subdirectories appeared, followed by two questions: ‘Subdirect or subject,’ permitting him either to enter directly into a specific file or to search for one under general subject matter.
The sergeant smiled. Now the detective work began.
For the next three hours, Flitcraft typed in questions, seeking the answers Sloan had requested at 3 A.M. that morning. He checked under North Vietnam, POW camps, temporary camps, unverifie1 reports, individual air sightings, reports from POW debriefings. Flitcraft was an expert at digging out obscure information.
When he was finished, Flitcraft had a list of temporary holding camps, none of which seemed to fit the description Sloan had provided, and several cross-referenced POWs. He had narrowed the list several times through cross- referencing.
But four returning prisoners had reported they had been held in what appeared to be the same temporary camp at different times between 1969 and 1972. The camp’s commandant was identified as ‘Thysung,’ ‘Taisung’ and ‘T’sung,’ all close enough to be the same man.
The locations, which Flitcraft pinpointed on a map, were all close to the Laotian border and generally within fifty miles of one another, although the exact location was hardly accurate. None of the four POWs had stayed in the camp for more than a few weeks. There was also a report from a B-52 crew that had sighted what it believed to be a POW camp in the same area. And another report of a recon flight over the location two weeks later that reported the camp no longer existed.
Significantly, however, all four of the POWs had reported that there were half a dozen men who were prisoners in the camp when they arrived, and were still there when they left. One stated he ‘had heard there was a VIP being held in the camp,’ and another had reported a rumor that at least one of the permanent prisoners was ‘collaborating with Charlie.’
Flitcraft ran a check on the four POWs. One was deceased, one was in a mental institution, the other two had been discharged. He traced them down and got current addresses and phone numbers.
For various reasons, none of the information was considered credible or significant by the Army. That was understandable, since the reports were isolated and not verifiable, and since the locations seemed to be those of temporary holding camps. But the four locations and the B-52 sighting were all on the Laotian side of the mountain range called the Chaine Annimitique, and all mentioned the village of Muang, which was six hundred miles north of Saigon.
Flitcraft also checked out Murphy Cody. As far as the computer was concerned, Cody was dead.
Flitcraft answered on the first ring.
‘This is Hatcher, N3146021,’ he said. ‘Do you need a voice print?’
‘You’re clear, sir,’ Flitcraft answered.
‘Did you turn up anything?’
Flitcraft rather proudly told Hatcher that his information indicated that the ghost camp did exist on the Laotian side of the Chaine Annimitique near the village of Muang. Four debriefed prisoners had stayed in it for various periods between 1971 and 1973, the longest for five weeks. And the four had reported the name of the commandant or warden, variously, as ‘Thysung,’ ‘Taisung’ and ‘T’sung,’ all close enough to imply that it was the same man. The locations, too, indicated it was the moving camp Schwartz had called Huie-kui.
Flitcraft had also phoned an ex-Hanoi POW who had known a man who was in the camp at one time. ‘He had the impression there were several prisoners being held there on some kind of permanent basis,’ Flitcraft said.
‘Any mention of Murphy Cody?’ asked Hatcher. ‘No, sir,’ said Flitcraft. ‘The name never came up.’ ‘Did any of the reports mention that a VIP was being held in the camp?’
‘Yes, sir. But the closest to anything specific was that there were several prisoners who were segregated from the rest of the group. Like maybe they were permanent party, something like that.’
‘Any reason why?’
‘I could only reach this one subject,’ said Flitcraft. ‘He said they might have been collaborators, but he was guessing. Besides, what would the percentage in that be? One prison camp is as bad as the next.’
Flitcraft had a point, although the possibility of collaboration certainly was not out of the question.
‘I wonder why the MIA commission never followed through on these reports?’ Hatcher wondered out loud.
‘I pieced this together from a bunch of scattered reports,’ said Flitcraft. ‘There were a lot of these transient camps, and nothing to pin them down. After the war, they just vanished.’
‘Thanks,’ he told Flitcraft. ‘You tumble on anything else, feed it to the colonel in Bangkok. I may be hard to reach for a couple of days.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Nice job, Sergeant.’
‘Thank you, sir. Good luck.’
Hatcher cradled the phone. It wasn’t much, he thought. But it was enough to make the upriver trip a necessity.
Someone up there would have dealt with the Huie-kui or at least have heard about it. And now he had a name — or three names.
He told Cohen the news.
‘Someone upriver had dealings with this camp,’ said Hatcher, ‘and I’m going to find them.’
‘Well,
‘Hell, China, the Ts’e K’am Men Ti knew your sympathies were with America. They did business with the Chinese, the Vietcong, the GIs in Saigon, the Khmer Rouge, but they wouldn’t talk about it with a
