Edge of War - [Red Dragon Rising 02]

by Larry Bond

  Her suspicions and doubts wrapped themselves tighter and tighter as she drove her scooter over to the shop Phai had mentioned to sell the sat phones. Mara didn’t particularly trust Phai, either, even though she knew him from Thailand. She rode around the block twice, making sure she wasn’t followed, then parked in an alley about a block away. Even so, she circled around on foot to make sure there wasn’t an ambush waiting.

  Under other circumstances, Mara might have simply left the sat phones in the city somewhere. But she needed money as well as misdirection.

  The fantasies she’d had as a child about being a spy—she’d grown up on Where in the World Is Carmen Sandiego?, then graduated to old James Bond movies—didn’t involve credit cards or ATM machines. But they turned out to be an agent’s best friend in the real world. When they weren’t working, life was a hell of a lot harder.

  Gold shops were common in the city, combination pawnbrokers and banks as well as jewelers. Like others, the owner of Ha Trung Finest conducted several other businesses on the side concurrently—tourist knickknacks and bottled water were featured in the window, along with hand-woven place mats and a rug.

  He offered her fifty thousand dong apiece for the two phones—a total of roughly six dollars.

  “Be serious,” scolded Mara. She was in no mood to bargain.

  The proprietor pretended to look at the phones again, then upped his offer to two hundred thousand dong.

  “No,” said Mara loudly, this time using English. She turned to leave the store.

  “Wait, wait, lady,” said a woman, rushing from the back room. She spoke in English. “Don’t worry about husband. Eels for brains.”

  Mara showed her the phones impatiently. The woman turned them over, looking at them as if they were pieces of jewelry. She flicked one on.

  “These active,” said the woman.

  “I figured you’d take care of getting new accounts,” said Mara.

  “Without accounts they’re worthless,” said the man in Vietnamese.

  “You just have to reprogram them,” snapped Mara in English. “I know that happens all the time.”

  What actually happened all the time—and what Mara was counting on—was that the phones would be used on the existing accounts until the phone company finally got around to shutting them off. That could be days if not weeks. Of course, stating that explicitly meant acknowledging that the phones were stolen.

  The store owners didn’t just suspect the phones were stolen; they were counting on it. But if Mara said that, they wouldn’t take them.

  The wile looked at her. “Five hundred thousand dong.”

  “One million dong each.”

  Mara pushed the phones into the woman’s hands. The woman tried to give them back. The man behind the counter harangued her for interfering.

  “Eight hundred thousand,” said Mara, speaking Vietnamese. “The account is good.”

  They settled on seven hundred and fifty, with the woman throwing in a sling bag Mara decided she could use for her gun. Once the money changed hands, the man became gracious, insisting on giving Mara a bottle of water. He would have tried selling her the rug if she hadn’t left abruptly.

  ~ * ~

  Mara had expected the trains south to be packed, but the station was almost empty when she arrived. Kerfer, Josh, and the others were huddled at the far end of the large room, camped out around a dozen of the light blue chairs. They’d bought some civilian luggage, and used them to stow their weapons and other gear. The SEALs had even found some new clothes and a doll for Mạ. She held the doll in her arms, rocking it gently and humming to it as she leaned against Josh.

  “I’m assuming you have some sort of plan,” said Kerfer when she arrived. All six of his men—Eric, Little Joe, Stevens, Jenkins, Mancho, and Silvestri—were sprawled nearby.

  “Are the trains still running?” Mara asked.

  “You sent us here without knowing?”

  “They were running this morning,” she said defensively.

  Kerfer made a face. Mara went over to the ticket stand, a small podium-style desk near the door. The clerk assured her that the full schedule of trains was operating. She asked for tickets for Hai Phong— the cheapest trip available—and tried to pay with her credit card. The clerk told her that they were accepting only cash. She tried to use dongs but he would only take dollars, greatly depleting her supply.

  Josh sat on the chair, his head hanging down about midway over his knees. His face looked even whiter than normal, and his eyes were gazing into space. Mạ leaned against him, but he didn’t seem to be paying much attention to her.

  “You with us, Josh?” Mara asked.

  “I’m here.”

  “He’s got some sort of bug,” volunteered Little Joe. “He ain’t pissing too well.”

  Great, thought Mara. She had the images Josh had made of massacre, but Washington wanted Josh and the girl as well. There was no substitute for a firsthand story.

  She put her hand against his forehead. He seemed a little warm. “You take aspirin?” she asked.

  “Eric gave me some. I think it’s something I ate,” he added.

  Hopefully. Otherwise they’d all have it soon.

