The Headmaster's Wager

by Vincent Lam

  “Just keep on walking,” said Percival, taking Laing Jai’s hand.

  Halfway to Cholon, cyclo drivers still refused to take them even this shorter distance. One driver said, “Eh, mister. No one is going to take the little métis. Not worth the trouble.” He cocked his head at a nearby patrol.

  When they finally saw Chen Hap Sing, it was almost dark. Laing Jai cheered up and asked what dishes the cook was making tonight. Could they have oyster omelettes? “Everyone has gone,” said Percival. “It is just the two of us now.”

  In the kitchen, Percival figured out how to light the burner, measured out a small amount of rice, and put it on the stove. When it was done, he put two salted fish on top. He watched the boy eat. He put Laing Jai to bed in his own room on the third floor, then lugged in another mattress and put it against the wall for himself. He went out to the balcony. Last night, the sky had been full of violence, now it was quiet. It was the same city as the day before, but washed new. He thought of Jacqueline’s voice on the telephone. Percival went back into his room, sat watching the sleeping boy breathe. His duty, and guilt, stood like a wire fence around his sorrow, hemmed it in.

  The next morning, the army trucks’ loudspeakers blared, “People of unified Vietnam, welcome the liberating soldiers with warmth and obedience. Illegal migrants from the countryside must return to their homes. People of unified Vietnam, welcome the liberating soldiers with warmth and obedience …” Each day, the same messages were broadcast. The ham and dried pork were soon gone. Soldiers went from house to house, searching and questioning. Percival went through the school’s books and hid a collection of them along with Dai Jai’s kung fu novels and Marvel comic books, under a loose floorboard in the family quarters. He hid the remaining cans of fish there, as well.

  A week after liberation, Percival heard banging on the doors of Chen Hap Sing. It was a group of soldiers. The officer in charge had no rifle or sidearm. He was armed with a notebook. He introduced himself to Percival as the new local can bo, the North Vietnamese political cadre, and offered no name. He asked Percival where he would like to conduct the registration interview.

  “What am I registering for?” said Percival.

  “For the right to exist,” said the can bo, and waved his soldiers into the school.

  Percival led the way to the school office. The can bo sat down at Percival’s desk, and Percival took the other chair. He heard the soldiers help themselves to the house, wandering through the halls, laughing and talking. The can bo lit a cigarette, did not offer one, put his notebook on the desk, opened it to a blank page of thin blue lines, and shot three questions at Percival—name, birthdate, occupation. He wrote the answers down in a small, neat script.

  “So you are a teacher, eh? How did you get this house? Why is it so large?”

  Percival said, “The house was my father’s. It became my school.”

  “Ah, then you were a business-owner.”

  “The headmaster of the school.”

  “Now it belongs to the people. It is Revolutionary School Number Thirty-Seven.” He flicked his cigarette ash on the floor. “You must have a lot of money. Did you steal it?” The can bo smiled.

  “My father built this house.”

  “Then he was wealthy.”

  “He built everything with his work. He started with nothing …” Percival felt an impulse to say that Chen Kai had left China poor, with nothing but his desire to search for the Gold Mountain, that somewhere along the way he had lost his true home while finding great wealth. He stopped himself, and said, “He was a poor farmer by birth.”

  “Who became rich by exploiting his brothers!” the can bo said triumphantly. “A capitalist! Your background is problematic …” He looked down and wrote in his notebook. “We will use the building for the good of the people.” The can bo stood and examined the finely worked window frame. “Were you a collaborator with imperialists? A war profiteer? Beware—already, your neighbours have told me a great deal.” He tapped the notebook with the pen. He motioned to the school’s safe. “Open it.” Percival spun the dials and opened the door. The can bo grinned, eyes wide at the stacks of money. He pulled them out, bundle after bundle, set aside the worthless piastres. Finally, he snapped, “Where are the dollars? The gold?”

  “I have been a loyal Vietnamese, a servant of the revolution!” Percival’s voice rose, and he hoped it sounded patriotic rather than fearful. “I have no interest in dollars or gold.”

