by Don Winslow
All that money, the crime lord thought. While the Cholon criminals were usually afraid to defy the Binh Xuyen by committing robbery on its turf, this amount of money could provoke a rash action. Someone might be willing to risk his life and the lives of his family for such a fortune.
“That won’t be necessary,” Nicholai answered.
“I suggest,” Bay said, “that you allow me to put your chips in the safe. I will arrange an armed escort to the bank for you in the morning.”
“That’s very kind of you,” Nicholai said. “And I accept.”
Haverford approached Nicholai and whispered, “That was stupid and dangerous.”
“I agree.”
“Tomorrow at the Sporting Bar. Five o’clock.”
“Very well.”
There was a bustle in the main room as Bao Dai prepared to leave. The emperor looked back at Nicholai, waved his hand, and waited for his guard to form.
Solange looked over his shoulder at Nicholai.
“Where shall we go now?” De Lhandes asked.
“To the Parc à Buffles,” Nicholai said, loudly enough for Solange to hear.
She turned away.
Momma, the brothel’s madam — alerted to this Guibert’s new wealth — was waiting for him.
“Monsieur Guibert, bienvenue,” she warbled, her chins quivering with the effort. “Felicitations on your triumph! Your pleasure is my pleasure.”
“Thank you.” My pleasure is your profit, he thought, but never mind.
“But this establishment is not for a man of your distinction,” Momma said, “you must accompany me to the back, which is reserved for our special guests.”
Nicholai could almost feel De Lhandes’s envy. “I assume my friends will be equally welcome, madame.”
“Of course,” Momma said, broadening her smile to encompass De Lhandes. “Any friends of Monsieur’s …”
They followed her out through a courtyard, past armed Binh Xuyen guards who kept an eye on a long line of soldiers waiting patiently for the less exclusive services. The brothel was a model of assimilation and Nicholai observed the diverse nature of French forces in Vietnam — paratroopers from the Métropole, Foreign Legion troopers from all over Europe, lanky Senegalese soldiers, and squat Vietnamese.
Momma led them into a separate building, ornately decorated in colonial fin de siècle. Nicholai found it grotesque and tasteless when compared to the spare elegance of Japanese geisha houses.
The House of Mirrors was an establishment so exclusive that only the very rich knew of its existence or could afford the quality of its services. Like the finest of French restaurants, if you had to ask the price, you had no place there.
Momma rang a small handbell and quickly a platoon of girls formed behind her in rank and file, a choice for every taste and predilection. Most of the women were Asians in tight, brightly colored cheong-sams or white satin ao dais, but a few European women wearing peignoirs stood literally head and shoulders above them. One had blonde shoulder-length hair and heavy breasts, barely concealed under the filmy nightgown.
The madam noticed that Nicholai’s eyes rested on her.
“That is Marie,” she whispered. “Belgian — like the French … but dirtier.”
Nicholai selected a Chinese woman instead. Her black, flowered cheong-sam was buttoned to her neck, her black hair pulled into a tight bun.
“Ling Ling will please you,” Momma said.
“I have no doubt,” Nicholai answered. “And please put my friend’s selections on my bill.”
“You are a good friend.”
“I am a man reborn,” De Lhandes said, scanning the line of women with the eye of a starving gourmand examining the menu at a four-star Parisian restaurant. He was in a torture of indecision, torn between a zaftig Slav from Belgrade and a Japanese who looked as if she’d been chiseled from alabaster. “One doesn’t wish to be perceived as a glutton, Michel, but …”
“I don’t mind spending Bao Dai’s money,” Nicholai answered. “Have both.”
“By the priapism of a pope, Michel!”
Ling Ling — although Nicholai knew that “Pretty Pretty” was obviously not her name — took Nicholai by the hand and led him to her chamber. He didn’t violate her privacy by asking her for her real name. The pseudonym was a small way of keeping what little she had left of herself for herself.
“Should I undress or would you prefer to undress me?” she asked.
