If you have enjoyed opium, gentlemen, you will love the remedy that our bastard offspring of East and West has for you. Boy! The Ronin snapped his fingers. Boy! BOY!
Through the muddle of my mind, or minds, I realized he was speaking to ME.
What are you doing just standing there, boy? Take the remedy around to the gentlemen!
As I made my rounds among the so-called gentlemen, who smirked at me as they partook of the sugar in the golden bowl, the Ronin said, Now, gentlemen, we begin! Ready to bid for your first choice? [The gentlemen cheered in assent.] Let’s bring this delightful doll up before you—step right here, on the pedestal, my dear—the Dragon Lady herself, an exquisite Annamite angel wearing the traditional ao dai that so many of us remember so fondly. But, in this case, without the pants. Annamite girls are not at all like our women, gentlemen, and frankly, that’s a good thing. [The gentlemen laughed uproariously.] They are becoming too much like men. [The gentlemen harrumphed in agreement.] Fortunately, these temptresses have never heard of “feminism,” and if they did, they certainly do not care for it. So, we have this seductress of the Mekong Delta, who tempts you not only with her body but with great peril—the peril of falling in love with her! Gentlemen, who will be the lucky man that will savor this delectable tropical dragon fruit first? Will she be your Annamite angel or your Dragon Lady?
The men started calling out their bids, and I despised them for their ignorance. Madeleine was not even an Annamite or a Vietnamese. Oh, Madeleine! She smiled and, at the Ronin’s command, slowly pivoted on one high-heeled shoe and rotated on the side table so that all the men could see her from every angle in her red ao dai with the golden dragon flaming across its torso. Someone groaned, and it was me.
Do you see what I see, gentlemen? the Ronin cried. The beauty! The beauty!
When the beauty completed her rotation, I saw once more her smile and her eyes, neither of which moved a millimeter. The men hooted and hollered like members of British Parliament in a contentious session, calling out their bids until finally I was embarrassed to be a part of the same species as they were, or at least the same gender. At last the winner leaped up—the white-haired legionnaire in a tropical summer uniform, with the option of shorts instead of trousers. He offered Madeleine his hand and she stepped down, eyes to the ground, and when she looked up she saw me staring. She beckoned, and when I came up to her, she whispered, I’ll take some of what you have. When I hesitated, she glared at me and hissed, What are you waiting for? Give it to me! It’s the only way I’m going to get through this night.
So I gave her the remedy, but was there ever going to be enough of the remedy to be a cure, for her or for me? Sartre said that “the European has only been able to become a man through creating slaves and monsters,” and if so, what were these girls? What was I? Perhaps I was not just a righteous bastard, enraged at being cast by the European in this dehumanizing manner. Perhaps I was also a rotten bastard who took comfort in these roles, since they gave me the chance to deny that I, too, had become a man in that most reliable of ways, through populating my imagination with my very own slaves and monsters.
When the auction concluded and the lights dimmed, I wandered past the couples and trios settled into the candle-lit couches, divans, pillows, chaises, and beds scattered throughout the parlor, the library, the billiards room, the several bedrooms, and the terrace with its view of the city lights and the dark shape of the erection-inspired Eiffel Tower. Over the course of the evening, which ran until dawn, the men and the girls consumed enough of the remedy to kill an adult African elephant, or at least render one unconscious. I did my best to help, sniffing a white line here and there when no one was looking, which was often, as the men were focused on being perverts while the girls were dutifully being perverted. The only time any of the men said anything to me was when the sheikh paused long enough for a few sniffs of the remedy and gave me a ferocious grin and a slap on the arm. Amazing stuff, my boy! I tried not to be disturbed by the necklace of human ears around his neck, which on closer inspection were dried peaches. Absolutely amazing! A man can live and die like this! Bunga bunga!
