PART 4: THE SERGEANT’S TALE
CHAPTER 1
They found themselves in an odd little town, grey and wretched, but still bearing the imprint of French civilisation. There was a tiny square surrounded by flaking colonnades; and the legs of some statue — a general or perhaps a poet — standing in the middle of the cracked concrete, its jagged shanks sprouting some rich ugly weed.
The Americans — in the singular, as it turned out — had their USAID headquarters in one of the old French houses, freshened up with paint the colour of flesh. The one American inhabitant was even larger and more close-cropped than usual — a lanky raw-boned man with a big white smile called Wedgwood. The walls of his office were papered with enormous crude paintings of men in uniform — squat brown-faced men with square shoulders and straight arms, very badly drawn, as though by a child. Under each was printed: KNOW YOUR ENEMY: NVA REGULAR. NVA IRREGULAR. PATHET LAO REGULAR — etc; then a detailed list of the weapons these men might be bearing. There was also one corner devoted to the fold-out pin-ups of at least six months’ issues of Playboy.
Murray stumbled over to the iced drinking water tank and helped himself to a couple of paper cupfuls. There was a dull throbbing in the side of his head, yet he seemed to notice things with a heightened awareness. He noticed, when he sat down again, a tiny mole just behind Jackie Conquest’s left ear where her hair broke forward across her cheek. She was sitting next to him beside a furled Stars and Stripes, and now that she had removed the copies of the Bangkok World, her combat tunic was draped loosely over her breasts.
Wedgwood called to a Lao assistant who went away to brew up some coffee, while Ryderbeit and No-Entry began a long, but not quite complete account of their aerial mishap. They made no mention of having transgressed North Vietnamese airspace, concentrating only on a failed port engine and how they’d feathered the plane down through eight thousand feet of mountains, over-running the airstrip and finishing up in an untilled rice-paddy.
Wedgwood took notes, shaking his head wonderingly and saying he couldn’t understand how any of them came to be alive. When the Lao assistant came back with the coffee Ryderbeit gave his most engaging smile and said, ‘Could we possibly have something stronger, Mr Wedgwood, sir?’
‘Why sure, boys!’ And a moment later the American was back with a full quart bottle of Four Roses bourbon, plus the inevitable paper cups. They all drank, except No-Entry, while Wedgwood began to make plans to fly them back to Vientiane. He might be able to lay on a chopper before nightfall to get them down at least as far as Luang Prabang. It might take longer to find transport for the Thai kickers, who had mysteriously and discreetly disappeared.
The bourbon had begun to deaden the throbbing in Murray’s head. Later Wedgwood, taking the bottle with him, led them all out into a narrow muddy street, to a house with arches and ornate balconies which he said was the nearest thing to a restaurant in town. He wouldn’t stay because he had to get back and send some radio messages; but he left them the bourbon.
It was very hot inside, full of slow fat flies and the foetid smell of fish. After a moment they moved out to the back where there was a small patio with a shallow pond and three goldfish flicking about in the dark water. The proprietor, a polite Tonkinese, brought out chairs, a table, and four glasses. The meal he served was peculiarly vile, but none of them had any appetite. After a second glass of bourbon Ryderbeit contented himself with sitting back with a hunk of stale bread, rolling little lumps between his fingers and dipping them in his bourbon, then tossing them into the pond, watching the fish dart up and swallow them. Each time he gave a low mirthless laugh, waiting intently for their reactions. One of the fish rolled to the surface, its mouth out of the water, gasping; the other two, after a couple of bites each, sank to the bottom, twitched for a moment, then lay still.
‘There you are!’ he cried, swinging his chair round: ‘There you have the whole human predicament — the ones that float and the ones that sink. I think we’re the ones who float — wouldn’t you say so, No-Entry? You’re not drinkin’, No-Entry, you miserable bastard!’
The Negro lifted his head wearily from his elbows, his eyes wrapped again in their dark glasses. ‘You know I can’t drink, Sammy.’
‘After a flight like that one, you bloody well drink!’ Ryderbeit roared.
‘Cut it, Sammy. I’m tired.’
Ryderbeit scowled, splashing more bourbon into his glass. ‘The rest o’ you’re drinking?’ he said, turning to where Murray and Jackie Conquest sat nursing their glasses in the shade of the wall. ‘C’mon, those need freshenin’ up,’ he added, leaning across with the bottle.
‘We’re doing fine,’ said Murray, not liking the look of Ryderbeit at all. The bounce and gaiety he had displayed back at the USAID headquarters was dissipated now into a sour, needling moodiness, as the level of the bourbon dropped and the other three spoke less.
‘Tell us about the Congo,’ Murray said wearily. It was Ryderbeit drinking in silence that worried him most.
‘I’ll tell you all you want to know about the Congo, Murray boy — but later. First I’d like to hear what lovely little Mrs Conquest here was doing on my plane. You come to spy on me, darling? All rigged up in yer battle kit like some bloody film extra, with her bloody great camera thrown in for the act — then back you go runnin’ to Mister Bloody Maxwell Esquire and tell him
