Big Mango (9786167611037)

by Needham, Jake

  “Oh, man,” Winnebago sighed and waved the paper away. “I wish you had put that some other way.”

  “Yeah.” Eddie took the paper back and looked at the picture some more. “Sorry.”

  “So what now, Eddie?”

  “You do what you want. I’m going to crash.”

  “Oh, come on. Let’s at least get some food first, huh?”

  Eddie took another hit on the Tanqueray and felt his resolve begin to weaken.

  “What do you feel like?”

  “Poontang!”

  As Eddie began to laugh, he realized that a sort of giddiness was threatening to engulf both of them, a lightheadedness that might just have been jet lag but he didn’t think so. It was too much like a feeling he remembered clearly from a long time back.

  When he had been in law school, he would sometimes hitchhike down to LA on weekends and sleep in a cheap motel on Hollywood Boulevard. At night, about nine or ten, after napping all day in his room with the drapes closed, he would walk out into the hard, sweet-smelling desert air. He remembered how much he had loved it then, just standing there, doing nothing but breathing deeply in and out, getting a little buzzed on the inexhaustible adventures drifting on the night, wallowing in the limitless possibilities that stretched in front of him.

  He had thought so many times that feeling would never come to him again, but suddenly it had.

  Against all understanding, here in this bewildering place halfway around the earth, that very same feeling was coming back to him again.

  Twelve

  PROMPTLY at noon the following day the suite’s doorbell sounded. It was a chime so discreet that for a moment Eddie couldn’t figure out what it was supposed to be. When he finally worked it out and opened the door, he found a young man of about thirty carrying a leather briefcase and wearing a dark, expensive-looking suit..

  “Mr. Dare?”

  Eddie grunted noncommittally.

  “My name is Geoffrey Morse. May I come in?”

  Eddie waved the young man toward a couch in front of the big windows overlooking the river and then settled into a chair opposite him. Morse’s accent was obviously English, Eddie noticed, as Marinus Rupert’s had been, but he had no idea what significance that might have.

  “Nice suite,” Morse said after a moment. “Wonderful view.”

  “I don’t deserve any credit. You’re paying for it.”

  “Only in a manner of speaking.”

  Morse reached into an inside pocket of his jacket. He produced a business card and was about to hand it to Eddie when Winnebago walked in from the second bedroom. Morse stopped, the card suspended in the air, and looked at Eddie.

  “I wasn’t told you were traveling with anyone, sir.”

  “Until two days ago, I wasn’t told I was traveling at all.”

  Winnebago took an empty chair and Morse played with the business card, rubbing it between his fingers. He was obviously uncomfortable that something unexpected had occurred and wasn’t sure what he should do.

  Everyone just sat and looked at one another for a while, waiting, until Morse finally broke the silence.

  “I’m only following instructions, sir. I had no idea anyone else would be here. I’ve been asked to brief you, and only you, on the situation.”

  That expression had a familiar ring to Eddie. “The situation?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You don’t happen to work for the Secret Service, do you?”

  Morse looked bewildered. “I’m sorry, but I don’t—”

  “Never mind,” Eddie interrupted.

  Eddie leaned back and folded his arms. Morse shifted his weight uncomfortably in the chair and cut his eyes at Winnebago again. He hesitated another moment and then flicked the business card out toward Eddie.

  “I’m an associate in the Bangkok office of Fairfields.”

  Eddie took the business card and examined it.

  When he didn’t say anything, Morse added helpfully, “You have heard of us, haven’t you? We are the largest firm of solicitors in the United Kingdom.”

  “Of course you are.”

  “Then you have heard of us.”

  “No.”

  “I was told you were a lawyer in America.”

  “I am.”

  “You’re a lawyer, but you’ve never—”

  “No. Never.”

  “Ah.”

  Morse let the single syllable hang there in judgment of Eddie’s stature in the world’s legal community. Eddie had never liked English solicitors very much and it was coming back to him exactly why that was.