  The can bo paused, surprised at this claim. He continued, “You Chinese! You are capitalist enemies of the working people who sucked the blood of this war.”

  Percival thought to point out that China itself had been communist for decades now, a circumstance Percival had once mistakenly chosen to ignore. Something in the way the can bo spat the word Chinese stopped him. Instead, he said, “Comrade, I am a servant of Vietnam.”

  “You may have been a servant of the old Vietnam. It is my job to make you a servant of the new Vietnam. I am told by your neighbours that there was an English school here, and that you charged a great deal of tuition.” The can bo sat at the desk, swept the piastres to the floor.

  Percival also sat. “I can explain.”

  “And that many of your students went to work for the Americans. Don’t you know that English is an imperialist language? Don’t you care about the history of the foreigners in this country, or even in your own land—China? You ignored this and collaborated with the white oppressors?” The can bo stubbed out his cigarette on Percival’s desk. “There is a two-week amnesty for confessions from police, army, and collaborators with the old foreign enemy. If you confess fully to your bourgeois crimes, you will be treated leniently. If we find after the amnesty that you hid anything, things will be more … uncomfortable for you,” said the can bo breathlessly.

  The door behind Percival opened. He recognized the footsteps. The can bo looked over at the boy in the doorway. Laing Jai slipped over to Percival and stood behind his chair, one hand gripping Percival’s shoulder. He said, “Baba, there are strange soldiers all over the house, I’m scared.”

  “Shh.”

  “Who is this?” said the can bo with disdain, craning his neck to see the boy. “Houseboy?” He spat on the floor. “Saigon is full of these half-breeds—we’ll fix that.”

  Laing Jai’s breath was quick as he buried his face in Percival’s neck. Percival said in a quavering voice, “I am a patriot, sir. I have been for years. I have been known as Deep Cover Agent B. It is in your own intelligence reports.” Now he would see if Mak had really done him this last favour, if he had sufficiently cleansed Percival’s background.

  The can bo laughed. “What is that riddle, Chinaman?”

  As Mak had intended to adjust Percival’s past, Percival must now complete the revision of his own history. Summoning the courage of luck as he would at the casino, Percival leaned forward, but not too far. “This school was a special intelligence project for the revolution. I ran it with my comrade, Mr. Mak. Top secret. How would my neighbours know? In fact, I’m not surprised, comrade, that you didn’t know I am a Viet Cong intelligence operative.” The can bo stopped writing and looked up. “Your rank is not high enough for you to have been briefed. Comrade Mak and I both joined the Viet Minh over thirty years ago, to oppose the Japanese. Later, we created the Percival Chen English Academy in order to place Viet Cong spies in the Americans’ Saigon offices.” If anything would save Percival and Laing Jai, it was Mak’s work. And Cho’s. Percival tried to channel Mak’s deft confidence, and the vocabulary of recent loudspeaker broadcasts, as best he could. “In Tet of 1968, we had such high hopes of victory. We cried bitterly to see the flowers of revolution wilted, and so many of our comrades slain by the imperialists. With that temporary setback, however, our resolve to overthrow the oppressors only grew stronger. We continued the patriotic fight against the corrupt capitalist puppet regimes.”

  The officer’s expression softened a little, and he selected an unlit cigarette
, said nothing.

  Percival continued, “Thank you, comrade, for coming to complete the liberation. I have dreamed of this day.” He told the can bo of their most inspired initiative, to gain special recognition from the Americans for the Percival Chen English Academy so that they would have direct access to all the most sensitive American jobs in Saigon and could place spies everywhere. He added, “With such good connections, anyone would have found it strange if we did not charge a very high tuition.”

  “Hmm …” said the can bo.

  “How I rejoice to see the armies of the people in victory. This is a joyous day!” Percival grasped for the right language. In the sea, one must swim. He hoped the trickle of sweat down his temple did not betray his fear. Percival kept on talking, reminded himself to speak slowly lest he stumble over his own words, lavishing the account with any details that came to mind.

  Finally, the can bo interrupted and asked, “Where is this supposed comrade, Mr. Mak? I would like to debrief him also.”

