Phantom Leader Part 47

Flak sat up, blinked in the rain, unwound the cloth from his arm, and fashioned it into a turban on his head. Frederick looked at Flak. "You look about as much like an East Indian as the Creature from the Black Lagoon."

"Yeah, thanks. You look as much a journalist as Genghis Khan."

Two minutes later the men were darting down the black street in the direction they had memorized from Flak's map.

The streets were spa.r.s.ely lit by one lamppost per block with a low-power bulb. Their sandals made soft slapping and splashing noises as they ran.

Frederick pulled Flak to a halt. "Sandals too noisy, hard to run." They took them off, held them in one hand, and ran on, silent as ghosts, darting from shadow to shadow, elusive as smoke. The streets were lined with shops, their metal doors and grillwork pulled into place. The rain slowed, then stopped. Thunder rumbled to the west, somewhere a dog barked twice, the subdued whine of Vietnamese music sounded from one of the windows over a shop. The dim glow of oil lamps made shadow outlines on a few windows. Each time they came to a corner, they flattened against a building.

One of them would drop to the ground and slowly poke his head to look around the corner. Seeing no one, they would continue. They counted the corners and made the turns they had memorized.

As they lay flat before the sixth turn, something scrambled on a small balcony over their heads, and a small dog started to yap. Flak crawled to the corner and slowly inched forward, his nose almost in the angle between sidewalk and building. It smelled of dog feces and something rotten. He was soaked with the acc.u.mulated water from the streets. He cautiously looked around the corner and froze, every nerve jangling.

From the ragged light of a small lantern, he saw two militiamen strolling toward him, casually chatting in the empty wet street, AK-47s slung muzzle-down over their backs. They were fifty feet from the corner.

Flak slowly worked himself backwards. "Two soldiers," he whispered in Frederick's ear, "with AKs."

Their eyes glistened as they looked at each other. Lightning flashed, closer. Then crashing rolls of thunder, Each knew what the other was thinking. If we take them, we at least have weapons and maybe uniform parts that might be a better disguise. But what to do with the bodies?

Worse, if we are captured we will be executed for murder, never mind the escape.

Each shook his head no at the same time. They both crawled backwards, hoping to find a doorway. They had only seconds. There were no doorways among the shop fronts, just shutters and grilles pulled flush to the face of the ancient concrete building. They could hear the murmur as the two soldiers approached the corner. The dog on the balcony set up a constant yapping. A m.u.f.fled voice from inside snapped a few Vietnamese words.

"Make like street sleepers," Flak whispered in Frederick's ear and a.s.sumed the position of a person curled up in sleep in an inhospitable environment. After a heart-stopping instant, Frederick did the same.

Then the soldiers were at the corner. They barely glanced at the sleeping forms on the sidewalk and continued on.

"What took you so long?" Flak whispered. They lay there, looking at each other.

"What did you say to do?"

"Make like street sleepers."

"I thought you said 'street sweepers."

Flak burbled a giggle and had to bite his tongue. "Oh G.o.d, Ted. There you are, laying in a street in the middle of downtown Hanoi in rags, smelling of your own p.i.s.s, and you think we should sweep the street."

"You should talk- --you're covered with dog s.h.i.t."

Flak punched him lightly on the shoulder. "Let's press on."

For the next hour they slowly and cautiously worked their way toward the British Emba.s.sy. They came to a cemetery.

Large and small croissant-shaped structures of concrete were set amidst square and rectangular headstones, many with crosses. In front of several stones were small lacquer bowls and sticks of incense. A few military trucks with blackout lights rumbled down the large street bordering the far side. The two men crouched outside the wrought-iron fence.

"This isn't on the map," Frederick said. The cemetery stretched off in both directions for several blocks.

"This is the area I couldn't memorize without Fidel becoming suspicious.

I do know we must cross that big road on the other side. The Emba.s.sy isn't far beyond."