  “Anyway…” there was something like a shrug in the young man’s voice, “we represent the general.”

  “The general?”

  “Yes, sir. The general.”

  “General who?”

  “I’m sorry, but I can’t talk about that. Anyway, you may not believe me, but I couldn’t tell you even if I was ethically permitted to. I really don’t know.”

  “You’re right,” Eddie said. “I don’t believe you.”

  Morse looked at Eddie and then at Winnebago and they both gazed back silently. He inclined his head slightly toward Winnebago, but spoke to Eddie.

  “I mean no offense to your traveling companion, Mr. Dare, but what I have to tell you is extremely confidential.”

  Eddie just nodded. “No problem. Go ahead.”

  Morse examined Winnebago carefully again, and then returned his eyes to Eddie.

  “As you wish.” He cleared his throat unnecessarily. “The general has asked us to make arrangements to wire the amount of $100,000 immediately to whatever bank you designate.”

  The young man unsnapped his briefcase, extracted a single sheet of paper, and handed it to Eddie.

  “If you would just fill in your account information at the bottom of this transfer instruction, the funds will be sent by the close of business today.”

  Eddie took the piece of paper, but he didn’t look at it.

  “What’s your connection with the man who came to my office?”

  “Who was that?”

  “The name he used was Marinus Rupert.”

  The young solicitor looked genuinely puzzled.

  “Is that a code or something?” His eyes twitched nervously and licked his lips. “I don’t know anyone by that name.”

  “Then let’s get back to who this general is.”

  “I already told you that I can’t talk about that, and even if I could, I don’t know what I would tell you.”

  Morse sounded exasperated and embarrassed at the same time.

  “Look, I was instructed by our Hong Kong office to bring you this wire transfer order to complete.” He gestured at the paper Eddie was holding, still unread. “And I am also to give you a message. That’s all I know about whatever is going on here, and it’s all I want to know.”

  “What’s the message?”

  “The general wishes you to join him for lunch today at the Four Seasons.”

  When Eddie didn’t react, the young man added helpfully, “It’s a hotel.”

  “I know it’s a hotel,” Eddie said. “I’m a lawyer, not an idiot. In America at least, they’re not always the same thing.”

  ***

  THERE was another Mercedes waiting for Eddie when he went downstairs. The driver looked like a local and apparently didn’t speak any English since his only response to Eddie’s greeting was a vague smile. Eddie leaned his head back against the butter-soft leather and closed his eyes as they drove at a stately pace from the Oriental up Silom Road, under the massive Rama IV overpass, and past the parched, dusty space referred to with a remarkable show of local optimism as Lumpini Park.

  A white-uniformed doorman wearing a pith helmet waited at the top of the Four Season’s long, arcing driveway. When the Mercedes glided to a halt, he opened the rear door with a snappy salute and Eddie stepped out. It all happened so smoothly that Eddie didn’t realize until after the car pulled away that no one had told him whe
re in the hotel he was supposed to go.

  He strolled between the two ponds covered with floating lilies, entered the Four Season’s vast lobby, and took a couple of laps around it to see what struck him. He didn’t spot anyone he recognized and no one seemed to be paying the slightest attention to him either, so he sat down in a lounge area and ordered a San Miguel.

  Eddie scanned the crowds that drifted in and out of the lobby and finished his beer without seeing anything remotely interesting. When he thought about it, he wasn’t even sure what he was looking for. He guessed he was half expecting Marinus Rupert to appear suddenly in a puff of smoke, maybe dressed as Beelzebub and wearing a red suit and carrying a pitchfork. When nothing happened and no one appeared at all, let alone Marinus Rupert in a puff of something, he waved down a waiter and ordered another San Mig.

  “Mr. Dare?”

  The soft voice had come from just over Eddie’s shoulder. When he turned, Eddie saw it was the man who had driven him from the Oriental.

