“No, you’ve got that right…except for the stray villager or hunter, we’re not going to run into anyone up this far,” said Charly.
“And Vanquish is arriving at seven?” asked Mac.
“He’s never on time. I’ve waited for well over an hour at times, but he always shows up and—anyway—I can track him on my GPS.”
“Does he know that watch he’s wearing contains a GPS?”
“No, and don’t tell him either. He never takes the watch off. It was supposedly a gift from his son. I told you the story, didn’t I?”
“Yes, you did. This is a great op you put together, Charly. A real professional job. You should get a medal for this one.”
“Speaking of medals, Harry MacMurphy, tell me how you got your Intelligence Star. I’ve heard lots of rumors, but no one seems to know the full story. No one I’ve talked to anyway.”
Mac and Culler looked at one another and laughed. “Yeah,” said Culler. “He got the medal, the same day he got fired.”
“Yeah, I heard that too. I also heard you followed him out the door, Culler.”
“Indeed I did.”
“Well, I want to hear the story, the whole story. I also heard you are richer than God. Is that true also?”
Mac laughed. “Now that last part, that’s real classified. Only a small handful of people know about that. Where did you hear that?”
“You know how it is in the clandestine service. We’re a small, incestuous group of professional intelligence officers. It’s our business to know stuff. Now, how can you do something important enough to deserve a medal, get fired for it, and end up with a bundle of money?”
“It’s a long story.”
“Don’t give me that crap. I’ve got plenty of time. Tell me what happened.”
“I will, but not now. I think you just drove past that trail you were looking for.”
Chapter Seventy-Three
Charly hit the brakes, cussed, and backed the Land Cruiser down the narrow road to the entrance of the trail. Once on the trail, she concentrated on her driving.
The trail was narrow and overgrown. Trees along the way scratched the bottom and sides of the vehicle. She drove cautiously until they reached a small meadow. The grass in the clearing was covered in dew, and a light morning mist rolled over it. She pulled out into the clearing, turned the heavy Land Cruiser around and headed it back into the trail. There she parked it for a quick and easy departure.
“Now we wait for Vanquish,” she said. “He’ll be coming from over there, on the other side of the meadow.” She indicated a spot about fifty meters ahead where the trail continued north. “His village is a couple of miles northeast of us.”
Culler glanced at his watch. “You timed this well, Charly. It’s exactly nine minutes to seven.”
“Well, I’ve done this a few times before. I keep trying to get him to vary our meeting locations and times, but he’s very stubborn. He feels safe here and it fits in with his morning routine. His morning rides are a passion for him, and he rarely misses a day.”
“Where is he now?” asked Mac.
She pulled her GPS out of her bag and turned it on. They looked over her shoulder as she zeroed in on their location and then expanded the map to show an area ten kilometers around them. The pulsating blip emanating from Vanquish’s stainless steel Rolex appeared about two kilometers away.
“There he is and here we are. He’s on his way. His village is over here, in this clearing. Ban Hin Taek is in this direction about fifteen kilometers from us in this valley.” She expanded the map further so they could see. “He’ll be here in about fifteen minutes.”
“You want me to get the assault rifles out of the back seat for some extra security?” asked Culler.
“Sure, if you like. But I can assure you, we’re safe here. We weren’t followed. The only way they could find us is if Vanquish is compromised, and I’d bet my life on him.”
Mac looked at her and then down the trail. “You already have, Charly.”
Chapter Seventy-Four
Vanquish rode out of the morning mist from the north end of the trail, sitting tall and stern in the saddle aboard a large palomino mare. He wore colorful native Hmong dress with bright blue Chinese style baggy trousers and a gray wool vest with silver buttons.
His only concession to modern civilization was the broad-brimmed, black cowboy hat he wore. The hat’s crown was decorated with a chain of native silver ornaments. He wore it pushed back on his head away from his tanned face. His skin resembled overcooked meat, but his penetrating grey eyes, surrounded by deep wrinkles from years of squinting into the sun, showed wisdom. He was of indeterminate age—maybe sixty, maybe eighty. He rode like he was joined with the horse.
