Don Winslow - Satori

He resolved that, if he survived this mission, he would spend more time in the mountains and master the techniques of technical climbing.

At night the Tibetans would build a fire, brew strong pots of tea from the dwindling supply, and make soup that got thinner each night. Still it was a good time, resting sore muscles and listening to the tales of ghosts and spirits, sage holy men and brave warriors that the crewmen would tell while Tasser translated into colloquial American English.

Then Nicholai would sleep the sleep of the dead, waking only just before dawn, when the day’s good and hard work would begin again. He was almost disappointed when, after three days, the portage was accomplished, the rafts reassembled, and the journey downriver could begin again.

The river was gentler below these falls. Jagged rocks and shallows, with the occasional rapids, still caused problems, but in only two days, Tasser checked the cartoon-map and happily announced, “We’re out of goddamn China.”

They were in the French colony of Laos, and the river changed its name from the Lekang to the Mekong.

In an almost mystical way, the river itself seemed to recognize the change. It broadened, slowed, and darkened with the collected silt brought all the way down from the Himalayan foothills.

“Like us,” Tasser observed. “Brown and down from Tibet.”

The mountains that flanked the river became greener, verdant with jungle vegetation, and here and there a bamboo village, its houses on stilts against the seasonal floods, appeared suddenly around a bend of the twisting river.

They put in at one of these villages to buy food, and Nicholai realized that Tasser knew a little more than he let on.

“I don’t know what you got in those goddamn crates,” Tasser said, “and I don’t want to know. But if you’re taking them where I think you’re taking them, keep your lips zipped. These are Hmong people, and they don’t much like Commies. So don’t give them any of that “Comrade” shit, or they might take one of them curvy knives and lop off your head. Got it?”

“Got it.”

“Another thing,” Tasser warned as he piloted the raft onto a sandy spot along the right side of the river. “Turn a blind eye to what you see here.”

He pointed across the river. “That’s Siam over there. Land of the Thais. Also land of the poppy. This here is prime opium-growing country, and the river downstream from here is a highway for dope. The Hmong grow it, so do the Thais. It’s how they feed their kids.”

“I understand.”

“You’d better,” Tasser said. “We smile, we buy our groceries, we get back on the water pronto.”

Nicholai stayed on the raft while Tasser took two men and went to buy supplies. Naked Hmong children happily dove off a rickety bamboo pier into the water. The women, in their unique black caps, sat nearby, kept a watchful eye, and sneaked shy glances at the tall European sitting on the raft. Nicholai heard dogs barking in the village and the ubiquitous bleating of goats and cackling of chickens.

Barely half an hour later Tasser returned with mesh nets full of bananas and other fruits, greens, rice, and smoked fish. Nicholai felt ashamed of his suspicions as Tasser gave the order to shove off and the raft swirled back into the gentle current. Then the captain handed Nicholai a bottle of clear liquid.

“Take a belt,” Tasser said.

Nicholai took a swallow and felt like his stomach, lungs, and brain were on fire. “Good God, man, what is it?”

“ Lao-lao ,” Tasser answered. “Hmong moonshine.”

Nicholai helped one of the crew build a fire in the charcoal stove and soon they had a delicious meal of rice, fish, and bananas. Then he took his turn at an oar, and when relieved sat on the edge and enjoyed the beautiful, verdant countryside, the green mountains and limestone cliffs.

Two days later they came into Luang Prabang.

NICHOLAI CUT an odd figure checking in to the small guesthouse.

His clothes were torn and mud-stained, his hair long and disheveled, his face brown as a nut and weatherworn. He ignored the desk clerk’s stare with an aristocratic insouciance and asked for the best room available, preferably with a view of the river.

“Does Monsieur have luggage?”

“Monsieur does not.”

“Will it be arriving from the airport, perhaps?”

“Probably not,” Nicholai said. He produced a handful of bills from his pants pocket and laid them on the counter.

“Passport?”

Nicholai handed over the passport indentifying him as Michel Guibert. It was a calculated risk, one that might send teletypes singing in Beijing, Moscow, and Washington, but Nicholai doubted it. Luang Prabang was a backwater even in Indochina, and there were probably no alarm bells here to be rung. Still, French intelligence would no doubt have a presence here, but Nicholai was counting on that.

The clerk copied down the passport information and handed it back to Nicholai with a key. “Room 203 has a charming view of the river. Would Monsieur like a razor sent up?”

“Yes, please,” Nicholai answered. “And coffee, croissant, and the most recent newspaper available, if you will.”

The clerk nodded with satisfaction.

Clean and shaven, Nicholai sat on his small balcony and enjoyed the excellent croissant.

The pastry seemed at odds with the intense heat that was building in the late morning, but nevertheless tasted good along with the cup of strong espresso. It was all very French – even as the file of saffron-robed young monks walked by on their way back from the ritual morning alms solicitations.

A main thoroughfare of the old Laotian royal capital, Khem Kong Road ran along the riverbank and was lined with shops, restaurants, and French cafés. A blend of odors – steamed fish and crepes – spoke redolently of the town’s mixed culture. Ancient Buddhist temples stood beside elegant French colonial manor houses, the red-tiled roofs of which would not have been out of place along the Mediterranean Sea instead of the banks of the Mekong. Beautiful emerald green mountains rose across the brown, muddy river. It was a scene of great tranquility, in sharp contrast to the shipment of lethal weapons waiting on the rafts just a few hundred yards upriver.

Nicholai took another bite of the croissant and read his newspaper, a week-old copy of the Journal d’Extrême-Orient. He hadn’t seen the news in several months, but was not surprised to see that little had changed. Negotiations to end the Korean conflict dragged on, the Viet Minh had defeated the French at a battle near Hoa Binh in the north, a Cambodian nationalist demanded that French forces leave the country, then was forced to flee and was branded both a Communist and an agent of the CIA by the editorialist. In Saigon, the puppet emperor Bao Dai welcomed a delegation from the French film industry and -

He almost missed it at first, in the dull list naming the delegation: Françoise Ariend, Michel Cournoyer, Anise Maurent…

Solange Picard.

Solange was not in Tokyo but in Saigon. As a member of a French film delegation. Interesting.

Saigon, he thought.

How interesting, how coincidental.

Haverford must think me a fool.

Nicholai walked up the street to a clothier.

The heat of afternoon was on – the air was moist with the promise of rain. The dry season in Southeast Asia would soon be over, the monsoons would be coming on. With the temperature at least a hundred degrees and humid, Nicholai’s shirt was soaked with sweat by the time he went into the shop. He bought three cotton shirts, two pairs of linen trousers, a white linen suit, a pair of oxford shoes, and a panama hat and had them sent back to his hotel. Then he found another shop and bought a decent suitcase. Now he could simply pack, walk away from the suicide mission to take the weapons into the south of Vietnam, and go to Saigon into the trap that the Americans were setting with Solange as bait.