Susan offered me the cellophane bag of dried fruit, and I shook my head. She ate some of the fruit, then lit a cigarette.
She said to me, “If you’re not going to speak to me, or if you hate me, you should have let me go.”
True enough, but I didn’t reply.
She said, “I gave you the pistol. What more can I do to make you trust me?”
“You have any other guns on you?”
“No.”
I wanted to ask her if she was supposed to whack me if I became a problem, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask, and for sure I wasn’t going to get a straight answer.
She said, “Do you want to talk?”
“We did that.”
“Okay.” She threw her cigarette in the stream, then pushed the cellophane bag at me. She said, “I’m not going any farther until you eat something.”
I don’t like fruit, even dried fruit, but I was getting a little light-headed, maybe because of the altitude. I took the bag and ate some of the fruit. I said, “Let me see the map.”
She handed me the map, and I studied it.
She asked, “How are we doing for gas?”
I replied, “It’s mostly downhill from here.”
She came up beside me and looked at the map. She said, “There should be gas available in Tuan Giao, where Route 6 turns north and this other road heads south to Dien Bien Phu.”
“I figured that out. Ready to go?”
“I need another cigarette.” She lit up again.
I waited.
She said, “If you don’t love me or trust me, I’m going to jump off this cliff.”
I replied, “There is no cliff, and I’m not in the mood for your bewitching charms.”
“Do you hate me?”
“No, but I’m fed up with you.”
“Will you get over it?”
“Let’s go.” I got on the motorcycle.
“Do you love me?”
“Probably.” I started the bike.
“Do you trust me?”
“Not at all.”
She threw her cigarette down and said, “Okay. Let’s go.”
She mounted up, I pushed off, and kicked the motorcycle into gear.
We continued on over the pass, and the visibility in the fog was less than ten feet. At some point, we were on a straight downgrade, and I kicked the bike into neutral to save fuel. Even without being in gear, we were moving too fast, and I had to keep tapping the rear brake.
I saw a pair of oncoming yellow lights, and within a few seconds, an army jeep appeared out of the fog. The only thing that anyone could see of our faces were our round eyes, but even that feature was covered with goggles. The driver, however, was staring at us, and I had the thought that the word was out on the apparent FULRO attack on the army jeep near the Laotian border. Things like that didn’t make the news, but I guessed that it happened more often than the Viets admitted, and the army guys were very alert and wary.
The jeep was slowing down, and the guy in the passenger seat had his AK-47 at the ready. I thought he was going to block the road, so I kept one hand on the brake, and the other ready to go for the pistol tucked in my belt.
The jeep came to almost a complete stop and watched us pass by. I counted to five, then threw the motorcycle into gear and accelerated. I also killed the lights, which actually made the fog easier to see through. I got up to eighty KPH, which was much too fast for the road or the bad visibility. I was basically flying blind, trusting in my nonexistent luck, and my sense of how this road was turning. To her credit, Susan said nothing, showing how much she trusted me, or maybe she had her eyes closed.
I kept looking in the rearview mirror, but I didn’t see any yellow fog lights behind us.
Within half an hour, we drove out of the fog, and I could see a stretch of curving road running through forested hills.
I’d never been in such a godforsaken place, even during the war, and I could see that there wasn’t any room here for misjudgment; one misstep was all it would take to end this trip.
I got into third gear, and we continued on through the forest. I looked at the gas gauge and saw that we were near empty. I had counted on being able to buy some overpriced fuel from a passing car or truck if I ran out, knowing that all vehicles carried gas cans and probably siphons. But I seemed to be the only idiot on the road, except for the army jeep, and I didn’t think he’d sell me gas.
I heard the engine cough, and I switched over to the reserve tank.
Susan heard it, too, and asked, “Are you on reserve?”
I nodded.
She didn’t offer any advice or criticism of my fuel management.
At about the point where the reserve tank should have been empty, I saw some cleared land and a few huts up ahead.
Within a few minutes, we were in the small junction town of Tuan Giao, where Route 6 turned north toward China, and another road headed south toward Dien Bien Phu.
I saw a sign that said Et-xang, and I said to Susan, “We’re French.”
We both took off our Montagnard scarves and leather hats and stuffed them into our jackets as I headed toward the sign.
We ran out of gas before we got to the so-called service station, and Susan and I pushed the motorcycle the last hundred meters.
The et-xang place consisted of a muddy lot and a crumbling stucco building inside of which were bottles and cans of gasoline of all sizes, shapes, and volume.
The proprietor was an old Viet wrapped up like it was snowing, and he smiled when he saw two Westerners pushing the BMW through the mud. This could be Slicky Boy’s father.
Susan said to the old guy, “Bonjour, monsieur.”
He replied, “Bonjour, mademoiselle,” being very kind about her age.
There wasn’t much else to say; the guy had no trouble figuring we were out of gas, and he began funneling fuel into the BMW tank from various containers. He’d hold up a finger or two or three and say in French, “Litres,” as he poured. He reached forty liters by his count, more than the tank held, and I cut him off.
The price was the equivalent of about a buck and a half a liter, which was expensive for Vietnam, but I wasn’t sure where the hell we were anyway, so I paid him in dollars.
It was 6:15 P.M., and the sun was starting to set behind the mountains to the west. The distances in this part of the world weren’t long, but the traveling times were deceptive. We’d come close to a thousand kilometers, which should have taken maybe eight hours on a real road, but had taken us two twelve-hour days, and we weren’t even there yet.
The next day, Thursday, was the official end of the Tet holiday, though in reality it would run through the weekend. But I had this thought that we’d find the village of Ban Hin, and the house of Tran Van Vinh, only to be told, “Oh, sorry, you just missed him. He’s on his way back to Saigon where he lives now. He manages the Rex Hotel,” or something like that.
Susan said to me, “It’s nice to see you smiling again. What are you thinking about?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“Whatever makes you happy, makes me happy.”
“If I had anything in my stomach, I’d puke.”
“Don’t be mean to me.”
“Get on.”
We mounted up and headed south. I saw a concrete kilometer post that said Dien Bien Phu, 81 KM.
We were Western tourists now, on our way to see the French equivalent of Khe Sanh and the A Shau Valley, the Viet version of Yorktown, Thermopylae, Armageddon, and dozens of other Last and Final Battlefields that were in reality only a prelude to the opening shots of the next war.
And as for my pistol-packing, cigarette-smoking friend behind me, I needed to figure out if I had a guardian angel back there, or something more dangerous. Guns are like bugs; if you see one, there are more. Or, to be more trusting, maybe Ms. Weber’s last round of true confessions was the whole truth and nothing but the truth.