When he spotted the two farangs standing by the Land Cruiser next to Charly, he jerked the reigns as if considering whether to flee, charge or stand firm. Charly waved him over with broad gestures of her arm, indicating everything was alright.
Vanquish trotted across the clearing toward them but remained sitting erect in the saddle after he reigned in the mare. As his aloof and penetrating stare fixed on the two farangs, Charly approached and reached her hand up to him. His pale eyes darted from one farang to the other in a suspicious, disapproving way.
“Don’t worry,” she said, taking his hand in both of hers, “these men are my friends and colleagues. I won’t introduce you because none of you need to know each other’s name. They have heard of your exploits with Bill Lair and Tony Po.”
Culler and Mac approached and reached up to shake hands with Vanquish, who remained on his horse. “You know Bill and Tony?” he asked. When he reached down to shake hands with them, the saddle squeaked and the scent of leather enveloped him.
Mac said, “I met Bill Lair once many years ago when I was in training, and I met Tony Po up in Udorn shortly before he died. It was in the mid-90’s. I was assigned there.”
Vanquish looked down and asked, “How many fingers did Tony Po have on his right hand?”
Mac smiled knowingly. “Three. His middle and ring fingers were blown off while he was screwing around with explosives. He used to order four beers with his two outside fingers sticking up in the air like this.” He held up his hand with pinky and index fingers extended.
Vanquish laughed, breaking the tension and showing yellow stained but straight teeth. “That is Tony.” He swung down from the saddle and stood facing Mac, who was surprised at his shortness. “He was a quite a character. Crazy, daring and indestructible. The Japanese on Iwo Jima tried to kill him, and the North Koreans tried at the Chosen Reservoir, and then the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong and Pathet Lao could not kill him in Southeast Asia, but all those beers and many gallons of Mekong whisky…that finally did him in.”
Mac shook his head and laughed. “You’re right, he was a legendary figure. He lived one hell of a life. And when he died he had a liver like a hockey puck.”
“So you guys are SKY?”
Mac considered his response carefully. He knew that SKY was the cryptonym used by the Lao Resistance, including the Hmong, to refer to the CIA. Rather than go into details of their present situation, he figured it was best just to agree with the man. “Yes, we are. We are all colleagues. We are all SKY.”
“Good, then we can get started.” He wrapped the horse’s reigns loosely over the rearview mirror of the Land Cruiser and turned to Charly. “Do you have the map?”
She unfolded a 1:50000 map of Northern Thailand and laid it out on the hood of the vehicle. Vanquish put on an old pair of yellowed reading glasses and set his gnarled index finger on the map.
“You know all of this Charly, but I will repeat it for the new guys. The opium is assembled in various movable refineries around here, here and here.” He indicated areas along the border north of Mae Sai at Wan Ping, Tachilek and Wan Lom in Burma, proud to display his knowledge to his newfound SKY compatriots.
“There it is cooked in large pots and filtered through burlap bags and
turned into a thick, dark paste. The places where the cooking is done are moved around on an almost daily basis to avoid detection by the CIA’s surveillance planes. After the initial refining is done, the paste is dried in the sun and turned into something like putty. The places where the drying occurs are changed regularly as well.”
Mac asked, “Do you have anything to do with that part of the operation?”
“No, all of that takes place in the hills near where the opium is collected from the farmers. There are others who bring the opium putty by donkey down to the warehouse in Mae Sai. That is where the next stage of the refining is done. It is very close to Ban Hin Taek.
“They cook it again in large drums and add lime to the solution. That turns it into a brown sludge which is scooped out and reheated and then they add ammonium chloride. After that it is filtered again and dried into a coffee-colored powder morphine base.”
Culler said, “But the bricks we saw were white, not coffee colored.”
