Duty and Dishonor: Author's Preferred Edition

by Dale A. Dye

  But he didn’t do that. What Cleve Emory did was scream at the leadership that he would enlist and fight The Man from inside his own house. He gave voice to a vague notion that had been discussed more than a few times among the more radical SDS members, but there had never been one of them radical or committed enough to volunteer. It was so cool, so fucking radical and outrageous, that he got a standing ovation from the members.

  Emory would likely have forgotten about it or made some credible excuse if SDS members hadn’t talked it up so loudly in his social circles. He was confronted by wild-eyed true believers everywhere he went. All of them thought his plan was brilliant. They made constant comparison between Cleve Emory and Jane Fonda. She went to North Vietnam and posed for photos showing her solidarity with oppressed peoples, but that was just a quick PR thing. What Cleve Emory proposed was heroic, a true demonstration of commitment to the cause that would leave the establishment flustered and choleric, just the kind of demonstration that was needed to change things for the long term. Cleve Emory was a radical hero before he ever really did anything more dramatic than write checks. And there was nothing he could do to save face and demonstrate his commitment other than carry out the audacious plan.

  He did it. Emory enlisted in the Army with his father’s reluctant blessing, as he lied through his teeth about his motivation. He opted for a two-year plan, offered if he volunteered for infantry and went to Vietnam. He endured the training, kept his mouth shut and his eventual goal in mind. If something went wrong, if he got caught, or blocked, or hurt, at least he’d be in the Army, in Vietnam, and then he could declare himself. It would likely mean prison, but he’d still be a hero to the people around the world protesting an immoral, illegal war. On the other hand, if he pulled it off and the Viet Cong won—as he felt sure they would—Cleve Emory would become an instant hero of the worldwide revolution.

  PFC Cleveland Herbert Emory, Jr. was assigned to a service and supply unit at a large base near Saigon. It took him just three months of spreading cash to find the right contacts in the city. And then he made his move. Shortly after that he was thrown in with Theron Clay.

  Images of that brute flashed in his dream. Emory didn’t know where the man was now. Likely he was dead. A man like that was too mean, too bourgeois to live in the new world order.

  CAMP 410

  As she had every morning for the past three weeks, Trinh Thi Thai squatted in the shade of the coconut palms near the well and watched the two hulking black shapes churn through the cloying mud of the rice paddy. The one in front of the plow, the one with horns and a ring in its nose, was a water buffalo. She might be a city girl born and later abandoned on the streets near Ton Son Nhut, but she knew a water buffalo when she saw one.

  What she could not understand was the strange allure of the taller black beast, the one with the horrible scars and hard eyes, who stalked silently behind the water buffalo, all day and every day. The man was a foreigner. He looked like some of the other American GIs Thai remembered from the bar where her mother once worked. Beyond that, she knew nothing.

  She noticed the man shortly after her arrival in camp when Grandmother Ba stationed her by the central well and taught her to operate the crude bamboo pump that sucked fresh water out of the ground. Thai had seen no others like him, not since the Americans all ran away from Vietnam. It was only a few short months after that when an Army patrol caught her stealing rice from a market in Saigon and sent her off to work in the fields.

  Camp 410, at a place called Nam Po on the banks of the Black River, was some 18 kilometers equidistant from the borders with Laos and China. Thai knew nothing about the geography, but she knew that the place was very likely to be her home for all the future time she could imagine. It was not the first camp she’d been in after she was arrested. There was the first one farther to the south where she was often beaten and forced to sleep with rough guards who smelled and grunted. She was just 16 then, or maybe a year younger, back in the early days when she still allowed herself to cry. She didn’t know precisely how old she was and trying to do the figures was pointless. She was here now, and no matter how many years passed since she was born, she’d be here until she was old and haggard like Grandmother Ba.

  The old woman nursed her back to health after she arrived sick and exhausted, feeding her extra rations of rice and hot leek soup. And while she coddled her new charge, Grandmother Ba, crowed and cackled as she told stories of her days as a Viet Cong saboteur, infiltrating the American bases in the south.

