Susan asked, “Was anyone… normal?”
I thought about that and said, “I’d like to say that there were men among us who… who held on to some degree of morality or humanity… but I really can’t remember… I think maybe. A combat unit is self-selecting… you know, guys who couldn’t handle it either never made it to the front, or were sent back. I remember guys who cracked very quickly and were sent to the rear to do menial jobs, and that was sort of a disgrace, but we got rid of them… and yes, there were men among us who held on to their religious or moral beliefs, but I think that in war, as in life, the good ones die young and die first…” I said to her, “That’s the best answer I can give you.”
She nodded.
I looked at the river, which I’d crossed so many years before with my own tribe, chasing the deer who led us into the dark rain forest to a darker place than we’d ever been before.
We re-crossed the river at the rock ford and started back to A Luoi. As we walked on the straight path through the ground mist and the farm fields, Susan said to me, “I feel that anything I say would be trivial or patronizing or stupidly sensitive. But let me say this, Paul — what happened here, to you and the others, was history, in both senses of the word. There was a war, you were in it, it’s over.”
“I know. I believe that.”
“And if you’re wondering, I don’t feel any differently toward you.”
I didn’t reply, but I wanted to say, “You say that now. Think about it.”
Susan took my hand and squeezed it. She said, “And there I am, having dinner on the roof of the Rex Hotel, bugging this total stranger about not wanting to talk about the war. Can I apologize for that?”
“No need. This whole trip has done me good. And if you weren’t along, I might not have been as honest with myself as I’m being with you.”
“I appreciate that.”
I changed the subject and said, “Somewhere in this valley, in May of 1968, a North Vietnamese soldier named Tran Quan Lee was killed in battle. Found on his body was a letter from his brother, Tran Van Vinh, also a soldier in the North Vietnamese army.”
I didn’t elaborate and waited for her to respond. Finally, she asked, “And you found this body and letter?”
“No. Someone else did.”
“And you saw this letter?”
“Yes, about a week ago. Do you know anything about this letter?”
She looked at me as we walked and said, “Paul, I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”
I stopped and she stopped. I looked at her. “Susan, do you know anything about this letter?”
She shook her head, thought a moment, then said, “This has something to do with why you’re here.”
“That’s right.”
“You mean… someone found a letter on the body of an enemy soldier… who found the letter?”
“An American soldier in the First Cavalry Division found the letter.”
“You knew this man?”
“No. It was a big division. Twenty thousand men. This guy who found the letter kept it as a war souvenir, and recently the letter was translated, and what was in the letter is the reason I’m here.”
She mulled that over, and I looked at her. I knew this woman by now, and I could tell she knew something and was trying to fit it in with what I’d said.
I asked her, “What did they tell you?”
She looked at me and replied, “Only that some new information had come to light and that you had to find someone here and question that person about it.”
“I told you that.”
“I know. And that’s all they told me in Saigon. Is this letter the new information?”
“It is.”
“What does the letter say?”
“Well, what it says is one thing, what it means is something else. That’s why I need to find and question the person who wrote the letter.”
She nodded.
We continued on toward the village of A Luoi, about a hundred meters away across the flat terrain. It was irrelevant where and how Tran Quan Lee died, but it would be interesting to know. If I’d had time back in Washington, I’d have found and questioned Victor Ort, and maybe swap some A Shau Valley stories.
I was certain that Victor Ort had made a photocopy of the letter for himself, or had kept the original and sent the VVA the photocopy. In either case, Victor Ort had an original text that I could have had translated rather than relying on the altered translation I’d seen. But probably Karl sent someone to Ort’s house and got the letter. Bottom line, Karl wasn’t going to let me do any standard detective work on this case; he’d made certain I went off half in the dark to Saigon on a weekend, where Susan Weber did some smoke and mirrors until I was on the train to Nha Trang.
Also, I didn’t see how that letter and Susan’s statement about Cam Ranh Bay fit together, if indeed they did. That could be smoke and mirrors, too.
Susan asked me, “Do you have a copy of the letter?”
I replied, “You must have skipped a few classes at Langley.”
“Don’t be sarcastic. I’m not a trained intelligence officer.”
“Then what did they teach you there?”
“How to be useful. I assume your contact in Hue told you how to find… what’s his name?”
“Tran Van Vinh. And yes, he did.” I asked her, “Does that name mean anything to you?”
“No. Should it?”
“I suppose not.” But I’d had another thought that Tran Van Vinh had become a high-ranking member of the Hanoi government, and somehow the true translation of this letter could be used to blackmail him into cooperating with the Americans on something, like maybe Cam Ranh Bay.
Mr. Vinh could actually live in Hanoi and be in Ban Hin only for the Tet holiday, which would make sense. But if he was going to be blackmailed, why did they want him dead? It was possible that Washington didn’t want him dead, and just told me that as more bullshit so I couldn’t figure this out. But if that were the case, why did Mr. Anh in Hue give me that message, which as far as I knew, were my final instructions from Washington?
It’s very difficult to solve a case when all the evidence you have is written or verbal, and the written evidence is bogus, and the verbal stuff is lies.
The truth of the matter lay in the village of Ban Hin — formerly known as Tam Ki — in the person of Tran Van Vinh, a simple peasant and former soldier, who might well be neither of those things. In fact, he might be long dead, or about to be dead, or about to be bribed or blackmailed.
War, as I’ve said, has a stark simplicity and honesty to it, like trying to kill someone with a shovel. Intelligence work was, by its nature, a game of liar’s poker, played with a marked deck and counterfeit money.