The Tale of the Lazy Dog

by Alan Williams

  Pol did not reply at once. He stretched out and refilled his glass, watching the bottle bobbing back into the half-melted ice. ‘Does “Lazy Dog” mean anything to you?’ he said suddenly, pronouncing the phrase ‘Low-see dowg.’

  Murray frowned back at him. ‘Yes, it’s a weapon they use in Vietnam. A beastly contraption that fires millions of needles over a wide area, destroying everything in sight.’ Then he remembered something Finlayson had told him on that first night at the ‘Cigale’ restaurant: something about the codewords for the previous ‘flush-outs’ — names like Happy Hound, Mighty Mouse, Bullpup — infernal weapons of the lobotomised war dubbed with the jargon of the lobotomised military mind. Then he remembered something else. ‘Wait a moment. It was on Finlayson’s telex — the last incoming message before the machine cut off. It must have come in after he was dead.’

  Pol looked interested. ‘Do you remember what it said?’

  ‘It didn’t make any sense at the time — something like “instruct inventory morning Lazy Dog,” datelined the Bangkok office of FARC.’

  Pol nodded slowly. ‘If you go through to my bedroom you will find a black attaché case. There is something in it I would like to show you. You will excuse me, but this leg still gives me pain.’

  Murray got up and went through to the bedroom. He found it on the bed, beside two white leather bags already packed. He carried the attaché case back outside and laid it in Pol’s lap. The Frenchman unlocked it from a ring of keys, opening it delicately as though it were a display at a jewellers. Inside was a sheaf of photostats of Xeroxed files, letters, printed documents, held in place by a pair of spring wires. He riffled through them for a few moments, finally selecting the photostat of two foolscap sheets reduced to single quarto, pushing them across to Murray.

  At first glance they looked like company reports: four long closely-printed columns of names and figures. He ran his eye down the first column — Banque de L’Indochine, Federal Reserve (S.E.A.), Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, Bank of America, Chase Manhattan, Bank of Vietnam, Bank of India, Bank of Japan — each listed against an eight-, sometimes nine-figure number. Many of the other names were of international companies with commercial interests in Vietnam; one of these — an American corporation with large Defence Department contracts, was set against the figure 159,698,727.

  Murray marvelled at the clinical accuracy of the accounting: trying to imagine what dry myopic mind could have set about such a task, so simple and definitive, right down to the odd seven. One five and two ones, perhaps? — two little old used ‘greens’ with the head of George Washington, traced, docketed, packed away among the stack of Lincolns, Hamiltons, Grants and Ben Franklins… Bloody bankers! he thought: mean, passionless little men sharpening their pencils, deducting interest, calculating the dividend. Money without a soul. Banque de L’Indochine — 125,899,600. And he nodded his approval. At least here was someone totting up the loot, give or take a few bucks to make a round figure.

  He handed it back to Pol and gave himself another glass of champagne. ‘You’re giving me an appetite. What is it?’

  ‘Confidential report issued in Zurich ten days ago concerning the total American dollar holdings in the Republic of South Vietnam when the books closed on the first of the month.’

  ‘Closed?’

  ‘There’s to be a new issue of Scrip on the first day of next month — two weeks from this coming Monday. And on the Sunday night the United States Government will evacuate’ — he ran his fat finger down the rows of figures — ‘precisely this amount of money in cash from Tân Sơn Nhất Airport, Saigon, to Guam airbase in the Philippines. The operation has been given the codename Lazy Dog, and the total sum involved is in the region — if you add those figures up — of around fifteen hundred and forty million dollars.’

  Murray felt a weight pressing on his chest. It grew heavier, becoming intense, suffocating. He struggled forward, almost toppling from his chair. His ears were singing and a wild laser-gleam had come into his eye. ‘Flush-out two weeks from Sunday,’ he muttered, stifling a crazy laugh, knowing that the passion was alive again — all the carefully-plotted details, the hopes and frustrated lust for those greenbacks, fired again in a sudden rush of adrenalin — a fierce, greedy, physical lust that grabbed at him deep inside, pressed and pummelled and twisted at him, making him want to jump up and laugh and leap round Pol in a crazy drunken jig.