  “If you fought so well with the VC,” Thai asked one day, “why were you sent to this camp? It’s terrible here!”

  “I am here because the northerners have big appetites and short memories,” Grandmother Ba sniffed. “When the northerners won, the Viet Cong lost. I knew it would happen. I always said you cannot trust the northerners, but no one would listen.”

  “But I don’t understand. You are Vietnamese, I am Vietnamese, the northerners are Vietnamese…”

  Grandmother Ba spit a stream of betel-nut juice between the stumps of her teeth. “Don’t be stupid, girl. I am Vietnamese but not the right kind of Vietnamese according the northerners. I am like you, Thai, a mongrel dog. My father was Chinese; your father was an American. The new regime has no use for us other than to work the land and keep them fed.”

  Thai realized in that moment that she would never leave the camps. No matter what the cadre said in classes and lectures, she would never be a part of the new Vietnam. She was tainted with what the cadre called monkey blood. She was an ugly reminder of the Americans who killed so many during the war.

  She’d never known her father. The long string of distant relatives who kept her fed and housed while her mother worked the bars shushed her questions. They said all Thai had to do if she wanted to know about her father was look in a mirror. She had tightly curled hair, dusky skin and a broad, flat nose unlike any of the other girls, and that often made her the subject of ridicule. Eventually, when she was old enough to work, they turned her out into the streets.

  One night just before she was arrested, Thai took refuge in an old prostitute’s apartment. Under the sleeping mat, she discovered a photo album stuffed with pictures of American soldiers, posing and posturing, draped over Vietnamese women with gaudy faces and vacant eyes. The Americans all had dark skin, black kinky hair, and broad flat noses. Any one of the smiling black men could have been her father.

  Thai stood and tugged at her conical straw hat, shading her eyes from the glare of noontime sun glinting off the flooded paddies surrounding Camp 410. She noticed that the black man out in the paddy wore no hat. His hair was cropped tightly to a misshapen skull, and his skin was burned a rich ebony color except where welts of scar tissue ran like a nest of snakes across his head and down over his shoulders. She kept her eyes on him as she carefully negotiated a muddy dyke, headed for the place on the other side of the paddy where Grandmother Ba supervised preparation of the first of two meals served each day. Viewed more closely, the man’s big head looked badly damaged, distorted and flattened at the back, which forced his ears to stick out and created a rounded point at the crown.

  Several Vietnamese words for ugly crossed her mind but Thai settled on one that simply meant curious. She stopped in the middle of the dyke and squatted, slyly tipping her hat up away from her face, so the black man would be sure to notice her when he reached the near end of the furrow he was plowing. He passed her and turned behind the wallowing animal but there was no sign that he saw her smile, no sign of life at all in his vacant expression.

  Thai recognized that mask. She’d worn it herself to hide hurt from her tormentors and conceal pain from herself. When you are born different from everyone else, she’d discovered early in life, you learn to hide behind a mask, to keep what the world saw of you as neutral and unthreatening as possible.

  Grandmother Ba was squatting near the cook fire, squawking at the other women working on the noon meal, and puffing cl
ouds of acrid smoke into the air from one of her foul-smelling, handmade cigarettes. Thai caught her eye and then stopped some distance away, waiting for the old woman to approach.

  “You should not leave the well until it is time to eat, daughter. Some of the guards may want their canteens filled.”

  “I filled all the canteens and left them in the shade, Grandmother.”

  Grandmother Ba squatted beside her and clucked when she noticed Thai’s eyes fixed on the man plowing the nearby fields.

  “It is better not to wonder about that one.”

  “But I do wonder, Grandmother. I can’t help that, can I?” Thai inclined her chin in the direction of the man who continued to churn through the paddy like a huge black beetle. “Tell me about him.”