"Then I guess we better cut through the cemetery," Frederick said, and glanced up at the fence. "We can climb this easy enough." They started to climb. Frederick reached the top, started swinging his leg over, and looked down. Flak was clinging to the fence halfway up, a look of agony on his face.

"What is it?" Frederick hissed.

"My arm, it's . . . it's killing me. Hurts like h.e.l.l, won't function."

Frederick locked his legs on the top of the fence for balance and reached down to help Flak up next to him, then helped him climb down to the inside of the cemetery. They scuttled in among the stones and settled in the rounded vee of a concrete-and-plaster tomb halfway between the surrounding streets. They both were sweating in the misty rain.

They sat with their backs to the tomb, facing the darkened street they had just come from. There was a tiny door into the tomb next to them.

Flak ma.s.saged his left arm.

"How does it feel?" Frederick asked.

"It's okay," Flak said, knowing he was lying. It hurt like h.e.l.l, but he didn't want Frederick to be alarmed.

Frederick lay flat and peered around the corner of the tomb toward the big street visible through the trees and beyond the small grave markers and rounded vaults. There was no civilian traffic. One after the other, about twenty-five meters apart, a convoy of military trucks splashed through the wide, rain-covered boulevard, blackout lights dim and low to the ground. After a moment Frederick pulled back.

The two men could barely see each other.

"Do we have to cross?"

"If we want to get to the British Emba.s.sy we do."

"We'll have to wait for a break, then dash across," Frederick said and lay back against the tomb. "You know what these are?"

"The tombs?"

"Yeah, the shape. They're shaped like the thighs of a woman . . . and her crotch. They're called hayet in Vietnamese."

"From the womb to the womb," Flak said. He sat back next to Frederick.

"It's going to be daylight soon." They spoke in hushed tones.

"G.o.d, I'm hungry," Flak said.

"Let's send out for a pizza."

Frederick felt around the small door to the tomb. Something clattered.

"Here," he said. He produced a bowl with what felt like hard bits of rice in it. Something scurried under the pressure of his thumb. "I also read where the Buddhists leave some food out by the tomb for the spirits of the departed." The two men split the contents, teeth cracking the dried rice like small chips of candy.

"Agh," Flak said, "it's like trying to eat sand."

"Let it soak in your mouth for a while," Frederick suggested. The splash and roar of trucks continued. "Looks like we might be here a while."

"At least until that convoy pa.s.ses." Flak settled back.

"You flew Thuds from Tahkli, didn't you?" he asked, naming a USAF base in Thailand.

"Yeah. Up until one of three SAMs fired at me ripped most of a wing off. How about you?"

"Ingested MiG debris that slowed me down, then I was. .h.i.t by antiaircraft near Vinh. Eighty-five mil, I think."

"Your backseater get out?"

"I don't think so. But you never know."

"No, you never know."

"Ted, you tapped through the wall that our names were getting out. How?"

"Right now in letters home. The V allow a few guys to write and receive letters. They make oblique references like 'I miss going with Bobby to the lake and sailing boats." That means Navy man Bob Lake is here. I guess our intell guys study those letters pretty thoroughly. And some writers use the dot code. That's where they make a tiny dot or p.r.i.c.k a hole in the paper under a letter. Others emphasize or raise certain words and letters."

"Sounds too slow and unwieldy to me. Who's allowed to write? They never said I could."

"The way we figure it is just those guys whose shootdown was publicized for propaganda purposes or whose pictures were shown by an East German or j.a.panese camera crew' Maybe the V think that shows their 'humane and lenient I policy. Anyway, each of our writers is a.s.signed so many names. But you're right. It's too slow. So we have a man who is memorizing names. The wheels have ordered him out on an early release."

"Early release. Can something like that happen?"

"You didn't know? Some of our guys cave in without torture and write letters to Uncle Ho begging forgiveness for their 'crimes against humanity." If they do that and 'show a good att.i.tude' by making broadcasts and meeting with the so-called peace delegations, they might get an early release.

