapped his hands for prompt attention. It was clear that he was a man used to authority. Most of the camp villagers were already gathering. Hushed voices accompanied a charged excitement of expectation and nervous anticipation. They would have seen Pin leave the camp earlier in a bid to investigate the explosions and smoke from up on the main road. To them this was their main BBC news bulletin, their own cable bringing the big event of the day fresh to their neighbourhood, person to person. The news today though was likely to be a bit too local for most stomachs.

  As he began to speak, a gathering of around twenty of the villagers huddled together, taking the bad news in their stride. They waited until he finished. There were no raised voices, no interruptions and no outward sign of any panic. Mike could not understand a word of what Pin was saying, but he knew the gist of it. In all probability he would be detailing the bus hijack close to their home, telling them that the Hmong would be blamed. There was the serious chance that an army might be whipped up into a fury and dispatched from Vientiane to obliterate all trace of them. An official in a plain green suite would then tell the world that the terrorist threat was neutralised and that the bad boy bus burners were six feet under and would not trouble anyone any more. Mike tried to imagine a similar scene in his native Portishead. If the good citizens were told that total destruction was imminent unless they fled and deserted their homes to become desperate refugees there would be panic and near certain riot. Around him the villagers simply hung their heads in mutual sympathy before calmly dispersing to collect their belongings ready for a long journey. Perhaps it was their mind-set, perhaps their downtrodden history and culture. They took the news bravely and were strong enough to move on to their next challenge with a minimum of fuss. Fuss killed time and lives.

  As Pin was finishing telling his flock of Hmong the bad news, the guy with the thinned out beard slowly made his way towards where Mike and Rusty were stood. He looked fairly unsteady, a sure combination of minimal daytime activity and heavy stoned sleep. After mimicking an army salute he held out his hand and awaited formal introductions.

  Louise looked embarrassed as she welcomed the newcomer.

  “This is John. We hooked up on Koh Chang. He’s helped watch my back and gets me out of trouble. He carried me back worse for wear after our first encounter, though mostly now the roles have become reversed. Generally you’ll find he prefers night to day, so you’ll find him enjoying the hammock much of the time. He calls it daytime hibernation, though he doesn’t exactly go running around burning up energy at `any time.”

  “Hey guys.” The pale stranger made to flap his hand hi five style, deciding at the last moment to swipe at a pestering mosquito. “How come you ended up here? Not the sort of place you’ll find in the glossy travel brochures! Kind of hard to find isn’t it? The trees mask our little holiday camp well. If you’re after picture postcards you’ll be disappointed. This place is way off limits. ”

  “The way we ended up in your holiday camp is a bit of a story,” Mike replied. “It’s centred around our friend Louise here.”

  “So you’re out looking for this ancient Buddha too then?” John quipped, totally unaware of the bombshell he was letting go.

  Mike was about to answer, he knew of a few temples and historic Buddha’s, there were a couple of famous ones back in Vientiane, but this wasn’t a reason they ended up in a Hmong jungle camp, before Louise quickly cut in. She held a scornful look in her eyes and Mike knew better than to interrupt her when she became angry i
n this manner. It was a controlled anger, one where her wit and sharp brain remained sharply switched on, able to expertly beat down an opponent.

  “What are you, a complete moron or one still studying for the certificate? We’ve talked about this before, all of us, and I thought you had at least picked something up. You’re a prize idiot. You’ve probably won it every year for a decade. This isn’t some game, there are lives at stake. It’s above me, John, and I’m afraid to say it’s way above you as well.”

  John looked to say something, but thought better of it. Instead he sheepishly grinned and prepared to meld into the background, presumably to retake his position in the hammock. Mike figured him to be the type to take a rebuke badly, though felt little empathy or kinship towards the pale figure. Perhaps he needed to get to know John better, though there was an element of mild jealously he was surprised to feel. A few illicit memories wafted through his head. He half wondered what kind of history John and Louise held together. If there was any previous between them, it looked to be long gone.

  “What’s this about some Buddha anyway?” It was Rusty who posed the question, his face alight with child-like curiosity. The whole issue about lives being at stake still lay hanging in the air like a dark mystery waiting to be explained. Mike was fully with him in wanting to know more. Finding Louise had only been the start of things it seemed. There was a lot of unexplained friction drifting just below the surface. It then occurred to him that they must put Jean top of their agenda. One missing person search had just been replaced by another. Perhaps he should persuade Louise to talk with her friends, the Hmong. They would surely have a few ideas on what to do in the wilderness when it came to missing westerners. Before that Louise needed to satisfy a few questions regarding some ancient archaeological quest.