“You can undress,” Nicholai answered. He was not deluded about the nature of this relationship. He didn’t wish the pretense of romance or seduction. This was a simple business transaction.
She unbuttoned her cheong-sam and hung it up in the small closet. Nicholai undressed, she hung up his clothes as well, and she then took him in her hand and went to her knees in a gesture of foreplay that Nicholai knew was a subtle health inspection. Satisfied, she pulled him down onto the bed. Nicholai was pleased that her body was thin and spare, what the Chinese describe as a “lean horse,” more a Zen garden than the lush, generous hothouse that was Solange.
Is she in bed with Bao Dai now? he wondered. Is she pulling the puppet’s strings, making him dance to her charms?
Nicholai was surprised at this flash of sexual jealousy. It was so … Western. Unpragmatic and foolish. He turned his attention back to the very lovely naked woman on the bed, looking at him expectantly.
“Let down your hair, please,” he said.
She reached behind her head and pulled out a cloisonné pin. Her black hair fell shimmering around her shoulders. Relieved that they could converse in Chinese, she was frank about ascertaining his other preferences.
“Would you like to begin with the Middle Way,” she asked, “then perhaps finish by Fetching the Fire from the Far Side of the Mountain?”
“Neither, actually,” Nicholai said.
“You do not find me attractive?”
“I find you very attractive,” Nicholai said. “But it is so delightful to hear your beautiful Chinese that I would find it most pleasurable to spend our time in conversation.”
She looked at him curiously, but chattered away. He made polite listening sounds and the occasional brief contribution to the conversation, but his thoughts were elsewhere.
Your rudeness to Bao Dai was stupid, he told himself, your anger at Solange unfair. Deliberately making an enemy of the country’s ruler was just courting danger, and as for your attitude toward Solange — did you want to drive her into another man’s arms?
You’ll be lucky if she ever wants to see you again.
He waited in the foyer for De Lhandes to return from his buffet. In a little while, the dwarf came rocking down the hallway on rubbery legs.
“Damn generous of you, Michel,” De Lhandes said, “to a fault, if I might say so, but if the indulgence of even recently made friends is a vice of yours, then I say hurrah for vice in all its variegated forms and twisted permutations, speaking of which —”
“You’re an information broker?” Nicholai interrupted.
“Yes,” De Lhandes said. “Do you have information you wish brokered?”
“I wish to obtain some.”
“And a generous discount for you, my friend,” De Lhandes said. “About whom, may I ask, which indeed I may, should, and must, in fact, if I am to be of service to you.”
On the taxi ride back to Saigon, Nicholai told De Lhandes what he needed.
“Your luck holds,” De Lhandes responded. “By my happily exhausted but cruelly abused male member, your luck holds.”
Let’s hope so, Nicholai thought.
120
SOLANGE PRETENDED that she was lying on the beach at Frontignan and Bao Dai was a small wave that kept washing over her.
The wave — finally — broke.
She waited for a politely appropriate spell of postcoital intimacy and mutual praise, then rolled over for a cigarette.
“He seemed quite interested in you,” Bao Dai said, getting up for a smoke of his own
and a glass of scotch. “A drink?”
“Thank you, no. Who did?”
Bao Dai smiled indulgently. “Please, my darling, trust me when I say that I’ve had more than my fill of games tonight. We both know that I’m referring to your handsome fellow countryman.”
“That Guibert?”
“That Guibert.”
Solange got out of bed, slipped into a white silk robe, and cinched the belt around her waist. Then she sat on the Louis XIV loveseat and looked over at him. “Men do find me attractive. Am I meant to apologize for that?”
“Only if the attraction is mutual,” Bao Dai answered. “Was it?”
Solange shrugged. “You said yourself that he is a handsome man. The world is full of them. I suppose you could have me blinded …”
“You’re being glib.”
“What else should I be,” she asked, “when you’re being silly? I’m with you, darling, not with him. I’m a little hurt — I thought you noticed.”
