Saigon: A Novel Part 37

"Johnson is a murderer! Rusk is a murderer! McNamara is a butcherer of women and children!"

With the hate-filled shrieks reverberating in his ears, Mark felt himself lifted and carried on the surge of the crowd as though he was awash in heavy seas; his clothes were in tatters and blood poured down his face from wounds in his head. He tried to roll over and dig his arms and legs into the ma.s.s of bodies to swim free, but he was jerked back violently by the handcuff which chained him by his left wrist to a young navy pilot. The navy man, unconscious now and covered in blood, had already sunk beneath the surface, and Mark felt himself being dragged inexorably downward, felt himself begin to drown in the squirming, seething ma.s.s of slippery Asian bodies. He twisted and turned, gasping for air, but the harder he fought, the more closely they pressed about him, and their flesh seemed to liquefy and flow suffocatingly into his mouth and nostrils like water.

Then the ground beneath him opened without warning, and the feeling that he was drowning gave way to a greater terror: he was tumbling downward Out of a high, bright sky toward distant land below, rolling helplessly in the free air watching his empty F-105D Thunderchief spinning away beneath him, belching smoke. It exploded on a jungle-covered hillside beside the Red River in a bright orange geyser of fire, and angry tongues of flame leaped hundreds of feet into the air, reaching out to his falling body, setting his flying suit and parachute afire, roasting his flesh and accelerating his downward plunge. But as always he somehow fell lightly to earth, landing nimbly on his feet, and he was surrounded in an instant by the same yelling crowd of Vietnamese peasants who always ran screaming from beneath the same clump of lac trees at the foot of the hill on which an old French fort still stood. They beat his body with machetes, cutting him deeply with their crude blades until his own free-flowing blood extinguished the agonizing flames. He drew his .38 pistol, screaming at them to retreat, but as usual they didn't hear him, and he thrust its muzzle towards the face of the Vietnamese nearest to him. Always, as had happened in reality, the first shot was a red tracer round and it tore a jagged hole in the middle of the peasant's face. As always the peasant collapsed on top of him, pinning him to the ground, but no matter how hard he struggled, he could never free himself of the scrawny corpse, and its unexpected weight bore him rapidly downward into the soft earth, heavier on top of him, it seemed, than a forty-story building.

A sea of Vietnamese faces peered curiously over the retreating rim of what had become an ever-deepening grave, and he spotted his mother, the gray-haired Pentagon colonel who had become his stepfather and his brother, Gary, among them; they watched blankly, shaking their heads from time to time in silent bewilderment, and although he tried to cry Out to them, they faded quickly from his sight and immediately he was writhing again in that black, fetid cell where they had first locked his feet into the rusting ankle stocks built by the early French colonizers, Invisible hands shackled his wrists behind him in "h.e.l.l cuffs," ratcheting them tightly through flesh and sinew until their jagged jaws bit on the bones of his wrists; in an instant his arms turned black, swelling to twice their normal size, and the open wounds around his wrists turned yellow and festered before his eyes. Bloated green scorpions and black rats scuttled back and forth over him, suppurating boils and sores sprouted like fungus from his limbs again, and bowls of food and liquid floated tantalizingly beyond his reach like disembodied ghosts. Taunting laughter rang crazily in his ears as the starvation and dehydration pains intensified, then the leering face of his Vietnamese torturer whom he had on that first day dubbed "The Swineherd" started to inflate in the tiny confined s.p.a.ce of his cell; grew bigger and bigger, like a child's balloon, forcing him to retreat whimpering into a corner, and the jailer's slack, drooling maw opened and closed slowly like a fish's mouth as he repeated over and over again "Bao cao! Bao cao! Bao cao! - Inform! Inform!"