  “The general asks if you would please join him in his private dining room. Would you come this way, sir?”

  Eddie left his beer and followed the man through the crowd to an elevator manned by a uniformed attendant who didn’t appear to have anything to do except push the lighted buttons, which he did very competently. The elevator whisked them quietly to the top floor of the hotel and the man led Eddie down a long, teak-paneled hallway past several doors, finally stopping at one, knocking softly, and then swinging it open. He gestured for Eddie to enter.

  The room was not large, but it was opulently appointed. A walnut dining table set with china, crystal, and crisp linen stood in the middle of the carpeted room. Along one wall there were several cushy-looking chairs and two white-jacketed attendants stood in rigid and respectful silence awaiting instructions. The room’s fourth wall was mostly glass and it looked out on a terrace where two large and comfortable chairs flanked a wicker table on which a bar had been arranged.

  The man who in San Francisco had called himself Marinus Rupert was standing alone on the terrace. He was near the railing, watching something through a pair of large field glasses. When he noticed Eddie, he waved him out.

  “Are you a racing man, Mr. Dare?”

  He didn’t offer his hand.

  “No,” Eddie answered, not offering his either.

  “Ah…pity. I love thoroughbred racing more than almost anything.”

  The man gestured toward a large racetrack that was across the street from the hotel. Eddie saw that the grandstand was packed and a mob of Thais was jammed along the white railings that separated the raw concrete of the public areas from the expensively-watered, unnaturally green oval of the grass track. The sound of the crowd drifted up to the terrace through the humid afternoon air and Eddie could see the bright silks of the jockeys as they maneuvered their mounts onto the track for the next race.

  “Anyway…” the man nodded toward the bar. “Drink?”

  “Just a beer, thanks.”

  One of the attendants had followed Eddie outside. He took that as his cue to step forward and fill a tall glass with San Miguel, handing it to Eddie.

  “That’s the real stuff,” Eddie’s host said, “from the Philippines. Not that shit they make in Hong Kong like you were drinking downstairs.”

  Eddie raised his eyebrows at that, but said nothing. Instead, he sipped at his supposedly genuine San Mig and settled himself into one of the big chairs.

  “Calling you Mr. Rupert seems a little awkward,” he said.

  “Why is that?”

  “You’ve already told me that’s not your name.”

  “Just call me general then, if you like.”

  The man returned to studying the track through his glasses.

  “And are you a general?”

  The man lifted his right hand without taking his eyes away from the field glasses and wiggled it in a gesture that could have meant anything.

  “On whose side?”

  The general lowered the glasses and smiled at that.

  “On my side, Eddie.”

  There was a sudden roar from across the street as a race went off and the general lifted the field glasses again to watch it. Eddie stayed where he was and, when the race was over, the general settled into the other chair and looked intently at him.

  “You don’t have much to say.”

  Eddie lifted his right hand and wriggled it in a close approximation of the general’s own gesture.

  The general laughed. “Fair enough, Eddie. Okay, I’m all yours. Ask me anything you like.”

  “I want to know who you are and what this is all about.”

  The general nodded thoughtfully a couple of times and then cleared his throat. “It’s about this: I want you to find out for me what Captain Harry Austin did with the $400,000,000 he smuggled out of Saigon in 1975.”

  “Austin’s dead. I already told you that.”

  “All the more reason why I need your help, Eddie. Harry Austin may indeed be dead but, as they say, he certainly didn’t take it with him.”

  Eddie watched the gray clouds dancing off in the distance and decided that the rains were coming soon as they often did in the afternoons in the tropics.

  “You understand that this is all a little hard to take seriously.”

  “Yes, of course. That’s why I had my solicitors bring you the wire transfer order today. $100,000. Exactly as promised.” The general looked at Eddie and dropped his voice a little. “Isn’t that serious enough for you?”

  “It doesn’t change what I told you in San Francisco. I can’t help you. I don’t know anything about any money and after 1975 I never saw Harry Austin again.”

