The Vulcan Disaster

I awoke in pitch darkness. I was lying on some sort of improvised mattress on a hard uneven surface. A metal surface, one that shook and vibrated beneath me. A truck? A train? No. An airplane with twin engines — props at that. The floor underneath was — I felt with one hand — metal mesh over metal girders or something. A DC-3. I’d felt that feeling before, a few times, going back a few years. The old bird was still the workhorse of the world’s airlines, and for a lot of good reasons.

I tried to sit up and then remembered what had happened to me. I lay back again, catching my breath, and let it all run through my head again, right up to the car and the alley. Well, I hadn’t been run over, or even hit. And somebody — the people in the car, perhaps? Phuong? — had picked me up and loaded me in this plane going wherever on earth I had no way of knowing.

I shook my head. I hoped it wasn’t north, but even as I entertained the thought I knew that that was the direction we were heading. Hanoi? Haiphong? Who could tell? And don’t ask me how I knew; I just knew.

“Damn it,” I mumbled, and tried to sit up again. It hurt, but not as badly as before. Someone had bandaged me up a bit, and fairly expertly, too. And unless I was totally insensitive to that sort of thing, they’d shot me full of painkiller. I couldn’t feel the painkiller; I could just feel the lack of pain. And I’d had ribs busted before. I knew how bad I ought to be feeling just then.

I took inventory of my personal effects. Wilhelmina was gone. Pierre, my little gas bomb, was still in place, as was Hugo, the pencil-thin stiletto stashed in a chamois case up my sleeve. Good enough, I thought. I’m not going to be helpless when someone comes in. Maybe I could take one or two of them with me.

I was looking aft when the door opened behind me — a quick flash of light, then darkness, only with the distinct feeling that now I wasn’t alone. I eased Hugo into my hand and slipped soundlessly to one side, away from the more or less central position in which I’d been left I couldn’t hear a thing because of the steady roar of those engines. I poised, knife in hand, ready to lunge.

“Mr. Carter,” a voice said.

“Phuong?”

“Yes. Oh, here... I was worried about you...” She slipped down beside me; took one of my hands in hers; felt the knife; shuddered. Then she pressed my hand again.

“Phuong,” I said. “What happened? Where are we going?”

“Oh,” she said. “The car... when it stopped, a man got out. A... a man I had known once. A man high in the government of the... of what we called the Republic of Viet Nam.” Both her hands closed on mine. She crept forward on her knees and nestled her head on my shoulder. I sat down, holding her with one hand, the knife still at the ready in the other. She swallowed hard and went on. “I... we don’t have much time, Mr. Carter. I will leave you no more illusions. I... I had been this man’s mistress. I had... I had left him for Walter. He was still... very much taken with me, I think. I... I am afraid I made him promises — anything, anything — if he would help me... help us... escape. I said you were an important State Department employee... a man who could ease his way once he had... made his way out of the Saigon area and had established his base of operations elsewhere. He...”

“Base of operations?” I said. “I don’t understand. And how am I going to help him?”

“He is going... somewhere... oh, I might as well tell you. He is going north to Hong Kong. There he will arrange for transfer of credit and set himself up. Then, once he is secure in Hong Kong, the next stop is, of course, the United States. Only there can he continue in the line of work he has chosen for himself. Only there can be...”

“Line of work?” I said.

“Oh, God,” she said. I could feel her sigh in despair. “He was one of the largest dealers in Long Pot heroin in the Republic. But no matter. Mr. Carter... Nick... I...” She burrowed her little face into my shoulder again. Patting her cheek with my free hand I could feel her face, wet with tears.

“Go on,” I said. “His name?”

I could feel her fingers dig into my arm again. She didn’t answer at first. Then her voice quivering, she named a name.

I whistled. A man high in the government, she’d said. Well, that hadn’t been any overstatement.

I thought of something. “Hey,” I said. “You said you’d made this guy some promises. What promises?”

Her fingers dug into my arm, harder. She tried to speak once, dissolved into a sob, and tried again. “I... I would... simply be... available.” She sighed, long and deep. “He will need... means... of persuading people in high places, first in Hong Kong, then in the United States if he gets there... means of persuading them that they should do whatever it is that he needs at any given time. He will... he will have need of girls like me...” She stopped there, though, and hung on to me like a barnacle.