A Dangerous Friend (24 page)

In the silence that followed, Dede said cautiously, Wanted what?

Wanted what Magda wanted, Sydney said. To be part of the life of my time, and it did not matter where that life was led. I believed history did not stop for Americans, and vice versa. That afternoon at the Foundation, Rostok was persuasive. He had a variation on Magda's theme: when America was involved, the matter was important, and when America wasn't involved, the matter was ephemeral. The stakes were high all around. Walking home that night, I thought about the war and wondered if I had been hasty, allowing myself to be swept along by Rostok's words. I looked in the window of a bookstore, a display commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of Second Ypres and Gallipoli. There were photographs of the carnage surrounded by newly published books. I stood alone at the window while people moved around me, men and women hurrying home to dinner or the theater indifferent to Second Ypres and Gallipoli. One of the photographs showed a group of young men, jaunty in forage hats and puttees, leaning on the hood of an ambulance. At that moment I saw myself as one of the ambulance drivers. Not a combatant, a witness—and somehow, however the war came out, someone who could be said to have done more good than harm.

I thought—he looked up with a disarming smile and took another swallow of wine—that I might learn something in Indochina. I thought I might learn whether an abstract principle was worth fighting a war. Whatever I gained would be worth much more than whatever I lost.

Also, he said, I was bored.

Never discount boredom as motivation.

I was bored to death with the Foundation. Bored to death in New York, and my discontent was infecting the family, Karla and my daughter both.

But I have to tell you this also, he said. Standing in front of the bookstore window looking at the ambulance drivers, I heard a roaring as if I had held a seashell to my ear. Surely this was a sign, though of what I was not certain. Later, Karla said that anyone who had anything to do with this war in any capacity was as guilty as if he had put the barrel of a gun in a child's face and pulled the trigger. Resistance meant resistance, according to Karla.

And what have you learned? Claude said.

That Karla was wrong, he replied. That there are people like you who live between the lines, neither one thing nor another. You live in the shadows, without allegiances except to the life that you have made. And that you won't give up. It's a mystery to me how you manage. Also, I have learned that South Vietnam is not Czechoslovakia, exactly, but is not entirely removed from it, either.

Strange lessons, Claude said.

I hope you are not offended, Sydney said.

We are not offended, Dede said.

I admire the way you live, Sydney said.

It isn't admirable, Claude said. It's what we have.

So she never knew her father, Dede said. Karla never went back and he never came out.

Sydney nodded.

I don't know mine, either she added.

They think he's alive, probably a commissar in Prague.

Mine's alive, Dede said. He used to take me out to lunch on my birthday but he stopped when I went away to school. He's a bond salesman living somewhere up the Hudson, Rip Van Winkle country. New wife, new baby. Wife number three, baby number four.

Karla rarely mentions him, Sydney said. I don't think she thinks about him. Karla's always been self-sufficient. She's a law unto herself. When Karla left Europe, Paul Parkes was a dead letter.

She thinks about him, Dede said.

Maybe she does, Sydney said. I don't know.

Trust me, Dede said.

And Magda? Claude asked.

I don't know where Paul Parkes fits into Magda's theory of history. Probably he's inconvenient to it.

I'll get the cognac, Claude said.

I'll make coffee, Dede said, rising to collect the plates. She seemed to sway as she moved around the table stacking plates and flatware. When Sydney offered to help, she shook her head. Claude followed her into the kitchen.

Sydney lit a cigarette, feeling sheepish. He had not intended a tour d'horizon of his wretched marriage and careful life in New York. He had difficulty convincing them and in the end probably he had failed; that was usually the case, you could never see into another life. Probably they would not think his wretched and careful but normal, the sort of safe middle-class life that people everywhere wanted for themselves. Democratic systems promised that life, monotonous days, a steady job, Sundays in the countryside, a baseball game on a soft summer night, a concert under the stars. He did not know what had made him go on and on about Magda. He was surprised he remembered as much as he had. He had not spoken to her in a year because she and Karla were on the outs and Karla did not want him involved, meaning choosing sides.

