"Yes, yes, comrade," the old Chairman said in a creaking voice. "You have told us that before. We must have a positive date for them to arrive. Why do you not give us that date? Is it because you do not have results with the criminal Apple?"
"Comrades, it will be soon now. He is coming along. This is too important a thing to take a chance."
"Comrade Thach, you had better take something if you wish to continue in your post as liaison officer with Hoa Lo. There are certain perquisites that you would be reluctant to give up.
And I speak not of just the sedan and driver and the condiments you are given to hand out as favors." His voice suddenly crackled like old parchment. "I speak of your very freedom, comrade.
If you do not produce the criminal Apple with his desire to return to his country, you will take his place in a cell of your own. Or perhaps take a long walk to the South from which no one returns. The time is growing short. The necessary men are in position in Laos. We must have that press conference or the overall plan will fail. Timing is crucial in this."
A much-shakcn Thach returned to the Hanoi Hospital and pulled Co Dust into the empty room, wrinkling the sleeve of her white uniform with his nervous grip. "It was not for nothing that you were placed in his room.
So why is nothing happening?"
"He ... he is a very strong man. He knows his own mind."
She did not look at him. She sat hunched over, staring at the floor, as she thought of what to tell this man to put him off for another day. She raised her head and looked out the window.
"You must tell me more."
"I don"t have to tell you anything except what to do." He spun her around and slapped her hard twice before she could react.
She thought quickly and kept her composure. "I did not explain myself well," she said with great dignity. "He, the criminal Apple, will ask many questions. He will ask that if someone is coming who is a friend and who wishes to take him home, he must at least know who that friend is. He will say that is a reasonable request so he does not become surprised and upset to see a stranger. Please, it will be important to him to know these things."
"Will it sway him to what we want?"
She hesitated. "Yes, it might." She had gained a day, maybe two. "He would want to know who is coming, what they do.
He would want to know if they are sent by his government. He would have many questions."
Thach was silent for long moments. "All right, then. I will return."
He faced her with a snarl. "I will see him, and talk to him. There must be no further delay." Thach stormed out. That the pressure was on him by the Committee, there was no doubt. But why? he wondered. They knew these things took time. It was common to put an American criminal in leg irons for months or solitary confinement for years to get them to sign a statement or make a broadcast. Why the intense pressure to adhere to such a short time schedule? What did they have in mind? Did it have anything to do with the Soviet GRU man?
That had to be it. They were always impatient, and setting the kind of schedules that were so alien to the Vietnamese way. If they would just supply the war matdriel and technicians and dispense with the advice.
And the Chairman had mentioned Laos. Thach knew it was not his to question the grand scheme of things, but secretly he could wonder.
Little bits of information always helped him advance in the Party.
Co Dust went immediately to her post in Flak Apple"s hospital room. His eyes lit up when she entered and moved to his side. She took his hand and felt for his pulse. It was a secret between them. She would hold his hand while pretending to take his pulse. Then they would squeeze each other in slow tempo. She had not intended to develop real feelings for him, but, unbidden, they had been creeping slowly into her consciousness.
"h.e.l.lo, Princess," he said. She had been teaching him a few simple words in Vietnamese, and when he had found out she was known as Unmarried Girl of Dust, he had immediately started calling her Princess.
"Bonjour, Roi Noir," she answered and checked his body with a practiced eye. They had ceased the intubation and IVs a few days back when he had proved he could sit up and take nourishment by himself. The antibiotics and the salve that had been delivered by the Quakers from the United States to North Vietnam were performing well, and he was healing fast externally. Internally, his intestines were sore and she was afraid there might be an infection. She took his temperature and pulse and entered them on the chart.
She called him Roi Noir, Black King. "If I am to be a princess, then you must be a king," she had said. "A great black king." They had talked, slowly at first because he did not believe she was anything but yet another instrument of torture.
After she had calmed and cooled him many times when he had yelled and screamed in the night, Flak had become convinced she wanted to help him.
Although she had carefully brought up the subject of visitors and his possible repatriation, she had not gone into any details when he pressed for more information. Thach had told her it was a move by his government to interview sick and lame POWs, with a view toward taking them home. She had kept him on just enough drugs so he wouldn"t question her too deeply, because she really didn"t know any details. He seemed so vulnerable, she must protect him as long as she could.
Yesterday she had started easing him off the drugs.
Today she would have to tell him what was really happening.
"You have wondered why you are getting special treatment?" she started, and was surprised when he rose to his elbows.
"Special treatment? What do you mean?" Flak was suddenly very concerned. Paragraph III of the Code of Conduct very specifically pointed out that no POW was to accept parole or special favors from the enemy. "You told me I was getting the same treatment as every American in this hospital was getting."
She took his hand and put her head very close to his. "I ... I lied to you. There are no other Americans in this hospital."
"What?" His voice rose alarmingly.
"Shh, oh please, you must be quiet! I think they listen to us, maybe even see us. I did it for you. I lied to them, too. They think you are aware what is about to happen. That even maybe you approve."
"About to happen? What is about to happen?"