Although he pressed himself frantically against the wall to try to avoid the ropes that drifted towards him like fronds of dark seaweed, they tightened by themselves around his arms again with an agonizing suddenness; his shoulder blades were forced together in the middle of his back, his breastbone threatened to burst from his chest, and when the familiar fear that his whole body would split open from crotch to gizzard returned, a voice began screaming hideously, providing a high descant to the torturer's repeated yells of "Bao cao! Bao cao!" This demented shrieking rose quickly to a crescendo like a steam whistle, and Mark eventually realized that he was no longer trapped in the toils of his nightmare but was lying awake on the concrete floor of the punishment cell listening to his own crazed voice. The face of "The Swineherd" close before his eyes too was no longer the suffocating "balloon" of his nightmare but the flesh-and-blood reality of his s.a.d.i.s.tic jailer. He was shaking him by the shoulder to rouse him, and as his vision cleared, he saw too in the gray light of dawn that the immaculately attired North Vietnamese cadre who had escorted him in the car the night before was standing behind "The Swineherd." The same faint smile seemed to be fixed upon the cadre's face, and the moment the screaming died away, he began talking in a soothing voice.

"You've been having bad dreams, Lieutenant Sherman - but you can relax now. I've come to take you somewhere we can talk quietly." Kim stooped and picked up the rabbit's foot which lay beside the American on the floor and placed it gently in his hand. "Don't worry anymore - everything will be all right flow."

He opened the cell door and stood aside to let Mark pa.s.s in front of him, then motioned to "The Swineherd" to follow. Kim directed him into the rear seat of the same Tatra outside in the prison yard and got in beside him; the jailer traveled in the front pa.s.senger seat, and only minutes later the car deposited them all in the courtyard of the Ministry of Justice building that stood close to the jail. In an empty interrogation room, a small table had been laid with a simple breakfast of toast, cereal and orange juice, and Kim waved the American towards it while he sat down on a nearby stool and took a buff folder from the doc.u.ment case he carried. The jailer remained on guard by the door, and after eyeing the table suspiciously, Mark sat down and began to eat; crouching in the chair like an animal, he devoured the food noisily, darting suspicious glances at Kim and "The Swineherd" from time to time, as though afraid they might change their minds and try to take it from him.

"From your file I see on your arrival you chose to undergo extended punishment for three months rather than reveal even your name, service number and date of birth," said Kim quietly without looking up. "That obviously requires courage of a high order."

Mark gazed dully at the Vietnamese for a second, still chewing, then hunched lower over the table to finish the food.

"It was a great pity you chose to demonstrate your courage in that way. If we'd known who you were from the start, we could have given you special consideration." When Mark made no response, Kim resumed his reading of the file. After two or three minutes' silence he glanced up again. "I shouldn't tell you this, lieutenant, but you are one of the very few prisoners who have refused to condemn your government's misguided involvement in Vietnam. Almost every one of your fellows has recorded or written denunciations that have been published or broadcast abroad. And why not? Some senators and other important public figures in Was.h.i.+ngton are now beginning to describe your country's role here as 'the gravest treason.'"

The Vietnamese drew a small tape recorder from his doc.u.ment case and set it up on a small table beside the stool. When he switched it on, the strained voices of other captured American pilots filled the room one after the other, condemning their partic.i.p.ation in the war. The adjectives "vile," "illegal," and "immoral" were used repeatedly and the pilots frequently described themselves as the "the blackest criminals" who had carried out "inhuman air raids." But if Mark registered the content of the recordings, he gave no sign, and Kim leaned over and switched the machine off.

"Reading your file is very interesting, lieutenant, you know, because in your determination not to say those things we would like you to say, you've talked about everything else under the sun with your interrogator." He tapped the file on his lap with his forefinger. "I was very saddened for Instance to learn that you fell out with your father when you were sixteen and have never seen him since. I knew your father too, you see. He's a remarkable man - he was responsible for saving the life of President Ho Chi Minh in 1945. So we have cause to admire him. And good cause to do something to return his kindness - such as sending home the son he believes might already be dead."