“Yes, you are right. There is another step in the process. It is a bit more complicated and done at the warehouse with more sophisticated equipment, not in the movable jungle refineries. I do not know exactly how it is done. But I know they dissolve the morphine base in acid and then add charcoal and heat it again before filtering it through fine cloth several times until they have a fine, white powder. The powder is then pressed into one kilogram bricks. That is what you saw.”
“And that’s the end of it? That’s pure heroin?” asked Culler.
Vanquish smiled. “No, not at all. The final refining process is much more complicated. It takes real chemists for that part.”
Charly explained. “He takes over after the bricks are pressed at the Mae Sai warehouse. It’s his job to get the bricks from Mae Sai down to the Mae Chan warehouse. The bricks are loaded onto donkeys, and he guides them down by caravan through the jungle. That’s his job.”
“And we never use the exact same route twice. We stay off the trails and meander down through the jungle until we reach our destination.” He drew his ten fingers down the map from Mai Sai to Mai Chan to show the many possible routes he would take.
“Okay,” said Charly to Mac and Culler. “That’s your background briefing. Now let’s get down to new business. We can’t keep him here all day. It’s best to keep our meetings as short as possible.”
Chapter Seventy-Five
Charly spent the next ten minutes debriefing Vanquish on the route he had taken on his most recent trip and the number of heroin bricks he transported.
His caravan was made up of eight donkeys carrying forty kilograms each for a total of 320 kilograms of heroin. He had been accompanied by two other men on horseback, all carrying AK-47 assault rifles and sidearms. He had hugged the Burmese border all the way to Wan La-ba, then cut almost due south through the jungle to Salong Noi before turning southeast to Mae Chan.
The trip took almost five days down to Mae Chan and two days back to Mae Sai, direct and empty. It was uneventful, hot, mosquito-infested, boring work.
When Charly was finished, she asked, “What about your next trip down?”
“We have another load going down the day after tomorrow: eight donkeys with about forty bricks each, the same team of three on horseback.”
“Our colleagues would like to examine the shipment. Can that be arranged?”
He looked suspiciously at Culler and Mac. “How close?”
“Pretty close,” she replied quietly.
Mac said, “We need to get close enough to take samples of the heroin. Scrapings.”
The old man rubbed the stubble on his chin with a gnarled hand. “How much time will you need to take your…scrapings?” He emphasized the word scrapings.
Mac replied, “Ten, fifteen minutes at the most. Can you arrange that?”
Vanquish studied the map. “You will have to do it at night, when I am on guard duty and the other two are asleep. It will be risky. If you are detected we will have to kill you. Is this really necessary?”
Mac nodded his head. “It’s extremely important. We won’t take long and will do it silently. We’ll just have to work out some signals between us. Give us a time and an exact location, as well as some sort of signal, and we’ll be in and out without disturbing anyone.”
Vanquish looked over at Mac and then Culler and then Charly. Finally he spoke. “I can give you an exact location on our first night out. There is one spot by a stream where we like to camp. After that it is hard to tell where we will be.”
“Show me,” said Mac.
“Here,” he pointed to the map and tapped his finger on a location, “about two kilometers east of Wan Hsenta-na on the Burmese side of the border. This stream runs north and south. See where it bends like a horseshoe here? That is where we will camp on our first night out, on the inside of the bend of the stream—right here.”
Mac jotted down the coordinates. “How will we know everything is clear and the others are asleep?” Charly and Culler were silently attentive.
“We will have a small campfire on the bank of the stream here, on the south end of the clearing. That is where my two companions will be sleeping. We will corral the donkeys and horses on the north side of this horseshoe. The donkey packs with the heroin bricks will be stacked here, in the middle.”
“That’s awfully close,” said Charly.
“Yes, very close. The area in the horseshoe is not large. It is our job to guard each shipment with our lives. That is why it is never far from us. Whoever is on guard, in this case me, will be sitting on top of the packs while the others sleep. You must be very careful not to disturb the animals or the other two guards. If you do, you will wake everyone.”
