Bernadette laughed theatrically at his puzzlement. ‘Still trading in antiquities? Who’s talking about antiquities? Today Monsieur Quatch earns his money by blackmail!’ Her voice rose to a screech. ‘By blackmailing his own partner in crime.’
‘This is not among the charges,’ Quatch shouted hoarsely.
‘Monsieur Quatch’s business in Paris was antiquities,’ Bernadette said rapidly. ‘But his pleasure was pornography. Movies made here, specially commissioned in the corrupt city of Saigon. Long after he returned from Paris, a year or two ago, he met the film maker, his old supplier of filth, at a conference in Geneva. The blackmail began then.’
The newsmen saw from Quatch’s evident agitation that this was no part of the set-piece. The manacles on his hands rattled. He was trying to stand, turning towards the judges, one arm raised, dragging the other with it.
‘Let the prisoner remain seated,’ the presiding judge said.
Quatch shrugged off the restraining hand of one of the guards. ‘I wish to make a statement, monsieur le president. I wish to make a statement on the introduction of the subject of these Western bank accounts.’
‘Let the prisoner be seated,’ the president said again. He looked desperately towards the man in the rumpled cream suit at the back of the court. ‘If this money exists, unadmitted by the prisoner, the Chief Prosecutor will no doubt be requesting the court to change very dramatically the sentence he was asking for.’ He turned to the newsmen. ‘You see,’ he said excitedly, ‘this is the democratic process at work. Further crimes are being unearthed as the trial continues. Greater sentences will be demanded.’
‘I insist on my right to make a statement,’ Quatch said, his voice rising.
From the back of the court there was a movement. The man in the cream suit stood abruptly. Heads swivelled in that direction.
The small grey haired man made a dismissive gesture with his right hand.
‘There will be no statement,’ said the judge.
Quatch was on his feet, the manacles trailing from his wrists. ‘I insist that the part played by the American be brought out into the open,’ he cried out in his high voice.
Among the journalists there was uproar. Quatch turned towards them, spreading his manacled arms. ‘Yes, messieurs, there is also an American involved. I see no reason now why his role should not be revealed.’
‘The prisoner must be silent,’ the judge shouted. ‘The court is adjourned!’
‘The prosecutor has betrayed the terms of our agreement.’ Quatch raised his voice above the din.
‘What agreement?’ Hunter roared from the press box.
The court erupted into chaos. Hunter jumped the barrier and reached Quatch’s side. Two other journalists were a step or two behind. Quatch screamed over his shoulder as the guards dragged him from the court: ‘If further charges are to be preferred the American pornographer should be named now!’
‘What American pornographer, for Christ’s sake?’ one of the newsmen bawled at Quatch. More guards had run into the court, rifles pointing at Hunter and the journalists.
‘The trial is adjourned,’ the presiding judge shouted above the scuffling figures. ‘Adjourned!’
In the confusion, the high screams of the guards, the deeper voices of the angry Westerners demanding to know the name of the American, Max turned towards Nan Luc. She was standing, her face drained of colour. For a moment he thought she was about to faint. ‘Nan Luc,’ he shouted above the din.
But she heard nothing. She had taken several steps forward so that she faced the witness stand. She was staring into the face of her grandmother. ‘Is this true?’ Max heard her say. ‘Tell me, for God’s sake, is this true?’
Then Bernadette too was dragged away and a line of guards began prodding rifles at the Westerners to drive them towards the wide double doors at the back of the courtroom.
From his position on the edge of the square Max watched Nan Luc come running down the courtroom steps. Perhaps she saw him, but she ran past, her sandals clicking on the sidewalk as she made for the Rue du Port.
For a moment he hesitated, still shocked by the horror he had seen on her face as she turned on her grandmother in the courtroom. Then behind him he heard a step.
‘Leave it, Max,’ Hal Bolson’s voice rumbled deeply. ‘Come on I’ll buy you a drink.’
Max turned to Bolson, nodding. ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘I could use one.’
Together they walked across the paved square between the huge puddles. The humidity forced Bolson to slow his step. Sweat poured from him, staining great black patches on the chest of his khaki shirt.
‘Do you think this American exists?’ Max said.
‘Maybe,’ Bolson shrugged. ‘Maybe not.’ They reached the Grand Hotel and entered, standing for a moment under the ancient revolving fan in the roof of the hall. ‘All we really know is that there was a pre-trial deal. The old lady blew it. Deliberately let the cat out of the bag about an American involvement. That wasn’t part of the deal. My guess is she’s signed Quatch’s death warrant.’
They approached the hotel in silence, Max’s thoughts on the way Nan Luc had faced her grandmother. And the words, what were they? ‘Tell me, for God’s sake, is this true?’
In the hotel bar most of the journalists were drinking beer or thin sugary orange drinks. Hunter alone seemed to be drinking liquor. He greeted them with a grimace. ‘Have you heard the news? We’re all off to Saigon for a five-day drunk.’
‘What happened?’ Max looked round at the angry faces of the journalists.
‘What happened,’ Hunter said, ‘is that without any explanation they’ve ended the trial. Van Khoa was just here to give us the news.’
‘The trial’s over?’ Max said. ‘It’s hardly begun.’
Hunter nodded. ‘Seems we were wrong.’
‘So we all go home?’ Max said. ‘Just like that?’
‘Anybody who wants to,’ Hunter rasped, ‘can come back in five days for the inevitable verdict – guilty on all counts, you bet your sweet life.’
Chapter Fifteen
The river carried them forward. There was no sense of motion unless he lifted his eyes to look past the rim of the boat at the overhanging branches of huge mango trees. In the prow of the sampan, shaded by a woven reed canopy he lay among cushions while Nan Luc, in a pale cotton dress, barefoot on the wet planking, guided the boat with the bamboo punt pole. Two old bicycles, one a rusting US Army foldaway, lay in the belly of the boat.
She turned the sampan from the middle of the river, against the pull of the tide so that it moved towards the bank. Almost reluctantly, Max lifted himself on to one elbow. He could see now that they were approaching a small township, a square with low yellow rendered buildings of which the river itself formed the fourth side. The square itself was unpaved and empty except for a few figures spreading nets to dry in the afternoon sun. Along the bank women in conical hats were bringing long branches while men stood in the water, chest deep, weaving a cage of bamboo about ten feet from the bank.
‘They throw food inside.’ Nan Luc followed Max’s curious glance. ‘When a big fish swims in they block the entrance and fish him out.’
‘And the nets?’ He looked towards the square.
‘Oh they’re for birds,’ she said. ‘The peasants stretch them between two mango trees and beat drums and blow whistles to drive the birds into the nets.’
‘And what then?’
She laughed. ‘They cook them and eat them.’