Mark raised his head slowly to look at the Vietnamese, and although his gaze still didn't seem to focus properly, Kim noticed he was frowning as though disconcerted for the first time.

"Perhaps you've forgotten now, but you once told your interrogator you swore never to speak to your father again after he deserted your mother. The file says you were delirious one night arid told the whole story of your quarrel with your father."

Mark appeared to make a renewed effort to concentrate on what Kim was saying and leaned forward on the table. Seeing this, Kim rose and walked slowly across the room until lie was standing beside the American.

"You know that you hurt your father deeply by your behavior because your brother has talked with him, hasn't lie? You were glad to hear he was suffering for his past indiscretions, weren't you? But it didn't make you any more inclined to meet him and talk to him. You wanted to hurt him as much as possible by your silence, didn't you? You wanted to get back at him at all costs." Kim paused to study the effect his words were having, and seeing Mark's frown deepen, he smiled. "But it's obvious that your father still cares for you despite all that, isn't it? Otherwise he wouldn't have taken the trouble to write a letter to our president pleading on your behalf. Despite your harshness towards him he's obviously still very concerned about you. That's perhaps more than you deserve, isn't it?"

As Kim watched, Mark's features tautened again as though he was confused by his thoughts; then he looked up at the Vietnamese cadre with a bemused expression in his eyes.

"Sometimes we go too far in our feuds with those closest to us. We long to take revenge for imagined hurts we've suffered, not realizing how cruel we are. I know myself what pain can be caused by strife between father and son, because I quarreled violently with my own father when I was young. Like you, I swore never to have anything more to do with him. He was killed fourteen years ago at the end of the French war, and although nothing has altered to change what divided us then, I've always felt a deep sadness that I never did anything to tell him of my feelings before he died. Perhaps the same thing will happen to you. Perhaps you will stay here for many years because of your stubbornness and by the time you are released, your father and your mother may be dead. Have you thought of that possibility?"

The muscles in Mark's jaw tightened and he stared hard at Kim; seeing that he was beginning to get the response he'd been seeking, the Vietnamese turned away casually and walked back towards the stool on which his doc.u.ment case lay.

"But perhaps I'm misjudging you. Perhaps, unlike me, you're not a man to feel regret or worry about what others are feeling. Perhaps you're able to seal yourself up in your own selfish world, pleasing only yourself. Why should you, after all, concern yourself with bringing relief to your worried father - and your mother? The pleasure your homecoming would give them is no concern of yours, you tell yourself, I expect. Am I right? I don't suppose it's ever occurred to you, has it, that in a different way while you choose to go on suffering here, they must suffer agonies of a different kind back home in America because of your stubbornness."

Kim turned again to look at the American and found him staring distractedly in front of him; an anguished look had come into his eyes, and he was beginning to breathe unevenly.

"If it were left to me alone," continued Kim in a consoling voice, "I would have you released immediately, lieutenant - for your father's sake. But unfortunately there are other leading comrades who must be consulted who don't know your father. They would have to be convinced that your release won't harm our cause. That's why if OU wanted to go home I would have to ask you to make a statement. It's just a precaution and it's no more than all your fellow prisoners have done. But of course I don't really know whether you want to be released, do I? Since you continue to refuse to talk to me, I can't judge whether you really would like to return to the comfort of your home in America. Maybe you are strong enough to withstand prison life here indefinitely.

Kim drew a single sheet of typescript from his doc.u.ment case and studied it intently for a minute or more. From the corner of his eye he noticed Mark turn in his chair to look at him.

"Of course if you turn down the opportunity Urn offering you today," continued Kim in a regretful tone, "it can't be offered to you again. I you decide you don't want to read what's written on this paper, I'll have no choice but to hand you back to the care of your jailer. You'll have to be returned to the punishment cells." He raised his head and glanced briefly towards "The Swineherd," who stood impa.s.sively by the door; then he turned back to Mark again. "But I hope you won't force me to do it. If you decide you can read for us, I'll make sure you're put in line for an early release - and you can go home and thank your father who cared enough to help you!" Kim picked up the tape recorder and walked over to Mark's table. He signaled for the jailer to clear the food tray away, then placed the sheet of paper and the tape recorder in front of Mark. "It will only take a minute or two to read," he said gently. "And there's no hurry - you can take as long as you like over it."

