Reyes had spent six months in those jungles, helping the Hmong trade their opium, bringing them back weapons and showing them how to use them. That was back in 1962, before the war in Vietnam really got under way. He hated the jungle, that gloomy netherworld of shadows and silence. He had always wondered back then what he would do if the NVA caught him, knowing no one would ever come for him because officially he wasn’t even there.
Poor bastard.
By the time he reached Tu Do, the Chinese and Indian merchants were bringing down the steel shutters against the heat of the day. Even the siclo drivers had taken refuge under the trees, dozing in the front of their pedicabs.
When Reyes reached the Caravelle he stalled for a while in the air conditioned lobby, letting the sweat dry under his shirt, rehearsing what he was going to say: He’s dead, princess. I’m sorry. I saw the photographs myself.
He made his decision and caught the elevator to the fifth floor.
When she opened the door and saw the look on his face he knew he didn’t have to say anything. “He’s dead, isn’t he?”
She turned and walked back into the room. He followed.
She sat down on the bed and cried. He put his arms around her and she turned her face up to his. Before he knew it he was kissing her, her cheeks were wet and then she had his face in her hands and was pushing him back on the bed.
Chapter 22
He supported her weight, one hand on either side of her on the bed, tried to resist her. If he was going to leave he’d better do it now. Her mouth was on his, her tongue forcing his lips apart, darting into his mouth. He groaned and fell on top of her.
“I love you,” he said. He slid a hand around her waist. She was wearing Je Reviens, and instantly it took him back to that very first night at his house on Mulholland. She squeezed herself against him so hard it took his breath away. He kissed her neck, the curve of her shoulder, ripped open her blouse and pulled down the cup of her bra. He took her hard brown nipple in his mouth.
She gasped.
Everything he had dreamed of these last seven years.
“No,” he said and pulled away.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
“He’s not dead, princess.” He rolled away from her. He lay on his back, hating himself, but liking himself, too.
“What do you mean?”
“He’s missing. He went into the jungles north of Sam Thong and got captured by the Pathet Lao. That’s the local equivalent of the Viet Cong.”
They lay there, side by side, staring at the ceiling. Her hand reached out, her fingers entwined with his. “What are we going to do?” she said.
“Not this.”
The overhead fan creaked in the silence.
“You tasted so good, Reyes. I’ve been longing to kiss you since I saw you that first morning at the Continental.”
Reyes raised himself on one elbow. “This maybe isn’t the best time to talk about that.”
“No, I guess not,” she said, and tried to button her blouse but most of the buttons were gone. She slipped a hand inside her bra and pulled it up again.
“So what now? Will the Embassy try and get him back?”
“They’ll make all the right noises but no one wants him back, princess. They’ll all be perfectly happy for the communists to shoot him and get him out of their hair.”
“Perhaps these...what did you call them?”
“Pathet Lao.”
“...perhaps they’ll let him go.”
“Perhaps.”
“You don’t think so?”
“I think they’ll hold on to him while they still think he’s useful, when they find out he’s not they’ll kill him. It’s the practical thing and these guys are nothing if not practical.”
“What should I do?”
“You report it to the Embassy, they’ll go through all the proper channels and then after a week or so they’ll tell you there’s not much they can do and they’ll be right.”
“So how will I ever know if he’s dead or alive?”
“You won’t, I guess.”
She picked up a glass of water beside the bed and threw it at the wall. “What the fuck was he thinking?”
“I don’t know. I’m no shrink but it’s like he had a death wish, and unlike other wishes it’s a damn easy one to make come true.”
“I tried to stop him, Reyes.”
“Some men just don’t know when they’re beat. If it was me, and Angel had me beat up like that, I think maybe it’s what I would have done, too.”
He heard a car down in the street, perhaps one of the open-topped Cadillacs the American engineers rode round town, the radio turned up full volume. “Suspicious Minds.” They must have been snarled in the traffic; he heard nearly the whole damn song, now he’d never get it out of his head.
“Caught in a trap, can’t walk out.” Damn right.
“What are we going to do?” she said.
He pulled her towards him. “What do you want to do?”
“I want to be together. I know I’ll go to hell for saying this, but there’s a part of me that hoped he wouldn’t come back. I did everything to stop him, but when he was gone, I thought, well that’s it, he’s made his choice. Now I’m free to make mine. I knew he wasn’t coming back.”
“It’s not as easy as that, princess.”
“Why not? This time we can make it work, I know we can.” She leaned on one elbow and looked into his face. She frowned. “You don’t want to?”
“Yes, I want to.”
“What is it then?”
“Connor.”
“You said there was no hope, you said no one will ever find him.”
“That’s not quite true. I said no one would go looking. It’s too difficult and it’s too dangerous. It would need to be someone who knows how to speak the local language, who perhaps has connections up there and knows a certain amount of jungle craft. They would also need a great deal of motivation, because it would be high risk and little chance of a result. It’s a real long shot.”
