In just minutes, the Pathet Lao fighters were gone.
Lincoln knew that didn’t mean they were all dead. But they had gone to ground, which would make them harder to find and to kill.
He moved into the front of the pack, trying to show his men that he was equally fearless. There had been many times in his life that he had been sure he was going to die—even, in his early days at the orphanage, before he really understood what that meant. But he hadn’t died then, and he figured that if he had survived the upbringing he’d had, there must have been a reason for it.
The Pathet Lao camp was surprisingly quiet for the moment. Lincoln’s men listened for signs of the enemy, but the enemy was laying low. Then a single crack sounded and a round streaked so close to Lincoln’s cheek, he thought he could feel the heat. It landed harmlessly in the dirt behind him. One of the Hmong soldiers pointed at a ground-level window in a nearby building—presumably a basement. It was open just a crack, but wide enough for a rifle barrel.
Lincoln fired a burst into the window, to discourage a second attempt, then sprinted to it. He stood to the side, stuck his AR’s barrel through the shattered glass, and sprayed lead inside. An abrupt cry made him think at least one of his bullets had found its mark.
“Spread out!” he called to his men, wishing Koob were beside him to translate. “Eyes open! The Pathet could be anywhere.”
Some of the Hmong seemed to understand, and they shared with the rest. The pack broke apart, men going in every direction. Soon Lincoln heard doors being kicked in, and sporadic gunfire indicating that hidden soldiers had been discovered.
He entered a barracks, a long, narrow building with twin rows of bunks. Sunlight slanted in through windows lining one side. All appeared still, but the dust motes floating in the bars of light close to one window danced madly.
Lincoln lowered himself to a crouch and eyed the spaces under the bunks. His gaze could only go so far on the left side, because at a bunk there—directly across from the window where the dust had still not settled—a footlocker had been dragged from its space at the end of the bunk and turned sideways between two. Peeking out from behind it, Lincoln saw a trembling boot.
“You can surrender,” he said, aiming his weapon at the footlocker. “Or you can die. Your choice.”
He waited. He had not really thought about what to do with prisoners of war, if there were any. He would have to have the Hmong hold them for the Laotian army, and he would have to make himself scarce when they were collected. But where they could be held was another question. Vang Khom had no jails, and he doubted if any of the other villages did. They might have to turn this camp into a prison camp and appoint Hmong warriors as jailers.
The man hiding behind the footlocker hadn’t responded, and Lincoln’s patience was growing short. “I’ll count to three,” he said. “One . . . two . . . two and a half . . .”
At that moment, the Pathet Lao soldier’s rifle barrel swung into view around the other side of the footlocker from the boot. Lincoln opened fire the instant he saw it. The Pathet soldier screamed and lurched to his feet, his right hand mangled and bleeding. He tried to raise the weapon with his left, and Lincoln finished him with a quick burst to the midsection.
All around him, he heard the sounds of similar encounters. A shot here, a volley there. He guessed things were being wrapped up. But he still had a last responsibility to address.
Back outside, he worked his way toward what had been Colonel Phan’s headquarters building. The camp had grown considerably, but he didn’t think that structure had been repurposed. If he was going to find Colonel Sun, it would be there.
• • •
The level of resistance Lincoln met convinced him he was on the right path. Not all the Pathet Lao soldiers had given up or gone into hiding; close to the headquarters building they still held ground and acted as if they planned to keep it. Lincoln had to advance little by little, taking out opponents where he could. He took a bullet in the left arm, a through-and-through that cost some blood but would hurt more later than it did in the moment.
He hurled a grenade into that pocket of soldiers and kept going. More popped up from behind sandbags. He dropped them with a spray from his AR and continued forward through the billowing smoke. The entire camp seemed to be veiled with smoke from all the guns and fires, and he knew he would smell it for days, that and gun oil and the metallic tang of spent brass and spilled blood.
