by Don McQuinn
There was a grating whir and Tuyet jerked in the chair, wincing her eyes shut. A shrill squeak forced its way through her twisted lips.
“The faster I turn it, the more electricity it produces.” The whir repeated, louder.
The slight body strained rigidly against the bandages and an amazingly low-pitched growl rushed through the wide open mouth aimed at the ceiling and suddenly she was limp, chin on chest. Taylor listened in shocked stupor to her gasping inhalations, each matching exhalation marked by a sighing grunt.
“Why do you force me to do this?” By now the reasonable, controlled voice from Tho made Taylor’s skin crawl.
“I have—told you—every—thing.” The tonal words came disconnectedly, a broken song of hurt and fear. “They would—learn. Kill me.”
“But you will learn other things as time passes. I will want to know what you have learned. I can always find you. One way or another, you will always tell me what I want to know.”
Chi stepped into the light again, his body between the men at the wall and the woman. When he stepped away, Taylor first noticed Tuyet’s head turned up and to the side, her face locked in an expression of dreadful anticipation. Then he saw the wired clips attached to her nipples.
At the first shock her eyes flew wide open, staring into space. Taylor’s nails bit his palms, waiting for her scream. There was none.
“Only a delicate touch,” Tho said. “It will help you consider.”
Taylor could barely discern the slight flicking motion of Tho’s finger as he gently manipulated the crank. Tuyet twitched in harmony with each movement. Madness frosted her staring eyes and runnels of perspiration traced the contours of her body. Her back arched as far as she could manage, and in contrast to the defined muscles writhing under her skin, her face went limp, lips loosely parted. A long, erotic moan slid through the darkness, then another. Her head slumped and she watched her breasts dance with each measured surge. A detached smile curved her lips and the lower one disappeared between her teeth. Her fingers clutched at the arms of the chair. Her hips twisted.
There was a meaty thump as her lower body slammed viciously against the back of the chair. The languid idiocy altered to reality and agony and she threw her head back and ululated. A pause, and she slid forward against the bindings, and then she was rigid again, the scream thinner and higher. Another pause, another cracking leap, and a dog’s short yip of pain, to be repeated again and again and again.
Taylor’s vision fogged. His knees tried to buckle and he shoved hard against the wall, concentrating on the burning at the back of his throat, swallowing it back. He heard himself saying, “Oh, Jesus, no,” over and over and had to bite his cheek on the inside to stop.
Then it was quiet.
Tho’s voice profaned the blessing.
“I believe you have a sister. It would be wise to think of her for a moment. And, please, do not pretend to be unconscious. You will only waste my time. I have no wish to cause you more pain. Look at me.”
Her head rose slowly, the hair tugging straight as it trailed through sweat on the arms and body. Eyes as featureless as mud-slimed rocks aimed at nothing.
"You will do as you are instructed?”
“Yes. Please, yes. Yes.”
“Good. My assistant will release you. You may wash before you leave. A taxi will take you home. I will contact you soon.”
The woman remained motionless as Chi unwrapped the bandages. Tho approached the men at the wall and Chi gave an angry exclamation. At the same time, Taylor’s nose was assailed by a new smell. He had no trouble identifying it. He looked to see Chi angrily ridding himself of the urine-soaked wrapping from one of the legs. The sight pleased him.
Tho motioned for them to leave. Taylor willed his legs to propel him to an outdoors that beckoned like paradise. The expectant silence behind the cell doors as they passed was broken as they neared the end of the passage. Sobbing eased through the portal in the last door. The sound seemed to float upward from hell’s bedrock. Taylor hurried through the lobby and into the dawn-lighted courtyard, where he spun to await Tho.
“You inhuman bastard!”
Tho’s hand brushed across his forehead and he locked eyes with Taylor.
“Yes,” he said.
“You didn’t have to torture her!”
“Yes, I did.” His eyes refused to waver. Duc took a step toward the American and Tho waved him back without breaking his gaze. “Her absolute cooperation is necessary. We have it. It was my job to get it. She feared for her life before. Now she will fear for the quality of life. I use the weapons I can find, Major Taylor.”
