“I do,” Leaphorn said. “It happened in a different way to some of us. We were hauled away to boarding schools.
But I’d like to know when you finally got reconnected with Mr. Delos?”
“That was later. My mother died and I got put in a refugee camp. Mr. Delos found me there and started paying me a fee to get him information on anyone in the camp who was—” Tommy paused, trying to decide how to explain. “People who were what he called ‘Cong-connected.’
I did that, and then, it was the next summer I think, he came and got me and took me Saigon. I worked for him there. We stayed at a big hotel and he went to work down at the U.S. embassy until the North Vietnamese came in, and the helicopters came in and the Americans got on them and went home. I told him I could find my way back to Klin Vat. I would help rebuild our village and get back with my relatives in the Vang family. Not a good idea, Mr.
Delos said to me.”
Tommy held up an open hand to demonstrate how Mr. Delos had made his case.
“In the first place, Mr. Delos said, he had done some THE SHAPE SHIFTER
175
checking and he had learned that between the Pathet Lao and the North Vietnamese army getting their revenge, there didn’t seem to be any Hmong people left from that village.” With that Tommy pulled down one of his fingers.
“In the second place, there wasn’t anything left of the village.” A second finger came down. “It had been hit with that napalm again. And in the third place, Mr. Delos said there didn’t seem to be anyone left in that part of our mountains. He thought the Vangs, and the Chengs, and the Thaos must have all scattered elsewhere to escape the Pathet Lao and the Vietcong.”
Tommy Vang closed his hand, looked down at it. Expression sad.
“But you still want to go back?”
Tommy Vang turned in the seat, and stared at Leaphorn, his expression incredulous. “Of course. Of course. I am all alone here. Alone. Nobody at all here.
And there, I know I could find some of my people. Not many maybe. But there would be somebody there. I think so. I am pretty sure of that.”
He turned away, stared out the side window, silent.
Then he raised his hands, a gesture that encompassed all he was seeing. The dusty wind, the desiccated landscape of high country desert with winter coming on. “It is cold here,” said Vang, talking to the glass. “And there is the green, the warmth, the ferns, the moss, the high grasses, and the waving bamboo. There is the sense of everything being alive. Here all I see is dead. Dead rock, cliffs with snow on them. And the sand.”
A tumbleweed bounced off the windshield. “And that,” Tommy added. “Those damned weeds that are nothing but brittle stems and sharp stickers.” 176
TONY HILLERMAN
“So you’re going back?” Leaphorn said. “You’re planning that? Have you made your plans? Arranged it?” Tommy Vang sighed. “Mr. Delos has told me he will make the arrangements. When the proper time comes, he will send me home.”
“Has he made any plans for that?”
“I don’t know. He doesn’t talk about it. But he said that when he is finished with everything here, he will send me back. Or maybe he will go back with me.” Finished with what? Leaphorn thought. But that question too would wait. Anyway, he thought he knew the answer.
“Would you be going back to Vietnam? Or Laos? I don’t imagine the Hmong have any sort of passport, or entry visas, or that sort of paperwork.”
“If they ever did, they probably wouldn’t by now,” Tommy said. “I guess our mountains are not ours anymore. We fought for the Americans, and the Americans went home.”
“Yes,” Leaphorn said. “We sometimes do things without really knowing what we are doing. Then we say we’re sorry about that. But I guess that doesn’t help much.”
Tommy Vang opened his door. “Would you give me back my piece of fruitcake? I must be going now. I have more things to do.”
“It’s still early,” Leaphorn said. “You said you had come here to talk to me. We haven’t talked much. Did you find out what you wanted to know?”
Vang settled himself into the seat. “I guess I don’t know. I think I found things I didn’t expect.”
“Like what?”
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Vang smiled at Leaphorn. “Like you are a nice man. I didn’t expect that.”
“You didn’t like me?”
“No. Because you are a policeman. I didn’t think I would like a policeman.”
“Why not?”
“I have sometimes heard bad things about them,” Vang said. “Probably not true. Maybe some policeman are bad and some are good.” He smiled, shrugged. “But now I have to go. I have to find a place out here—” he waved both hands in a widespread gesture. “I know its name, but its name is not on my map.”
“Maybe I can help you with that.” He patted Vang’s shoulder. “Maybe that would prove to you that I’m one of