Lincoln fought until no one stood between him and the building. He didn’t know what waited inside, but he was bone-tired and ready to finish this task, whatever it took. He kicked open the door and stepped aside, expecting a burst of fire to come his way. It didn’t. Was he too late? Had Sun escaped?
Cautiously, Lincoln peered inside. Only one man stood there, in full officer’s uniform, his spine ramrod straight. He was short and squat, and under other circumstances Lincoln might have thought him a small-town butcher or perhaps a middle manager. His face was open and might have seemed friendly, though at the moment it was composed, without obvious expression.
He held a pistol in his left hand, but if he had any other weapons, Lincoln couldn’t see them. The pistol was held loosely at his side, not pointed at Lincoln. Lincoln didn’t make the same mistake—he centered his barrel on the officer’s midsection.
“Come in,” the man said in English. “You are the American, yes? The one everyone talks about.”
“I didn’t know people talked about an American,” Lincoln said. He wouldn’t commit to his identity, even if it were just the two of them here. He couldn’t be sure they weren’t being recorded or perhaps transmitted to the north.
“Of course. We know all about you. We wait only for verifiable evidence before broadcasting your illegal presence to the world.”
“You’re Colonel Sun, I take it?”
“I am. And you are Lincoln. Like your president.”
That surprised Lincoln even more. He tried not to let on, to keep his face as settled as the colonel’s.
“I’m offerin’ you the chance to surrender,” Lincoln said. “And to tell the rest of your men to surrender, too. If they don’t, the Hmong will kill them all.” From outside, another volley of shots sounded. “Better do it fast.”
“We don’t surrender,” Sun said.
“Plenty of your men have deserted in these last couple of weeks.”
“They were cowards. They are not fit to serve.”
“One way to look at it, I guess.”
“You are going to shoot me?”
Lincoln shrugged. “You don’t surrender, I don’t have much choice.”
“There is one other way,” the colonel said.
“What’s that? I’m not surrenderin’ to you, if that’s what you have in mind.”
Sun smiled briefly and held up his pistol. “This.”
It took Lincoln a moment to understand what he meant. “What about . . . oh. You’d rather do it that way?”
“Yes,” Sun said. He nodded toward the door. “A moment’s privacy?”
Lincoln was torn. Walking out the door and leaving an armed enemy alone seemed like a bad idea. But he couldn’t think of anything it could hurt. If Colonel Sun had wired the camp with explosives and had a detonator hidden inside, he probably would already have used it.
Finally, he shrugged, checked outside to make sure it was safe, then stepped out and pulled the door closed.
He was there for only seconds before he heard a gunshot from inside the building, followed by a rustling slide and a thump. He threw the door open again.
Sun was crumpled by the wall where he’d been standing, a spray of blood and brains on the wall and ceiling above him and a streak down the wall he’d left on his way to his resting spot.
Outside, the sounds had changed from sporadic gunshots to celebration. The camp had fallen; the Hmong were in charge. With that victory, the crucial crossroads was back in friendly hands as well.
Lincoln went out again and was hailed by hi
s Hmong warriors as a hero. He let himself relax, allowed a smile to cross his face.
It wouldn’t last long.
40
* * *
Lincoln left a small force of men at the former Pathet camp to defend it and bury the dead, and headed up the mountain to Vang Khom with the rest. There would be feasting, drinking, the slaughter of buffalo. Women who had lost their men would wail their sorrow, but those cries would be drowned out by the celebrating. Lincoln guessed he would have to requisition more ammo, not just because of the battle but because the men would fire off whatever was left as they partied late into the night.
When they reached the village, a light rain had started to fall, though the massing of dark clouds in the near distance warned that it would get heavier.
Lincoln broke into a jog. It had been too long since he had seen Sho, held her. He’d had moments during the fight when he wondered if he ever would again. But he had survived, and his house was just ahead. He was a little surprised she hadn’t come out when she’d heard the sound of the returning army, but then he thought about some of the things that could signify, and they mostly had to do with her being naked and waiting for him. He ran faster and burst through the door. “Sho!” he called. “I’m back!”
