by Ty Patterson
He wiped sweat off his palms, careful not to make any noise, and resumed.
He could take cover just before the bend and pour lead into the room.
If there were several VC, he would chuck grenades.
His six was clear, so he could escape if he was attacked from the front.
Decision made, he moved faster.
The sounds were clearer now. One voice, growling.
Billy knew only a few Vietnamese words, most of which were curses.
The VC was swearing.
He risked a peek around the bend.
One soldier, in VC uniform. Hands on hips, staring at the hole in the wall. Two flashlights on the floor, illuminating the room.
Sacks on the floor.
The soldier smacked a hand on his thigh and poked his head through the trapdoor. Removed it after a while and commenced shouting.
He’s alone. That’s why he’s loud.
Billy watched for a while as the VC ripped several racks, spraying H on the floor carelessly.
He raised his head to swear in anger when Billy got to his feet and entered the room.
The VC watched in disbelief for a moment and then dove at his AK-47, which was on the floor.
Billy shot him in the left thigh and kicked the rifle away.
He leaned down, punched him in the face, almost knocking him out, and searched the VC quickly. He found a knife, a few loose bills, nothing else.
The VC lay moaning on the floor, clutching his leg. Billy knew it wasn’t a fatal wound. He knew where his round had entered.
The soldier was bald and small in stature, shorter than Billy by a couple of inches. He was clean-shaven, wore glasses, and had an ascetic look about him.
He seemed to be the same age as Billy.
‘This is yours?’ Billy asked him as the VC propped himself up and leaned against a wall, sweat pouring down his face.
The soldier didn’t answer. He ripped a length of cloth off his shirt and made a rough tourniquet that he applied to his thigh.
‘You.’ Billy waited until the soldier had finished. ‘This is your stash?’
The VC looked at him finally, meeting his eyes. There was a speculative look on his face.
There had to be a reason the American soldier hadn’t killed him.
He introduced himself.
‘I am Chieu Ton Dang.’
Chapter Twenty-Five
‘You got my money,’ Dang rasped, eyeing the AK-47 at Billy’s feet.
‘I got someone’s money.’ Billy grinned, confidence flooding him. He was a born salesman. He could sniff opportunity a mile away. There was a deal to be struck here.
‘Mine,’ Dang hissed and rolled towards him swiftly.
Billy backhanded him and the VC fell away, his mouth bleeding.
‘Now it’s mine. I can kill you and take everything. Leave your body here.’
He let the words sink in, saw the VC soldier translate them mentally, process them.
‘I am still alive,’ Dang responded after a while.
‘You know why?’
Dang’s eyes were dark, fathomless pools as he took in his American captor. A light burned in them when he connected the dots.
‘You, greedy. Americans, greedy.’
The laugh burst from Billy, bringing tears to his eyes.
‘You’re right, buddy. I can kill you and take everything. I can torture you and find out if there’s more. However, the way I figure it, keeping you alive helps us both.’
Dang took a while to understand his words.
He shook his head. ‘I find you. I kill you.’
‘Your money will still be missing.’
‘I find you. I torture you.’
‘Not going to happen.’
‘I tell other Charlie. We attack your camp.’
‘That won’t happen either. I can get our unit to attack you, raze your village.’
‘What you offering?’ Dang panted after exhausting all his options.
Billy tossed him his canteen, and after the VC had drunk his fill, he spoke.
‘A partnership.’
Billy knew the risk he was taking. He didn’t know Dang. The VC could kill him. He could bring more Charlie with him, hunt Billy and capture him.
I could do the same to him too, however. I have the upper hand. Besides, I have most of his money.
The Benjamins were Billy’s aces.
As long as they were in his possession, he was confident Dang would listen to him.
However, he knew the VC would always be looking for a way to best him.
That’s not in his interest. Nor in mine.
Billy saw it clearly in his mind.
If Dang could operate an illegal drug-running enterprise in the middle of the Vietnam War, under the noses of the Americans and his fellow VC, he had smarts.
Billy didn’t lack in them either.
‘Think big.’ He crouched next to the VC, searching for simple English words that Dang would understand.
‘I kill you, I keep the money. You kill me, you may get your money back. But if we both work together, we can get more. So much more.’
Dang didn’t speak. He moistened his lips and eased his thigh.
Dude’s got a round in his leg. It’s got to be hurting like hell, but he’s not crying. Got to hand it to him. He’s got nerve.
‘You sell your H in villages, don’t you? You supply VC soldiers, Americans, whoever needs it. You got a network, don’t you?’
Dang’s face remained blank.
Billy sighed. It would be a long night. He used smaller words, easier ones.
Dang hesitated, and then nodded fractionally.
‘This is your only cache?’
Dang blinked.
‘Your only store?’
Dang shook his head.
‘I thought not. How many of the others have been destroyed? By our Hueys, or in our raids?’
Dang held up four fingers.
‘I can help.’
Billy could warn Dang of upcoming bombing runs or search-and-destroy missions. That would give the Vietnamese time to move his H stashes.