When Mark lifted his head to stare at the Vietnamese, he found him smiling sympathetically; suddenly a look of utter bewilderment came into the American's eyes and his head sank down on his arms. A moment later, his shoulders began to shake, and the sound of his sobbing, quiet at first, gradually grew louder until it filled the room. He wept for nearly a quarter of an hour, and during that time Kim waited patiently beside him; when finally he fell silent, Kim patted him encouragingly on the shoulder and switched on the tape recorder.

"Just read it, lieutenant, in a normal voice," he said soothingly. "That's all you need to do."

For a long time Mark didn't move, then he straightened slowly in the chair and picked up the sheet of typescript. His face worked convulsively from time to time as he read it through, then he turned to face towards the tape recorder.

"I'm First Lieutenant Mark Sherman, of the United States Air Force," he said reading aloud in a hollow, halting voice. "My grandfather is Senator Nathaniel Sherman, who has served as Democratic senator from Virginia for more than forty years, and I wish it to be known that, contrary to his views, I see the cruel war of aggression being waged against the heroic Vietnamese people by the United States as a crime against all humanity. I was shot down while carrying out inhuman air raids against churches, hospitals and schools in the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and I regard my role in the war as evil and shameful.

Here and there he stumbled over a word, and whenever he did so Kim patiently told him to go back and reread the sentence again. Each time he stopped and looked up, he found "The Swineherd" staring fixedly at him from his place by the door acid he reluctantly resumed his reading.

The barbaric and immoral policies of the United States government stand condemned by all the decent peoples of the world," he continued as the spools of the tape recorder spun silently on the table beside him. "And my conscience will not rest easy until the last of the American imperialist aggressors has been driven from Vietnamese soil.

5.

"I always felt cheated by Vietnam," said Naomi Boyce-Lewis with a rueful little smile. "Even before I knew what or where it was. All the other girls in my cla.s.s at school had their fathers back, we'd had the celebrations and the war was obviously over but I was still told I had to be patient and wait. I'd been getting occasional letters from this strange place called 'Saigon' that n.o.body had ever heard of, then suddenly they stopped and I was told he wasn't ever coming 'back. I took it pretty hard, I suppose, and quite illogically when I came here for the first item in 1963 I was still nursing the grudge deep down. I think without fully realizing it I felt Vietnam owed me something."

She picked up a spoon and toyed for a moment with the little French sorbet ice that the white-jacketed Vietnamese waiter had brought to their table on the verandah of the Cercle Sportif, and watching her, Joseph felt himself deeply moved. Although twenty-three years had pa.s.sed, it had come as a shock to hear in Le Loi Square the previous night that the British intelligence colonel with whom he'd worked had been killed in action only a day or two after his own departure from Saigon in 1945; in his memory Colonel Boyce-Lewis had been an aloof, faintly condescending figure who had dismissed American sympathy for the native Vietnamese with some disdain, but the mental picture of a distressed nine-year-old girl waiting fretfully for her father's return from the war aroused an intense feeling of compa.s.sion in him. The news had also carried his own thoughts vividly back to those moments in late 1945 that had been so poignant in his life - his reunion with Lao and their rescue of Tuyet from the famine-stricken North - and this too colored his response.

'How was he killed exactly?"