  “All I ask is that you draw on whatever resources you have to do your usual thorough job of representing a client to the best of your ability, Eddie. No one can ask more of you. I certainly do not.” The general pursed his lips and thought for a moment. “For example, bringing Mr. Jones along on this trip with you shows admirable foresight. I’m sure he’ll be very helpful.”

  “Is there anything you don’t know?”

  “Not a great deal.”

  “Except where Austin stashed the money.”

  “Except that.”

  “If he ever had it.”

  “Oh, he had it. He had it all right. We’re sure of that.”

  “Even though you know Captain Austin’s dead, you still think I can find that money for you?”

  “Absolutely. I don’t think there’s a better man for the job.”

  Eddie mulled that over. He didn’t have the first idea who this guy was, let alone where to start looking for any $400,000,000. And that was assuming Austin ever had it in the first place, which Eddie doubted.

  Then again, what did he really have to lose here? Couldn’t he just walk away any time? Couldn’t he just get on a plane if things got weird, fly back to San Francisco, and forget any of this ever happened?

  Eddie cleared his throat. “I’d have to ask a lot of questions before I agree to anything.”

  “I would certainly think so.” The general stood up abruptly and stepped around Eddie’s chair, holding open the door that led from the terrace back inside to the dining room. “Shall we have lunch?”

  Thirteen

  TO Eddie’s surprise, the general didn’t say another word about Harry Austin, the Bank of Vietnam, or the missing money until after dessert was served and the coffee had been poured.

  As Eddie forked his first strawberry, the driver who had escorted him upstairs slipped quietly back into the dining room and politely ushered the attendants outside. It wasn’t until the door had closed behind the last of them that the general began to talk.

  “Please listen carefully, Eddie. I want to tell you exactly what happened in Saigon in 1975.”

  The general sounded like a man who was hearing his own voice from somewhere else, like it was coming out of a radio.

  “Do you remember those shuttle flights from Tan Son Nhut to U-Tapao Airbase
in Thailand, the ones they were running every few hours right up until Saigon went down the crapper?”

  Eddie nodded and the general went on.

  “You and your squad were on one of those flights two days before you were shifted to guard duty at the embassy. You did escort duty for a shipment of embassy archives. Remember?”

  “Sure,” Eddie said. “When we got to U-Tapao, we turned the whole load over to the Air America guys.”

  “And after that…” the general prompted.

  Eddie tried to remember.

  “I think we went straight back on the next…” Eddie stopped and reached back to a time more than twenty years before. “No, the guys wanted to go to Pattaya and get laid instead of sleeping at the base, but Austin came up with a van somewhere and insisted we all drive to Bangkok.”

  “Go on.”

  “That was about it. We all got pretty much wiped out in Patpong and slept wherever we could find a spot that hadn’t been puked on. Nothing special happened.”

  “I meant the following day.”

  “We went back to U-Tapao the next morning to catch the shuttle to Saigon. Then…” Eddie reached back in his memory again. “We were transported to the embassy and turned around again to ride shotgun on another convoy out to Tan Son Nhut. I think it was the last one before the airport was closed.”

  “Then you went back to the embassy again?”

  “No, Austin sent us…”

  The general’s face relaxed into something that was almost a smile and his eyebrows started to ride up.

  “That was it, wasn’t it?” Eddie said.

  He was beginning to see how this was going to come together.

  “It was that warehouse Austin sent us to after we left Tan Son Nhut. The Operation Voltaire money was there.”

  “I never mentioned the name Operation Voltaire to you.”

  “No, but the Secret Service did. That was it, wasn’t it? That’s when we had the money.”

  The general seemed to think about it for a moment, and then he spoke very softly.

  “Not exactly. There were crates in the basement of that warehouse Austin sent you to, you’re right about that, but the currency and the gold from the Bank of Vietnam wasn’t in them. The crates you were guarding were just decoys.”