Wellington gestured urgently for Howard to come closer to him and farther away from the entrance. Howard obeyed, looking back, and saw the two men, both dressed in black, step through the curtain, pushing their long-barreled guns ahead of them. As they went out, there were strange coughing sounds — phut, phut — four or five of them, and then silence.
One of the men stuck his head back in and said to Wellington, “Môt phút.” The word sounded so much like the noises he’d just heard that Howard looked at the man to see if he was smiling, if some sort of joke was under way, but the man looked serious.
Wellington said, “Có.”
Howard, unable to restrain himself anymore, started to say to Wellington, “What the hell is—”
The man in the entrance said, in an angry undertone, “Yên lăng!”
“Yes,” Wellington said softly. “Be quiet, Howard. Wait.”
So Howard was quiet and waited. The man in the entrance disappeared again, and Howard took the time to look around at the interior of the trailer.
It reminded him mostly of a Marine radio shack he’d seen on Oahu sixteen years ago, when he’d been a PI officer in the Navy. Illumination was furnished by three bare light bulbs hanging from wire strung along the top of the trailer, the light gleaming on a card table, half a dozen metal folding chairs, and a bank of what looked like fairly complex electronic equipment. Rolled up in a far corner was what looked like several sleeping bags.
Howard glanced at Robert, who returned his look with a headshake and an exaggerated shrug. Howard nodded, agreeing that it was impossible to figure out what the hell was going on here.
There was a faint sound, gradually increasing, and Howard and Robert exchanged another glance, both recognizing it as a Renault engine. The other agents were returning to their nest.
Wellington seemed to be listening as intently as the others. Howard, looking at him, realized for the first time just how incongruously Wellington was dressed; dark-gray suit, white shirt, dark-figured tie, black topcoat. And black rubbers over black shoes. The topcoat buttons were open, but the suit coat was closed. Wellington looked like an insurance man who had somehow wandered onto a battlefield.
Outside, the Renault engine grew very loud and then stopped, and for a few seconds there was silence. Then two car doors slammed, and then again the phut sounds, this time fainter because farther away. And then they too stopped.
When the entrance curtain was shoved open, Howard jumped as though there’d been an explosion. But it was only the same man as before, who this time said to Wellington, “Tôt lam.”
“Tôt,” Wellington said.
“Chò dây.”
Wellington said, “Bao lâu thì xong?”
“Năm phút,” the other man said.
“Tôt.”
As the man disappeared again, Wellington turned to Howard and Robert and said, in a conversational tone, “We’ll have to stay in here for about five minutes.”
Howard said, “Can we talk now?”
“Yes, it’s all right now.”
Robert said, “Are they Chinese?”
“The men who were in here with me? No, Vietnamese.”
Howard said, “You speak Vietnamese?”
“Some. Not a great deal.”
Shaking his head, Robert said, “I don’t get it. What are Vietnamese doing here?”
“Toward the end over there,” Wellington said, “it was safest for some of our friends to leave Vietnam and come to the states. The useful ones.”
But what are they doing here? And what are you doing here?”
“The same as you, actually,” Wellington said. “Finding the Chinese base.”
Howard said, “Is this it?”
“Yes. That equipment there has been tapping Bradford’s phones.”
“The two men who brought us here, were they more Vietnamese?”
Wellington smiled with one side of his mouth. “No. They were Chinese.”
“And the men in the Renault?”
“Also Chinese.”
“What happens to them now?”
“They get buried, I believe,” Wellington said. “Sit down, both of you. I think we ought to talk.”
All three sat down at the card table, and Robert said, “How many people do you have working around here?”
“Just the two you saw. And they don’t know the situation. They don’t know any more than they absolutely have to know.”
“But who do they work for?”
“I have a high enough position, where I work,” Wellington said delicately, “that I can ask to have the two men assigned to me without having to explain what I want them for.”
“What do you want them for?” Howard asked him.
“To take over from the former tenants of this place,” Wellington said. “From this point on, whenever Bradford comes out to make contact with his Chinese friends, it will actually be our friends that he’ll talk to.”
“But won’t he be able to tell they’re not Chinese?”
“Would you?”
Howard said, “I’m not as well-traveled as Brad.”
“The fact is,” Wellington said, “the Vietnamese look quite similar to some Chinese types. Close enough for the purpose. An Oriental might not be fooled, but it isn’t an Oriental we’re trying to fool.”
“All right,” Howard said.
Robert said, “What’s the advantage of it, though?”
“The advantage,” Wellington explained patiently, “is that there’s going to be one unavoidable delay after another in the Chinese plan to help Bradford get out of the country. Every time he comes out to see if it’s time to leave yet, our men will regretfully explain that another problem has come up, another small delay.”
“That’s good,” Robert said. “That’s really good.”
Howard said, “But how long can it work? Won’t he get suspicious after a while, or at least impatient? How long can you keep him hanging that way?”
Wellington shrugged. “Maybe a week, maybe a month. Depending how rapidly his mind is deteriorating, maybe forever.”
“I don’t think it’s deteriorating,” Robert said. “I think there was a change, and now there’s a new stability.”
“We’ll see what Joe Holt has to say. He’s coming out tomorrow, isn’t he?”
“Yes.”
Howard said, “All right. It gives us more time, and that’s good. But it isn’t a permanent solution.”
“I didn’t say it was,” Wellington said calmly. “But it does give us time, a little more time.”
Howard said, “What about the Chinese? Not these ones here, the ones behind them. Won’t they try to re-establish contact?”
“I imagine they will. We’ll have to keep it from happening. Somebody will have to actually be with Bradford at all times from now on.”
The man stuck his head in again, saying, “San sàng.”
Getting to his feet, Wellington said, “Cam ón. All right, we can go now.”
They went outside, and the two black-garbed Vietnamese were standing near the dusty black Renault. None of the Chinese were anywhere in sight.
Wellington and the two men spoke together briefly, and then Wellington said, “I’ll walk with you as far as the perimeter road.”
The three of them walked on up the twin ruts, going back the way they’d come. Looking back, Howard saw the two Vietnamese going up into the rear of the truck.
Robert was saying, “Was it one of the Chinese or one of your men that Evelyn saw the other night?”
“Yes, that was unfortunate,” Wellington said. “That was one of my men. I was afraid Evelyn might mention it to Bradford, who in his turn would mention it to the Chinese. Fortunately, it didn’t happen that way.”