Nina’s appraisal, at this point, was not kind.
“We’re in deep shit.” Trin downed the contents of the glass.
Nina turned to Broker. “We trust this guy?”
“We have to. He’s all we’ve got,” said Broker.
“And you told him everything?”
“I left out the dead guys in Wisconsin,” said Broker.
“What dead guys?” asked Trin, swallowing.
“Jimmy shot this one guy Cyrus had tailing us. She got the other one,” said Broker.
“Cyrus knows you’re after him,” Trin said fatally.
“It’s more accurate to say that Cyrus is after us. He knows by now that Tuna told us where it is. He also thinks I’m trying to cash in on his treasure hunt.”
“Aren’t you?” asked Trin.
“The way I see it happening, the Vietnamese government will wind up with most of it. But we deserve a little for our trouble,” said Broker.
“Is there anyone else here with you?” asked Trin.
“Just us,” said Broker.
“And you have come halfway across the world to catch Cyrus LaPorte, a famous American, for looking for buried gold?”
“Look,” said Nina. “I’m here because my dad took the blame for the gold incident. And Jimmy told us there’s evidence on my dad’s remains that proves Cyrus ordered the robbery. I thought you were friends with my father.”
Trin ignored her and paced three steps, turned and paced back. “Cyrus used to be a very thorough man. Assume he had the airport watched. Possibly with the assistance of the Vietnamese police. Assume he knows we’re sitting in this room right now. We must stay in public places until we make a break for the countryside. Cyrus could try anything,” said Trin in nervous rapid-fire delivery.
“Listen to him all of a sudden,” said Nina.
“Please sit down, Miss Pryce,” said Trin in a coiled voice. His face became flat and cold as a stone adder. Nina’s color rose. Broker smiled.
“What’s so funny?” she demanded.
“That’s the warm cuddly Trin I remember,” said Broker.
Trin did not smile. “This discussion may already have cost me whatever future I have. You arrive and in two hours you put my neck on the block. Please sit down, Nina.”
Nina reached in her pocket, pulled out a slip of paper, and extended her hand toward the hotel phone on the table next to the bed. “Sorry, Broker. I’m calling the MIA office to line up a little assistance, U.S. type.”
Trin leaned over in a smooth motion and a slim gravity knife opened in his hand. He swept up the phone cord with the blade and held it captive. “You try to call and I’m out that door. You’ll never see me again.”
“Jesus,” muttered Nina, stepping back.
Trin closed the knife, put it back in his pocket, and smiled, no longer coldly, now a little drunkenly, at Nina. “The MIA office is integrated at every level with the Ministry of Missing Persons. Their phones are tapped. They are not allowed to drive their own vehicles. They are under
“He’s right, Nina,” said Broker. “We can’t trust the army. They screwed you, remember?”
“Like you screwed Cyrus’s wife?” she said sarcastically.
“I did not,” shot back Broker.
“Ah, another complication,” said Trin philosophically. “You two are in love.”
“You’re drunk,” said Nina.
“I drink,” qualified Trin. “I speak English and French fluently. I can read one thousand Chinese characters. When I was twenty-five I commanded a Viet Cong battalion. At twenty-nine I commanded a South Vietnamese regiment. Then I spent five years in a reeducation camp being lectured by morons. In the camp I ate frogs and bugs. All my life I have had this problem of seeing both sides simultaneously. For that, and other reasons, I drink.” He lurched from his chair, grabbed the TV remote, and snapped on the television.
“Now what?” Nina was not happy.
“The BBC world business report will quote the price of gold in New York, Hong Kong, and Zurich. It’s a logical question,” said Trin.
Nina flopped down in one of the chairs and folded her arms across her chest. Broker sat on the bed with his elbows resting heavily on his knees. He felt sealed in the hotel room.
Veiled in air conditioning. Outside he could feel the pressure of three million people, almost all of them poor, most of them touched roughly by war and scarcity. And the only avenue he had into this strange capital and into the countryside beyond was this bitter, and now drunken, man whose thoughts he couldn’t fathom.
And he wondered how many minds in Hanoi were sorting out their anxieties in English at this precise instant. Perhaps a thousand? He struggled to comprehend the alien process going on in the surrounding ocean of Vietnamese minds.
Like what the fuck was Trin thinking right now?
With Nina he had a pretty good idea. He could read her body language, her facial expression; he had some history. He’d even been inside her body. And maybe he
She’s sitting there thinking:
Nina unfolded her arms and got up. “Phil, I want to talk to you alone.” Broker pushed himself up.
“Don’t worry. He didn’t show it to me,” said Trin.
“What?” asked Nina.
“The map. But I have a general idea where the gold is,” said Trin.
“You do?” asked Broker.
“Yeah,” said Trin. He eyed the bottom of his empty glass, rose from his chair in front of the TV and went to the mini-fridge and removed a can of Tiger beer. He popped the top and resumed his seat. His eyes stayed on the muted BBC news report as he lit another cigarette, sipped his beer and said, “The convalescent home is in a deserted area of dunes. Exactly where Jimmy wanted it. The coastline for ten kilometers in every direction is uninhabited. The local people call it the Graveyard of the Iron Elephants. Romantic, isn’t it…
“In 1968-before your time, Phil-the U.S. Air Force had a plan to end what was referred to as the Ho Chi Minh Trail by Water. The North shipped supplies out of Vinh Moc above the DMZ and landed them along the coast below the zone.” Trin broke into laughter.
“What’s this got to do…” Nina interrupted.
Trin pushed himself up and reached over and plucked Broker’s Zippo from the table. He tossed it at Broker and said, with a downward curve to his smile, “Read it again. You may get your wish.”
Nina put out her hand for the lighter, read the inscription, and looked back to Trin. “Iron elephants?” she repeated.
Trin smiled. “When farmers dig up old U.S. mortar rounds in their fields they refer to them as iron potatoes. Elephants imply something grander.” His smile broadened. “Jimmy has played a joke inside his joke.”
For a moment Trin relished the suspense of holding them in thrall.
“You see,” he said, “they carpeted the beaches with two thousand-pound bombs. Hundreds and hundreds of them. They were dropped from very high so they would burrow into the sand and they were set with time delayed fuses so they would go off at random intervals…get it?
“Except they didn’t go off as planned. They’ve been going off at odd times ever since. Everybody left. People avoid the place. Jimmy knew what he was doing.”
Alcohol had turned Trin’s nicotine-colored skin as scarlet as a chili pepper. His scars blanched. He directed this molten face at Nina.
“There are two kinds of Vietnamese. If you go out in the street and hail a cyclo and ask him to take you to the Manila Hotel he will smile and say, yes. Who cares that the Manila Hotel is in the Philippines. He will say yes and take you on a merry ride forever.
“If you call the MIA office and tell your story some smiling Vietnamese will eventually appear and say ‘yes’
