In the space of a few minutes the entire work force had assembled. They hunched over their tables, busily scribing intricate patterns on pieces of chinaware. All were intent on their individual efforts.
“Follow me,” I whispered and moved off at an angle to reach the bicycle rack most removed from the open loading door. Screened behind a low leafy bush resembling a hawthorn, I looked over the nearest bicycles, making my choice. Once more the advantages of a police-state regimented society favored us. None of the cycles were secured to the rack. “Just our luck,” I complained. “Just bicycles. Not a moped in sight.”
“It’s just as well,” Bu Chen said. “All motorized vehicles are registered and easily traced. Even if we had some de-etching acid, we’d be in some pokey by noon. Foot power is the safest way to go.”
I began to move out of the bushes. A strong hand grabbed my ankle. “Not you,” Willow hissed. “We’re close to the big city where French is a second language, but you wouldn’t get by with it here. I’ll go.”
She went forward, erect and unhurried. With her comely looks hidden under the projecting peak of her cap, she looked little different from the others who had entered the factory. She examined the racks almost casually, then pulled a bicycle loose. She wheeled it over to where Bu Chen and I lay on our stomachs keeping watch. With a weight lifter’s ease she hoisted the bike over the chest-high hedge and deposited it beside us. Bu Chen wheeled it further out of sight.
Willow made a second round trip with equal aplomb.
She had selected a third bicycle and started to remove it from the rack when its handlebars became entangled with an adjacent bike. She should have left it and taken another, but Willow was determined to disengage them.
In the act of unhooking the bicycles, a truck wheeled into the driveway. Willow heard it. She stood stockstill. The truck continued its approach to the loading door. It was a two-and-a-half ton U.S. Army vehicle, part of the millions of dollars worth of military equipment abandoned in the pell-mell exodus of American troops from Vietnam.
The truck came to a stop with its front bumper no more than fifteen feet from where Willow stood grasping the two bicycles and looking over her shoulder. Now I could see that there were two men in the cab. The one sitting on the passenger side wore a peaked, woolen cap bearing a red star insignia. Both men got out. The driver, a civilian, glanced at Willow and continued into the building. The soldier, wearing a baggy uniform with cloth leggings wound around his muscular legs and thonged sandals on his bare feet, got out of the truck from the side nearest me. He carried a partially-filled rucksack which he carried by its straps in one hand. He walked toward Willow stopping beside the fender of the truck. His mouth moved, but I couldn’t hear any words. Willow stood her ground and said something in return. Whatever it was, it encouraged the young soldier to move closer. Willow backed away. I thought she was inviting the soldier to make a try at separating the bikes, but he didn’t step between them.
I knew instinctively that it wasn’t going right. My hackles prodded me. As I moved around to get closer, I could hear Willow’s voice. It had a pleading tone. It didn’t take a crystal ball to see that the soldier was only interested in Willow and not in what she was doing. The impression grew firmer when he dropped his backpack so both hands would be free. His mouth was parted in a wide, sinister grin.
Willow’s submissive actions were confusing to me. Whatever threat she thought she was facing — rape or exposure as a foreigner — it was forcing her to seek the shelter of the building corner.
She dodged around it blindly, tripping over something, then fell to the ground. The soldier broke into a run toward her. I moved at the same time, covering the intervening space without regard to being observed. I reached the hunched-over soldier just as he was reaching down to grab Willow.
His head turned as he sensed my presence. A snap of my wrist caused Hugo to grow out of my forward-moving right hand. The up-thrusting movement drove the dagger point deep between his third and fourth ribs. Its progress slowed slightly when the blade edge scraped and severed a costal cartilage next to the sternum. During the four seconds it took him to die and slump to the ground, he wheezed out a pitiful gasp of surprise. I used my foot to slip him over on his back so that blood would drain back into the body cavity instead of on the ground.
“Grab another bike and get back in the bushes!” I hissed. “I’ll take care of this.”
Willow had enough sense not to argue. She moved with a blur of speed and I was alone with a wholly unexpected, unwanted, and painfully evident corpse. My grisly handiwork could be found by anyone tending the ovens in preparation for the day’s ceramic firing. I had to make a split-second decision and dispose of the body at once. The longer I waited, the more likely fresh blood would seep through the uniform and stain the ground. I couldn’t hope to drag or carry it across the open space without leaving a damning trail of red stains.
The nearest circular kiln was ten feet away. I could feel the intense heat from fires burning behind its hinged metal doors placed near ground level every few feet around the circumference of the domed oven. The perspiration that ran down my stained face was as much from fear of discovery as from the blistering heat from the kiln fires.
I kicked open the nearest fire door. A blast of heat poured out. I grabbed the dead soldier by both wrists and pulled with all my strength. The body, propelled by the momentum I gave it, shot through the opening like a well-aimed sack of potatoes. I slammed the door shut and ran for the hedges.
I found Bu Chen behind the wall of bushes calmly spraying a yellow bicycle with an overcoat of neutral brown. “Where’s Willow?”
“She’s gone ahead. We’ll catch up as soon as I finish this.” He saw the questioning look on my face. “Oh, you didn’t see her. She snatched the third bike from the rack and grabbed up the loose knapsack while you were roasting that marshmallow you speared. Neat trick.”
I presumed he was admiring Willow. I did. Only a rare type of girl would have the will and presence of mind to finish a job despite the unnerving experience she had just undergone.
Bu Chen tucked the used aerosol can in his backpack for disposition later and wheeled the freshly painted bicycle away. The quick-drying finish would be hardened by the time we reached the road. I followed him with the bicycle left for me. Willow was fifty yards down the road, pedalling at a steady pace toward Hanoi.
At mid-afternoon we reached the outskirts of the city. We brought with us chafed butts and aching leg muscles. The long hours of pedalling were tedious rather than terrifying. We conversed very little, generally moving in single file with myself situated between Willow and Bu Chen. I never allowed myself to get careless or overconfident, but I adapted to the high plateau of tension we were under. It’s a compensating feature of my personality, otherwise I could never operate efficiently under constant strain.
I’d had time to think and plan. Twice during the day we had an opportunity to stop alongside the road within earshot of a public loudspeaker which was part of every crossroads village. Willow and Bu Chen translated the propaganda broadcasts. Aside from exhortations to make constant efforts to produce food, fuel and products useful to the people’s society, and harangues about the decadent western world, very little current news was heard. I was surprised at the completeness of weather reports even though the monsoon season had begun.
Nothing was mentioned about crime in the capital city. I had a suspicion that such information was deleted by government censors. To confirm the lack of public knowledge about recent deaths, Bu Chen went to a kiosk and bought a two-day old newspaper. No announcement of any kind was carried about an unknown killer roaming the streets striking down important public figures. The newspaper had no obituary column. Between Willow and Bu Chen, the entire edition was read while we rested and munched on high protein energy snacks. I had to caution Bu Chen not to discard the wrappers when he carelessly balled up one to throw it away.