  “There is not much to know.” Grandmother Ba began to roll a slug of raw tobacco into a dried corn husk. “He is a foreign volunteer, an American who fought with the Liberation Front during the war. They say he was almost killed in a bombing raid. He spent many years in hospitals. One of the cadre told me he’s crazy…mean like a tiger, they say.”

  “What else do they say, Grandmother?”

  “Only that he went crazy and killed a guard when they sent him to the camps. No one knows why he still lives. Perhaps they do not just kill him because he is crazy…or because he is an American. I don’t know. The cadre won’t talk about him much and I’m told he does not speak, except for a few words when he wants something.”

  “I think they are afraid of him,” Thai said pointing to the man with the rifle who kept a close watch on the paddy. All the other militia guards remained mostly outside of this agricultural camp but wherever Thai had seen the shambling black man, she’d also seen an armed militiaman trailing at a distance. “He is the only one here who has a guard watching every minute of the day. I feel sorry for him.”

  Grandmother Ba cackled loudly and shook her head at the thought. “As you would pity a pet monkey, I suppose? That one is no longer a man. He is just skin and bone with no brain. See his head? I think there is no room for a brain in there.”

  “I think he is like me.”

  “So? Like you because he is a black one, like your father?” She chuckled and reached for Thai’s breast. “Do you feel for him here, girl?” Thai turned away but Grandmother Ba dropped a hand to grab her crotch. “Or do you feel for him here?”

  In the distance they heard the cadre officer’s whistle. Workers began to straggle toward the cooking fire. Thai watched as the black man continued to mush along behind the water buffalo, heaving on the bow of the plow while his militia guard shouldered his rifle and went to get his meal.

  “I will take him his food, Grandmother.”

  “If you wish to feed dumb animals, I cannot stop you, daughter. Just be careful he does not bite your hand off.”

  Thai beat the crowd to the serving line and ladled a large bowl of vegetable soup and rice. She poured hot, green tea into a bamboo container and then walked toward the paddy where the black man worked. She stood directly in his line of sight, and for just a moment she thought she saw a glimmer of recognition. It was only a flicker, perhaps only a series of rapid blinks, but he knew she was there.

  “I have a meal for you. Stop and eat.”

  His expression remained blank, placid, and uncomprehending like the animal he followed. Surely he knows enough to eat, she thought. People must eat to live no matter how damaged they might be. He was standing still behind the plow now staring at her over the head of the water buffalo and making no attempt to approach. She swallowed a dry lump in her throat and stepped cautiously into the muddy water.

  The black giant lowered his head and glowered at her as she approached holding the bowl and cup out to him. She could see a long ridge of scar tissue on his forehead above a neck that looked as thick as the trunk of a teak tree. She stopped beside the water buffalo and forced herself to smile. The man looked huge at this distance. She could see the jagged scars that glowed pink against his ebony skin. He draped the reins that controlled the buffalo over his neck, and she watched as the knots of muscle on his arms knotted and then relaxed. He was a powerful man.

  She greeted him politely and extended the food again, stepping a cautious few feet closer as they stood calf-deep in the sun-warmed paddy flood. He shrugged and rolled massive shoulders, passing an idle hand over his sweaty face. His mouth sagged open and she could see that he was missing a number of teeth. This man had lived through very hard times. She felt a certain bond with him. They were both damaged and futureless souls.

  And then he moved causing a muddy wave in the paddy. Before she could back away, he was standing near her with his hand extended. She stared up from under her broad straw hat, fearful and shaking the same way she had frozen when she encountered a poisonous snake while harvesting yams. She heard a rumble from somewhere in his throat. If it was a word she didn’t recognize it, but the man was pointing at the soup bowl in her hand.

  “This is vegetable soup,” she said handing over the bowl. “And this is tea.” The black man took the bowl and cup but made no move to get out of the sun or sit somewhere he might enjoy the meal. “You’re welcome,” she said and made a motion toward the shade of a treeline near the paddy. “Come with me. You can eat somewhere out of the heat.”

