“The beard suits you,” she said coolly. “So does the loss of weight. Together they make you look almost intelligent.” She could hear Buonaparte’s soft laughter behind her, but she kept her face cool and appraising.
“I’m glad to see my recent miseries haven’t softened your heart,” Pierre said.
“I knew you’d be all right, Pierre. What is that saying, about the Lord looking after drunks and fools?”
He kept the smile from his lips and limped past her, lightly stroking her arm with one finger. His touch sent a surge of pleasure through her. He seated himself in a high-backed chair across from his grandfather’s, as Molly took a standing position behind Buonaparte.
“We shall have to speak one day about the level of respect I receive from some members of your group, Grandpère,” he said. He looked quickly toward Auguste and Luc. “I’m sorry for all the difficulty I caused you,” he added.
“Your grandfather was more trouble than you, Pierre,” Auguste said. “Being here with him was like living with a cranky old woman.”
Pierre broke into a smile for the first time, then looked back at his grandfather. Buonaparte raised his hands, then let them fall helplessly back to his lap. Pierre thought how one day he too would like to experience a friendship like the one that existed between these two old men.
He turned back to Luc and spoke in Lao. “Your people were very good to me, my brother. I will never forget my debt to them.”
Luc’s face beamed pride across the room. “They did not do as well as they should have,” Luc said. “You look like hell, Brother Two.”
“Your region of this world is a difficult place,” Pierre said. “I spent many hours wondering at your people’s ability to survive it throughout all these centuries. It is even more dangerous than Molly’s tongue.” He added the final sentence in English.
“I’m very pleased you weren’t able to kill yourself, Pierre,” she said. “It would have been difficult to find someone to replace your quick wit.” She placed her hand on Buonaparte’s shoulder. He reached up and covered her hand with his own.
Pierre stared into his grandfather’s eyes; a wordless message passed between them. Pierre nodded his agreement.
“Grandpère, there was much I wanted to say to you when I first arrived here,” Pierre said. “I did not, because I decided it was better said when we were all together.” He drew a long breath, then leaned forward in his chair. “As Molly pointed out before I left Saigon, I have been a fool. I chose to ignore your wisdom, but even worse, I failed to trust in your love for me. I am sorry that I showed you so little respect.”
Buonaparte raised his hand. “All men are fools, Pierre. Some continue to be, because they fail to learn from their foolishness.” He smiled at his grandson. “I am pleased you chose this way to tell me your feelings. You will need our help now, and it’s better to have this matter removed. What do you plan to do?”
Molly watched Pierre’s face. His eyes were calm, yet hard. Piercing. So much like Buonaparte’s eyes. She had never noticed how much alike they were in that way, and she wondered now if they always had been, or if this was something new. Pierre leaned back in his chair, waiting before answering his grandfather. Molly sensed there was something false between them, something personal that had not yet been said. She wondered when it would be.
“In two weeks, I’m going back to Saigon,” Pierre answered in Corsican. “First I want to regain my strength, and to use that time to discuss what I plan with you and Uncle Auguste. I need your counsel, Grandpère; I have debts to pay in Saigon. In the meantime I would like your permission to ask a favor of my brother, Luc, and of Molly.”
Buonaparte steepled his fingers in front of his eyes. “You have my permission, of course, Pierre. But these debts. They are things that can be paid without you involving yourself.”
Pierre nodded. “I know, Grandpere. But it would give me pleasure to do it myself. I sent them a message with an ARVN soldier I did not kill. It’s a matter of honor to me to carry out the promise I made them.” He watched his grandfather nod his understanding, then turned to Luc, switching languages again, as a sign of respect. “Brother Two, I would like you to come to Saigon with me. I need your skill.”
Luc’s grin filled his face. “With pleasure, my brother,” he said.
Pierre turned back to Molly, taking a sheet of notepaper from his shirt pocket. “I have a list of names here, Molly. I would like your man, Po, to have each of them watched closely for the next two weeks. I’ll need to know their movements, and their habits. And any new precautions they may have taken.” He handed her the notepaper, then looked back at his grandfather again.