“I think—” Taylor said, and Duc launched his body into him, knocking him stumbling. When he regained his balance, Duc was looking at him with nervous concern. They remained unmoving.
Tho’s head jerked toward the building. “You do not have to tell me what you think. Come now—Chi brings the woman shortly. She must not see you. This way.”
They moved to the side of the building, watching as the Sergeant came out, one hand under Tuyet’s elbow. She walked in a mincing shuffle, testing her legs at each step. She wavered once, and only Chi’s solicitous grip kept her upright. A taxi pulled up and he gently helped her be seated. It was the finishing touch for Taylor.
“Excuse me,” he said thickly. The inanity of the apology enraged him further as he stalked off behind a thick-boled tree and began to heave spectacularly.
Between efforts, he heard Tho say, “He is shocked. I understand. It is natural. I will explain that he will not be at work until late today. Take care of him.”
“Thank you, Trung Ta,” Duc said.
Taylor forced himself erect and tried to curse at both of them. Another spasm bent him double again. He collapsed against the tree to avoid falling to the ground and continued to gag, hating everything that entered his mind.
Chapter 13
“Something on your mind?”
Winter looked at Taylor without raising his head from its bent position over the papers on his desk. He registered no apparent response to the dirty, haggard, civilian-clad appearance of one of his officers.
“You wanted to see me,” he prompted.
“I want out,” Taylor said.
Winter leaned back in his chair. A staring match ensued, neither man breaking contact until Winter spoke. “I can fix it. Where do you want to go?”
Taylor dropped his eyes to the papers. “Can you get me to Third MAF?”
The flat expression behind the desk creased. “I don’t know about that. I can keep you in MACV easily enough. Your people are awfully hard-assed about assignments. As you probably know.”
“I’ll take anything I can get. Just get me the fuck out of this.”
“It’ll take a few days. I’ll ask you to do two things before you leave—help Duc and Kimble set up the transmitters and ammunition and give me your word you won’t discuss the Unit, ever.”
Gesturing erratically, Taylor said, “You know I won’t say anything. What good’s the other stuff? I was the contact. Trung won’t deal with anyone else.”
“We’ll have to try to work someone else in. If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, we’ll pick up the three live ones, or something.”
The passive acceptance was making Taylor nervous. He wondered if that was the purpose. A burst of anger burned his stomach. He didn’t care what motives were involved, the important thing was to insure he’d never go through another session like the interrogation. Never again. The anger metamorphosed into another wave of nausea.
“I hope the operation doesn’t come apart.” The words were distant in his ears, felt odd in his mouth. “I feel like I’m ditching you all. I know how much you want Binh. I just can’t take that stuff.” He moved his head to indicate the other side of the hall.
“Tho?” Winter smiled wearily. “Don’t be too hard on Tho. He does what he has to do. I won’t tell you he doesn’t enjoy his work from time to time. It’d be an easy lie to see through
and I hate to be caught lying.”
“And that’s what you sent me into? Thanks.”
“Don’t wet yourself. I hate to tarnish my image, but the dull fact is, I had no idea what was eating you when you came in here. I guessed what happened. I honestly had no idea the young woman would give him any trouble. I wish she hadn’t.”
“Give him trouble? Jesus H. Christ, man, he nearly broke her fucking mind!”
“How?” Winter leaned forward.
“He hooked her up to a double-E eight.” Thinking about it aloud broke a sweat on him and his voice rose. “He kept turning that handle and talking in that voice and I watched a human being turn into a goddam animal, a—a—a bunch of meat, only the nerves were still working. How’d you like to watch that?”
“Shit, Major.” The expletive was drawn out, pitying. “What you saw was nothing. You understand that? Nothing!” His face mottled irregularly, sunbursts of scarlet against a paled tan. “I’ve watched things that still wake me in the night, goddam you! Stood there with puke in my throat—yes, by Christ, with a mouthful of it, praying I could get rid of it before I passed out—and you come in here and lecture me because you’ve seen someone get flipped around on the end of a fucking telephone generator. What do you expect from me, sympathy? You think I haven’t tried to stop it?”