"He was shot through the neck with a poisoned arrow in Montagnard country north of here. He died within a few hours." Naomi spoke in a flat, unemotional voice without looking up from her plate, but Joseph closed his eyes for a moment.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have asked." An awkward little silence developed, and they ate for a while without speaking. "Sir Harold as I remember him was the kind of Englishman all Americans admire greatly despite themselves," he said at last, resorting to a white lie about his recollection of her father in an effort to break the ice again. "That unfailing courtesy and dignified bearing no matter what the provocation is something your cra.s.s, ex-colonial subjects born on the other side of the Atlantic just aren't capable of. It can he infuriating sometimes - but it's a much-envied quality. I remember the dinner in the British staff officers' mess that last time I met him was a tribute to the British sense of style in difficult circ.u.mstances, too. Regimental silver, linen napkins and a great sense of decorum was observed by all - even though a civil war raged in the streets outside. For me it was a memorable return to civilization after those weeks in the jungle in the North. I was ungracious enough to blow my top that night, on the subject of British policy, but your father, who was sitting beside me, merely smiled politely and pointed out what he saw as the error of my ways in a tolerant voice."

"That sounds just like Daddy!" She looked up at him, her warm smile reflecting the inner pleasure that his reminiscences had invoked. "I've never met anybody who knew exactly what he was doing out here before he died and It's SO Strange for me to hear you talk about those times. He was such a misty figure in my own life, you see, because he was away most of the time. Listening to you talk like this about him helps somehow to lay the ghost of his memory for me." She continued smiling at him for a moment, then looked away quickly as if embarra.s.sed by the inadvertent intimacy of her confession.

"I'm delighted that what little I've been able to say has been some help," said Joseph quietly. "I wish there was more I could tell you."

"Hearing what it was really like here in 'forty-five from somebody who lived through it is rare enough." She smiled at him again a little wistfully; she wore a crisp white s.h.i.+rtwaist dress and her hair, freshly coiffed, fell in soft waves to her shoulders. In the candlelight she looked rested again, almost radiant, but the sadness which the conversation obviously induced in her tugged down the corners of her mouth from time to time, giving her beauty a touchingly vulnerable quality. During most of the dinner she had sat motionless in her seat, her chin resting on her fingertips, as Joseph described in detail the events in which he and her father had been caught up during the autumn of 1945. She had barely touched her food or her wine and had spoken little herself until he reached the end of his account. "I suppose because of my father I'd have been drawn here some time or other to see what it was like, even if I hadn't become a journalist," she said, a faraway look coming into her eyes. "But as soon as I arrived in Saigon for the first time, I think I knew I was going to have a kind of love-hate relations.h.i.+p with the place. I stumbled across the most dramatic stories of my life almost immediately with the pictures we salvaged from the ambush at Moc Linh and the burning of Thich Quang Duc. I can still dine out on either of those in London whenever I like, even five years later . .

"It's strange you should feel that way too." Joseph's voice suddenly had an emotional edge. "I've had something of a love-hate relations.h.i.+p with Vietnam all my life too - and even now I can't make up my mind which feeling is the strongest."

"Why do you say that?"

"I first came here on a shooting expedition when I was fifteen - to help collect animals for a natural history museum founded by my grandfather. I was just bowled over by the exotic people, the jungles, the palaces in Hue - but on the last day of the hunting my elder brother was killed. So I was entranced and horrified by the country a one and the same time. But it was that trip that made me decide to major in Asian history and like a moth drawn to a flame, I came back to do research here ten years later. That's when my love affair with Vietnam started to go deeper than yours, I fancy He broke off abruptly, a faint look of embarra.s.sment showing on his face. "d.a.m.n it, Naomi, I can see why you make such an outstanding journalist. I've hardly known you two minutes and you've got rue pouring out my heart in a way I've never clone to anyone before."

"But I've barely asked you a single question," she protested with an amused smile.

"Maybe that's the secret of it!"