“Grandpère, you once told me of this man, Faydang, who has protected Francesco. Do you have a way of reaching him in the north?”
Buonaparte seemed puzzled by the request, and glanced quickly at Auguste. Auguste shrugged, equally puzzled.
“We do, Pierre,” Sartene said.
“I would like you to send someone to him. I want him to know the details of Cao’s death, that it was Francesco who betrayed her. And I want him to know about Francesco’s involvement with Brody.”
An expressive snort of laughter came from Auguste. “That is brilliant, Pierre,” he snapped. His eyes flashed to Buonaparte’s face, beaming with pride.
Buonaparte caught Auguste’s look, and he knew what lay behind the pleasure. It pleased him as well. Perhaps the medallion was secure at last. He looked at Pierre and nodded. “It is very good, Pierre. Francesco will lose the support of the communists, and their protection.”
Pierre’s eyes remained hard, impassive. “Unfortunately, there are others willing to protect him. But it’s a mistake they won’t have a chance to make again. Very soon Francesco will be out of friends, out of surrogates, and he will have to deal with me himself.”
“Francesco will be much more difficult than the others, Pierre,” Auguste interjected. “Francesco will expect you to come. The others may not. And Francesco will be hard to kill, even if he is a pig.”
“Auguste is right,” Buonaparte added. “He will try to choose the time and place. You must make him think he is choosing it, and then spring a trap. Otherwise he will remain hidden. It would also be better to kill him from a distance. He will be very dangerous at close quarters.”
Pierre stared into his grandfather’s eyes. “I want him to look into my face when he dies. I want the last voice he hears to be mine.” He looked past his grandfather to Molly. “I’ll need one more favor. I’ll need a place to stay that no one else knows about. Also clothing.”
“Philippe has several places like that, Pierre,” Molly said. “I can arrange something with him as soon as I return.”
“No,” Pierre said. “I don’t want to involve anyone who is outside my family.”
Molly hesitated, uncertain for the moment. “I’m not exactly family, Pierre,” she said.
He looked at her softly. “Yes, you are, Molly,” he said. “Yes, you are.”
The noise along Le Loi Street was deafening. Jeeps and trucks vied with cars, pony cycles, motor scooters and bicycles, all blaring their horns and bells, trying to find some minute advantage in the chaotic traffic pattern. Along the graceful, tree-lined sidewalks, Vietnamese men and women moved with an equally frantic abandon, jostling each other without concern, then racing on to be jostled themselves after a few more steps, all apparently oblivious to the beauty of the flower-filled median dividers that cut the street into three separate roadways. At the curbsides peddlers hawked myriad wares, food, vegetable, fish, the smells assaulting the senses in waves, while the peddlers themselves added to the cacophony by banging large steel scissors together to accompany their singsong shouts of quality.
On the south side of the street, Pierre Sartene stood next to a shoe stall examining a pair of sandals. His beard was slightly more than a month old now, his hair longer and shaggier, and to those who passed he appeared to be one of the hundreds of merchant seamen who crowded
Saigon’s streets each day. He put down the pair of sandals, then picked up another. His eyes strayed across the street to the entrance of a small French restaurant, one he knew to be a favorite of Colonel Benjamin H. Q. Wallace. It was one o’clock, the time Wallace preferred to indulge himself.
A crowd of Vietnamese moved noisily past the door of the restaurant. Two men were arguing, shouting insults at each other as they moved rapidly down the street, their voices becoming louder and higher-pitched as they scurried along, almost running. The crowd kept pace, enjoying the entertainment, commenting to each other on the quality of the hurled insults. Pierre ignored the spectacle, keeping his eyes on the restaurant, waiting, watching.
The jeep carrying Wallace arrived at one-fifteen. The driver, a burly army sergeant Pierre had not seen before, waited outside. The warning had been received, he decided. And Wallace had believed it. He had never seen the man with a bodyguard before. Normally, various clerks in the office rotated as drivers. A smile came imperceptibly to his lips, then left. He turned and walked quickly down the street, to the position Luc had taken earlier.
