Thai Horse

and, as he turned sideways, he tripped over the gunwale and lunged backward into the river.

An instant later Porter felt a stabbing pain as a cold sliver of steel invaded him, slicing deep into the small of his back. He turned and was face to face with the young Chinese. The youth’s arm arced again, but Porter spun away and the knife slashed his side. Behind him, Split-eye rose out of the river. His hands wrapped around the gunwale of the hang yao and he pulled himself out of the water with one lunge, stepped into the boat and grabbed his stiletto off the deck.

Porter was too busy to feel o1 hear anything. He slammed an enormous fist into the young Chinese’s face, felt his nose shatter, heard his muffled cry of pain. He brought his knee up sharply into the man’s groin, and the assailant jackknifed and fell on his knees. Behind him, Split-eye very deliberately and with no particular haste stuck the point of his dagger in the base of Porter’s neck, severed the nerve to his brain and paralyzed him.

Porter turned, stricken, and stared blankly at Split-eye, his arms dropped to his sides and dangled uselessly there. Split-eye struck again, bringing the dagger up in a short, hard arc, and burying it to the hilt Porter’s side. The big man felt very little. He was aware that something was inside him, aware that it was coursing upward deep into his chest. Then his heart collapsed his eyes rolled up. Split-eye pulled the knife out and slammed into the big American, knocking him sideways 1-to the river.

Pot heard the commotion, felt the hang yao begin to rock, heard a woman scream, then another. He was struck suddenly with fear, like an electric .bock flashing through every nerve. He jumped up, scrambled for his pants, then heard a tremendous splash. He crawled on his hands and knees and peered out of the thatched room in time to see the young Chinese stab Porter, watched in horror as Split-eye rose out of the river, attacked the big man and knocked him over the side. Sp1itee turned toward Wol Pot, his good eye glittering with evil

Pot was struck with terror. He twisted, rolled over the side of the hang yao in his shorts, and dropped into the black water.

Onshore, the shock of the brief, violent drama was wearing off, but there was still a great deal of shouting. Split-eye knew the Thai had escaped him again. He grabbed his young partner by the shirt front, shoved him into the hang yao he had commandeered, and turned back to the young whore. He shoved her into the seclusion of the thatched cabin and held the point of the blade to her throat.

‘Where does he live?’ his voice hissed.

She shook her head but was too frightened to speak.

‘Where do I find Thai Horse?’ he demanded.

‘Who?’ she stammered.

The assassin could tell she knew nothing.

‘Speak to the police and I will come back and carve your face until you look like a grandmother,’ he said and, jumping into the hang yao, raced off into the darkness.

HOOCHGIRL

Hatcher was watching from the observation room as the Navy fighters streaked like silver dragonflies over the Pacific Ocean and landed at the MAS. An F-16 banked sharply into its final approach, caught the morning sun on its gleaming surface for an instant, then leveled off, its wheels dropping and locking in place a few seconds before the big fighter’s tires screeched on the runway.

The bullet-shaped plane glided smoothly to its hard- stand and stopped, and the pilot emerged from the cockpit. He was a diminutive man, tiny in every way — short, skinny and small-boned — who seemed dwarfed by the helmet, the parachute harness, the Mae West, even his crew chief, who loomed over him like a giant. The pilot came down the ladder and spoke with the chief for a few minutes, then walked around the perimeter of the fighter, pointing here and there. Quite a difference from Cody’s other wingman, Hugh Fraser, whom Hatcher had interviewed the night before in Seattle. The pilot seemed to make up for his size with kinetic bursts of energy while the chief strolled along behind him, taking half as many steps, looking bored and nodding constant agreement with whatever the pilot was telling him.

Hatcher knew it would be another ten or fifteen minutes before the flier was through with the post-flight check. He left a message with the officer in charge of the flight line and walked a block down the neatly mowed and trimmed Street to the Officers’ Club. Inside, he stood at the doorway to the club room. He had been in this room once before, eighteen years ago. As far as he could remember, it had not changed a bit. Even the tables appeared to be in the same place. The oak-paneled room gleamed and smelled of lemon polish and floor wax. The walls were lined with photographs of men who had served there and gone on to other places: fresh, clean-cut, neatly trimmed, eager young men in dress whites, smiling innocently for eternity. The Navy never changed. Part of the allure of the service was a sense of security in knowing that even the furniture polish was a tradition. For Hatcher there was sadness in this room, which in a few hours would come alive with the ring of raised glasses .and toasts and songs to the glory of the corps.

He walked around the empty dance floor, his shoes making hollow clacking sounds on the hardwood floors. It was ironic that the ghost of Murph Cody had brought him back to this place, to this very room where a friendship that had endured hardship and mockery, good times and bad, and had been bonded by promises of loyalty and respect had ended so rudely. In this very room Cody had terminated that comradeship as finally as a bullet to the heart terminates life.

Hatcher had come to the party filled with anticipation and excitement. He had not seen Murph since his friend’s marriage almost a year earlier. He arrived expecting a rowdy reunion.

Instead, he was humiliated and disgraced by the unpredictable Cody in a manner that in other times would have called for a gloved slap across the face and satisfaction with a choice of weapons at dawn. Hatcher would never forget the cold sneer, the harshness of the words, spoken loud enough to stop every conversation in the room. Cody had handed Hatcher a glass of champagne, and holding it up in what was to become a mock toast, he said, ‘Here’s to a maggot who is still a maggot. Here’s to a maggot who was fed and clothed and housed by the service and taught by her and who now has turned his back on her. Here’s to a maggot I once called friend who’s running out because there’s a war on. Here’s to a coward .‘ And had poured his glass of wine on the bar and turned and walked away. Pledged to the secrecy of the Shadow Brigade, Hatcher had no response. Every eye in the room had followed Cody out the door.

A harsh memory for a room where heroes normally frolicked.