Up Country Part 42

I put the money back in his pocket.

He said something to the driver, and they went inside the office.

Susan and I made eye contact. She said, "Mr. Cam is not dressed for a night drive up north."

"The car has a heater."

"They rarely use the heater because they think it wastes gas. Same with headlights, if you can believe that. Also, if the car breaks down, they'd freeze to death."

"How cold is it up north?"

"Probably in the fifties at night. That's very cold for someone from Nha Trang."

I nodded and said, "We must look stupid."

"Speak for yourself. Also, Mr. Cam may speak some English. So watch what you say."

"I know that."

She looked at me and said, "Are you sure you don't want to take the mini-bus tomorrow?"

I replied, "I can handle Mr. Cam."

"Can you handle getting robbed on the road?"

"I'm driving."

"Paul, you aren't allowed to drive."

"Don't worry about it."

She informed me, "Sometimes they're in cahoots with the police. They'll pull over the chauffeured car and fine the Westerners in the car big bucks. If you're driving, you'll get arrested."

"If they catch me."

She looked at me and said, "I guess the R&R is over."

"You bet."

She forced a smile and said, "So we outrun the police or speed through the ambush."

"Right. Mr. Cam wouldn't be so accommodating." I asked, "Is there an alternate route?"

"No. At night, it's Highway One, or stay home. The other roads aren't drivable at night, unless you want to go about ten miles an hour."

"Okay. This is a challenge. I like challenges."

She didn't reply.

I realized that Susan might not share my enthusiasm for irrational behavior. I said, "Look, I'm the one who needs to make a rendezvous. I'll go, and you follow with the Frenchmen tomorrow."

"Oh, so I have to ride with a busload of Frenchmen, and all you have to do is stay awake eight hours and watch out for highway robbers. I thought you were a gentleman."

"Be serious."

"Look, Paul, chances are nothing is going to happen. And if it does, the nice thing about this country is that they don't kill you. And the women aren't raped. It's only about money. You just hand over everything you own, and they're gone." She added, "We can hitchhike the rest of the way in the morning."

"I'm not getting a good image of us standing in our underwear on Highway One, trying to flag down an ox cart."

She handed me her tote bag, which was heavy.

I said, "What do you have in here?"

She replied, "Some American companies keep a little protection locked in the safe."

I didn't say anything.

She continued, "In the Binh Tay Market in Cholan, you can buy pieces of American military hardware under the counter. You put the pieces together, and voila, you have something. In this case, a Colt.45 automatic, American military issue. You're familiar with this weapon."

I looked at her and reminded her, "You said this was a capital offense."

"Only if you get caught."

"Susan... where did you hide this?"

She replied, "In the hot water tank. There's always an access panel."

My mind was reeling, and I started to say something, but Mr. Thuc and Mr. Cam had come out of the office.

I looked at them and had the impression that they'd gone over the final details of their plan, as Susan and I had gone over the details of our plan to screw up their plan.

Mr. Thuc was smiling again, and he said, "Mr. Cam ready. You ready. Have good journey to Hue." He added, "Chuc Mung Nam Moi," then reminded us, "Pay Mr. Cam when you get to Hue."

Not wanting to seem as jumpy as Mr. Cam, we shook hands with Slicky Boy and wished him a Happy New Year. Mr. Thuc and Mr. Cam each opened a rear door for us, and we both got in the back.

We pulled out of the lot and halfway down Van Hoa Street, Susan said something to Mr. Cam. He replied, and she got a little sharp with him. I put my hand on his shoulder and said in English, "Do what lady say."

He realized we weren't going to be that easy. Within a few minutes, he pulled into a gas station.

He filled the tank, and I stood near him. Susan went into the service station office, and came out a few minutes later with a guy who was carrying two ten-liter cans of gasoline. Susan had a plastic bag that contained two liters of bottled water, a lot of cellophane bags filled with snacks, and a road map.

I made Mr. Cam pay for the gas, and as he did, I took my Nha Trang map and guidebook out of my overnight bag. We all got in the car, me in the front this time, and off we went.

We headed north, and on the map I could see we were going in the right direction, toward the Xam Bong Bridge.

The long bridge pa.s.sed over a few small islands where the Nha Trang River widened and emptied into the South China Sea. The sea had turned from blue to gold as the sun began to set above the hills to our west. It would be dark within half an hour.

We continued north on a fairly decent road that cut through the high hills north of Nha Trang.

I recognized this road and looked to my right. I said to Susan, "That's where the giant fairy fell down drunk and put his handprint in the rock."

"Glad you were paying attention. And up there, on the next mountain, is where his lover turned to stone." Susan said, "This is sad. Leaving Nha Trang. I had the best week I've had since I've been here."

I looked back at her, and we made eye contact. I said, "Thanks for a great R&R."

Within fifteen minutes, the road intersected Highway One, which ran straight to Hue, about six hundred kilometers due north.

The so-called highway had one lane in each direction, but widened now and then to three lanes for pa.s.sing. Motor traffic was moderate, but there were still a lot of ox carts and bicycles on the road. Mr. Cam's driving would not get him a Highway Safety Award, but he was no worse than anyone else on the road.