Standing beside him at a small booth covered with various fruits, Pierre took an envelope from his pocket and handed it to Luc.
“Give me five minutes, Brother Two,” Pierre said.
Inside the restaurant, Wallace sipped his martini and looked casually about the room. The place pleased him, always left him feeling a bit mellow. Even the dark brocaded wallpaper had a soothing effect. And, unlike those in most Vietnamese-run restaurants in the city, the waiters did not treat non-French-speaking customers with disdain. Wallace took another satisfying sip of the martini as the headwaiter approached his table.
“Colonel Wallace?” the headwaiter asked.
“Yes, what is it?” The thought flashed in Wallace’s mind that he was about to be moved to another table. Bloody hell I will, he told himself.
The waiter held out an envelope. “This was delivered for you, sir.”
Wallace took the envelope, stared at it, then back at the headwaiter. “Who brought it?” he asked.
“I never saw the gentleman before. He was Lao.”
Wallace waved the man away with the envelope, then sat staring at it for a moment. A slight twitch came to his eye. Carefully, he fingered the edges and sealed portion, making sure it held no explosives. Then he took a knife from the table and slit it open. He stared at the terse message for several seconds. It read: Your driver has been incapacitated. I await your pleasure. It was signed: Pierre Sartene.
Wallace crumbled the note in his hand, then reached for his hip pocket to feel the wallet holster he carried there, and the small .25 caliber automatic it held.
Wallace signaled the headwaiter, tapping his fingers on the table as he awaited his approach. The twitch returned to his left eye.
“Would you be kind enough to have someone ask my driver to come inside?” Wallace asked. “He’s sitting in a jeep, parked in front of the restaurant.”
Wallace took the crumpled note and spread it out on the table before him as he waited. Goddam cheek, he told himself. Even signs it with his goddam guinea name.
The headwaiter hurried back to the table. “I’m sorry, colonel, but there is no driver and no jeep outside,” he said.
“Where’s your telephone?” Wallace asked.
“It has been out of order all day,” the headwaiter answered.
Wallace crumpled the note again. His jaw tightened, the muscles jumping against the skin. “Is there a back door to the restaurant?” he asked.
The headwaiter’s face became puzzled. “Yes, in the kitchen,” he answered.
“I have to use it,” Wallace said. “Show me.” He pulled a ten-dollar MPC note from his pocket and laid it on the table, then stood and took the Vietnamese by the arm. “It’s important,” he added, glaring down into the much smaller man’s face.
At the rear door, Wallace drew the small chrome-plated automatic from his back pocket and jacked a round into the chamber. He eased the door open and looked out into the cluttered alley that ran behind the building. Slowly, keeping low, he moved through the door, the automatic out in front of him.
Outside, his back close to the building, he looked up and down the alley. Nothing. There would be at least two of them, he told himself. That bastard Bently, and the Lao. His mind clicked with the possibilities. One would be in front, possibly both if they had not known about the alley. He looked up and down the alley again. Each way it ended in a side street, one only about fifty yards away, the other nearly a hundred. If no one’s here now, they’ll be waiting at the side street, and they’ll expect me to go the shortest distance to get out, he thought. But I’ll go the other way. He stepped away from the wall of the building, remaining low, and began moving down the alley.
Pierre dropped from the low roof above, his right knee slamming into Wallace’s back just below the neck. Wallace fell forward; the automatic flew from his hand and clattered down the alley ahead of him. Wallace spun onto his back. Pierre stood over him, to his left, a silenced High Standard .22 caliber pistol in his hand.
Wallace’s mind spun with possibilities. He was too far away for a kick, or any defensive move He would have to talk his way out, if he could.
“Wait a minute, Bently. Just hold on.” Wallace’s voice was strained and he struggled to control it.
“The name is Sartene, colonel,” Pierre said. His eyes were flat and cold, and did not move from Wallace’s face.
“I didn’t know anything about it, until after it happened. You have to believe that. Look, dammit. You’re an army officer, you have to understand these things happen. Mistakes are made.”