  “Hang in there,” Mara told him. Shouldering her backpack and sling bag—her folding-stock AK-47 was in the pack, her pistol in the bag—she pointed to the door out to the tracks. “Our train leaves in ten minutes. Let’s go.”

  Mara walked across to the southbound train. It wasn’t the one she had tickets to, but it was the one she wanted. This train traveled along the coast, with stops at Dong Hoi, Hue, and Da Nang, among others, before heading inland to Saigon. It was a sleeper, and ordinarily would have been at least half full with tourists and businesspeople. But it was empty.

  “Hey, they even got TV,” said Little Joe, pointing.

  They spread out in the cars.

  “You gonna give us all tickets?” Kerfer asked.

  “They’re not for this train,” said Mara, handing them out. “What?”

  “They aren’t going to collect them,” said Mara. “We’re not going to be on long anyway.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She shook her head.

  “Listen, I gotta know what’s going on here,” said Kerfer. “I don’t like being on a train to begin with.”

  “Neither do I,” said Mara. “I didn’t have enough cash for the right train. Besides, we’re going to jump out down the line. A friend has arranged to leave some vehicles for us.”

  “You should have said that before.”

  “What difference does it make?”

  “It makes a difference.”

  “Well, that’s what we’re doing. It was a backup plan,” she added. “And now we’re using it. Because I don’t like the fact that the train is so empty. The ones this morning weren’t.”

  Kerfer frowned, then went and gave his men the tickets.

  Two minutes later, the train started out of the station. They still hadn’t seen a conductor.

  ~ * ~

  Josh slumped against the window. His pelvis felt as if it were burning up. He breathed slowly, trying to dissipate the pain.

  He imagined it was something he ate, but had no way of knowing for sure. Maybe it was a urinary infection, but he hadn’t had sex in weeks.

  Three months now, actually. When he and his girlfriend broke up. So that couldn’t be the cause. It must just be something he ate or drank.

  “They have bathrooms on these?” he said, feeling the urge to pee.

  “Up there,” said Mara, pointing.

  The small closet reeked of human waste and ammonia. Josh felt his stomach churning and leaned over to retch. But nothing came out.

  “Let it all out, man,” said Squeaky, who was standing outside. “Just let it go. You’ll feel tons better.”

  “Trying,” muttered Josh, steadying himself against the side of the coach as the train began to pick up speed.

  ~ * ~

  The train ra
n along a highway through the city and immediately south. It chugged along slowly, barely approaching thirty miles an hour. Mara nervously watched the countryside pass by. Knots of Vietnamese troops were parked every quarter mile or so along the road. This was the safest way past the military bunkers where most of the government and army officials had taken shelter to the south, but it took them perversely close to them, as well as to several military installations along the sidings.

  Mara left Josh and Mạ in the seat near the back of the car and went up the aisle to the first row, not expecting a conductor but prepared to deal with one if he showed up. A small bribe would be sufficient to take care of any problem about their destination, especially since they weren’t going to be on the train for very long.

  “So when exactly is it we’re getting off?” said Kerfer, settling down beside her. He leaned forward and rested his arm on the seat back of the row in front of him, leaning toward her.

  “Soon,” she said.

  “That ain’t good enough, kid.”

  “You’re calling me kid now?”

  “I call everybody kid. I figure that’s better than lady, right?”

  “Mara works.”

  Kerfer frowned. She could only guess at his age—late twenties, maybe thirties. He had a rough face that seemed made of unpolished stone. His green civilian shirt and blue jeans made him look more military, not less, even though he was unshaven and his hair edged over his ears.

  “All right. So Mara—what are we doing?”

  “We need to get south of Phú Xuyên,” she told him.

  “Where’s that?”

  “Twenty-one miles south of Hanoi. Things are less tense there. We shouldn’t have to worry about being stopped.”

  “I thought Major Murphy said these guys are on our side now.”

  “I wouldn’t trust them for the time of day.”

  Kerfer frowned again—it seemed to be his basic facial expression— then slowly nodded.

  “What about the little girl?” he asked.

  “Washington says she can come back with us,” said Mara. “That’s what you want, right?”

  “Hey, I don’t care. Better than an orphanage, right?”

  Mạ had a hell of a story to tell, which was the real reason Washington wanted her back. Still, she could live a far better life in the States than she could here. Regardless of the war.

  “When are we getting out?” Kerfer asked.

  “I’ll tell you in plenty of time.”

  Kerfer pushed himself back in the seat, extending his legs to relax. “Girl jumping, too?”

  “She can come with me. We’ll go out uphill. It’s like stepping off an escalator.”

  “I’ve done it before.” He smelled of sweat. “Country’s falling apart?”

  “Not really,” said Mara. “If that was happening, the train would be packed.”