Now, I'm not talking about the guys who are tortured to do these things.

I'm talking about guys who cooperate the minute they are captured. So far six of those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds have gone out with Americans from the peace groups."

"Who is the guy ordered out?"

"Hegdahl. So far he's memorized two hundred fifty names by service and rank. He's only nineteen and he really plays the village idiot around the V. They have him out there sweeping sidewalks and emptying slop buckets and all the time he's communicating. He's also sabotaged some trucks."

"Go on. How'd he do that?"

"When he was over at the Zoo, Stratton saw him sweep up some dirt and pour it in truck gas tanks."

Flak sat up. "Listen," he hissed.

"I don't hear anything."

"That's it. I don't either. The convoy has pa.s.sed."

They crawled to the sides of the tomb and looked over at the wide boulevard. They saw the last truck disappear out of sight.

"Okay," Flak said. "This is it. Time to cross over."

"I'm not sure I like the sound of that."

The two men got to their feet and darted through the tombs and mausoleums to the black iron fence. The boulevard was deserted in both directions. The shop fronts across the wide avenue were closed, the shuttered windows above presented dead eyes. With a quick glance in both directions, Ted Frederick sprang halfway up the fence and reached for the top. The fence shook, and he heard a clatter behind him and looked down. Flak Apple was in a heap at the base, his face a mask of pain in the shadows.

"It's my d.a.m.n arm again," he moaned softly. They heard a truck approaching.

"Quick," Frederick said, clinging to the top and reaching down for him.

The truck noise grew louder. There were several. "Christ," he said.

"It's another convoy."

"Press on," Flak almost shouted. "Don't wait for me.

Move it, G.o.ddammit. Move it!" The noise grew louder.

Frederick made a motion up to the top of the fence, then dropped back down to the ground next to Flak. "Nah," he said. "We go together or we don't go at all." They scuttled back to the sheltering arms of the tomb as the first of the trucks roared past the cemetery, The moist air deadened the sounds. Flak pressed his arm to his side and eased himself down to rest against the tomb.

"Why in h.e.l.l didn't you go on?" he asked.

"I forgot where the Emba.s.sy was." More trucks accelerated past the cemetery.

"Forgot, h.e.l.l." He looked to the east. There was a faint grayish glow.

"I think we are going to have to spend the day here.

Frederick looked around. "Let's crawl in one of these womb tombs."

"Yeah, a big one. Real big."

They found one near the fence. It was as large as an automobile. The plaster was crumbling; parts of the rounded corners were missing. They knelt at the two-foot-square door in the vee of the angle and pried it open with their fingers. Pieces of the wood came off in their hands when the wood-and-leather latches snapped. The door fell to the ground.

Musty and fetid air oozed out heavy as smoke from a greenwood fire. They looked at each other. The gray of the wet and overcast dawn diffused the cemetery in moist gauze.

"After you," Ted Frederick said, his mouth twisted in a lopsided grin.

"YGTBSM," Flak Apple said and crawled in. Something scurried away in the blackness in front of him. He wiped a hand in reflex as cobwebs draped his head and face. He nudged big stone jars that sc.r.a.ped the concrete floor with gritty noise. He felt around in front of him, found a wall, and stopped. He touched the blank face, then backed out.

"It's about five feet deep and four wide," he told Frederick. "Let's back in, then pull the door shut after us."

"Unh, Flak, is there anything ... unh, anyone in there?"

"Only in the jars."

One after the other they backed through the narrow door and lay facing each other, knees drawn up to squeeze into the confined s.p.a.ce. Flak reached out and pulled the fallen door to the front of the opening and wedged it in place, shutting out the dim gray light that had given them form and substance. A round dot of gray on the door marked a missing screw.

"Cozy," Frederick said. Their faces were six inches apart.

"Too cozy for words," Flak replied. "Your breath is ... well, imposing."

"Yours isn't exactly eau de cologne."

"It's all that d.a.m.n pumpkin soup and rotten rice."