We sipped the hot, flavorless tea for a while. I inhaled the steam, and my lungs started working again.
I was exhausted and even Susan yawned, but it was beyond the hour that would have mattered in regard to a good night’s sleep, so we sat there and sipped this horrible tea. After about ten minutes, I realized this was quite pleasant.
Finally, Susan said, “You know what would make me happy?”
“What?”
“If you went home tomorrow.”
For some reason, I told her, “It would make me happy if you went home.”
This was a somewhat intimate exchange between two people who hadn’t yet been intimate. I said, “You need to get out of here before something happens to you… I mean mentally.” I heard myself saying, “You’re worried about me, but I’m worried about you.”
She stared at the flickering candle for a long time, and I saw tears running down her face, which surprised me.
We were both a little drunk, and this moment wasn’t real, or even rational. With that in mind, I said softly, “When I was here… there was this story going around among the troops… the story of Gordon’s Kingdom. Gordon was supposed to be this Special Forces colonel, who went off into the jungle to organize a tribe of Montagnards to fight the VC, but Gordon went around the bend, went native, and got really messed up in the head… you know the story. It was a version of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, but somehow the story got transferred to Vietnam… this apocalyptic story that they made into this movie… but apocalyptic or not, it was a warning… a fear that we all had, that we would stop wanting to go home, that we would get really messed up in the head, and we couldn’t go home anymore… Susan?”
She nodded and let the tears keep flowing.
I gave her my handkerchief, and we sat there, listening to the night insects, and the muffled sound of sexy Janis Joplin from the bar, punctuated by “Ride of the Valkyries.” I couldn’t even guess at what caused her to weep.
I held her hand, and we sat there awhile longer.
Finally, she took a deep breath and said, “Sorry.” She stood. “It’s time to go.”
We left Apocalypse Now and went out to the street. We got into a taxi, and I told the driver, “Dong Khoi.”
Susan shook her head. “We need to go to the Rex.” She said something to the driver, and he pulled away.
As the taxi moved through the streets, Susan said, “I get weepy when I drink too much. I’m okay now.”
I said, “You must have Irish blood. My whole family and all my Boston friends get drunk, sing Danny Boy, and cry.”
She laughed and blew her nose into my handkerchief.
Within a few minutes, we were at my hotel. Susan and I got out, and she said, “Let’s check that message and see if there’s anything else.”
“That’s okay. I’ll call you at home if there’s anything new.”
“Let’s check.”
So, we entered the hotel and went to the front desk. I got my room key and an envelope. The message inside, in barely readable English, said: You to meet Colonel Mang at Immigration Police headquarters, 0800, Monday. You to bring all travel documents and to bring travel itinerary.
It would appear that I was going to get my visa and passport back in exchange for an itinerary. That’s what I would do if I were Colonel Mang. I had aroused his curiosity, and also pissed him off. He wanted me around.
Susan looked at the message, then got businesslike again and said, “I’ll see you here in the morning when you return from your appointment. I suggest you pack and check out before you leave to see Colonel Mang, and have the hotel hold your bags in the lobby. You may not have a lot of time to spare. I’ll have tickets with me for something by the time I get here, or I’ll have the tickets delivered here. I’ll go with you to the train or bus station, or wherever you need to go. In any case, I’ll be here at nine, waiting.”
“If I’m later than noon, do not wait. Leave the tickets here and contact my firm.”
She took her cell phone out of her bag and gave it to me. She said, “I’ll call you from my apartment in the morning with some tips for your meeting, and I don’t trust the hotel phones.”
I asked, “Is your apartment phone secure?”
“It’s another cell phone. I have a landline, but that’s only for long distance.” She added, “Call me if you need anything, or if something comes up.” She looked at me and said, “Sorry if I kept you out too late.”
“I enjoyed my day. Thank you.”
She smiled, and we gave each other a friendly little hug and kiss on the cheek, and she turned and left the hotel.
I stood in the lobby another few minutes, waiting, I guess, to see if she came back, the way she’d done on the Rex roof. The door opened, but it was just the doorman, who said to me, “Lady in taxi. Okay.”
I walked to the elevators.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I woke before dawn and took two aspirin and one malaria pill.
I’d decided to wear what I wore when I first met Colonel Mang: khaki slacks, blue blazer, and a blue button-down shirt. Cops like to see suspects in the same clothes each time — it’s a psychological thing, having to do with a cop’s negative knee-jerk response to people who change their appearance. This outfit would be fixed in Colonel Mang’s little brain, and with any luck, we’d never see each other again.
I put the snow globe in my overnight bag to give to Susan as a thank-you present. As I was making a final check of the room, Susan’s cell phone rang in my pocket. I answered it and said, “Weber residence.”
She laughed and said, “Good morning. Did you sleep well?”
“I did, except for the chay long rong parade outside my window, and the Ride of the Valkyries running through my head.”
“Same here. I’m a little hungover.” She added, “Sorry if I got weepy.”
“Don’t apologize.”
She got down to business. “Okay, any taxi knows where the Immigration Police headquarters is. It’s actually in the Ministry of Public Security. Give yourself fifteen minutes because of rush hour. Don’t hold your taxi — they don’t like to hang around that building.”
“Maybe Colonel Mang will offer me a ride back to the Rex.”
“He may actually do that if he wants to see some kind of ticket to Nha Trang. But most likely he’ll instruct you to report to the Nha Trang Immigration Police.”
“If he does come back to the Rex, make yourself scarce.”
“Let’s see how it plays.”
I asked her, “Are you glad you got involved with this?”
“Beats going to work. All right, I have an e-mail from my travel agent, and she’s working on transportation to Nha Trang. Leave my cell phone with the front desk, and I’ll pick it up when I get there.”
“Okay.”
“Now, regarding Colonel Mang — try not to piss him off. Tell him you saw the Cu Chi tunnels, and you’ve earned a new respect for the people’s anti-imperialist struggle.”
“Screw him.”
“When you get to the Ministry of Public Security, you want Section C — that’s the Immigration Police. Stay away from A and B, or we may never see you again.” She chuckled, but she wasn’t kidding.
She continued, “You’ll be directed to a waiting room, then you’ll be called, but not by name. It’s random, but old people go first in Vietnam, so you’ll be called first. You then go into another room, and the guy there asks what you want. He’s nasty. Most people are there because they’ve been stopped with an expired visa, or they need visa extensions, or work or residence permits. Low-level stuff.”