  ‘Over one and a half billion dollars,’ he added, his teeth bared over his champagne glass. ‘Bigger than last time — bigger than Happy Hound or Mighty Mouse. The biggest ever, Charles!’

  ‘To Lazy Dog!’ said Pol, raising his glass.

  ‘To Lazy Dog.’ Murray relaxed with a great glowing sense of release. He had forgotten the bomb, the nail in Finlayson’s neck, Pol’s complicity in cold-blooded murder. The whole angry world, from Vietnam to the vaults of Wall Street, was focussed in that moment on those monotonous photostated figures, the equivalent of five — or would it be nearer six? — tons of paper money. He sat back with a long easy sigh. ‘And this was all found and photographed in George Finlayson’s office?’

  Pol nodded cheerfully: ‘Monsieur Finlayson was a very methodical man.’

  ‘And your hired help must have been a fast worker with a camera!’ But he softened the malice with a quick smile, as Pol pushed across a second photostat, this time with the seal of the U.S. Treasury — Federal Reserve Board of International Monetary Fund, Bangkok. Most Confidential. There followed the ugly devitalised prose of international high finance: — ‘containerization dollar-par movement of FRB/VN Reserve Exchange…’ Murray looked up, frowning: ‘How long did Finlayson have these documents?’

  ‘Since almost immediately after they were issued by the Zurich headquarters. In fact, as soon as he asked for them. In his case — as head of the Lao branch of FARC — it would have been a perfectly normal request.’

  ‘So he had them when I talked to him three days ago?’

  ‘Almost certainly. He was getting the final confirmation figures, according to the telex message you read, the next day. But he said nothing about it when you talked to him?’

  ‘Only that he’d keep his ear to the ground. And that he found the plan acceptable — or at least, believable. Why would he have sat on it? Why didn’t he get on to the Americans, or the British, at once?’

  ‘Ah.’ Pol poured the last of the champagne into their glasses. ‘He wanted to sound you out, my dear Murray. To find out just how serious the plan was — and how seriously, if at all, these two pilots would react. To wait till the plan had begun to mature and ripen before cutting it down. He probably didn’t want you biting too quickly.’

  Murray nodded, trying to convince himself that this was a plausible explanation. If Finlayson had been working for British Intelligence, would he really have worked alone on a job as big as this — even in a country as small as Laos? Or had he been working with Hamish Napper? And if Napper were the one who’d tipped Pol off, what percentage was he hoping to get at the end — to supplement his pension and the bungalow near Godalming? Yet there was one thing that didn’t quite fit. Why had Napper, if he had known that Finlayson was to be killed — indeed already had been killed — been so keen to warn Murray off Ryderbeit? Was Ryderbeit himself some mysterious double agent? It seemed hardly likely. Yet Napper had gone to some pains to warn Murray off — almost as though he’d known what Finlayson knew, and was anxious to keep Murray out of trouble.

  Something, somewhere, didn’t add up. Murray would have dearly liked to talk again to little Hamish Napper. He thought of tackling Pol about it, but decided to hold his tongue. It was very possible that at the last moment Napper had got cold feet and wanted out — had been trying to do Murray a favour by hinting he should do the same. And if Pol suspected this, it was also a strong possibility he would have Napper disposed of as well. Pol’s ‘romantic idealism’ did not stop at the ‘necessary killing’. Instead Murray changed the subject, to something more academi
c, but which was also worrying him.

  He nodded at the sheaf of photostats in Pol’s lap. ‘One and a half billion dollars is a fantastic sum, Charles. Isn’t it just a little too fantastic? Too big for anyone to get rid of — especially when one hell of a lot of it must be in numbered, traceable notes.’

  Pol gave his sly smile. ‘Ah, but my dear Murray, it’s just the fantastic size of it, and the fact that so much of it can be traced, that is the very essence, the very beauty of the plan!’

  ‘I don’t follow.’

  ‘No? So what do you think the Americans will do when they find the money has gone? They’ll be very upset of course — and they’ll start the most massive land and sea search that the world has probably ever seen. But then what? After a few weeks — a few months — when they find nothing? After all, they will not be operating on American territory.’