His exasperation was so genuine that for the first time that evening they both laughed, but when their laughter died away he continued without any further urging to recount the story of his unhappy love affair with Lan, his marriage to Tempe and his later discovery of Tuyet's existence. In her turn Naomi was moved to see the handsome, confident man opposite her grow hesitant and embarra.s.sed at his own words, and her eyes softened as she watched him fiddling with the stem of his winegla.s.s. Most of the time he kept his gaze averted from her, speaking slowly and haltingly of emotions that she could see had lain buried away inside him for many years, and he pa.s.sed quickly over Lao's death, Tuyet's later disappearance and his retreat to Cornell before finally falling silent.

"But after staying away for twelve whole years," she prompted gently, "what was it that made you decide suddenly to risk reopening all those old wounds and come back again?"

Joseph shook his head slowly from side to side and sighed. "I was afraid you were going to ask me that. When I left my wife, you see, Naomi, she married a career army man who I think in my absence made military life look very glamorous to my sons. Gary, whom you met at Moe Linh, chose the army and my younger son, Mark, went for the air force. They both took my leaving very hard - Mark has refused to have anything at all to do with me since, and although I've had some contact with Gary he's still cool towards me. He's been back here a few months now on his second tour and we had lunch the other day - but it was hard going. Mark was shot down over the north flying from Da Nang two years ago. I live in hope that he's survived the crash, hut I've had no news of him at all. When Gary came out here again I was still sitting on the fence in Cornell watching my country tearing itself apart. I found I couldn't line up with the peace marchers or the draft dodgers, I didn't fit comfortably among the doves or the so-called silent majority, and it suddenly dawned on me that both my sons were out here doing their duty in this G.o.d-awful war mainly because of my own stupidity. If I hadn't turned my back at the wrong moment maybe neither of them would have chosen the careers they did. And even my brother Guy's back here now for a second tour at the emba.s.sy - so I suddenly felt like a backslider, and first off I decided to write a personal letter to Ho Chi Minh about Mark. I was with an OSS unit that dropped into Tongking at the end of the war and I met Ho then and got to know him well. I went to see my former wife about the idea, and by chance she showed me one of Mark's old letters. He'd pa.s.sed on a garbled message without understanding it from a girl in Da Nang who he thought called herself 'Tuyet'

Naomi's eyes widened suddenly. 'And you thought you could find your missing daughter! That's what really brought you back?"

Joseph pursed his lips as though he wasn't proud to own up to the motive and nodded reluctantly. "I guess if I'm going to be honest I have to admit I suddenly wanted to try to salvage something from the wreckage of my life. There's not much chance that Gary will ever see things my way, and Cod knows whether I'll ever see Mark again. But I always sensed that deep down Tuyet might be hiding her real feelings .." He sighed again and finished his wine. "Several government agencies had tried to persuade me to rake posts out here over the past year or two because of my background, and I'd always turned them down. But the JUSPAO offer dropped out of the sky two months ago, just after I'd heard about Mark's letter and I decided there and then to put my moral objections on ice."

"You're right, Joseph, it's very strange." Naomi spoke slowly, as though thinking aloud, and there was a note of wonderment in her voice. "We don't just seem to have a love-hate relations.h.i.+p with Vietnam in common. In different way I think perhaps both of us have come here time and again, almost against our will, looking for something important - something we don't have much hope of finding."

He raised his head to look at her in surprise, and their eyes met and held; in that instant they both sensed instinctively that a new intimacy was being born, and he smiled at her. "When you're looking for something you never dared hope to find, Naomi, it's especially nice to find something you never dared dream of looking for."

She smiled playfully back at him. "That sounds as if it might have been translated from the mysterious works of some Chinese sage-or is that pure Joseph Sherman-style wisdom?"

"The Chinese have a nice unsentimental proverb .to describe those who get lucky against all the odds. They say, 'Even a blind cat sometimes trips over a dead rat.'

They laughed together, and looking up he saw for the first time that the rest of the diners had gradually drifted away, leaving them alone on the verandah; several waiters were watching impatiently for signs that they were ready to leave, and Joseph signaled apologetically for his bill, then led the way out into the tree-lined boulevard running alongside Doc Lap Palace. In the warm darkness beneath the trees they strolled side by side for several minutes without speaking, content to enjoy the pleasurable ease they suddenly felt in each other's presence, and it was Naomi who broke the silence at last.