Sydney finished his cigarette and still the Armands had not appeared. He could hear them in the kitchen talking, the confidential murmur reserved for married people who were fully attached to each other and dependent equally. He knew it well and missed it now. He missed the early mornings in Manhattan, Karla still asleep in their bed, the sky-blue duvet pulled to her throat, her soft hair spilling onto the pillow. Her eyes were shut but she was smiling. She appeared to blush in the light of early morning and then she moved, stretching herself. Her hand appeared, her fingers slender and supple as a cat's tail, flopping on the sheet. He knew she was dreaming. He thought he had never seen anyone so beautiful. He sat on the edge of the bed and willed her to wake but she rarely did; and then she would shudder voluptuously, smile again, and say something in her downy just-awake voice and he would kiss her on the neck. She moved farther under the covers and then she had part of him under the covers, too, a leg and an arm, and she would begin to laugh softly, her arms around the small of his back. She had something she wanted to tell him, what she remembered of her dream and his place in it. But the memory always feathered away before she could get it out. So he would invent a dream for her; a gaudy, complicated affair, ribald, full of promise. Tell me again, she murmured.

At that moment Dede came through the door with a tray, Claude following close behind with the bottle of Martell and three glasses.

The sun began to fail, casting long shadows through the living room. Dede poured coffee and Claude set ponies of cognac before them. They sat in companionable silence, listening to the songs of birds. Dede had thrown open the window and the room was filled with the thick scent of the forest and something else, acrid fumes from the factory shed at the bottom of the lawn. She stood at the window sipping coffee, dressed in a white shift, the crucifix at her throat, bangles on her wrists, looking like any settled suburban matron at the end of the day. She was evidently fatigued, her shoulders slumping as Karla's did at the end of a long rehearsal. Sydney looked at his watch and reckoned it was about time to say goodbye. He wondered how he could tell them gracefully that he wanted to come to them again for lunch or dinner. He liked their company. He liked the way they were with each other; communicating with a glance or a raised eyebrow. Together they seemed the essence of conjugal life and he wondered whether that was because of or in spite of their isolation from the war around them. He wondered how they had found each other and whether they knew right away, as he had with Karla; probably they were people attracted to extreme situations, such as those who lived on the slopes of a volcano, rising apprehensively each day to glance at the boiling cone. He suspected that between the Armands much was concealed, a specific zone of privacy that no outsider could break or would wish to break. They lived by their own lights.

Sydney looked up to see Claude staring at him with an expression that suggested he was reading minds, and not liking the text.

Claude said, Can your Rostok be trusted?

The remark was so unexpected that Sydney was startled. He answered truthfully, I suppose so. It would depend.

Depend on what? Claude said.

On what was at stake, Sydney replied. He thought a moment and attached an amendment, At stake for him.

You mean, him personally?

From the window Dede murmured,
Claude,
in a voice somewhere between apprehension and resignation.

It's all right, Claude said.

Be careful, she said as if she were speaking privately, tête-à- tête.

Claude said, Do you mean personal risk?

Not risk in a physical sense, Sydney said quickly. Rostok doesn't care about that because he thinks he's invincible. He does not want to be cornered, to be put in a position where he might be—outflanked. He likes to be able to see ahead, around the next corner. He likes to see from today to tomorrow. Meaning, to identify the contingencies. He watches his back. Your wife has worked in the government. She knows what it's like, the rivalries and the knives in the back.

Claude grunted doubtfully, reaching for his cognac and sipping, staring into the middle distance. Dede did not move from the window, where she stood listlessly watching her birds through a pair of binoculars.

Rostok likes to be in control of things, Sydney went on. He likes to be in charge and be certain everyone knows he's in charge. If he sensed a situation where he could be at the mercy of other people or unpredictable events, he would worry. Rostok worried is Rostok unreliable. He knows he has enemies, people who want him to fail and aren't above pushing things along. But in his own way he's very able. He's shrewd and he knows what he wants and will bend rules to get it.

That's what you need to know, Claude, Dede said from the window.

What are you seeing? Claude said.

