since replaced by electronics. Archaic or not, it seemed to work, as Mr. Suhuannaphum demonstrated. At low pressure, diesel oil emerged evenly from each injection jet. Then, with his face registering first surprise and then disapproval, Mr. Suhuannaphum advanced the throttle. He gestured angrily.
Fuel spurted from one jet. The others died away to a trickle.
“Do it again,” Moon said.
Mr. Suhuannaphum stared at him. Moon devised the proper hand signal.
Mr. Suhuannaphum repeated the process. This time he said, “Broke.”
Moon thought about it. He removed four screws, lifted a plate, removed the filter from the only jet that operated properly, blew through it, handed it to Mr. Suhuannaphum, and made washing motions. Mr. Suhuannaphum looked surprised, but he washed it.
With that done, Moon reinstalled the filter and replaced the plate. Simple enough, but would it work?
“Start it,” Moon said, gesturing to Mr. Suhuannaphum. Mr. Suhuannaphum’s expression formed a question.
“Let’s see,” Moon said, trying to think of a way to explain to this Thai why the old injection systems worked in this perverse way, increasing the pressure when the filter was dirty and thus starving the jets whose filters were clean. He didn’t understand it himself.
“Just start it.” he said.
It started, but it had started before. The question was whether the tendency to cut out with acceleration had been solved. Now it thumped with slow regularity, like a healthy heartbeat.
Moon had an eye on his watch, giving it a little time to warm. And thinking that if he had fixed it, and he probably had, he had once again cut his own throat. The condemned electrician repairing the electric chair. Moon Mathias, jack-of-all-trades, fixing the engine that would take him into the hands of the Khmer Rouge, who beat people like him to death with sticks.
It was a little after three A.M. and Mr. Suhuannaphum was looking at him anxiously, awaiting instructions.
“Okay,” Moon said, “go for it. Give it the gas. Vrooom, vrooom, vrooom.” He leaned back against the rail, fighting an urgent need to throw up.
The old Euclid diesel went vrooooooom, vrooooooom. Mr. Suhuannaphum eased off the throttle, clapped his hands, and produced a joyful shout. Captain Teele emerged from the darkness, grinning broadly. “Yes!” he said.
“Well, hell,” Moon said. “Nothing to stop us now, I guess. Here we go to meet the boogeymen.”
And with that, Moon Mathias leaned over the rail and became thoroughly sick.
SAIGON, South Vietnam, April 26 (Havas)- Some of the many signs of panic and desperation in South Vietnam:
Saigon drugstores are sold out of sleeping pills and other medications useful for suicides.
An American economic aid worker is offered $10,000 to marry the pregnant wife of a Vietnamese co-worker so she can qualify for escape.
Deserting ARVN paratroopers seize a transport plane, force the passengers off and fly away.
The Fifteenth Day to, Alas, the Eighteenth Day
IT WAS EMBARRASSING. He remembered that part of it clearly enough. But much of the rest was either hazy or mixed with the confusing dreams that high fever provokes.
He recalled sitting on the deck after the heaving of his stomach finally wrenched to a stop. He recalled trembling with a chill, and the voice of Mr. Tung saying something in his oddly accented English about this seasickness, this mal de mer as Mr. Tung called it, being unusually premature, and laughing at his joke. And then he remembered the angry voice of Mr. Lee, speaking in a language that might have been Tagalog or Chinese or almost anything but English.
They took him belowdecks then, Captain Teele helping him down a narrow ladder. He’d sprawled on a bunk. And there was Osa van Winjgaarden leaning over him, asking what he thought was the matter, asking about pain, about what might be causing this, and he’d said something like it must have been something he’d eaten, and she had said, “I hope so.”
She’d stood over him, he remembered that clearly, frowning at him, holding the back of her hand against his forehead, taking his wrist and checking his pulse, looking worried.
“You are practicing medicine without a license,” Moon had said. The fever was back, and Osa’s hand felt cold on his skin. “If I have to throw up anymore, I’ll call my lawyer and have him file a malpractice-”
But he didn’t finish. Didn’t feel like trying to be funny. Felt, in fact, like closing his eyes and leaving all this behind. And so he had.
And now it was-what? Three days later? And almost sundown, so that would make it three and a half days.
“Well, it’s Wednesday,” Osa said. “And we left Puerto Princesa Sunday morning. So, yes. Three days you’ve been sick.”
Moon had just eaten a bowl of soup made of rice and something else-probably some sort of fish. It was very thin and warm and delicious. It sat uneasily in his stomach. But it was going to be all right, he could tell that. In fact, he could use another bowl.
“Good soup,” he said. “Excellent soup.”
“You should wait a little while,” Osa said. “Until we see what happens with your digestion.”
He was sitting on a roll of canvas, leaning back on a burlap sack full of something heavy-maybe rice. A bank of dark clouds closed off the horizon to the left, but the sky above was clear and the setting sun felt wonderful. Climbing up the ladder had left Moon feeling weak. But his head no longer ached. His stomach seemed to be dealing handsomely with the soup. No more nausea. A fresh breeze blew across his face and hummed through the rigging above him. The sea was dark blue, and Moon felt absolutely wonderful. I am actually going to find Ricky’s kid. I’m actually going to walk into the room and hand this child to Victoria Mathias and say, Well, Mother, here she is. Here’s your granddaughter. And then- He exhaled a huge sigh.
Osa was leaning against the railing, frowning at him. “You’re all right?”
“I’m fine,” he said. “Hungry. I feel like you should be telling me what I’ve been missing. First, where are we?”
“Well,” Osa said, “we’re on the
“You did, I guess. But a lot of it-” He tapped his forehead with a finger. “You know. It’s all confused. I remember hearing people talking about the Filipino minesweeper. Rice, I think it was, and Mr. Lee. And I seem to remember the minesweeper didn’t chase us. And you told me the North Viets were almost at Saigon. Or maybe I dreamed that. And something about an air base being bombed.” He shrugged.
“I think I told you the airport had been shelled and no airplanes were landing. And the Vietnamese had put in a new president but the Communists wouldn’t negotiate with him.”
“I hoped maybe the good guys would have won while I was asleep,” Moon said. “Nothing good seems to happen for our side out here while I’m awake.”
“I think it’s even worse since you got sick. The Communists are winning everywhere.”
“Maybe that will solve a problem for us,” he said. “I mean, no more war. Peace. Maybe your brother will be safe now.”
Osa didn’t react to this. She was staring out toward the setting sun.
“Well,” he said, “who knows? Why not?”
“Mr. Teele said the Khmer Rouge radio didn’t sound very peaceful. He said they announced they had executed