And so the hours crept past, for there was nothing more boring than to watch other people have fun, if the girls could be said to be having fun. I considered myself a worldly man who had seen a wide range of human sexual behavior, but I had never seen anything like this. Then again, I was just a colonized provincial, not ready for this level of civilization, which would not have made the Marquis de Sade even blush. Finally, sometime near dawn, I found myself in the master bedroom of the third level, where the big game hunter was sitting in an armchair in his safari garb, the pale tuber of his erection sticking out from his unzipped pants, while he aimed his hunting rifle at the brunette and the redhead on the emperor-sized bed, peering through the scope.
That’s it, girls! he shouted, his forehead damp with sweat. That’s hot!
The room was indeed groin temperature. I was so exhausted and overheated I felt dizzy, the vertigo forcing me to sit down in the corner. Was the remedy causing my wooziness? Or was the remedy the cure? To decide, I inhaled another white line, then one more. But before I could divine whether the remedy caused or cured, the big game hunter spotted me. Get up, boy! Get up! He swiveled and aimed his weapon at me, the crosshairs of his scope fixed between my eyes, and I tried to rise. But I couldn’t get up any more than I could get it up, so what the hell . . . who gave a fuck . . . it’s just the same old shit . . . I give up . . . I sucked up another dose of the remedy, closed my eyes, and waited, sobbing, for the big game hunter to pull his trigger.
CHAPTER 17
After the sun finally rose, its light revealed that the Eastern and Western Hemispheres of my divided brains remained joined in my head. The big game hunter had not actually loaded his gun, which hadn’t prevented him from giggling and squeezing the trigger a few times. What fun! The Boss laughed a great deal when he showed me this scene in his observation post, located in the locked garret where he had remained ensconced the entire night. The garret was crowded with monitors and videotape machines, connected by braids of wires that disappeared into the walls and were connected to cameras hidden throughout the fabulous apartment.
Where did you get all this? I asked.
My friend, the old Indochina hand, the Ronin said. A real pal ever since ’54, when I handed him the Laos-to-Saigon opium route.
While I stood in the doorway, the Ronin had flopped onto the only other free seat besides the pair occupied by the Boss and his luscious secretary, who looked, as always, bored, not to mention hot, in the figurative sense. Like the sun, she bothered everyone except herself with her hotness.
Where’s the coffee? the Boss said, without looking away from the monitors.
The luscious secretary unfolded her legs in slow motion. Beauty and youth are transitory—it’s what’s inside that matters—it’s character that truly counts and defines a person—but those smooth, gleaming legs and everything they led to blew up my platitudes and caused the little bubble of my remaining testosterone to rise in the thermometer of my body until it reached the bulb of my head and my eyes swelled in their sockets. The Ronin and I watched her leave, and the Ronin sighed and said, Even after this night, I’m still ready for some of that. No offense, Boss.
The Boss merely grunted and continued fast-forwarding through the videotape. Take a look at this, he said finally, hitting play.
The scene reeled forth in black and white, the black-robed priest sitting on an armchair with one of the white slave girls. Brilliant! the Ronin said. He was high enough to skydive, propelled to that altitude by repeatedly refilling his tank with the remedy. She’s confessing! I love this guy. Don’t you love this guy? Tell me you love this guy.
What are you going to do with these tapes? I said. It was a semi-rhetorical question, because the answer was obvious, but I wanted the details.
The Boss, after sneering at m
y seeming lack of comprehension, said, What these guys paid to be here makes us a nice small profit, but what they will pay—eventually—to keep these tapes from leaking is where the real money is.
Ah, capitalism! the Ronin said, just as the luscious secretary returned with the coffee. As it dripped ever so slowly, the Ronin stripped the luscious secretary with his eyes. The greatest coffee in the world! he proclaimed. This is one way we Vietnamese have bettered the French.
It was remarkable how much easier it was for the Ronin to become Vietnamese than for me to become French. But I did not say this out loud. No one wanted to hear from me anyway, because everybody was watching the priest.
He’s disgusting, the luscious secretary said. Why did you invite a priest? He’s not going to have any money.
Just because he’s a priest doesn’t mean he doesn’t have money, I said.