He walked over and put his arms around her neck.
She hated his touch.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “Perhaps it’s that he took so much from me tonight. I was worried that maybe he took you as well.”
“Oh, now you are being silly,” she answered, turning her neck to kiss his fingers. “Vous me faites briller.”
Later he went into his private study, picked up the phone, and ordered, “Kill him.”
121
NICHOLAI LAY ON HIS BACK on his bed and forced Solange out of his mind.
Focusing instead on creating a mental go-kang, he reviewed the state of play as it stood at the moment.
My position, he decided, is strong but ephemerally so. I have sufficient funds to launch and sustain my next moves, but what should those moves be? The possession of Voroshenin’s papers is promising but the promises must be fulfilled — a tricky prospect.
Nor can I rely on Haverford’s promise of a new passport. It could just as easily be a setup for another termination attempt, and in any case would still leave a trail that the CIA could follow. Then there are the papers I am due from the Viet Minh, but do I want them and the Chinese to also have a way to track me?
In either case, I would still be in my perpetual peripatetic prison.
But let them both think I need their passports.
Or that we do.
Solange had been so difficult to read. She would have made a superb Go player — maybe she will, he thought, if she decides to come with me and we manage it. But she had looked indifferent, icy, and angry in turn — furious, in fact, when I took the money from Bao Dai.
Was it an act? The theatrical skills of a first-class courtesan on display, or is she really with Bao Dai and through with me? Certainly she gave me not the slightest sign otherwise, but then again, given the situation, she had to be circumspect. Or was I the one exposed to the “theatrical skills of a first-class courtesan”?
His doubts surprisingly painful, he moved on to scan the position of the white stones that still surrounded him.
They were many and they were in motion.
Start with Haverford and the Americans. Despite his protestations to the contrary, it is still most likely that he intended me to be killed in Beijing and was surprised and dismayed that I survived. Now that I’ve openly surfaced in Saigon we’re both pretending, at least, to be friends and allies.
But will the Americans make another attempt?
If so, which Americans? It is most likely that Diamond was responsible for the attempt back in the rock garden in Tokyo (which seemed like another lifetime). Would he now make another attempt in Saigon, with or without Haverford’s assent?
Then there are the French, doubtless edgy at the thought of a stranger getting near their opium-smuggling operation. They will be suspicious, perhaps lethally so, and if the army isn’t moved to act, the civil authorities might be, considering that a mess will soon land on their desks as soon as it is discovered in Moscow and Beijing that Michel Guibert is alive in Saigon.
And what about L’Union Corse? The opium trade is the wellspring of their wealth, from which they draw to purchase their hotels, clubs, and restaurants. While they appear to be cooperative, soliciting as is their nature their “cut of the action,” “Corsican” is virtually synonymous with “treacherous.”
On the topic of treachery, he thought, can you really trust Bay Vien, a man who has switched sides before and doubtless will again? Will his albeit temporary alliance with Bao Dai cause him to betray you as well?
And, if so, to whom? Bao Dai is the obvious choice, but it is well to keep in mind that Bay, after all, is Chinese, although many generations removed from the homeland. But Cholon is Chinese, surely swarming with Beijing-controlled operatives, even if Bay himself isn’t one of them.
Beijing will certainly be coming for me.
As will Moscow. Even if Leotov has not already lost his nerve and contacted them, they will soon find out — if they haven’t already — that Voroshenin’s killer is in Saigon. The KGB certainly can’t be seen to let that go unavenged. They will be coming. If not here, then somewhere else, and they will be relentless.
“Michel Guibert” needs to disappear, and quickly.
Hopefully, he thought, Solange Picard will disappear with him.
But it all depends on what happens tomorrow.
With delicious irony, my future depends on Yuri Voroshenin.
He put the imaginary board away and went to sleep.
122
MICHEL GUIBERT WAS the talk of Rue Catinat.