  “People are afraid to take the train because they know the Chinese will bomb it soon,” said Kerfer. “It’s an easy target.”

  “They haven’t bombed it yet,” said Mara.

  “That’s because they figured they would waltz right through. They wanted the train. Now that they’re starting to slow down, they’ll bomb everything in sight. They won’t care about how many they kill. They’ll just lay it all to waste.” He turned to her. “That bother you?”

  “It’s not my job to be bothered by that.”

  Kerfer laughed. “You do a good imitation of being a hard-ass,” he told her. “I’ll give you that.”

  The train started braking. Mara looked out the window. She wasn’t sure where they were, but she knew they couldn’t be much more than halfway there; they hadn’t even passed Phu yet. She got up and walked to the vestibule of the car.

  “Problem?” asked Kerfer, following.

  “We shouldn’t be stopping,” she said, taking a train key from her pocket and opening the door.

  “Nice,” said Kerfer.

  Mara leaned out of the car and saw a contingent of soldiers near the side of the track ahead. They must be the reason the train was stopping.

  It was too late to run for it.

  “Back in the car. Group together,” she told Kerfer. “I do the talking.”

  “They going to ask us for passports?” said Kerfer.

  “Hopefully not.”

  “We got ‘em.” The SEALs had prepared civilian covers for this very contingency. They were a soccer team, in the country for an international goodwill tour.

  “Hold on to them,” said Mara. “The girl is my daughter. I talk. No one else.”

  ~ * ~

  Squeaky banged on the door of the restroom. “Come on, come on,” he said in his high-pitched whisper.

  Josh straightened and took a slow breath. The putrid air of the closet-sized bathroom only made him feel worse. What he needed was fresh air.

  “Josh? Stay in there,” said Mara outside. “You’re all right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “There are soldiers coming onto the car. Stay in the bathroom. Don’t come out unless I tell you.”

  Josh heard her tell Squeaky to stay there as well. He pressed the tap to get some water and wash his hands, but nothing flowed. And then there were Vietnamese voices in the car.

  ~ * ~

  Mara watched the soldiers as they came into the train. They were teenagers, joking about something one of them had done while waiting for the train. The sight of the foreigners silenced them momentarily. They moved into the middle of the car and sat in a clump together, a half dozen of them, all lugging AK-47s and light packs.

  Mara had gone back to sit with Mạ. The little girl was tense, sitting stiffly upright. They were two seats from the end of the rear door, just up from the restroom.

  She wouldn’t have minded the soldiers at all, except for the fact that she had to jump from the train. She wasn’t sure how they were going to react if half a dozen foreigners went off the side.

  The train began moving. Mara pretended to be interested in the scenery.

  Josh was still in the restroom as the train started to move again. Now that the soldiers were in their seats, Mara decided it was time to get him back out. So she went over and put her head to the door. Squeaky blinked at her, trying to puzzle out what she had in mind.

  “Honey, are you okay?” asked Mara. She made her voice just loud enough for the soldiers to hear, guessing that they would know at least a little English.

  “I’m okay,” said Josh.

  “Come out and sit with me,” said Mara, her voice softer.

  Josh immediately opened the door. Squeaky hesitated for a second, then slipped inside as if he’d been waiting.

  “What are we doing?” asked Josh.

  “You can have the window,” said Mara, gently pushing his side.

  He slipped Mạ between them and sat down. A few seconds later, the door at the front of the car opened. Another pair of Vietnamese soldiers entered—a lieutenant and a corporal.

  The lieutenant immediately frowned at the foreigners. “Why are you on this train?” he said to Kerfer, who was sitting alone in the seat closest to the door.

  “Going to Ho Chi Minh City,” said Kerfer. He held his ticket, folded down, in his hand.

  The lieutenant shook his head. “You’re Americans?” His English was good, his accent by now familiar.

  Mara got out of her seat. “We were all here on a visit to Hanoi University,” she told the soldier, walking forward. She switched to Vietnamese. “The government advised us to join the rest of our group in Saigon.”

  “Who?” said the lieutenant, still in English.

  Mara used the first name that came into her head—Phú, claiming he was from the education ministry, which had sponsored their soccer visit. The soldier would have no way of checking, and she calculated that if she seemed sure and exact, he would eventually drop the matter.

  But she calculated wrongly.

  “We will search your bags,” said the lieutenant.

  “Why?” said M
ara, switching to English as well so Kerfer would know what was going on. “Why are you going to search our bags? Do you think we are thieves?”

  “Let me see your passport and visa,” demanded the lieutenant.

  “Okay. Let me get it.”

  Mara turned and walked to the back, even though her passport was in her pocket. Only one of the soldiers was watching; the others were either listening to MP3 players or reading.