The luscious secretary looked at me the way the young glance at the old, the way the rich regard the poor, the way incredibly attractive females dismiss males no longer competitive in the sexual hunt. She killed me with that look, a mix of pity diluted by amusement and spiked with contempt, and while the best thing for me to do would have been just to die, my lips kept moving.
He could come from a wealthy family, but probably more useful is his store of secrets, I said, my well-trained fingers immediately finding the pulse of a plot. Can you imagine what a priest hears in his confessional, especially if he ministers to the elites?
The Crazy Bastard’s right, the Boss said. This guy hears the confessions of the wealthy and powerful. I want to hear the confessions of the wealthy and powerful. And since I’m sure he doesn’t want anyone seeing this, he’s going to tell me what those confessions are.
On the monitor, the priest was committing a most unholy act with his rosary beads. I had never prayed the rosary, and never again would I see a rosary in the same way after witnessing the priest diabolically desecrate the beads.
I can’t look, said the luscious secretary, turning her eyes away.
That’s only because you’re Catholic, the Ronin said with a leer.
It’s because I’m a woman.
Shut up, the Boss said. He ejected the tape and passed it to the luscious secretary, who labeled it PRIEST WITH WHITE SLAVE GIRL. The new videotape that the Boss put in featured BFD with Madeleine.
This guy’s nonstop, said the Ronin.
Very impressive, the Boss agreed. I have some respect for him after watching him tonight.
Yeah, but his thing looks like . . . like . . . a mushroom, said the luscious secretary.
No one said a word, for what cannot be spoken of must be passed over in silence.
What is that? I asked, squinting.
Foie gras, said the Ronin.
Oh my God, the luscious secretary groaned. I’m going to vomit. What a creep.
The Boss chuckled. Aren’t we all? he said, stirring his coffee. Looks like we have what we need. This tape we’ll let age like fine wine. It’ll be worth much, much more if BFD is as talented in politics as he thinks he is.
Mayor of Paris one day? the Ronin said. A cabinet minister?
Molotov! the Boss said, raising his glass.
Molotov? asked the Ronin.
Isn’t that what the Jews say for congratulations?
Mazel tov, the luscious secretary said. You mean mazel tov.
The Boss shrugged. I like Molotov better.
I secured the videotapes in a suitcase and carried them to the trunk of the Boss’s car, waiting outside with Le Cao Boi behind the wheel. He drove with me in the passenger seat and the Ronin and the Boss in the back, and we headed toward the warehouse under a midmorning sun because, as the Boss said, I want to finish this fucking business before Fantasia tonight. Le Cao Boi popped in a cassette that the Ronin gave him, which was how I was introduced to the songs of Jacques Dutronc, who was much better than Johnny Hallyday, although some of his lines initially made me pause.
Sept cent millions de chinois
Et moi, et moi, et moi
What did the Chinese have to do with anything? Well, c’est la vie, as Dutronc sang at the end of each stanza, after counting Indonesians, blacks, and even Vietnamese. C’est la vie. So French! So charming! The only thing missing was a stanza to bastards, which was odd, given that Dutronc sang about Soviets and Martians and the imperfect and the starving, if I heard correctly. Surely there must be tens of millions of bastards the world over, an alien diaspora enormous enough to be its own motley nation. But did I even need a nation? I myself was nobody if not a nation, and if so, I needed no nation but my imagination.
The problem was that sometimes I had not used my imagination enough. The most shocking videotape of all made this clear, even though it depicted no carnal acts. It simply showed two of the girls alone, which would normally be hydrogen-bomb hot, except that these two were just . . . talking? I had turned up the volume to hear what the brunette and the redhead were saying, the first bit of dialogue on the videotapes not involving fornication, copulation, or just plain intercourse.
PALESTINIAN FREEDOM FIGHTER
That idiot dressed up as a sheikh—his
was shaped like a broken finger.
VIET CONG GUERRILLA
Oh God. He made me eat one of those ears
around his neck.
PALESTINIAN FREEDOM FIGHTER
Sick bastard!