Billy could also point out other American soldiers and units, those who used. Dang’s network could reach out to them, push them the drugs.
‘You and me, we can make this big. You’ve done well to build this operation and get it to this stage. You want to become a king?’
‘You got to trust me for that,’ Billy said softly.
‘You got my money. You asking me to trust you?’ Dang sneered.
‘Yeah. Because you’ll kill me once I give you the money.’
‘Other VC will kill you anyway.’
‘I’m a Tunnel Rat. I don’t die easily.’
They traded words back and forth, but Billy knew Dang was thinking furiously.
He doesn’t have a choice. I haven’t killed him; that’s one sign that he can trust me.
‘Tomorrow, we bomb two villages,’ Billy offered. He drew a map on the floor and marked the locations. ‘You can see if I’m lying tomorrow.’
Dang compressed his lips, staring at the map, saying nothing.
‘Tomorrow evening. Seven pm. We’ll meet here. At the top. We can talk further.’
He took the AK-47 with him and got to his feet. He pointed it at the VC momentarily and chuckled at the fear that flashed across Dang’s face.
‘I told you, I won’t kill you. You gotta believe me.’
He went out of the room, and when he was back in the tunnel, he tossed the rifle back.
‘Tomorrow. Seven pm.’ he repeated. ‘And watch out for those villages.’
Present Day
‘Who is Dang?’ Gorbunov asked irritably.
He was in his New York apartment, watching Chisholm’s stock chart.
He was buying carefully, stealthily, using several shell companies to execute his trades.
The market knew that he was circling the steel corporation and also knew he had a small position. If it
knew just how he was buying, and how much, the share price would go up. That wasn’t what he wanted.
‘I am finding out,’ Kirilov answered.
His killer had followed the sisters to Vietnam, getting close enough to them at some hotel to overhear snatches of their conversation.
‘Find out fast. We need to know what they are up to.’
Kirilov hung up.
Gorbunov’s killer sat in a restaurant, watching the hotel where the sisters were staying.
He had followed them to the Mekong Delta and had noted the house they had gone into.
He had made inquiries and found out they had met with Luc Cham, then made further inquiries and found out who Cham was.
That told him the twins were on Dang’s trail. Kirilov ordered another cup of tea and drank the hot, sweet beverage slowly.
He would sit back and let the twins do the running around. Once they found who Dang was and located him, Kirilov would act.
His lizard-like eyes swept over the street outside.
He didn’t see any sign of Carter or those two men, the black one and the blond one.
However, he knew the three men were in Vietnam.
He knew their kind. They would protect the women.
They weren’t a threat as yet.
And even if they were, Kirilov could take them out.
‘Where are you?’
‘You gotta get your hearing checked, Zeb.’ Bwana snorted in disgust. ‘Or your memory. You’re getting old. We told you. We’re tailing Beth and Meg. They went to some village. We followed them. We’re outside their hotel now.’
‘They know you’re there?’
‘Nope. Give us some credit, for Chrissakes,’ he protested in an aggrieved tone. ‘Say,’ he asked suspiciously, ‘where are you?’
‘New York. If you’re with the twins, I’m not needed. You two can stop a nuclear war. Or start one.’
Zeb hung up and tossed his cell onto the seat next to him.
He wasn’t in New York. He was in a white car, a taxi, that had the logo of a cab company. He wore a simple white shirt and khakis.
He was posing as a cab driver in Ho Chi Minh City.
He knew he would stand out as a Westerner, but he didn’t intend to take any passengers.
He was five hundred yards away from Kirilov’s café. He had his binos with him, and his Glock. His screen told him where the Petersens and Bwana and Roger were.
He had only one goal—to keep Kirilov in his sights.
He waited and watched. He was good at both. He was now finding that the Russian killer, too, was good at the two activities. As good as Zeb.
An Khoi picked up the sisters from their hotel and drove them to the police station.
He told them he had cajoled and threatened Luc Cham and had pleaded with his wife, but the Vietnamese farmer hadn’t emerged from his room.
Neither had he responded to any more questions.
‘He knows Dang.’ An Khoi had thumped the wheel in frustration as he had driven back from Sa Dec.
‘Yeah. We’ll have to find some other way to find out who Dang is,’ Beth had replied.
Werner hadn’t come up with any answers. The supercomputer was still digging into the Patten family’s lives, and that search wasn’t turning productive either.
An Khoi didn’t have any better news on the witness front either. He had suspended the search, and his team had gone back to their normal duties.
In the office that the Vietnamese police had assigned to them, Beth listlessly punched keys on the police computer, running random searches.
‘You got any ideas?’ she asked her sister.
Meghan didn’t reply.
‘I’m talking to you, not the wall.’
Still no response.
She swiveled her chair around to let fly a volley, and then bit it back.
Meghan had that expression, the one that said she was on to something.
‘What?’ She shook her twin’s shoulder.
Meghan started. ‘You remember what Duhan said?’
‘He spoke a lot,’ Beth replied impatiently. ‘What are you referring to?’