  ‘They’ll alert every bank in the Western world — lean on every friendly, even unfriendly Government, to track those dollars down and hand them over — with us.’

  Pol was shaking his head, still smiling. ‘Oh no they won’t, Murray. And I’ll tell you why. At this moment approximately forty-four billion American dollars are in circulation throughout the world. When the Americans discover that nearly three per cent of that cash has been stolen, you ask me what their reaction will be? A large proportion of that money, as we know, will be in high denomination bills — fifties and hundreds. And a large amount of those, particularly the ones held by the big international banks, will, as you say, be numbered and traceable. But if the American Treasury were to announce publicly that three per cent of this money — perhaps a half per cent of all fifty- and hundred-dollar bills in circulation in the entire world — was stolen money, then what do you think would happen? The value of the dollar, particularly the high denomination bills, would slump — probably more than the three per cent lost. So the Americans will do nothing. They will prefer to have the money still circulating, hot, than have their creditors and the international dealers shying off the dollar and turning to more respectable currencies. For that is the whole point, Murray. If we make off with this money, we are not only stealing it — we are threatening to discredit the currency of the United States of America! And the dollar, at all costs, must be kept respectable!’

  ‘And with a fraction of this sum — say ten million dollars — it wouldn’t work?’

  ‘Oh, a small sum would be useless. That is the only reason why I am so interested in this operation. Because one and a half billion U.S. is a reasonable, workable amount. It even gives us an edge over the United States Treasury!’ He chuckled gaily, rubbing his hands: ‘But this is all theory. What we must now attend to are more immediate, practical matters. We have the information, the two pilots, the landing-zone in Laos — and possibly the girl who could be of either great help, or great danger. We also have the small problem of the gentlemen who sent me my present for breakfast. I think we must find these gentlemen, and if possible neutralise them. Since they have already gone to such trouble to kill me — and must by now know they have failed — I suspect they are anxious to try and finish me off here in Bangkok before I get back into Cambodia.

  ‘Now I have already booked myself out, as you know, on the same flight as yourself — Air Vietnam to Saigon via Phnom Penh, due to leave in exactly two hours. So their only opportunity will be between here and the airport. I suspect there are probably not many of them — two at the most, perhaps only one. So if you were to lend me a little assistance, Murray, the contest should be an even one.’

  He struggled to his feet, wincing for a moment with the pain in his leg. ‘You are all packed and ready to go? And you have your international driving licence with you? Perfect! It is now half past three. Our plane leaves at five-thirty, so we must be at the airport by five. Business hours start again at a quarter to four. Now, when you leave here I want you to go out of the hotel and up to the corner of the block where there’s a hire-car firm. You will be in no danger — remember it is me they are after, not you — and in any case, they are very unlikely to know that you have been visiting me.

  ‘You will hire a car — something small and not too conspicuous — and drive round and park just a little way up the street behind the hotel entrance, facing Kitchburi Avenue. I shall leave at precisely four o’clock, in a taxi. That will give us a good forty minutes to reach the airport — with ten minutes to spare for any eventualities on the way. When you see me leave, you will start up as well, at a discreet distance. You do not have to keep up with me — just follow towards the airport. I don’t think they’ll try anything as I leave the hotel — it’s too public. The most likely spot is the beginning of the autoroute out to the airport. There I will tell the taxi to stop and dismiss him. Then I shall wait for you. If our friends are going to act, that will be their opportunity.’

  ‘And if they do?’

  ‘I shall try and kill them.’

  ‘With a two-two pistol?’

  Pol grinned: ‘With something rather better. Now, everything is quite clear? All you have to do is watch for my taxi, and follow at a reasonable speed towards the airport.’

  ‘Why bother about a taxi — why not come in the hired car?’

  Pol stood for a moment tugging at his lower lip. ‘I thought of that,’ he said at last. ‘But two of us might distract them — or him, as it may be. We want to draw whoever it is out into the open, now or never! Better to have two cars — it gives us more of an element of surprise.’ He spoke suddenly with the mischievous glee of a schoolboy planning a daring and ingenious prank. As he led Murray to the door he stopped and took out an enormous wallet, counting out a number of crisp twenty-dollar bills. ‘You’ll need something for the deposit on the car,’ he added: ‘The rest is for the inconvenience.’