I thought I saw a Bonaparte but it was only an ordinary parrot, Dede said.

Keep looking, Claude said.

Usually at dusk it's the best time. They're always moving around at dusk. You should find yourself a pair of binoculars, Sydney. Vietnam has the most extraordinary array of avian life. But I guess I've mentioned that before. She opened the door and stepped onto the verandah where she stood with the glasses lowered. In the distance they heard the beat of a helicopter.

Is his word good? Claude asked.

He very seldom gives it, Sydney said. Almost never. But when he does give it, his word's as good as anybody's.

That's not encouraging, Claude said.

It wasn't meant to be, Sydney said.

And you, Claude said. What about your word?

My word's good, Sydney said. I don't give it often, either, but that's because I can't deliver the way Rostok delivers. I can get a roof on a church but I can't stop them bombing your rubber trees. I thought I could, but I can't.

Claude said, Where do you fit in, then?

Sydney went through it again, Rostok and Pablo Gutterman and the others, Rostok in charge and Gutterman doing what Rostok gave him to do. He, Sydney, was third in line. But Rostok was the principal, he said, knowing that was what Claude was asking. But when the Frenchman did not reply, only continued to stare into the middle distance, Sydney said, What's this all about?

I understand you've lost someone, Claude said.

Sydney shook his head. He thought that the Frenchman meant Karla but the expression on his face showed otherwise.

What do you mean?

Your young army officer, Claude said. Captain Smalley.

Yes, Sydney said. He's missing. He and three comrades from an action a week or so ago. They were ambushed, hit hard, a very bad scene. They went in at night without sufficient force and were overwhelmed. Many dead and wounded and four missing. We'd like to get them back, all four. It's important to us.

Claude nodded soberly.

Very important, Sydney said.

That will not be possible, Dede said from the doorway. She gestured with the binoculars in the direction of the forest.

There are ways and means, Sydney said. He hesitated and added, Some kind of exchange or other reward. There are people working on it now, in the embassy and at MACV. And Rostok's working on it, too. I'm certain something can be worked out, something beneficial all around. Naturally we would have to verify. We'd have to know the situation. Where they are and in what condition. We'd have to communicate with them. And we'd have to approve the terms, of course.

Three of the four are dead, Claude said.

Rest in peace, Dede said.

The big one's still alive. Smalley.

Badly injured?

I don't know the nature of his wounds. I don't have that information. The information that I have is that he's alive and being held. I know he's been on the march, here and there over the past few days.

Where is he? Sydney asked.

Claude moved his head vaguely. Why, he's out there—

Sydney followed the Frenchman's line of sight, to the forest and the hinterland of the forest. Smalley could be anywhere, aboveground or below. He could be in a village or on a boat. He could be in the hills to the west or over the border in Cambodia or Laos. He could be in Saigon or one of the coastal cities, Qui Nhon or Nha Trang, though that was less likely. He would never be found unless his captors wanted him to be found. He had effectively disappeared from the known world, a ghost soldier.

Sydney said, Is he being well cared for? Are they looking after him?

I suppose they are, Claude said. It's not a suite at the Continental.

You know what I mean, Sydney said.

My information is limited. I doubt if there's torture. Is that what you mean?

They like torture, Sydney said.

Not always, Claude said.

Are they locals?

Claude shrugged and did not reply.

They are local, Dede said.

Claude glanced sharply at his wife, then turned again to Sydney. Is Captain Smalley important in some way? More important than an ordinary infantry captain on assignment?

They say so, Sydney said.

Who is he, then?

This must be between us, as friends. Are we friends?

Yes, Claude said.

He's related to a congressman, Sydney said.

I thought it was something like that, Claude said. There are rumors, more rumors than usual. We have them all the time but these are different. There's activity in the district, night patrols and so forth. Interrogation of villagers, offers of money or threats, depending on who's doing the interrogating. Helicopters checkerboarding. It's more activity than we've ever seen. So the people here had an idea that this captain might be out of the ordinary, a special sort of captain. They thought he must be a spy despite the uniform.