“You haven’t stopped it, though. I was there, Colonel.”
The colored spots on Winter’s face and neck darkened, then faded. “You’re right about that. And I don’t want you leaving us with the notion that I haven’t tried. I even went back to the States, trying to convince people we had to get it stopped. I talked to the Pentagon. I even talked to a Congressman.” He laughed harshly. “I still can’t believe the sonofabitch. He’s making speeches about the immorality of this whole war today, and I talked to him in ‘66. I put the wood to him about helping the honest Viets and hanging the crooked ones and insisting on proper treatment of POWs and all that shit. He showed me a newspaper clipping. Some Buddhist monk was touring the country, setting up sympathy for their own parochial objectives. The article said—I can still quote it—‘What happens to the Vietnamese when they are dealing with one another is not your business.’ The Congressman liked that. Sat there licking his chops over it.”
“So then what?”
“So I told him I hoped the only homicides in his constituency were committed by locals. That way it wouldn’t matter to the rest of us.”
Taylor winced.
Winter smiled. “I never figured to make General anyhow. But that’s all immaterial. I just wanted you to know, before you leave. I’d have kept you out of there if I’d known what was going down. And I want you to know I oppose it and can’t do a damned thing about it.”
“I shouldn’t have sounded off, Colonel. I mean, I knew it went on, but I never saw it, you know? It tore hell out of me.”
A knock on the connecting door interrupted them.
“Come in, Loc,” Winter said.
Loc stopped short when he saw Taylor. The surprised twitch of his eyebrows was gone quickly and he was as expressionless as ever. He crossed between the two Americans and sat down. At his gesture, Tho followed, closing the door behind him, and turning to give Taylor a quick smile that could have been sardonic or mocking.
“I thought you would be asleep,” he said. The menace of the soft voice slipped through the words, even in these surroundings. The sound of it poked around in Taylor’s mind like a loathsome thing looking for a place to nest.
Loc spoke to Winter. “Major Taylor has told you of last night’s happening?”
Winter was grim. “He hasn’t slept. He’s asked for a transfer.”
After studying Taylor silently for a long minute, Loc asked, “You won’t reconsider?”
Taylor realized he’d been holding his breath. He had to inhale in order to answer. “No, sir.”
Loc intertwined his fingers, elbows on his knees. “That is unfortunate. I had believed you would be of help to us. I knew you wouldn’t engage in the harsher interrogations. I hoped you would understand the necessity for them. They are unpleasant for everyone.”
Tho’s eyes weighed heavily on him and Taylor turned to return the stare coldly.
“It’s not my style,” he said, facing Loc only after the statement was made.
“I understand,” Loc said. “Trung Ta Tho said you were very disturbed by what you saw.”
The remark struck Taylor as artful understatement. He waited for Loc to continue.
“Since you are leaving us, it is unimportant—as you will probably be in the basement of MACV—but I think you should know that what you have seen is not exactly what you think you have seen.”
Taylor felt his lip curling in a sneer, and after an instant’s hesitation, let it develop of itself.
Loc ignored it. “There is psychology involved, Major. The woman’s fears are well-founded. If she is uncovered as an informant, she will likely die. Very unpleasantly.” Taylor thought he saw a flash of irony in Loc’s eyes, but it was gone too quickly. “There is more than that, however. Perhaps it is part of the Oriental culture you westerners have come to call ‘face.’ You see, the woman knew she would work for us. She knew she would betray her employer as soon as Tho made the proposition. Unfortunately for her, she felt money alone does not excuse betrayal. Now if she is uncovered she can explain that she was tortured and that fact may save her life. Furthermore, she did not do it merely for the money, in her own eyes. She has been overpowered. She can live with that.”
“What you say may be true, Dai Ta,” Taylor said. “If it’s not universally true, I’m sure Colonel Tho felt it was true in Tuyet’s case. I don’t claim to know everything. I know me, though. It’s not my style, this other thing.” He shook his head vehemently.