"I don't think any European who's ever had anything to do with Vietnam goes away entirely unchanged," she said in a pensive voice. "Perhaps we're not so different from all the others in that respect. There's some hypnotic quality I can never put my finger on that casts a spell over all our minds when we're here. And whatever it is, it seems to have the power to bring out the best or the worst iii us - sometimes even both."

"I think I know what you mean."

"I felt it on my very first day in Saigon in 1963. And in the beginning I think it brought out the worst in me."

"It sounds like you're working up to some juicy true-life confession," said Joseph humorously. "This could be interesting."

"I suppose I am - but this isn't a joke. I told you earlier that I'd met Gary and your brother Guy briefly when they were here before - well I wasn't being really honest then. It's true I met Gary only once, but I got to know Guy quite well because we found we had a mutual interest in comparing notes during the Buddhist troubles. We had a faintly flirtatious friends.h.i.+p, that never really came to anything and I wanted to tell you that, in case I every meet you together." She stopped walking and he saw that her face in the shadow of the trees was serious. "I'm saying this, Joseph, because I have a strong intuition that your friends.h.i.+p's going to be important to me - do you understand?"

Her eyes searched his face anxiously and he nodded. "Yes, I understand."

"There was something else too that happened then, about the time of the Diem coup. It involved Guy, but I don't think I can tell you about it now. Perhaps when I know you better it will be easier. But it made me see myself with a sudden clarity - made me realize that I was in danger of becoming something 1 didn't admire."

"What was that?"

She looked at him uncertainly, then turned and began walking again. "I've always been very ambitious, Joseph. Perhaps it's something to do with being the daughter of someone rich and t.i.tled who was a stranger to me. Perhaps your psychoa.n.a.lysts back home would tell OU I'm trying desperately to prove myself to my dead father, or show that I can succeed at something where my privileged background's no help - or some such mumbo jumbo. Well I don't know what the reason was in the first place, but I certainly did set out to convince myself and the world I could do my job as a television correspondent as well as anyone else - or even better. And I haven't really changed my mind about that. But the incident I'm talking about made me realize I was so anxious to succeed that I didn't care who suffered in the process -- that's what I meant when I said Vietnam at first brought out the worst in me."

"You can't be as bad as you paint, yourself," said Joseph quietly, "if you've listened to your conscience."

"I'm going to borrow your phrase now - I've never talked to anyone like this before. But listening to you tonight made me suddenly want to confide in you - I can't tell you why. And since the Diem coup I've tried consciously to see my stories with a more compa.s.sionate eye, tried to think of the story first, not myself. I don't know whether I've always succeeded, hut I'm trying at least."

"I haven't known you long, Naomi," said Joseph, smiling again.

"But it's been long enough for me to know that you're a rare spirit."

They crossed Le Loi Square, heading in the direction of the Continental Palace Hotel, and Naomi moved closer to Joseph to slip her arm companionably through his. "You Americans are very quick on the draw with a compliment. I'd hoped to get in first with something like that about you..

As he came down the steps of the Continental Palace with another officer of the 301st Infantry Division with whom he had been dining, Captain Gary Sherman glanced casually across the street in front of the hotel and noticed a broad-shouldered man in a pale, tropical-weight suit escorting a strikingly elegant woman with blond hair. The man, graying at the temples, was laughing, and Gary watched the couple idly for a moment or two before he realized with a start that the man was his father; a moment later he saw that he also knew his companion. They were walking close together arm in arm, and as soon as he recognized them, he stopped where he was and watched them approach the hotel. Because they were engrossed in their conversation, Joseph and Naomi didn't see Gary until they began climbing the steps, and then they looked up to find him blocking their way.