Culler and Charly looked at Mac, who was deep in thought. “What’s the best route for us to take in?” he said.
“You can drive to Wan La-baon the Thai side of the border. Then you must walk north across the border for about one kilometer and then turn west for about four or five kilometers. The jungle is not too dense in that area, so you can make pretty good time on foot. I would suggest you circle around our campsite to the north and enter from the west. That way you will not come splashing across the stream right next to us.”
The three of them smiled. “Good advice,” said Mac. “What time?”
“I will volunteer for the midnight-to-four shift. No one wants that shift, so I will be sure to get it. I will also bring a bottle of Mekong whiskey with me for the boys. They should be out by the time you arrive.”
“What’s the best time for them to get there?” asked Charly.
“Between three and four, say three-thirty, after they have been asleep for awhile. They will sleep soundly, especially with their bellies full of Mekong. The horses and donkeys will be your biggest problem, but they know me, so when you get there I can try to comfort them while you do your…scraping.”
“Okay,” said Mac. “How will you signal us that all is clear?”
“I will be sitting on top of the packs with my rifle across my lap. As soon as I see you, I will take off my hat and wipe the inside of sweatband. Like this. Then, when I think it is okay for you to come in, I will put my hat back on, get up, sling my rifle, and walk over to the corral, leaving the packs unattended.
“If I do not move off of the packs, you must stay out of sight. If I go anywhere other than the corral, you must stay out of sight.”
“Understood,” said Mac. The others nodded in agreement. “We’ll see you in two days, at oh-three-thirty.”
Chapter Seventy-Six
Khun Ut climbed out of the pool at his mountain retreat in Ban Hin Taek and limped toward a row of lounges. Two bikini clad, darkly tanned Thai women met him with towels and patted him dry before he plopped himself awkwardly on one of the lounges and lifted his stiff, mangled leg onto the lounge using both hands.
He had just completed his regular morning swim and was feeling invigorated. Now he was ready to get down to business.
Reaching for his cell phone, h
e pressed the speed dial. “Come over to the lodge, Ung Chea, and bring Paiboon with you. Now that Paiboon has inherited the responsibility for security at the warehouse, we should include him in our discussions. I am by the pool. It is a beautiful day. We will have breakfast at poolside before it gets too hot.”
Pointing to a barefoot waiter dressed in starched white shorts and shirt, Khun Ut ordered him to set a table in the shade for breakfast for three. Thirty minutes later Paiboon and Ung Chea were escorted to the table by another servant. They bowed deeply and exchanged wais with Khun Ut before sitting at the table. The waiter shook open starched napkins and placed them on their laps.
Paiboon was decidedly uncomfortable in such opulent surroundings. It was his first visit to Khun Ut’s mountain villa.
Khun Ut, still dressed in a bathing suit with a towel tossed over his shoulders, toasted the two men with a tall glass of iced green tea.
“Welcome to my home, gentlemen, and congratulations to you, Paiboon, on your well deserved promotion. Ung Chea holds you in high esteem, and therefore I do as well. I am sure you will do very well in your new position.”
Paiboon blushed and gave Khun Ut a deep wai. “Thank you, sir, for your confidence. Khrap khun ma khrap.”
Ung Chea was amused at Paiboon’s discomfort.
When the waiter departed, Khun Ut asked, “What is the status of the surveillance on the CIA woman?”
Ung Chea pushed back from the table and turned to face Khun Ut.
“Well, um, let me start from the beginning. We, the police actually, found the police cruiser two days ago behind an abandoned charcoal factory in San Sai. That is a little town just east of Chiang Mai.
“I spoke with one of our police contacts from the district, and he told me that a villager had seen a large white SUV drive up and park behind the factory where the police cruiser was found. They suspect that the SUV picked up the two farangs there, where they left the cruiser, and took them away. The SUV headed in the direction of Chiang Mai.”
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