Pierre smiled at him, a cold, chilling grimace of a smile. “I’m not an officer in any army, colonel. The officer you’re talking about died near the Laos border. He was killed on a mission. Another man died that same day. Do you remember him, colonel? His name was Morris. He died trying to hold his guts inside his belly. I’m sure it was very painful. You never should have helped them do that.”
“Now wait a minute, Bently … Sartene, whoever the hell you think you are …”
“There’s nothing more to say, colonel. The pistol is loaded with exploding bullets. I’m going to fire one into your belly. You won’t die right away, colonel. But there won’t be any chance to save you either. You’ll just lie here and die the way Morris did. Slowly and in great pain.”
“Wait,” Wallace screamed. His voice bounced off the walls of the alley, echoing back and forth.
The sound drowned out the quiet spit as the pistol jerked in Pierre’s hand. He looked down at Wallace writhing in pain on the ground, then turned and walked slowly back down the alley.
General Lat arrived home at five o’clock, stepped through the small gateway in the wall that surrounded his house and casually saluted the two ARVN privates who guarded the interior garden walkway that led to his front door.
Inside, he dropped his hat on a small circular table in the large foyer and walked on to the massive living room, where his male servant would be preparing his evening cocktail.
When he reached the living room he was surprised, then annoyed to find it empty. He spun on his heels, determined to find the fool and make his annoyance felt. He stopped abruptly. Two men blocked the doorway. A bearded European with a pistol in his hand, and a Lao with a short, black-bladed ninja to sword. Instinctively, Lat’s hand moved toward his holster. The bearded man raised his pistol slightly, stopping him.
“Who are you?” Lat said, choosing French to be certain he was understood.
“You may speak your own language,” Pierre answered in Vietnamese. “I am Pierre Sartene, the man you attempted to execute.”
Lat’s face cracked; the lips began to quiver. He began to speak, failed at first, then started again. “How did you get into my house?” he asked.
“Without difficulty,” Pierre answered. “Your men guard just as they fight. Poorly.”
“You … must … understa
nd,” Lat stuttered, stopping, then beginning again. “You must understand that I was only following the orders of your own commanders.” Lat watched, his body trembling, as Luc moved across the room and stopped beside him. He was holding the ninja to sword in both hands, the black blade held straight up in front of his face.
“Your last words should not be a lie, general,” Pierre said softly. “Are you a Buddhist?”
Lat’s lips trembled; his eyes darted to the sword, then back to Pierre. “Yes,” he whispered.
Luc’s movements were almost too fast to see. He pivoted, bringing the sword back in the same motion, then, without any perceptible change in direction, brought it forward in a sweeping downward arc, striking Lat on the back of the neck.
Lat’s head seemed to hover in the air for a moment, then toppled forward, striking the floor and rolling toward Pierre, as the headless body crumpled to the floor, the severed arteries in the neck spurting blood in a fountain of deep red.
Luc walked slowly back to the doorway, nudging the head out of his way with a foot. He smiled at Pierre.
“A fitting punishment, Brother Two. Now his soul will never leave this land of sorrow.”
Brody had been shaken by the news of Wallace’s death, but at first had forced himself to believe it was the work of a VC sapper, not Peter Bently. The VC, after all, had placed bounties on U.S. military personnel. Later, when the subsequent investigation had uncovered the note Wallace had left behind in the restaurant, Brody had realized he was not dealing with a random death. He had contacted Francesco Canterina by telephone to ask his advice. Upon hearing the news, Francesco had just grunted. and hung up the telephone. Now he was among the missing.
Brody had remained in his office until nine o’clock. His quarters were in a villa adjacent to the embassy which housed unmarried members of the embassy staff. It too was guarded by Marine Corps personnel, but he had not wanted to make even the short trip unprotected. He had thought about telling Christopher, but had ruled it out. The charge was best left out of the picture. It would not do well for his record if it became known he had blown the simple assignment of handling a troublesome army officer.
The Corsican Page 46