“You’re talking like a spook.”
“Well, I was one, I guess, for many years. That’s why I think I could perhaps find your husband.”
“Tell me you’re not serious.”
“I wish I wasn’t.”
He got up and went to the minibar and came back with an armful of miniatures. He wouldn’t meet her eyes.
“So what’s your plan, Reyes? You’re going to walk into the jungle and not come out again, just like Connor. We’ve wasted all these years and now you’re just going to throw everything away on a lost cause and leave me with nothing?”
“I didn’t say it was a lost cause. I said it was a long shot.”
“I won’t let you do this.”
“You can’t stop me from doing it, princess, it’s my call.”
She slapped him as hard as she could. “You’ve just told me you loved me! It is not just your call!”
“What do you want, then? You want to live with knowing that you abandoned him?”
“I didn’t abandon him! It was his choice to go!”
“And it’s my choice to bring him back!”
“Why?”
“Because I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t. I know about Laos, I have contacts there.”
“So that was where you were all those years ago, those six months you went away when we were in Los Angeles.”
“I thought you’d already figured that out.”
“What were you doing there?”
“I was shipping hard rice, bringing back opium.”
“Hard rice?”
He mimicked a machine gun.
“You ran drugs and guns?”
“Back then opium was just another form of currency. Most of it went to the opium dens in Saigon; the trade’s been going on for centuries. The government had a big cut, it costs a lot of money to fight communists, and Congress sure as hell wasn’t going to vote for it in the budget. The opium bought the g
uns for the local tribes people to fight the Pathet Lao.”
“And they’re still doing it. That’s what was getting Connor so worked up?”
“It’s going to be a big story when it breaks.”
“And you think you can go back there and get him out of this fix when you haven’t been back for seven years?”
“I’ve got a better chance than anyone.”
“What if he’s already dead?”
“But what if he isn’t, what if he walks in here right now?”
“Then I’ll leave him. I have to. You know it’s you, it’s always been you!”
“It’s the same for me, princess. But look, this is the way it has to play: if he’s alive, then I’ll bring him back here and I’ll get the next plane out of Saigon. If you leave him, then it has to be your decision. You have to break clean. You get single again, then you come and find me. If he’s dead, then I’ll find out and I’ll bring him back, if I can, so he can have a decent burial and not just rot somewhere in the jungle. That’s the deal.”
She ran into the bathroom and got in the shower and turned the cold tap on full. She gasped at the shock of the water but it felt good. Besides, she didn’t want him to hear her cry. She knew he was right; she just didn’t want to admit it.
They had been so close to finally having everything they’d ever wanted. So close.
Chapter 23
She came out wrapped in a towel. He was standing on the balcony smoking a cheroot. She went out and stood behind him.
“It’s a funny thing,” she murmured. “I knew when I married Connor that if anything ever happened to him I’d be okay. I never felt that way with you. I knew if I got really close to you and something happened, I’d be lost for the rest of my life. That’s why I did what I did. I guess I sabotaged us. You scared me, Reyes.”
“And now?”
“You still scare me, but I’m braver now. I can stand it whatever happens.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “You really think you can find him?”
“Maybe. I have to try; I don’t want his ghost following us for the rest of our lives.”
“You believe in ghosts?”
“Not in the daylight.”
“The thing is, he really loves me. This is so unfair, I’m such a bitch.”
“You can change your mind if you want. If he comes back.”
“I won’t change my mind.”
He turned around and she kissed him.
“You think we can do this?”
“I just spent the last seven years regretting you; I’m not walking out on this a second time. You know there’ll never be another woman for me. Not now. But there’s still Connor. You have to work this out for yourself, this is between you and him.”
“I know.” She kissed him again. “When do you have to go?”
“There’s not really much time to lose, princess.”
“Just give me one more hour,” she whispered. “Just in case this is the last time there is.” And she pulled him inside and drew the curtains.
She murmured “wait” but he couldn’t wait. He had waited forever. He tore off the towel and threw her onto the bed.
She pulled down his linen pants, couldn’t get them over his boots and gave up. He felt her calves tighten around his back, pressing him into her. Her eyes widened as he entered her, she didn’t take her eyes off his; their faces were so close it was like looking into the bottom of the ocean.
He could not get deep enough inside her. Could not. He felt her nails rake his back as she was saying: I want you, I want you over and over. He licked at the salty hollow between her breasts, wanted to inhale her, devour her.
He bit her shoulder, bit her neck and she told him to bite her harder, harder. He couldn’t hear everything she was saying, perhaps she was talking to him, perhaps she was talking to herself, telling him what to do, telling him she loved him, telling him she hated him, telling him she has missed him, missed him so much.
They fell off the bed onto the carpet, knocked over the bedside table and the lamp and the telephone with it, dragged the bedcovers onto the floor on top of them. “I should never have let you go,” he said.