The inside was dark, and his eyes needed a few moments to adjust after climbing in bright sunlight. There was a strange, coppery smell, but he thought that was him; his sleeve was drenched in blood from his arm wound.
It wasn’t, though.
She lay on the bed, her clothes torn, her head tilted back, her arms and legs splayed out, her beautiful brown eyes open but sightless. Her throat was a gory red slash.
“No!” he cried, falling to his knees and scooping her into his arms. “Sho! Sho!”
She was already cool; life had been gone from her for a while. He pressed his forehead against her, his tears splashing onto her supple flesh.
He didn’t know how long he stayed like that, releasing great sobs that racked his spine and made his chest ache. After a while, his thoughts turned in a darker direction. Who had done this, and why? Somebody would pay, and pay dearly.
Finally, he tore himself away from her and went outside again. People had gathered in the rain, drawn by the sounds he’d made. Worried faces turned up toward his.
“Sho’s been killed,” Lincoln said, struggling to keep his voice even. “I want to know who did it. Someone here knows.”
A couple of English speakers translated for the rest, and within moments, loud, wailing cries soared up toward the heavens. No one came forward with information, though.
“Who did it?” Lincoln thundered. He came down from his house and went to the next one, kicking out one of the stilts from beneath a front corner. “I’ll tear this fuckin’ piece-of-shit village to the ground, piece by piece!”
“No, Lincoln!” It was Pos, shoving his way through the growing crowd. “Do not hurt the village! We’ll help! We’ll find the killer!”
“I want his ass in front of me now,” Lincoln said. “Right now. Whoever knows who it is better fuckin’ turn him over.”
Pos said something that Lincoln assumed was a desperate appeal for information. He saw only people looking uncertain, confused. No one volunteered anything useful. He kicked over another stilt, and the whole house lurched forward. The door swung open and contents spilled onto the ground: cookware, rubber sandals, a jar of water that trickled into the dirt.
Lincoln knew he was threatening the wrong people—most of these men had been in the battle with him, and the butchery done to Sho didn’t look like a woman’s work. But he was out of ideas, too frantic to think clearly.
Finally, he turned away from them and stormed toward Mai’s hut. She was Sho’s best friend; maybe she knew something.
By this point, word had spread throughout the village. Everywhere he went, people eyed him with pity or fear or something in between, and they whispered among themselves as he passed. “Mai!” he called as he neared her place. “Mai!”
Nobody answered. He yanked open her door and stepped inside without waiting for an invitation. She was on the bed, curled up in an almost fetal position, and for one horrible instant he was afraid she had been killed, too. Then he saw her back and shoulders hitching, heard her soft sobs.
“Mai, damn it,” he said. He grabbed her shoulder and pulled her around, onto her back. She tried to writhe away, but he held her down. “What the fuck is going on around here?”
She relaxed a little, lowered her hands from her face.
That’s when he saw what had become of it. Her lips were mashed and pulpy. She had a black eye, and the left side of her face was a mass of bruises. He wasn’t sure, but he thought her cheekbone might have been broken on that side. Bruises encircled her throat, and more stood out on her upper arms.
“What happened to you?” Lincoln asked. “What . . . Sho is . . .”
He couldn’t finish his sentences. Sho and Mai, both brutalized. It was too much. He didn’t understand. He said the only words he could manage, asking the only question that seemed important. “Who did it?”
She wrenched out of his grip and turned back toward the wall. Less gently than before, Lincoln grabbed her and turned her around again. “Goddamnit, Mai, who did this? Who killed Sho?”
Mai exploded into loud sobs and curled into his arms. He held her, realizing he would have to wait until she calmed enough to remember her English. Every now and then he prodded her, stroking her head or drying her tears with his fingers. “I know, I know,” he said quietly. “I feel the same way. Whoever did this is gonna fuckin’ pay, Mai, I promise you that. I promise you.”