"Two Americans are coming to Hanoi. I do not know who they are, but I am told they want you to return to America with them. The Party here wants very much this to happen. There is a man, he will be here today to talk to you. He is very powerful in the Party. His name is Thach and he can help you go home."
Flak Apple lay back. He spoke with difficulty. "Princess, listen.
You"ve been very good to me and I appreciate that, but you have just given me devastating news. You must understand this. I cannot accept special treatment that the others don"t get.
And I certainly can"t go home until we all go."
"But you are badly wounded. Surely under the Geneva Convention-"
"Geneva Convention," he snorted. "Where have you been? You don"t expect these monsters to torture one day and follow the Geneva Convention the next?"
She drew back. "Monsters? They are monsters, my people? That is a harsh thing to say."
He took her hand. "I am sorry to make you feel bad, but my body did not get this way falling down a flight of stairs.
Those monsters in Hoa Lo tortured me and practically everybody else over there that wouldn"t make broadcasts or sign statements."
"Broadcasts? Statements? Torture? I do not understand what you are telling me."
He explained to her in detail what had been done to him. He started with the straps that bent his shoulders back in a V, and his torso forward so grotesquely his toes were in his mouth; he progressed to being hung upside down and beaten with rods for three days; and ended with the water hose inserted in his r.e.c.t.u.m and his stomach beaten until something burst.
She looked ill. Everything he said matched with the tears and bruises on his body.
"I ... had heard things. I didn"t want to listen, to believe."
Her face was a study of anguish. "There has been talk, quiet talk behind closed doors here at the hospital. Pilots have died here. We were told their bodies were torn upon jumping from their aircraft or in the crash. But nurses experienced in these things would look strangely and say these young men were injured not from crashes but from other things. They would never go beyond that. They were afraid to say any more." She squeezed his hand. "If there was only some way I could help you." When the words came out she realized how deeply she felt toward this man and she was surprised. There had been a man in France, a Frenchman who had taught her many things that a young woman from Vietnam would not-should not-know.
"Help me?" His grip tightened and a strange light came into his eyes.
"Yes, there is a way you can help me." He pulled her head closer. "You say they can hear us in here?" She nodded and he continued whispering into her ear. "Do you really want to help me?" She nodded again, and snuggled her face against his throat and shoulder.
"Can you hear me?" he whispered.
She nodded.
"I want to escape."
She struggled to sit up, but he pressed her tightly against his chest.
"You cannot do that," she murmured into his throat.
"Yes, I can, and you can help me. I don"t know how yet, but you can.
Will you help me?"
An idea was forming in his mind, involving the two Americans that supposedly were coming to interview him. They were Americans, they would help a fellow American. That was what his country was based on.
That was what his mother had always taught him. That was what he believed. One American always helped another --- especially when they were overseas in some G.o.d-forsaken country and one was in trouble. G.o.d, wasn"t America a great country and weren"t Americans the greatest people in the world? He knew they were.
He thought for a while and tried to get his priorities straight.
It wasn"t easy-his mind was still fuzzy from the drugs and as bruised by the beatings as his body. The slightest sound or rattle, and he would leap and jerk almost uncontrollably. He fought to keep the torture memories from his mind, for to let even the slightest bad thought surface was to bring on trembling and acrid sweat. To keep free from unwanted thoughts, he conjured up an evenly burning candle and concentrated on the flame to the exclusion of all else, until he felt ready to continue whatever thought process he had in his mind at the time. Other times he multiplied numbers to great amounts but had difficulty concentrating. The candle flame was best. Finally he had a plan of sorts laid out.
"You must prepare yourself. Very soon I will need you to make some contacts for me in the prison at Hoa Lo. I will make a plan and let you know what I need." He seized heihand and spoke with deep fervor. "I will escape."
2030 Hours LOCAL, FRIDAY 18 OCTOBER 1968 PHANTOM FAC OPERATIONS,.
8TH TACTICAL FIGHTER WING.
UBON ROYAL THAI AIR FORCE BASE.
KINGDOM OF THAILAND.
Court met with his operations officer, Captain Howie Joseph, and the instructor a.s.signed to Ubon on temporary duty from George AFB, Captain Ken Tanaka, and told them he"d be away for a few days, running around the boonies in Laos.
"In civilian clothes?" Tanaka asked.
"Yup," Court answered. "No American military in Laos allowed. Over Laos, yes. On the ground, no."
"No problem on the schedule, boss," Joseph said. "It will be a little tight, but we can cover the missions. I"ll just hold Tanaka here from his four-day R & R in Bangkok for a while.
You going to tell us what"s going on up there?"
Court told them what he knew and said he didn"t think he"d be gone more than three days. "The reason I have you here," he said to Tanaka, "is because you have seen Eagle Station at low level in the daytime. Now I want you to get familiar with it at night. See how to get in from any direction if the weather is bad, see what the best laydown patterns are for some of our more accurate weapons like CBU, napalm, and 20 mike-mike strafe. I"ll get word back to you when I"m up there, and on a frequency we can talk, and I"ll show you what Flaming Arrow is."
"Flaming Arrow?" Tanaka echoed.