  This time Murray took the money without arguing; it wasn’t like taking money off a dead man. Not quite, anyway. Pol had taken out his little gun and stood back behind the door. ‘Merde!’ he whispered.

  ‘Merde,’ said Murray, and opened the door.

  CHAPTER 4

  The corridor was empty. Murray walked to the end, round the corridor, reaching the two lifts: neither of which were at the floor. He touched both heat-sensitive call-buttons and waited. His watch said 3.37. Easy. Plenty of time.

  One of the lifts stopped and slid open. It was empty. He stepped in and touched the button for the ground floor. Piped music clinked softly round him. The door began to close and a man squeezed in — a tubby little man in a porkpie hat. They started down.

  ‘Pretty humid,’ the man said cheerfully: an American.

  Murray nodded. If there was one day in the year in Bangkok that wasn’t humid, it was worth a paragraph in the papers. The lift itself was distinctly chilly. Murray disliked lifts; he felt the same sense of exposed privacy in them as in a public lavatory. He stood watching the floor numbers lighting up, with irritating slowness, along the panel above the door: 6-5-4 —

  ‘You American?’ said the man in the porkpie hat.

  ‘No,’ said Murray. ‘I’m an Irish bum waiting for a break.’ The lift stopped. ‘And a good day on yah!’ he added, leaving the little man gaping after him.

  The lobby was less crowded now, with a dozy afternoon lull. No one even looked at him. The same clerk was on duty at the desk. Murray gave him ten baht and collected his camera and grip-bag; then at the last minute turned and started back up the open stairway to the Rama Cocktail Lounge. At the top he almost bumped into the tubby little American from the lift. The man smiled sheepishly, steering clear of him, round towards a wall of telephone booths.

  Murray went into the bar and spent a few minutes sucking a long brandy-and-soda through a straw; then started down again, with his camera and holdall, across the lobby and out into the sticky, storm-heavy afternoon. Hot gusts of wind stung his eyes as he hurried up to the corner of the block. The rain would begin at any moment.

  He spent an irritating five minutes waiting while two pale American youths on
Rest-and-Recuperation argued with the car hire reception girl about the relative merits of five cents per mileage for a Toyota sedan, against ten cents a mile for an American convertible. Murray had finally hustled in and told them to finish their discussion while he arranged his own deal, because he was in a damned great hurry. The boys had gawped at him, mumbled their apologies and stood aside. He had felt bad about it almost at once; they looked nice innocent country boys, perhaps battle-weary after many months in Vietnam, still strange to the ways of the big city. Later that evening they’d be in some frowsty clip-joint, drinking bad bourbon and yapping of their experiences — just like Sergeant Don Wace had done — to any stranger who would stop to listen.

  But he had soon forgotten about them, as he sat double-parked in a white beetle-backed Volkswagen about thirty yards up from the hotel entrance. It was raining hard now and the street was jammed with determined ranks of traffic, driven in laconic bursts of speed between shrieks of brakes. He had the windows rolled down and his jacket off, with the engine idling. Several taxis, of various makes, pulled up outside the hotel, exchanged fares and drove off. Trade, like the traffic, was brisk without being frantic.

  One minute to four o’clock. Rain splashed through the Volkswagen window, bringing a freshness to the dust-choked air. Poor, frail, ancient Bangkok, he thought: its golden spires crowded in with high-rise construction, its canals and Floating Market cemented over in an arid, treeless, sprawling extension of the Great Suburb Society.

  He looked up and went stiff all over.

  In the driving mirror a taxi had pulled up just a few yards behind him. It was a cream-coloured Toyota, and in the rear seat he could just make out, through the rain blurred windows, a chubby face under a porkpie hat. He thought rapidly: one insignificant American tourist among thousands, who’d ridden down in the lift with him, bumped into him by the bar, and had caught a taxi outside the hotel. Only his taxi wasn’t moving.