After a long while, she got hold of her emotions. “Corbett,” she said softly.
Lincoln wasn’t sure he’d heard right. “Corbett? Corbett hurt you?”
“Yes,” Mai said. “Corbett.”
“But why? He loved you!” But even as he said it, he remembered what Sho had told him. Corbett hit Mai sometimes. He had a violent temper. “What happened?”
Mai sniffed, wiped her nose on her dress. “He say . . . he said he would kill Sammy when he goes back to U.S.”
“Sammy?” Lincoln echoed, confused. “Sammy who?”
“Sho said Sammy is your father.”
“He’s gonna kill my father? Why? He doesn’t even know my father!”
Lincoln realized abruptly that he didn’t know that for sure. Corbett made regular trips back to the world, usually to sell heroin. He had asked Lincoln about his family in the past. He knew Sammy’s name and his position in the New Bordeaux underworld.
“He knows him,” Mai said. “He said Sammy talked to him like he was a child. Said Sammy insulted him. Nobody insults Corbett, he said. He will go back and kill Sammy.”
“I still don’t—where does Sho fit into all this? And why did he hurt you?”
“After he told me that, he hit me some, then got drunk. Fell asleep here in bed. I worried, so I told Sho what he said. Sho said Sammy is your father, that she had to tell you. When I came back here, Corbett was gone. I was glad. After a little time, his plane went away.”
“So he didn’t leave right when he woke up? You came back here and he was gone, but it was a while before he left? How long?”
“Not a long time. But not short.”
“So you think he killed Sho?”
“Maybe he heard me talk to her? Hid until I come back here, then killed her, then left?”
It had probably happened in just that way, Lincoln thought. Corbett hadn’t been as passed out as Mai thought. When she left the house, he followed. The bamboo structures were far from soundproof, and Corbett spoke Hmong. He could have hidden by Lincoln’s longhouse and listened to the conversation. He would have known that Sho would tell Lincoln as soon as he returned to the village but would have also believed that, since he had already brutalized Mai and killed her best friend, she wouldn’t dare say anything to Lincoln, or anyone else. Besides, killing Mai would have cast even more suspicion on
him. Once he had murdered Sho, he would have wanted to get airborne in a hurry, in case someone found her.
But where would he have gone from here? Vang Khom was usually in the middle of his rounds, not the beginning but far from the end. Not only did he have to make more official stops before returning to Saigon or Vientiane, he would want to pick up more poppies and distribute more heroin money, too.
Would murder have changed those plans? Lincoln didn’t think so. He believed Corbett to be utterly amoral. Snuffing out the life of a Hmong woman wouldn’t seem like much of a crime, particularly compared to killing Lincoln’s adopted father. Corbett could probably do both murders, then come back to Vang Khom acting like Lincoln’s best friend.
Lincoln could wait for his return and take his vengeance then.
But that would risk Sammy’s life. And he didn’t want his revenge served cold. It burned inside him, like he had swallowed coals straight from the fire.
He wanted his hands on Corbett’s throat, now.
“I’ll be back,” he said. He ran from the hut and toward the village center, calling for Pos. In another few moments, he was explaining his plan. “Get on the radio,” he said. “Find out where Corbett landed after he was here, and if he’s still there, let me know. Immediately!”
Pos nodded his understanding. Lincoln would rather have trusted Koob with this, but he had no reason to think that Pos wouldn’t do his best.
Waiting was the hard part. He couldn’t be sure how much time had elapsed since Sho’s murder and Corbett’s departure. Even the few Hmong who wore watches didn’t seem to pay any attention to them. Lincoln had, for a while, admired a life that was at once so busy and so slow that the passage of time hardly mattered. Now, he felt like every minute was an eternity, because every second that passed meant Corbett might be getting farther away.
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