  “He has been missing since the liberation.” Percival pushed down the image of the burned car. “He might be deep undercover, rooting out any remaining counter-revolutionaries. I look forward to celebrating with him.”

  “We will look into it,” said the Northerner. His pen scratched the notebook. He lit the second cigarette. This time, he held out the pack to offer one. Percival refused. The can bo filled a page in his little book with notes in a tiny hand. When he finished his second smoke, he said, “The things you say are intriguing. They will require verification. Everyone in the neighbourhood says that you lived an indulgent capitalist life.”

  “Part of the ruse. How better to avoid suspicion than to live like those who were American puppets? In service of the revolution,” said Percival as if this were the most obvious and trivial thing. He felt the same shiver that he knew from laying down a large bet on a bad hand. He smiled. “I am certain,” Percival continued, “that in your patriotic intelligence branch of the North Vietnamese Army, there are many reports referring to our work as Southern Viet Cong spies. These will confirm what I am telling you, comrade.”

  The can bo took out a sheaf of papers that had been mimeographed in purplish blue ink. He wrote Percival’s name on one, signed it, and handed it across the desk. “This is your residency permit. You will need it for food. Without a permit you are subject to deportation to the countryside. We will get rid of most of you Chinese, because Saigon is for the Vietnamese. Ho Chi Minh City, that is. If you are really a patriot, perhaps we will have to allow you to stay. If you lied to me, you will regret it. Don’t lose your permit.”

  Percival looked down at the paper and read his name. He held it out. “Comrade, do the names of children go on the permits as well?”

  “We do not register half-breeds. They have no place in the new society. Tell your houseboy to get out of here, to vanish.”

  “He is my son.”

  “What?” The can bo snatched the paper back.

  “I have served the—”

  He held Percival’s permit up, taut between two hands, about to rip it in half. “In any case, I don’t think you need him registered, do you?”

  “General Cho would be so upset if anything happened to him,” Percival said, “for he is very fond of Laing Jai.” He felt the tingle of doubling up a wager on a bad hand. Sometimes this was the trick, to take a bet too far, so far that no one could think it a bluff. “Whatever—I don’t care. Rip that up. I’ll get another and have General Cho speak to your commanding officer.”

  The can bo relaxed his grip on the paper. “General Cho?”

  “Laing Jai is his great favourite. Cho was in command of our special project. Mak and I reported directly to him.” Percival spoke as quickly as he could think. “My son often delivered our briefings to him—who would suspect a young boy of carrying intelligence papers? Cho always gave him sweets.”

  “I’ve heard of the Viet Cong General Cho, that he has a temper.”

  “Yes, then you know who I mean?” said Percival. The flush of good luck was palpable. “A bitter temper. My son is one of the few people he has a soft heart for, I don’t know why.”

  The can bo put the paper on the desk, scrawled Laing Jai’s name, and handed Percival the residency permit. “Consider this permit temporary. We will verify your story.” He stood. “You may keep one room, after I choose one for myself. I am going to tour my new school.” He left the office and went down the hallway. Once he was gone, Laing Jai threw his arms around Percival. He did not cry, but only held on to Percival tightly.

  Percival whispered, “It’s alright. Baba will take care of you.”

  The can bo chose Percival’s third-floor room with its handsome balcony overlooking the square. He took the old school office for his own. Percival and Laing Jai retreated to Dai Jai’s room, and the can bo’s unit of special political soldiers occupied the rest of the building. The next day, they carted out the English school books and American magazines and burned them in a bonfire in the square. The loudspeakers directed everyone who had American and French books or magazines to bring them and burn them in the fire or face harsh penalties later. Percival secretly removed his hidden stash of books and canned fish to Dai Jai’s room. He saw that the soldiers wrote down the names of everyone who brought books for burning, lists for future reference.