"I can see you haven"t had a tour in South Vietnam," Court said with a grin. "Flaming Arrow is when you have a friendly camp that has lost its radios and is about to be overrun by the bad guys. The men in the camp have already rigged LIP 1I ten-foot plank and some boards shaped like a big flat arrow.
It"s mounted a few feet off the ground on a pipe so it can be swiveled to point in any direction. Nailed to the top of the arrow are a bunch of cans stuffed with oil-soaked rags.
When the bad guys are climbing the wire and there is air support available but no way to talk to them, the guys light the arrow up and point it in the direction they want. The fighters lay down everything they have at a prearranged distance beyond the tip of the arrow."
"Simple enough. We can do that," Tanaka said.
Court looked to Joseph. "Meanwhile, Howie, I want you to start scheduling the dusk and dawn patrollers to take a look at Eagle while there is still light. Then you, Ken, start showing the guys the place at night."
"s.h.i.t oh dear," Tanaka said. "That means I have to ride in the black pit." He meant the backseat of the F-4, from which forward vision was nil in the daytime, minus nil at night.
"The very place," Court said. "You"re a combat night IP now, I checked you out. Start IP-ing."
1145 Hours LOCAL, SUNDAY 20 OCTOBER 1968 EAGLE STATION AT LIMA SITE 85.
ROYALTY OF LAOS.
Landing a turboprop Pilatus Porter airplane uphill is not an easy task, yet Air America pilots in Laos had reduced it to the humdrum. In weather where the mists and clouds cut off mountaintops, the pilots could snake their planes from a well Romp known bush to a favorite rock to a tree they knew, then finally smash onto the ground with a great roaring of reverse propeller. If the ground was dry, a great dust cloud would envelop the plane.
Court Bannister sat in the right seat as pilot Dave Little dropped the flaps and slowed the Porter to 35 knots in preparation for landing at the dirt clearing at Eagle Station. Wolf Lochert sat in the rear, wearing a new T- IO backpack parachute.
If the parachute bothered Little, he made no comment. Court tried to appear nonchalant as Dave Little slammed onto the short strip, so steep and narrow it looked like a Tahoe ski run in the summertime.
Fighter pilots have a natural aversion to being in a small plane that someone else is flying close to the ground in dangerous conditions.
Unless he had flown with the light-plane pilot many times before and trusted his abilities, a fighter pilot was always convinced he could fly the plane better, thereby taking his own destiny into his own hands.
Most fighter pilots believed in the statement of Saint-Exupdry"s friend Guy Mermoz: "It"s worth it, it"s worth the final smashup." But if there was to be a final smashup, they did not want it at someone else"s hands.
Court was no different, but all he said to Dave Little as the dust cleared was, "Good job."
Bob Pearson waved to them from the edge of the clearing. A husky, cowlicked, blond twenty-five-year-old with a clear face, Pearson wore old khaki trousers cut off at the knees, thongs, and no shirt. He looked like he had just come from the surf at Malibu, except that he carried an M14 carbine. Two Hmoung soldiers trailed behind him. They also carried M14s. Off to one side stood a solid dark-headed man in civilian clothes.
Court and Wolf climbed down from the Porter and reached in for their bags. Dave Little waved and said he had some rounds to make. Court looked up at the low clouds. "Good luck," he said to the pilot. "It"s no sweat," Little replied and gunned the plane around and took off downhill.
Wolf unzipped his bag, pulled out an AK-47, took off his parachute and put it in the bag. He and Court picked up their gear and walked to the shade, where the USAF controller stood. (Ground scope dopes were officially called weapons controllers-probably in the attempt to make them feel like steely-eyed killers.) Both Court and Wolf wore dark cotton pants, light guayabera sport shirts, and combat boots. They had bought the clothes at the Ubon PX.
Wolf"s combat boots were a "gift" from a supply sergeant who said all he wanted was to be able to say, "Why sure, I know Wolf Lochert." Court wore a green mesh survival vest over his sport shirt, and a 9mm Browning automatic in a shoulder holster.
"So you"re Phantom Zero One," Pearson said to Court and extended his hand.
"And you"re Eagle One Four." They shook and Court introduced Wolf Lochert.
"And this is Mister Sam," Pearson said as the dark-headed man walked over. He was a thin man who wore khaki pants gathered at the waist and a dark green sport shirt. They shook hands.
Pearson pointed to the two Hmoung. "These are my buddies, Lee and Loo.
They"re the local kato champs." Kato was a cross between volleyball and soccer. The two small men, barely as tall as their M14s, nodded shyly.
They had the bodies and faces of twelve-year-olds and the wise eyes of jungle cats. They took up front and rear positions as Pearson and Mister Sam led Court and Wolf up a trail to the radar site.
As they climbed, the vegetation thinned until the path was barren as a mesa. The radar bubbles were the first things they saw of Eagle Station, then the radio antennas. Long wires, whips, blades, and log-periodic that looked like a TV antenna on any roof in a city. The first sound they heard was the m.u.f.fled throaty purring from the buried exhaust of a big generator. Pearson led them into an air-conditioned van, opened a small refrigerator, pulled out a c.o.ke for everyone, and started his, brief.