William Boyd - Sweet Caress

We took our seats, ordered coffee, I lit a cigarette.

‘I’ve missed you,’ I said. ‘Silly me.’

‘Queenie’s run away. Run away home.’

‘Well, you know what these—’

‘She’s pregnant.’

‘Bargirls get pregnant, John. Occupational hazard.’

‘She says it’s mine.’

‘Come on—’

‘It can only be mine, she says.’

I felt a weariness of spirit descend on me. Fool, I rebuked myself for the second time in ten minutes. You were a one-night stand, old lady. I tried to reason with him but he didn’t want reason.

‘You can’t be sure it’s yours.’

‘Yes I can. She wouldn’t lie to me.’

‘What’s it got to do with me?’ I asked, letting some cynical steel into my voice. I was, I had to admit, a little hurt.

John explained. He knew where Queenie’s parents lived, in a village called Vinh Hoa on Highway 22 north out of Saigon, on the road to Tay Ninh. He needed someone who spoke French to be able to explain the situation to them — Queenie’s parents spoke French, she was proud of that, which was how he knew. I could see the panic rising in him so I said: whatever I can do to help, just tell me. He wanted to go directly to Vinh Hoa — he was sure Queenie would be with her parents — also he wanted me to bring my photos of her as a means of identifying where the family lived.

‘Hang on,’ I said, remembering. ‘There’s still fighting on Highway 22.’

‘Very sporadic. They’re mopping up. It’s only thirty clicks up the road, anyway — an hour, max.’ He wouldn’t stand for any caution. ‘Traffic is flowing. I checked.’

‘I’ll try and get hold of Truong.’

‘We can’t wait. I’ve got my bike with me. Come on, Amory — it’s very important. You owe it to me.’

I bridled at this: I owed him for a fuck?

Then he leant forward and kissed me and I forgave him.

‘She’s carrying my child. I can’t just let her vanish. I’ll never find her if I don’t go immediately. It’s now or never.’

He was right, I supposed, or so I thought as we walked back to the bureau. I wanted to take one precaution — I insisted — we had to tape BAO CHI 1in large letters to his bike.

‘Of course, anything,’ John said. ‘We can tape it to the leg shields.’ He pointed at a dirty old red and white motorbike, paint smirched and flaking.

‘What kind of bike is this?’ I asked.

‘Why do you want to know?’

‘I just like to know these things.’

‘It’s a Honda Super Cub.’

‘You meet the nicest people on a Honda.’

‘Ha-ha.’

I went into the office and found what I needed — I also put my camera in my bag (a Paxette, a 35 mm miniature, a solid little thing) — and taped a piece of card with BAO written on it in black marker on one leg shield and CHI on the other. John kick-started the motor and I climbed on the small pillion behind him. There was an aluminium handhold between the seats but I felt safer with my arms around him.

‘You don’t mind if I do this?’ I asked.

‘I don’t mind.’

We set off and I hugged myself against his damp sweaty shirt. It was cheap cotton and had a pattern of red clipper ships in full sail on it. I closed my eyes for a moment, feeling like a teenager again. It was proving to be the strangest day, with my emotions veering around from soft and silly to cynical and uncaring; and my sense of adult responsibility seemingly switched off — what was I doing on this bike with Oberkamp heading off to Highway 22? It was as if I was in some hallucinatory state.

John seemed to know where we were going. He had a street map folded up in a pocket that he consulted from time to time, pulling into the side of the road for a few seconds to get his bearings. We took back roads to avoid the traffic jams at Tan Son Nhut airport and finally pulled on to Highway 22 about four or five kilometres north of the city limits. I was very pleased to see it was busy — military and civilian vehicles going in both directions. ‘Highway’ was something of a misnomer, though: a two-lane strip of potholed tarmac with wide dusty verges heading through a scrubby landscape and the occasional grove of coconut palms. It was a hot and hazy day — I wished I’d brought a hat.

But half an hour up the road we were the only vehicle moving. I tapped John on the back and he pulled in.

‘What’s happening?’ he asked

I pointed to my right where, about two miles away, a converted Dakota known as a ‘Spooky’ was flying in a tight pylon turn. Then there came a noise like a chainsaw as its Gatling gun opened up from its position in the gaping side door.

‘There’s a problem,’ I said. ‘Where’s all the traffic? What’s the Spooky shooting at?’

‘They’re just mopping up. I checked with CIB, 1I told you. We’re heading west. All the trouble’s in the north.’

Then, as if to back up his reassurances two cars sped down the road towards us.

‘See? We’re only fifteen minutes away, I reckon.’

‘OK, let’s go.’

After about another mile the vegetation became sparser and over to the left I saw a flat expanse of semi-dried-out lake come into view, that had drained away or been half-evaporated by the heat. Parked on the near shore were three US Army personnel carriers, their crew sitting in the shade cast by their high sides. I was pleased to see them, made John stop and took a few photographs and gave them a wave as we puttered off. One of the soldiers jumped to his feet and shouted something at us, making crossing motions with his hands, but he was quickly lost to sight as we turned a corner. I tapped John on the back and he brought the Super Cub to a halt, once again.

‘Those GIs,’ I said. ‘They were telling us not to go on.’

‘We’re almost fucking there!’ he protested, pointing.

Up ahead, I could see a wooden shack by the roadside, roofed with palm leaves and with some rickety market stalls set out in front of it on the verge, ready to trade with passing vehicles — except there was no produce laid out.

I slipped off the bike and stepped into the middle of the road, looking up and down the shimmering tarmac. All traffic had disappeared and we were quite alone on Highway 22 again. Far in the distance the Spooky was banking into its pylon turn, looking for targets. I shaded my eyes, feeling the sweat trickle down my spine, listening.

‘Come on, Amory!’ John shouted and just at that moment I saw something move in the roadside shack.

The first shots hit the tarmac about ten feet in front of me. I felt the sting of bitumen chips hit my forearms and as I turned and ran heard the flat firecracker noise of several AK-47s open up and sensed the burn and tug of something hitting my right calf muscle. We ran into the undergrowth and crouched down. The Super Cub lay incongruously on its side. A bullet pinged off its front fork and tall puffs of dust erupted around it.

I looked down at my right leg. My chinos had a tear at the calf and blood was spreading. I rolled the trouser up and saw a neat three-inch furrow torn along the surface of the muscle. I felt no pain.

John pulled off his shirt and ripped off a sleeve — with remarkable ease — and bound it round the wound, knotting it tightly. The gunmen in the shack were now spraying the undergrowth, randomly searching for us. We were safe for the moment if we kept our heads down. Then I heard the roar of engines from the APCs from the lake, heading up the road towards us at full speed. The firing stopped and I raised my head to see three people run from the roadside shack and pelt into the scrub, just before the palm-frond roof was shredded into a thousand swirling pieces as the.50 calibre machine gun on the lead APC hosed the building. Some internal structure must have shattered because the whole shack half-collapsed with a creak and what sounded like a sigh and a thick cloud of dust rolled across the road. We stepped out of the undergrowth, hands up, just in case, as the lead APC lurched to a halt and its commander, sitting in the turret with the machine gun, began to swear at us colourfully.