  THE MIMEOGRAPHED RESIDENCY PERMIT ENTITLED PERCIVAL and Laing Jai to a weekly ration of food, one kilo of rice and a cabbage each. At the site of the old post office, which had been made the food depot, Percival lined up at dawn to be sure to get their ration. The cabbages were often rotting. There were usually stones in the rice. Percival read books with Laing Jai, hoping that his grandson might lose himself in the pages, careful to put a Vietnamese cover over English books in case one of the soldiers who now lived in the house happened to come into their room. Percival went out once a day—he had no money to buy anything, no reason to see anyone, but he loitered around the cafes to hear the gossip. If he recognized someone from the old days, they might exchange a quiet nod at a distance. Since they had known each other as capitalists and profiteers—though they had once called themselves businessmen—they did not acknowledge one another openly.

  He wrote to Cecilia, to explain what had happened to Dai Jai. His story was safe for any censor to read. Their son had died as a soldier of the liberating Northern army. For a while there was no response, and Percival wondered whether this was because she had written something that the censors had seized, or simply that she had found nothing to say to her ex-husband. Then, after a few months, Percival received a brief note to thank him for his recent correspondence, nothing else. His mail had been forwarded to Cecilia in America. There was a return address in Brooklyn. He penned an equally short note wishing her all the best and saying that he was glad she was pursuing her dreams. Percival did not write about Laing Jai’s true paternity. If he ever saw Cecilia again, he would explain the rest.

  Jacqueline had been right about Vietnam’s fate. Percival kept Laing Jai in the house. Abandoned métis children scurried in the shadows of the streets and alleyways, filthy and skinny, begging and stealing to live. In the morning, they were often found dead from the army patrols’ night-time abuses.

  Once in a while, Laing Jai asked about America, whether his mother had sent any letters and when they would go to join her. “Soon,” Percival always answered. “Very soon.” The boy spoke as if he were certain that Jacqueline was waiting for them in America. Percival was unsure whether Laing Jai actually believed this, or whether he said it because it was the best thing for him to believe. He did not contradict the boy.

  When Percival saw that Laing Jai’s spirits were low, he would open a can of fish for him in their room, and remind him to keep it secret. Later, he would sneak the empty tin out in order to dispose of it discreetly. Week after week, Percival and Laing Jai saw trucks arrive in the square to be loaded with people who had been told to report for re-education in the countryside. The Northern soldie
rs checked names off lists, slammed shut the tailgates of the trucks, and drove away. A few former teachers from the Percival Chen English Academy were assigned to teach in the new Revolutionary School Number Thirty-Seven. Others, those who had larger houses or came from more prosperous families, or perhaps just spoke with a little too much confidence, were ordered to report for re-education. Some mornings, Percival watched as someone he knew, a former teacher or student, peered at Chen Hap Sing from the back of a North Vietnamese Army truck, a wordless goodbye in their eyes. He dared not wave. He wanted to turn away, but felt obliged to at least watch them go. Meanwhile, Percival heard occasionally of other former students who received good positions in the new government—they were those who Mak had placed as Saigon spies.

  In Chen Hap Sing’s classrooms, the new Revolutionary School Number Thirty-Seven taught Marxism, classical Vietnamese poetry, and political confession to the neighbourhood children. There was no question of sending Laing Jai. In political confession class, the can bo sat and took note of the things children said about their parents.

  By autumn, no one had returned from their two weeks of re-education in the countryside. One did not ask after people who had not been seen for a while. Such queries led to a re-education order. By the anniversary of the liberation, everyone knew someone who had fled by sea, or who had either died or been arrested trying to do so. In the old days, trouble could be avoided by slipping away to Phnom Penh, but now Percival heard that the killing was even worse in Cambodia than in Vietnam.

  Once the lists of the politically questionable were exhausted, the can bo turned his attention to deporting would-be escapees. He began to fill the trucks with people who had tried to ride bicycles out of Cholon towards the coast at night, people who had attempted to engage snakeheads who were really political soldiers in disguise, families who hid themselves in the trunks of cars heading east, or those who had sought out coastal charts or waterproof compasses. Their gold was confiscated, their houses given to soldiers and officials, and they were put on trucks bound for the jungle camps. Even so, there were the whispered rumours of escape, that someone’s uncle or brother had sent word, having escaped by boat to Thailand and found his way to San Francisco, or Montreal, or Marseille.