"Gary! What a surprise!" Joseph's face broke into a broad smile of pleasure. "I thought you weren't going to be able to get away from your unit again for another week at least. You know Miss Boyce-Lewis already, I believe."

"Sure, Dad, we met once." Gary's voice was deliberately cool and he greeted the English journalist with a curt nod.

"We've just been dining at the Cercle," said Joseph, still smiling. "It's a pity we didn't know you were in town. You and your friend could have joined us." He glanced at the other officer, but Gary made no move to introduce him.

"I was watching you both cross the Street - I don't think somehow that would have been a good idea."

The smile on Joseph's face faded a little but he patted his son's shoulder warmly. "Nonsense, but what I'd really like to do, Gary, when you get into Saigon again is to have you come to dinner at my villa. I'm settled in now. You'll get to meet some of the American correspondents who write about the war."

"That will be just great - but you'd better send me your printed invitation well in advance so I can fix it with the VC for a night they're not working. So long." Gary grinned as he spoke but there was an unmistakable note of sarcasm in his voice, and he nodded formally at Naomi again before moving off briskly down the steps.

Joseph watched him go for a moment then turned apologetically to Naomi. "I'm sorry about that."

"Don't apologize," said Naomi quickly. "I sensed it was partly my fault for taking your arm."

"I don't want any apologies on that score," said Joseph firmly. "I wouldn't have missed that for anything."

In her third-floor suite Naomi waited until the Vietnamese waiter had delivered a tray of Scotch, ice and Perrier water then sat down beside Joseph on the sofa. After a moment's hesitation, she took hold of one of his hands. "I can't tell you how much this evening has meant to me, Joseph. Thank you for indulging me with so much talk about 1945 and my father - and for every- tiling else."

"I've talked at least as much about myself, it seems to me," replied Joseph, smiling; then on an impulse he lifted her hand and pressed his lips gently against her fingers.

She watched him in silence, her face expressionless but she made no effort to remove her hand. "I really ought to get some sleep now, Joseph. I've got an early flight to Hong Kong tomorrow."

Joseph nodded understandingly. "I only wish you were staying longer."

"I'll be back again before very long." She rose to pour a drink and placed it on the low table in front of him. For a moment she stood indecisively beside the sofa - then she smiled at him again. "I'm going to get ready for bed now, You may take five minutes to drink your whisky, and after that you're free to leave." Still smiling at him she removed her shoes and walked to the bedroom door in her stockinged feet; but before opening it she looked around at bins and smiled again. "Or you can stay, if you like."

Joseph looked up in astonishment. "I thought you said you had to get some beauty sleep."

"You didn't listen carefully, Joseph. I said I ought to."

After she'd left the room, Joseph took off his jacket and tie, and spent ten minutes over his whisky. When he finally opened the bedroom door he found the room in shadow; only one lamp was lit, and Naomi was sitting on the far side of the bed with her back to him. She wore a white lace nightdress which left. Her shoulders bare and she was brus.h.i.+ng her hair in a distracted fas.h.i.+on.

"I began to think you weren't coming." She spoke in a whisper but didn't turn round.

"I felt I ought to wait - in case you wanted to change your mind."

She shook her head quickly and put the brush down. After a moment he began to undress, then she felt the bed take his weight. "I ought to tell you, Joseph, I'm not awfully good at it," she said softly. "I hope you won't be disappointed."

She laughed a little m.u.f.fled laugh hut the tension in her body was unmistakable, and when he brushed his lips across her shoulders he felt her quiver.

"Neither am I," he said smiling at her back. "It's surprising how deceptive appearances can be."

When she finally turned to him, her eyes were open wide as though she was startled by her own actions, and he kissed her gently on the forehead before taking her in his arms. Their lovemaking was tentative, almost reverent, without high pa.s.sion, but each sensed wordlessly in those moments that the separate obsessions that had drawn them back to Saigon again and again had led at last to an unexpected solace for them both.

6.