The smell of the jungle was oppressive. Saville moved close to Tyreen and spoke quietly. “Smith ain’t the only one.”
“Everybody’s scared,” Tyreen said.
“What are you scared of?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re scared to give in, David. Scared to admit it when you get too sick and too beat-up to fight. You used to be the best fighter there was.”
“I still am.”
“No. But you’re scared just the same.”
Tyreen said, “I’ll tell you something, Theodore. Not one of us would have come on this mission if we hadn’t been scared of something.”
Chapter Twenty-two
1005 Hours
Up front, Nhu Van Sun’s foot was reaching for the brake, and Tyreen pitched forward with the abrupt stop. He heard J. D. Hooker’s “Jesus H. Christ!” All Tyreen could see was dark jungle on both sides of the road. No one was in sight. Tyreen flapped back the tarpaulin.
Corporal Smith leaned out of the seat. “Almost missed it,” he said. “Sorry we shook it up, Colonel. This is where we get off the road. End of the line. Chutrang’s just over the ridge, there.”
Tyreen said, “All right. Let’s pull off the road.”
The truck backed and jockeyed and rammed into the rain forest. They stopped after thirty feet of travel, and when he looked back Tyreen could not see the road.
Corporal Smith got down and said, “Hang on a minute, sir.” He cupped his hands to his mouth and spoke rapidly in a singsong tongue, calling toward the south.
Tyreen got out of the truck. “Everybody out.”
A handful of figures appeared in the forest, a knot of men in white Oriental pajamas. Corporal Smith’s talk rattled at them. Saville muttered at Tyreen, “Must be a Montagnard dialect, hey?”
A soft, light voice uttered a command, and the white costumes flapped a little in the rain. One figure moved forward — a woman, slight and supple. Her voice was young. “Les Américains?”
Smith talked quickly, using his hands. Tyreen heard his own name. Saville said, “What the hell?”
The young woman advanced, carrying a carbine. Her face was shaded by a conical hat of woven straw. “I am Lin Thao. It is all right, Colonel. I speak English.”
She did not smile. Tyreen wished he could make out her features. What did a name mean? The rain was slow and cold. Tyreen said, “Corporal.”
“Yes, sir. Her brother’s Ngo Kuy Thao. He runs the village.”
The young woman said, “My brother is dead, Corporal.”
Tyreen heard Smith’s slow intake of breath. Under Lin Thao’s loose blouse the shoulders lifted and fell, a tired gesture. “The Vietminh...”
“Your brother was killed?”
“Eventually.”
“I’m sorry,” Tyreen said. He felt awkward and irritable.
“We found him in the jungle. This morning. He had been beaten. He was returning from Chutrang to tell us about Captain Kreizler.”
Tyreen put his submachine gun over his shoulder on its sling. He scraped a hand across his mouth. “You’ve been expecting us, Miss?”
“Yes. I have come to meet you because there is no one else. The village has not yet elected a new leader. I will tell you what my brother would have told you, and try to do what he would do.”
“Do you think they made your brother talk?”
Saville cleared his throat. The girl’s face was invisible under the hat. Tyreen said, “I’m sorry. We ought to know. If he was made to talk, then they’ll be expecting us.”
“My brother did not talk.”
“You’re sure?”
“I am quite sure, Colonel. My brother was their prisoner twice before, and he did not talk then.”
“All right,” Tyreen said.
The girl turned. “Please follow me.” She walked into the rain forest.
There was the odor of food cooking in the jungle clearing. Boiling rice steamed in big pots over open fires sizzling in the rain. A dark, humped water buffalo stood in an open shed beside a hut thatched with rushes. There were three small huts and a pagoda. A tribesman stood outside the pagoda, armed with a semiautomatic rifle. He wore khaki pants and a loose black Oriental shirt. Crossed ammunition bandoliers hung from his shoulders. Tyreen caught the smell of burning joss sticks in the pagoda. Under a shelter two old people sat crosslegged: an old woman smoking a cigar, and an old man, scrawny with a potbelly. By them on a platform lay the shape of a human body wrapped in a sheet, the face covered by white paper. Incense smoldered in pots. The young woman spoke quietly, and the two old people got to their feet. They placed their palms together and bowed slowly toward the covered corpse and then toward Tyreen’s party. Lin Thao said, “These are my father and my mother, and that is my brother.”
Corporal Smith spoke very low into Tyreen’s ear:
“Her brother’s lucky. The last village chief here was tied up to a stake in front of the pagoda. The Vietminh ripped his belly open and left him hang there with his guts spilled out.”
Theodore Saville’s face was wet with rain. He blotted his face into the crook of his elbow. Tyreen said, “Let’s have a look at the map of Chutrang, Theodore.”
Saville had been watching the girl. He flashed angry eyes at Tyreen. “It’s a bad thing about your brother, Miss.”
She said, “He has nothing to fear now.”
J. D. Hooker’s eyes were hooded. “You act real busted up, don’t you? What’s with you people?”
She answered coolly. “Haven’t you heard of the stoic Oriental, Sergeant? We do not cry.” Presently Hooker looked away.
Tyreen said, “Theodore.”
Saville wheeled on him. “Just hold your Goddamn horses, David.”
“Tell that to Eddie Kreizler,” Tyreen said bleakly.
Saville said to Corporal Smith, “Where can we get out of the rain for a minute?”
“I will take you,” said Lin Thao. She made a gesture and walked toward a hut thatched with rushes.
It was like an Indian jacal Tyreen had seen in New Mexico. The girl turned up an oil lantern. The flame wavered on low oil, filling the hut with flat yellow light. Tyreen’s attention lay wholly against the girl.
She looked at him as she might look at a man under sentence of death. Her face was small and fragile. She was brown and oval-eyed; she appeared very young, but not frightened. Her mouth had a strange shape, as though she had been biting the lips. Tyreen locked eyes with her for a studied interval, but there was no break in her composure; she did not blink.
A narrow, bony man entered, a graceless tribesman with voracious eyes. He carried several bowls of stew. The girl apologized: “It is not our best, but you must eat.”
“Nuoc mam,” said Corporal Smith.
Theodore Saville said, “Thank you, Miss.” He sat down and began to eat.
Tyreen said, “Let’s see that map, Theodore.”
Saville’s eyes came up slowly. He drew the oilskin map pouch from his jacket and spread the map on the floor. Tyreen squatted beside it, deep in study. “That’s the guardhouse?”
“Eat,” said Lin Thao. “One of our people watched the city with glasses. He saw them take Captain Kreizler out of the jail and into the headquarters.”
“How long ago?”
“It has not been an hour.” She waved a small brown hand at him. “Is the food bad?”
Tyreen tasted it. “It’s fine. What about Lieutenant Chinh?”
“The guards killed him outside the jail. But they did not shoot Captain Kreizler.”
“Sure,” murmured Theodore Saville through a mouthful of stew.
Tyreen tasted the fermented sauce and bolted the food while his eyes traveled around the map. Saville said, “Figure to slog it, or use the truck?”