“What, then, is your style?” Loc’s features intensified. “If the woman were to betray us, let us say, and Colonel Tho was interrogated as she was, what would be your reaction?”
Taylor knew he was being led. His face heated. “I’d grease her as soon as I could catch her.”
Instantly, Loc’s eyes flew to Tho. “And you?”
“Capture her, Dai Ta, to learn what she could tell us of others.”
“There is the difference.” Loc closed his argument with a flitting gesture. “Your enemies are potential corpses. Ours are potential weapons, even potential allies. Your judgement of Colonel Tho is premature and excessive.” A sulky tone surfaced in his words, a startling sound from him. “You should know that, in spite of the level of your work in the Unit to this point, my men respect you. They have already nicknamed you. They are men who have been at war all their lives and they think they see something in you. They call you the Cobra Who Laughs. They will be sorry to see you leave us.”
Loc rose in the uncomfortable silence.
Winter said, “Perhaps the Major would like to think about his decision.”
Taylor stood mute, meeting their noncommittal inspection with his own tightly controlled reaction. Behind the fixed look, his mind leaped like a hooked fish. He saw Tuyet’s face shifting before him, changing from a terrified mask to a sub-human horror responding to nerve signals. If he stayed, he’d be part of that. If he left, it would continue, regardless. If he stayed, could he influence it, perhaps stop some of it? And the Binh operation, so important to Winter? And a chance to have something to do with the war?
Incredibly, a half-joking lecture from his father came to his mind, forgotten all these years.
“Never be an innocent bystander,” he’d said. “If a brawl starts and you can’t do the intelligent thing and run away, for Christ’s sake, pile in hard. Every time you pick up a newspaper you read about a fight in a bar—‘Three men in bar fight hurt,’ it says. ‘Innocent bystander hit with a brick and knocked dead.’ The innocent bystander is an unnatural thing and an invitation to disaster. Either run or fight, and if you have to fight, fight like hell. After all, you may be on the right side.”
Taylor forced wor
ds. “I’ll stay. But there’s no way I can work on anything like last night. No way.”
“Agreed,” Winter said.
“I agree, also,” Loc said, moving to leave. He reached up to put a hand on Taylor’s shoulder as he drew abreast. “I will keep your delicacy in mind, and not call on you unless we need someone killed.”
“The Colonel is most considerate.”
Loc’s laughter hissed through a thin smile. He squeezed Taylor’s shoulder and left. Tho followed, passing an oblique smile at Taylor as he pulled the door closed. Taylor couldn’t find it in himself to smile back.
“Don’t be too harsh on Tho,” Winter said.
“I won’t make any trouble. Duc deals with him more than I do. He’ll deal with him all the time, from now on.” He paused and Winter waited patiently, understanding, letting Taylor burn it all out.
“I’ve been in the Corps a long time,” he said. “Seen pain and heard screaming. I don’t like it. I can’t understand how a man can do that to another human.”
Winter said, “Let me tell you about Tho. I’m not apologizing for him, I want you to have a better basis for understanding him. He’s a northerner, a Catholic. When he joined the Army, back in the days of the French, the Viet Minh butchered his mother. They meant to teach him a lesson, and he learned it. It was their bad luck the lesson he learned was to play their rules.”
Taylor shook his head. “It won’t cut it. They do it, so it’s OK if we do it. You know that’s a copout.”
“I said I wasn’t apologizing for him.” Winter stood and stretched. A joint cracked authoritatively and he frowned absently as he continued. “He doesn’t like us much, you know. He knows if he’s ever tagged for some of the things he’s done, he’ll have half the world calling him a war criminal, with Americans leading the pack. It bothers him that no one applies the same standards to the other side. We’re still digging up bodies in Hue—hundreds of executed civilians. Have you ever heard of anyone asking who the North Vietnamese General was who’s responsible for the units that pulled that? My Lai’s an atrocity and someone deserves to be racked for it. Hue’s just unfortunate, I guess. We know who was in charge. I keep waiting for one of our unbiased journalists to print it.” He laughed, the same hard sound Taylor heard the first night they met. “I also buy a sweepstakes ticket every year.”