She rolled him over onto his back, knelt over him holding his face in her hands and grinding against him. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t stop. He tried to grip her hips but she was so slippery with sweat he couldn’t do it, and she was moving so fast and so urgently he couldn’t control what was happening. He arched his back against her and couldn’t hold back any longer.
She kept grinding against him, and when she came she screamed so loud he thought someone would call the police. It sounded like he was murdering her.
She clung to him, sobbing, and he licked the tears off her face and told her again that he loved her and that everything was going to be all right. She collapsed on top of him, and they both lay there, stunned, trying to get their breath. Finally she rolled off him onto her back, her long brown body gleaming with sweat. She took his hand and put it on her breast. He pulled her closer so her head lay on his shoulder and he licked the sweat off her forehead and kissed her. She brushed back the stringy curls from his forehead and gave him a slow, uncertain smile. “Welcome back, lover,” she whispered.
Chapter 24
MAGDALENA
The first flush of pleasure was immediately smothered by the guilt. The look on his face scared me. I hoped he might smile, but he looked just as tormented as I felt.
I didn’t want to think this might be our last time together. I wished Reyes didn’t have to play by his rules, but then if he didn’t, I supposed I would never have fallen in love with him.
“I really thought I’d never see you again,” I whispered. “It just seemed impossible.”
“Did you know I was in Saigon?”
“I rang my agent a couple of years ago. You remember Ted? He told me you were here.” I put my arms around him. “I can’t lose you again now I’ve finally got you back. Can’t someone else go?”
“Who’d be crazy enough to do it?”
“If they ambushed him, won’t they do the same to you?”
“Yeah, but I can talk their language. I’ll negotiate, I’m good at that.”
“Are you going to offer them money? Connor doesn’t have much. We could sell the apartment in New York.”
“I have to find him alive first and I’m not counting on it.”
I wrapped my leg over his thigh, I would have kept him prisoner in my room forever if I could. “Before he left, Connor told me that everyone believes in something. Afterwards I racked my brains trying to think what it was that I believed in and I couldn’t think of anything. When I was a little girl I used to believe that my handsome prince would come along and sweep me off my feet, and when I left Havana I dreamed that I would be famous and rich and no one would ever look down on me ever again. But since that time on the island it’s like I’ve been sleepwalking through my life. I stopped believing in anything.”
“What about now?”
“I believe in you and me. I believe that somehow we’ll get away from all this, away from wars and away from men like Angel and just find peace. That’s what I dream about.”
“You’d be bored in five minutes.”
“No, not this time. I know what I want now. What about you, Reyes?”
“I guess that’s my dream, too.”
“So you’d better make sure you come back, then.”
“I promise.”
He laughed, a little too easily. I knew what he was thinking, and I was thinking the same thing. This could be our last time together. It was as if life had just brought us back together again to make sure I knew exactly what I was missing when it was snatched away again forever.
Chapter 25
REYES
Vientiane was a hot sleepy town nestled among the oar-blade palms on the wide and muddy banks of the Mekong River. It was still mostly rural, the people lived in thatch and bamboo huts built on stilts, with chickens and black
pigs fussing around underneath. Pirogues with high swept prows glided up and down the brown river as they had done for hundreds of years. It was one hour and a million light years from Saigon, a most unlikely staging post for an international drug trade and a proxy war between the world’s great superpowers.
But the ugly blights of the modern century were catching up. Two storey brick buildings were mushrooming in the centre of the town, wreathed in bamboo scaffolding, challenging the upswept golden eaves of the temples and the blazing flamboyants for domination of the skyline. American two-tone cars with big fins scythed between the oxcarts and water buffaloes, orange-robed bonzes with begging bowls walked hatchet-faced past cheap girlie bars where Air America pilots in Hawaiian shirts went for a whisky or a blow job, or sometimes both, sometimes at the same time.
It was a comic opera kingdom, the ‘Land of a Million Elephants’. Most Americans would never be able to find it on a map.
Reyes dropped off his bags at the Setthya Palace Hotel and made his way to the Purple Porpoise. It was only just afternoon and it was still quiet when he walked in; the ambassador of a large South American country was asleep in a rattan chair, snoring, the Lao Presse covering his face; two guys in aviator sunglasses and baseball caps sat in another corner, blearily playing poker and smoking marijuana. There was a bottle of White Horse whisky on the table between them, and two straws. Reyes noted their gold identity bracelets--they were Air America pilots.
The barkeep’s name was Monty Banks, an Australian who sounded like Prince Philip when he was sober. He was leaning on the bar in his shirtsleeves, sipping a pink gin.
“I’m looking for James Brandt,” Reyes said to him.
“James Brandt?” He pronounced it ‘Brarnt.’
“You mean Buzz?” He looked at his watch. “He’ll be here in ten minutes. Chum of his?”
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