VIET CONG GUERRILLA
What about the general? I couldn’t find his
past his belly.
PALESTINIAN FREEDOM FIGHTER
Well, I found it, darling. It looked
like raw hamburger.
When the guerrilla and freedom fighter burst into laughter, the Boss said, Disgusting. The luscious secretary smirked, but before she could say anything, the Boss said, Shut up.
VIET CONG GUERRILLA
Have some more of the remedy. It helps.
PALESTINIAN FREEDOM FIGHTER
So—good. Um, so good.
VIET CONG GUERRILLA
And at least it’s free.
PALESTINIAN FREEDOM FIGHTER
Well, give me some more!
VIET CONG GUERRILLA
Just count the money in your head. That’s
what I do.
Then Aladdin entered the frame and the Palestinian freedom fighter and the Viet Cong guerrilla turned their faces to him with glowing smiles. Their eyes automatically descended from his blackened face to his exposed manhood, which was naturally, utterly, and completely white.
Oh my God! whispered the luscious secretary. It’s shaped like an egg.
Somewhere between avenue Hoche and the warehouse, I fell asleep. The Ronin woke me by slapping me in the face—lightly—after the car was parked. You’re the youngest here and you can’t even stay awake, he said, leaning close and peering into my eyes. Just because you stayed up one night? All you did was walk around with the remedy and the hashish! I was banging girls all night long and that is not easy work, my weak-kneed friend. When I pointed out that I was only invited to serve as the Cholon drug dealer, the Ronin shrugged. That’s because you hadn’t earned the opportunity yet, my friend. We earn our opportunities. They’re not given to us!
Let’s go, the Boss said, standing outside my window, an overnight bag from the trunk in his hand. He wordlessly led the way to the warehouse, where the door was unlocked.
Goddammit, Le Cao Boi said.
We walked between the pallets of coffee to the back of the cold, echoing warehouse. In the office, Grumpy and Shorty sat in front of the television playing a video game, another marvel invented during my time in reeducation. The game made a series of pings and pongs as a ball bounced back and forth between two blocks that guarded opposite goals.
The Boss sighed and said, What the fuck are you idiots doing?
Grumpy and Shorty jumped to their feet, and Grumpy said, Sorry, Boss, but that guy’s asleep anyway.
The Boss motioned to the door at the back of the office and Grumpy unlocked it. Make us some coffee, the Boss snapped to Grumpy before we went through the storeroom and to the cell behind it with Shorty.
A naked Mona Lisa lay in a far corner, curled up with his back to us. Shorty headed toward the Mona Lisa, but the Boss waved for him to stop before unzipping the overnight bag. He pulled out a pair of blue mechanic’s overalls and took off his jacket and pants, which he gave to Shorty to fold. Then he slipped on the overalls, zipped them up, and bent down to the bag one more time. When he stood, I saw what he had in his hand—his beloved hammer.
Now this shit’s going to get real, Le Cao Boi said with satisfaction.
Get me a chair, the Boss said to Shorty. Then wake him up.
Shorty had no success in waking the Mona Lisa up with yelling or nudges of his foot, so he resorted to a bucket of water and ice while the Boss watched with his hammer in his lap and the Ronin whistled Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy.” The ice water landed and the Mona Lisa jerked upright, spluttering, just as Grumpy came in with a folding table and a tray with the same arrangement that the luscious secretary had carried, except with four glasses and four filters. Placing the folding table next to the Boss, Grumpy put the tray on top and joined Shorty in flanking the Mona Lisa, huddled against the wall, head bowed, arms clutched around knees drawn up to his chest. The Boss tapped the tray with his hammer and the glasses rattled. You have until the coffee finishes dripping, the Boss said. Then you tell us where to find your friends. If you don’t, you die. Simple. Understand?
The Mona Lisa did nothing but shiver.
The Boss glanced at the dwarfs, and Grumpy attempted to kick the Mona Lisa in the ribs but struck his elbow instead when the Mona Lisa shifted his arm to defend himself. Do you understand? the Boss said.
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