T. Parker - Little Saigon

Where’s that feeling now, Frye wondered, the one I had down in Burke’s basement when I thought I could kill him?

All he felt was numb.

“Chuck, what I really want out of this is my money. You do have my money, don’t you?”

Frye nodded.

“When Thach’s men didn’t deliver, I just knew you were the reason, Chuck. You’ve got a helluva talent for getting in my way. Of course, I can’t have you telling what happened, so I’m in a tough position here. Basically, I have to kill you, ‘less I can think of some reasonable alternative.”

“You set this whole thing up?”

“Me and old Thach, or Huong Lam, or whatever the fuck he called himself.”

“Dien?”

“Naw. Dien and me just do business. He wasn’t in on the kidnapping. Hell, he almost stopped it that night at the Wind, didn’t he?”

“Why’d you do it?”

Burke sat down, placed the gun on the coffee table in front of him. “Why not’ s a better question. It was one of those opportunities that just fall in your lap. See, Thach and Lucia talked on one of her early trips to the ‘Nam. He told her the story of his big historic tank battle, how he got his face shot off and still saved his company. When she got to know him a little better, and he told what really happened, about Huong Lam, the whole deal. Those gooks trust my sister, Chuck, I don’t know what it is about her. Lucia told me and I thought: Bingo. I know that guy. So I got to thinking, sent word to him through Lucia, and we started communicating. He remembered me. He remembered what a dipshit I always thought Bennett was. He’d already heard Li on the Secret Radio, and he was burning to nail Bennett and his pipeline. He already had Kim in his pocket. It was slow, but over time, it got clear what we could do with a little... creativity. Thach got a little more creative than I did, though, that’s for sure. Original plan was to off your brother and Li, but Thach decided he wanted to take them back with him. I told him it wouldn’t work, but by that time I’d made up my mind to grease him anyhow. For my part, hell, it was just a way to make my ransom money and get Bennett out of Lucia’s way.”

“Out of the way?”

“Well, Hanoi sure wasn’t gonna deal for the POWs with some legless American shipping guns over, now were they? Early on, they told Lucia that one condition of release was to stop the Secret Army. That’s why she talked to Thach in the first place — because he was the counter-terrorism pro. And, of course, your pig-head brother wouldn’t stop, even when DeCord cut off his government scholarship. So I said to myself, self, you can help Thach raise some hell over here, make a big pile of money, and do your patriotic duty to get those POWs home, if you stick up Bennett and wreck his pipeline. After that, it was just a matter of planning it all out.”

“So you used the Dark Men and framed Eddie?”

“Sho’nuff. They’re young and violent. We knew Minh would suspect Vo, and when he ducked out of the Wind, it didn’t help the kid any. When the FBI shot him, that was great good luck. We’d planned all along to plant the evidence in his house. Perfect. All we needed from Vo was a little time to make Bennett sweat — that was one of Thach’s ideas. And, of course, to get the ransom stuff set up proper. I put on a mustache and dressed like a gigolo to do business as Lawrence.”

Burke picked up his pistol, studied it with a philosophical air, put it back down. “Chuck, the times they are a-changin’. Uncle Sam and Hanoi’ll be in bed together before you know it — POWs out, diplomatic thaw, the same old story. That’s gonna happen soon enough, you know. But we got thousands of refugees here, burning up ‘cause they got no homeland left. We got guys like Benny who still just can’t believe the United States couldn’t win a war. We got enough free-floating residual hatred these days to start up our own hell. That’s all energy, Chuck, needing to be channeled. In just a few short months, it’ll be gone. The war will really be over. Well, I saw a chance to make a killing while the nerves were still raw, and I took it.”

Frye could feel the rage gathering, rising up inside himself. It seemed to be coming from Burke, some psychic osmosis. Keep feeding it, he thought: it feels good. “You’d help Thach kill Bennett and Xuan and Li. You let him bomb Nguyen Hy and half a dozen innocent people. What kind of a man are you?”

“I’m a good man, Chuck. A patriot. Of course, I’d have killed Thach before he got a chance to go back home.”

“Why kill your partner?”

Burke looked at Frye as if he were a fool. “To make sure the POWs get back! Uncle Sam isn’t going to deal with Hanoi while one of their colonels is running amok over here, any more than Hanoi’s going to set POWs free while Bennett was running guns. Talk about a situation that needed fixing. It was like turning loose the dogs to eat the cats, then shootin’ the dogs. And I am a patriot, Chuck. DeCord couldn’t stop the pipeline without killing your brother, and the CIA may be low, but they’re not that low. Besides, Benny had DeCord on tape, making payments. And the FBI couldn’t find Thach without help, so Burke Parsons came to the rescue.”

“Our government knew Thach was here?”

“As of about two days ago. A select few knew it. At first, everyone thought Thach was quarantined in Hanoi for his political trouble. He was. Then he disappeared. Hanoi stalled a few days to figure out where he’d gone, but when Li got taken and Xuan’s head rolled, they knew damn well where he’d gone. They didn’t want that maniac on the loose. See, Hanoi’s going to collect close to two million bucks for each POW they let go. That’s one of those diplomatic conditions Lucia hasn’t discussed with the American people. Hanoi loves those dollars. So about eighteen hours ago, they let it be known that Thach was gone and probably here. I told DeCord I could find Thach faster than he could. I suppose I left him with the idea that I’d grease him fast and keep it quiet.”

“What was in it for you?”

“I got rid of a murderous Commie bastard for one thing. I got three hundred grand ‘operational expenses’ coming from the agency. And I closed down the Secret Army once and for all. Actually, Bennett did most of it for me. But I’m the hero, Chuck!” Burke grinned, then rotated his head quickly, seeming to assess everything in the apartment in one glance.

“If you knew where Thach was, why didn’t DeCord just throw your ass in jail?”

Parsons shrugged, smiled. “Because I played it cool, Chuck. I never told him I knew where Thach was. I said I’d find out what I could with my connections in Little Saigon. But mainly I just took a page from your brother’s book and blackmailed ‘em. I showed DeCord the tape of him paying Nguyen. He couldn’t touch me. Still can’t. Why should he? Thach is dead, the Secret Army’s wiped out and the POWs can come home. I’m a good guy, Chuck. I made this country a better place to live.”

“DeCord got the administration to call off the FBI and just let Bennett walk into a trap at the airstrip?”

Burke’s brow furrowed. “That’s what I told him would work best. If he let Thach take out Bennett, then I take out Thach, we could keep it all real quiet. No cops. Minimum Feds. No reporters. No nothing. Couple of bureau gophers already planted IDs on Thach’s guys. Then they’ll set the place on fire. When it’s all said and done, Bennett got shot trying to ransom his wife from slant gangsters. Press will love it. Clean. Look how right I was.”

Parsons’s eyes narrowed. “You do have my money, don’t you, Chuck?”

“I’ve got it.”

Parsons smiled.

“What about me, Burke?”