‘He said something about Billy. That he had spoken to Billy Patten after he had come back.’
‘Yeah, what about it?’
‘We assumed that meant he and Patten had spoken on their return from Vietnam.’
Beth saw where her sister was going.
‘What if Patten visited this country on his own? After leaving the Army.’
Chapter Twenty-Six
Meghan waited till evening to make the call to Debbie.
‘I can try,’ the receptionist answered doubtfully. ‘That’s all you want to know? If Billy Patten had been to Vietnam on his own?’
‘Yeah.’
The sisters could sense the smile in her voice when they called back half an hour later.
‘The answer is yes. Billy Patten did visit Vietnam.’
She gave them the month and the year. Beth whooped and immediately looked contrite when a police officer came running.
She made an It’s alright gesture, and he disappeared.
‘That month. The timing,’ Meghan mused when the call ended.
‘I know.’ Beth was bouncing in her chair in excitement. ‘It was before he bought the mine. You think he came here to get the two mil?’
‘An Khoi?’ Meghan called out.
The police officer appeared in the doorway instantly.
‘How long do your flight records go back?’
‘Why, ma’am?’
He shook his head when she explained. ‘Not that far back, ma’am. What about at your end?’
‘We’re checking.’ Meghan looked over at Beth, who was working on a screen.
‘Nope, Werner says tough luck.’ The younger sister was crestfallen.
‘Werner?’ An Khoi asked, puzzled. ‘Who is that?’
‘A…friend,’ Meghan replied. ‘Even if we had records, it would be difficult to find out who Patten met all those years back.’
‘Yeah. Which means we’ve got to uncover Dang.’
They returned to Sa Dec the next day. This time they made no prior appointment, and took Hy Phuong with them.
They insisted that the police officer dress in plain clothes. ‘Cham shouldn’t know you’re a police officer. You’re our translator. That’s all he should know.’
Phuong drove them in her own car, a black Toyota, and they reached Sa Dec just after noon.
Cham wasn’t home when they arrived. His wife said he was at the fields.
The police officer took the car as far as it could go, and they then trekked to the lush, water-soaked paddy farms.
An expanse of green greeted them when they came to the outskirts of the farmland.
Cham was easy to spot among the several people in the fields. He was alone in his acre, wearing a straw hat as he inspected his rice.
He straightened when Phuong called him. His wizened face broke in a grin when he recognized the sisters.
He might have refused to answer their questions the other day, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t happy to see them.
He made his way to them and dried himself with a towel that was draped over his shoulder.
‘You want to buy his field?’ Phuong translated for them.
‘We wouldn’t know what to do with it,’ Beth chortled. ‘Ask him about Dang,’ she instructed the Vietnamese officer. ‘Tell him the police aren’t involved. It’s just between him and us. We won’t tell anyone.’
Cham shouted at another farmer and pointed at a buffalo that was heading to his field.
The farmer acknowledged him and directed the animal away.
‘Dang bad,’ Cham said in broken English. ‘Very bad.’
Vietnam, 1967–1975
Luc Cham looked forward to his meetings with Billy, Leroy, and Pete.
He and his platoon went on missions along with American soldiers, and he had developed a fondness for these three.
&n
bsp; Leroy and Pete, they were always cracking jokes. Making fun. They knew Cham didn’t understand their language, but nevertheless, they tried to include him.
That effort warmed Cham. Sure, he could communicate with the Americans with a few universal words. Everyone understood VC, Charlie, enemy, and such words.
He brought them hot tea in his battered flask whenever he met them. They gave him American cigarettes in return.
Amidst the war, the killing around them, there were a few pleasures, such as puffing away on tobacco.
There were times when Cham went with his unit, no Americans with them. They prowled the jungles and the villages, seeking Charlie, and searching for tunnels.
After one such mission, he was on sentry duty at night while his fellow soldiers slept.
They were close to the banks of the Saigon River, bedded down in the forest.
The SVA soldiers slept either on the ground or on the ragged backpacks they carried. Mosquitos bit at them and sucked on their blood, but most of them didn’t notice.
Cham was awake. He paced occasionally to keep himself awake. He prowled in the shadows, knowing that movement was a giveaway and hence keeping close to the trunks of trees.
Sometime in the night, nature’s urge came to him.
He went a hundred yards deeper inside the forest and relieved himself against a bush, careful not to make any noise.
He was zipping himself up when he heard whispering.
He cocked his head. This late at night, whispering and stealthy movement could only be the enemy. There were no friendlies near them.
He dropped to the ground and belly-crawled inch by inch in the direction of the sounds.
He parted branches and leaves and reached for the prized possession hanging around his neck.
It was a pair of night vision goggles, NVGs, that Templeman had given him. Cham was the only SVA soldier in his unit to have an American-made pair.
He brought them to his eyes and adjusted them slowly. He stilled when he saw the VC soldier. Charlie was about a hundred and fifty yards away.
Even through the scope, Cham could recognize his uniform and the AK-47 slung over his soldier.
The VC was talking to someone who was hidden behind a tree. Gesticulating.
