Quiller Salamander

'They'd give me the battalion I asked for?'

'It's not quite like that.' He hitched himself towards me a little. 'Neither the CIA in the States nor DI6 in London is officially interested in what happens in Cambodia at the present moment. There are too many other turbulent theatres of unrest engaging their attention both in Europe and Asia. But if it were known with certainty that Pol Pot means to make a final attempt to seize power again, and has the capacity, there might be a decision by shall we say — the more covert factions of government in Washington, London, Tokyo, Bonn and Paris to stop him — with or without reference to the United Nations.'

'By military force?'

'I suggest we leave that to them. The point is that when I say, "If it were known" that Pol Pot has this ambition, I clearly mean If you can find out. All we are asking you for, you see, is information, as I told you at the airport in Phnom Penh.'

'You don't think it's asking just a little too much,' I said, 'for one solitary spook to stand in for the CIA and DI6 because they're busy?'

'I also suggest we leave that to Mr Flockhart.'

'What you want first,' I said as the streetlamp flickered into life again, 'is the precise position of the main Khmer Rouge camp in the jungle, somewhere west.' Because if this man was talking about 'highest military authority' and 'covert factions of government' he was talking about an air strike, and just because the US had brought coals on its head for doing it before, it didn't mean they wouldn't do it again if they thought it was necessary, history being repetitive.

'We would very much like to know, yes,' Pringle said, 'the precise position of the main KR forces. And we might assume that this would also give us the precise whereabouts of Pol Pot.'

'He's still the target.'

'Specifically. And you should bear that in mind.'

'Noted.'

'What the major democratic powers want to avoid, in fine, is the potential destruction of a further million Cambodians in new and improved killing fields, and the potential risk of Pol Pot's subsequent invasion of North Vietnam, which is at present militarily vulnerable, with the blessing and support — in terms of bargain-price material — of China, creating a Communist bloc.'

I gave it some thought for a moment and Pringle left me to it, shifting slightly away in a symbolic gesture of withdrawal. Through the filthy window I watched a dog crossing the waste-ground, dragging something heavy, some kind of food it had seized from somewhere, perhaps, and wanted to hide, its ribs showing and its legs buckling sometimes, forcing it to rest, its jaws still locked on the trophy, the means of maintaining life for a few more days. I couldn't see exactly what it was but it was angled like a human foot, deep crimson, almost black in the acid light of the streetlamp as the dog got up and went on again, dragging its spoils through the rubble.

'Is the prime minister,' I asked Pringle when I was ready, 'being kept informed?' The Bureau is directly and exclusively responsible to the PM in all its activities. Hence its ability not, virtually, to exist.

'I'm not sure,' Pringle said.

'You mean you don't know? Or you think so, but you're not sure?' It was important. If the PM was already aware of Salamander then we were operating close to the 'highest military authority' Pringle had mentioned.

'Frankly,' he said, 'I don't know. But let me put it this way: the moment you achieve any kind of breakthrough, the prime minister will indeed be informed that we have a mission running, and told the nature of the objective.'

'And will you let me know when that happens?'

'You have my word.'

'I want assurance,' I told him, 'that I can eventually get support on an effective scale if I need it, since I'm taking on an army.'

'And with the prime minister in the picture, that would of course be guaranteed. I understand.'

He was very understanding, was our Mr Pringle, and he wore kid gloves and was stroking me with them. Why in God's name couldn't Flockhart have given me Ferris? Ferris or Pepperidge or even that bastard Loman, who at least has the grace to return my disregard. I don't like people who help me gently up the steps to the guillotine.

Pringle uncrossed his legs. 'Questions?'

'No. But you can get a couple of things for me. A Mine Action van and some field-glasses, 10 x 50s if possible, nothing less than 7.' He had a connection with Mine Action: they'd flown me out here from Phnom Penh.

'When do you need them by?'

'First light tomorrow.' I got off the seat and started down the aisle, and Pringle followed.

'May I ask what you have in mind?'

'I want to get close to Colonel Choen again — at the moment he's the only lead I've got. But this one's a long shot.' Pringle was waiting for me to tell him more, but I wasn't in the mood, didn't trust him yet.

As we dropped from the twisted step of the bus and kept to the shadow along the wall I heard him saying, 'Gabrielle Bouchard is in Pouthisat, did you know?'

I told him I didn't, and kept on walking. 'She's at the French Catholic Mission.'

'How is she?'

'Pretty well.'

I stopped just before the shadow of the wall came to an end.

'We break off here.'

'All right. So when do I expect a signal?'

'God knows,' I told him. 'As soon as I've got anything for you, that's all I can say.' Then I gave him the Church of Christ pamphlet the Caucasian woman had slipped through the open window of the Mazda. 'Get it to London for me. Wherever it can do the most good.'

Pringle looked at it briefly in the poor light. 'Oh, yes, we've all seen these. Unfortunately, it takes a political dissident's arrest to outrage the human rights groups. Driving children into brothels by the thousand doesn't worry them. But — ' he shrugged, putting the pamphlet away '- I'll see it reaches London, of course.' He melted into the night.

I would pass close to the French Catholic Mission on my way back to the safe-house, so I made a detour by a couple of turnings and found the place and knocked at the door and asked if Gabrielle was there, but the nun said no, she'd been shot in the street half an hour ago.

14: SNAKESKIN

'It could have been worse,' the black American nurse said. 'The bullet passed within a couple of inches of the liver, and this place ain't Bellevue, honey, there would have been nothing we could've done. C'mon in, this is what we call the intensive care unit, mostly for gunshot wounds and crashes and stuff, excuse the packing cases, we have to have something to sit on when our feet ache.'

An electric fan turned slowly overhead, fly-encrusted, wobbling, stirring the smells of blood, antiseptic and tobacco smoke. A young Vietnamese lay propped up on a dirty straw pillow, smoking — he was dying of tuberculosis, the nurse told me, so he was allowed two cigarettes a day to keep him from going crazy, and it smelled better anyway than most of the other things in this place. Her name was Leonora, she said, and she was from the Bronx.

'Fancy meeting you here,' I heard Gabrielle saying. She was in the end bed, half in shadow, her dark eyes luminous in her pale face, reflecting the kerosene lamp. She didn't smile, maybe couldn't.

'Don't do that!' Leonora told her as she tried to sit up. 'You can shake hands just the way you are, or kiss or whatever you have in mind.'

So I leaned down and kissed Gabrielle; her mouth was hot, moist, feverish. The nurse pushed a packing case across for me.

'I don't want you sitting on the bed, which is what you're dying to do. She has to keep still, you with me, honey?'

'Got it. How much blood did she lose?'

'Maybe a pint; we didn't have to give her any — not that we could have, none she would've wanted in her.'