Even the waiters at breakfast treated him with an increased deference, and Nicholai saw the staff and other guests subtly point to him and whisper.
He found his new status amusing.
So did De Lhandes. He arrived in the dining room looking remarkably fresh from the previous night’s excesses, sat down at Nicholai’s table, and sniffed disapprovingly at the fare.
“But, my friend,” he huffed, “this is shit, especially for a man of your taste and wealth. These Corsicans wouldn’t know cuisine if it crept up their anal cavities and warbled Piaf tunes. Look, they can even make a debacle of breakfast. Would you like a real croissant?”
“I suppose.”
“Come on then.”
De Lhandes led him outside and down to the corner of Rue Catinat and Le Loi to a place called La Pagode, where the outdoor café stubbornly refused to adorn itself with anti-grenade netting.
“The owners act as if there is no war,” De Lhandes said. “They consider putting up such vulgarities as the edge of a slippery slope. This, my nouveau riche friend, is how quality is preserved.”
Over café au lait, croissant — which were, Nicholai had to admit, delicious — and apricot preserves, De Lhandes slipped him an envelope. “Exactly what you requested.”
“And what do I —”
De Lhandes waved a small, dismissive hand. “On the house, my friend.”
“I can’t —”
“You can and shall,” De Lhandes said curtly. “Am I not allowed to return a gift in my own way, with what means I have at hand, by the ancient bells of St. Germain? I would have cited Notre Dame, but you’ll understand that I’m a bit sensitive about the Quasimodo association.”
“Thank you,” Nicholai said.
“You’re welcome.”
Nicholai was impressed that De Lhandes never asked why he wanted the contents of the envelope or what he intended to do with them.
It has been a long time, he thought, since I’ve had a friend.
Later that morning, Bay Vien personally picked Nicholai up to deposit his winnings in the bank. They rode in his personal car, armored, and escorted by machine-gun-wielding guards.
“You are a difficult friend,” Bay said on the drive.
“How so?”
“You embarrassed the emperor,” Bay said. “In his city, in front of his woman.”
My woman, Nicholai thought. But he said, “You helped me.”
“Everyone sa
w how you looked at her,” Bay said. “For that alone, not to mention the money, he could kill you.”
“More likely he would ask you to do it.”
“True.”
“And would you?”
Bay said, “I’d feel badly about it — you’re a good guy, for a colon, and you have balls. But don’t kid yourself, Michel — guys like you come and go, I will have to live with Bao Dai for a long time. So if he asks me to get rid of you …”
He didn’t need to finish the sentence.
“I would understand,” Nicholai said.
“Leave Saigon,” Bay said. “Get your money and get out. Tomorrow. Today if you can.”
“I have business here.”
“The rocket launchers?” Bay asked. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten your offer to procure more of them. But do it from Laos. You don’t need to be in Saigon.”
“I have other business here.”
“What kind of business?”
“My business,” Nicholai said.
“Please tell me you are not going after this woman,” Bay said. “I have a dozen blonde Frenchwomen —”
“As I said,” Nicholai snapped. “It’s my business.”
Bay regarded him for a long moment. “Do it quickly, xiao. Do it quickly and get the hell out, before I have to do something that I really don’t want to do.”
They arrived at the Banque de l’Indochine. The Binh Xuyen guards escorted Nicholai and his cash inside.
123
HE MET WITH THE BANKER, a colon in his mid-fifties, in a private office.
“I wish access to my safety deposit box, please,” Nicholai said.
Laval had heard of this Guibert. All of Saigon had. He said, “I’m sorry, monsieur, but I wasn’t aware that you had a safety deposit box with us.”
“I do,” Nicholai answered. “In the name of Yuri Voroshenin.”
He slid Voroshenin’s passport across the desk. Laval glanced at it and then looked back at Nicholai. “I am informed that Monsieur Voroshenin recently passed away.”
“As you can see,” Nicholai said, “you were apparently misinformed.”