Highway One ran along the coast, and up ahead I could see another mountainous promontory jutting into the sea. To our left, rice paddies and villages stretched along the highway, and beyond them were more mountains which now blocked the sun. It was getting to that time of day that in the military we called EENT, the end of evening nautical twilight, with enough light left to dig in for the night.

This was going to be the first time since 1972 that I was in the Vietnamese countryside after dark, and I wasn't looking forward to it. The night belonged to Charlie, and to Charlie's son, Mr. Cam.

But unbeknownst to Mr. Cam, Susan Weber had an old, but I hoped, well-oiled Colt.45 ready to point at his head.

In fact, as the sun set, I was less angry at her for bringing the gun, and I hoped it was a.s.sembled and loaded. I could a.s.semble and disa.s.semble a Colt.45 literally blindfolded, and do it in under fifteen seconds, including slapping in the magazine, chambering a round, and taking it off safety. But I didn't want to try to break my record.

It was dark now, and the traffic had all but disappeared, except for a few trucks wasting gasoline with their lights on. We pa.s.sed through a small town, which my map said was called Ninh Hoa. A mountainous headland blocked the view of the sea to the right, and up ahead was a stretch of desolate road. I could see a few peasants' huts with lights in the windows, and water buffalo being led in from the fields. It was dinner time, and perhaps ambush time.

I said to Mr. Cam in English, "I need to pee. Biet? Take a leak. Make nuoc."

He looked at me. "Nuoc?"

Susan translated, and Mr. Cam pulled over to the side of the road.

I reached over, shut off the ignition, and took the keys. I got out of the car and closed my door.

I came around to the driver's side and took the orange streamer off the antenna. I opened the driver's door, gave Mr. Cam a little push, and said, "Move."

He was not happy, but he slid across the seat. I'm sure he had thoughts about making a break, but before he considered this option, I was behind the wheel, and the car was moving. I shifted through the gears and cruised along Highway One at about a hundred kilometers an hour. The Nissan drove well, but with two Caucasians and one Viet, and a full tank, it was a bit underpowered.

I didn't really want Mr. Cam along, but neither did I want him going to a police station. So, I kidnapped him. I said to Susan, "Tell him he looked tired, and I'll drive. He can go to sleep."

She translated.

Mr. Cam looked anything but tired. He looked agitated. He said something, which Susan translated as, "He says you will be in big trouble if the police see you driving."

"So will he. Tell him." She told him.

I got the Nissan up to 120 KPH, and without traffic, it wasn't too bad. But now and then we hit a pothole, and I almost lost control. The springs and shocks weren't the greatest, and I was relying on the spare if I had a blowout. I certainly wasn't relying on my membership in the AAA.

About ten minutes later, I noticed in my rearview mirror the headlights of a car, and as it got closer, I saw that it was a small open jeep. I said, "We have company."

Susan looked out the back window and said, "It could be a police jeep. I think there're two people in it."

I floored the Nissan.

The road was straight and flat as it pa.s.sed through the rice paddies, and I eased the Nissan to the center of the road where I hoped the blacktop was better. The vehicle behind me was keeping up, but not gaining.

Mr. Cam was looking in his sideview mirror, but said nothing.

I asked Susan, "Do the police have radios?"

She said, "Sometimes."

Mr. Cam said something to Susan, and she said to me, "Mr. Cam believes there's a police car behind us, and he suggests we pull over."

I replied, "If it was a police car, he'd have his lights and siren on."

She said to me, "They don't have lights and sirens here."

"I know. Just being funny."

"This isn't funny. Can we outrun them?"

"I'm trying."

I was maxed out at 160 KPH, and I knew if I hit a major pothole at this speed, I'd have a blowout, or I'd lose control, or both. The police knew the same would happen to them, but they seemed uncommonly dedicated to the chase, and I figured they had more in mind than a two-dollar ticket. In fact, if Mr. Thuc had set us up, the cops had also figured out by now that Mr. Cam wasn't driving.

The Nissan held the speed, but this was a total c.r.a.p shoot regarding who was going to hit the first big pothole.

There was a big truck in front of me, and I came up behind it like it was standing still. I swung onto the oncoming lane and saw another truck coming head-on. I pa.s.sed the truck, then at about two seconds before I would have collided with the oncoming one I swung back into the right lane. A minute later, I saw the headlights of the jeep behind me, and he'd lost some ground.

Mr. Cam was getting increasingly agitated, and he kept trying to reason with Susan, who kept telling him, "Im lang," which I recalled meant be quiet or shut up.

The vehicle behind us was about a hundred meters away, and maybe a little closer than last time I looked. I asked Susan, "Do the cops carry rifles or just pistols?"

"Both."

"Do they shoot at speeding cars?"

"Why don't we a.s.sume that they do?"

"Let's a.s.sume they want to rob the stagecoach, and they don't want everything incinerated in a ball of fire."

"Sounds right."

I said to Susan, "Get ready to toss that thing in your tote. We don't want to face a firing squad."

She said, "I've got it in my hand. Tell me when."

"How about now? Before I flip this car, and they find it on us."

She didn't reply.

"Susan?"

"Let's wait."