  As she led the way toward the bank, Thai could feel the pressure of muddy water on the back of her knees. He was following her the same way he followed the water buffalo. When they reached the trees, she climbed out of the paddy and found a shady spot where she unfolded an old scarf and spread it on the ground. She sat nearby and patted the scarf in invitation, but the big man simply set his food on the ground and looked around as if searching for something.

  “Hunh…hunh.” He grunted and she saw his red tongue poke through the gap in his teeth. His dark face contorted, jaw muscles bunching and eyes squinting as if he was experiencing some painful irritation.

  “Hunh…hunh.” He grunted again and reached for the string that held baggy trousers around his waist Thai watched fascinated as the man pulled the knot loose and dropped the muddy trousers to his knees. His penis was huge, veined and swollen like a dark black snake. It twitched once and spat a stream of yellow liquid that splashed loudly into the rice paddy water.

  When the stream stopped in a fit of spurts and dribbles, he reached for his trousers and pulled them back up to his waist. He fumbled with the drawstring while Thai sat watching, waiting for him to try the food she’d brought. She’d seen plenty of penises before, and despite its unusual size, this one didn’t shock her. Nothing much shocked Thai after so long in camps like this one where privacy was practically nonexistent. At least he wasn’t trying to jam that big black snake inside her.

  He climbed out of the paddy, squatted next to her and began to eat, using two fingers to scoop vegetables into his mouth and slurping at the broth. Thai made a decision.

  j

  Grandmother Ba scolded and squawked, warning Thai that it was a terrible idea. It was sure to get them both punished and sent to another camp that would be even worse than this one. Thai explained herself patiently, using phrases that just came to her, saying things from her heart and stumbling on the words.

  “He needs someone. I can tell. I can feel it. He needs the kind of care you gave me when I first came to this camp. And he is like me…alone…different from everyone else. They fear him as they hate me. We are different which makes us the same.”

  Grandmother Ba stuffed her gums with betel nut and stared at the night fire in the center of the women’s communal hut. “No matter, they will not allow it.”

  “I will try it anyway, Grandmother. I will never be allowed to leave this place. You know that and so do I. Why should I not try to make a better life for myself here? Many of the women live with men. They have formed families. I want one also.”

  “But this one you want for family is different.”

  “He is black and I am half-black. I will never ge
t a Vietnamese husband. But this one is like a child. I can take care of him and he will take care of me. We can make a life that is bearable for both of us.”

  “They will just kill both of you.”

  “No, Grandmother. They are afraid of him. You’ve seen that yourself. No one approaches him without a gun. If he accepts me, he will protect me. I know this for certain.”

  “You are about to make a terrible mistake, daughter.”

  “Perhaps…but I would rather take this chance than to go on living as we do now.”

  In the middle of the night, Thai used a candle stub to find her few meager personal belongings. She tied them in her scarf and slipped out of the women’s hut where a pale moon danced through scudding clouds. The monsoon rains would be coming soon. Trinh Thi Thai bathed carefully in the stream, using a scrap of soap that she’d saved, and then made her way around the perimeter of the camp. She passed the pigpens and the melon patch heading for the lone hut that was located at the far north end of the compound. The man she needed lived alone there, guarded and isolated.

  There was no light showing in the small thatched hut as she approached but Thai could make out the form of the militia sentry who strolled casually around it with a rifle slung on his shoulder. When he leaned against a coconut palm near the open door of the hut to light a cigarette, she emerged from the shadows and walked toward him. He stiffened and slid the rifle off his shoulder, but she continued, keeping the wind at her back so he would catch the aroma of the scented soap on her body.

  She was near enough to touch when he finally ordered her to halt. She just smiled and dropped the bundle of her possessions at her feet. She could see the gleam of his teeth when he smiled.

  “What brings you out this night?”

  “I wish to see the one inside there.” Thai flicked a hand toward the open door of the hut.

  “Not allowed,” the guard said slinging his rifle back onto his shoulder. “This area is off-limits to everyone.”