The Burma Effect (19 page)

Stefan walked up to Delaney, put a stylish Reebok trainer on the back of his neck and pointed the AK at his cheek.

“What's your deal, reporter man?” he said.

“I'm a friend of Kellner's,” Delaney said. “From Montreal.”

“Who's Kellner?” Stefan said, grinding his shoe harder into Delaney's neck.

“You know damn well who Kellner is,” Delaney said. “You're living in his damn house.”

“Are we now?” Stefan said. “Well, maybe we are at that, reporter man. You seen your friend Kellner recently?”

“I'm looking for him.”

“You're looking for him,” Stefan said.

“For Jesus sake, Stefan,” said one of the other mercs, a short Brit who looked like a weightlifter. “Let's get in out of the rain. Let's question this cunt inside somewhere instead.”

“This be British weather, Clive. You used to this British weather,” Abbey said. “The hell I am,” Clive said.

“OK, let's do this inside,” Stefan said. “Clive's right. Why should we stand here getting soaked because some reporter man has come to see us? We'll let Bobby find out what's he's up to, inside. Bobby's not too happy with reporter man right now. You realize that, Francis J. Delaney, reporter man? Bobby tells me you hit him over the head with a metal chair. He is not the sort of man who likes that sort of thing. He's not used to that. He is going to have an attitude meeting with you, Francis J. We are all going to watch.”

Stefan prodded Delaney with his gun barrel.

“Up,” he said.

“What about my driver?” Delaney said.

All five of the mercenaries laughed as one.

“That is a dead man in the car,” Clive said. “He won't be needing anything.”

“You can't just leave him there,” Delaney said.

“We bury the dead. Usually,” Abbey said. “We are civilized people. When the rain stops, we get civilized and bury the dead.”

Stefan, the man in charge, said: “Tom, Sammy. One of you get a tarp over that car. Get a tarp from the barn.”

“After the rain,” said one of the mercs in an American accent. He was wearing a red baseball cap.

“Now, Tom,” Stefan said.

The small group headed back down the driveway to Kellner house, Delaney going first. He took a last look back at Ben, sprawled backward against the seat of his car.

“That man dead,” Abbey said.

W
hen Delaney emerged from the driveway into the clear area in front of the house, Bobby was sitting on the porch steps, despite the rain. Inside the doorframe stood another mercenary, this one also tall, sporting an oldstyle, flat-top, military haircut. He wore wirerimmed glasses, military issue.

Bobby now had small bandages on his head wounds. He spotted Delaney and let out a roar. He leapt up, rushed off the steps and tackled Delaney hard, sending both of them flying into the mud and gravel. The other soldiers formed a loose circle around them.

“Lucky we got a medic with us,” Clive said.“Hey, Dima, come down out of there and watch that no one gets hurt.”

The bespectacled soldier in the doorway moved out and down the stairs. His faded khaki T-shirt had Cyrillic writing on it and an elaborate military crest.

Bobby was sitting astride Delaney's chest, pummelling him with his fists. There was no real defence against an enraged attack like that. Delaney only tried to shield his face with his hands and forearms.

“Move your arms out of the way, you little faggot,” Bobby shouted. He pulled Delaney's arms back and began slapping him in the face, slapping methodically back and forth.

He jumped up and started kicking Delaney in the side, legs and arms with his military boots. Delaney rolled around trying to protect himself, trying to protect his head and neck. Bobby stomped on Delaney's chest with a boot.

“Lie still, scumbag,” he shouted.

“Don't kill him, Bobby,” Stefan said.

“Why the fuck not?” Bobby said, pausing for breath. Delaney was bleeding from various cuts and almost unconscious in the dirt. “Why not?”

“We've got to talk to the cunt, that's why,” Sammy said, another stocky Brit.

“Nothing to talk about. We don't need this guy,” Bobby said, panting heavily. He delivered another kick to Delaney's ribcage.

“Don't kill him, Bobby,” Stefan said. “That's enough.”

“Payback time is over,” Tom said.

“Fuck off,Tom. I'll tell you when payback's over,” Bobby said.

“It's over,” Stefan said. “Dima, see if you need to fix this guy up. Some of you guys help Dima put him in the barn.”

A couple of mercenaries pulled Delaney to a sitting position. He was barely conscious. They halfcarried, half-dragged him to the barn. The two vans were parked outside. The men pushed him into a sitting position in a space clearly used as a garage. Two motorbikes stood on their stands to one side.

Dima peered at Delaney through misted glasses, holding his head up with one hand and pulling an eyelid up with the thumb of the other hand.

“He's OK,” Dima said in a heavy Russian accent. “He's not nearly dead yet.”

Dima grabbed an old rag from a shelf and wiped blood and rain from Delaney's face. “You will live, my friend. You are not even nearly dead. You are a lucky man. Bobby would kill you if we let him.”

The others stomped up a staircase. Through the haze of pain and shock, Delaney could hear them moving around on the wooden boards overhead. He heard the sound of bottles clinking, cupboards being opened and shut. Someone turned on a radio to a Thai music station. He heard cutlery and plates.

Dima the medic gave Delaney some water to drink from a bottle and pulled him into a corner to prop him up. Then he went back toward the main house. Delaney rested his head back against the garage wall, knees pulled up, forearms on knees. The room swam before him. He could not see clearly through one eye.

Dima came back, carrying a syringe. He pulled up Delaney's sleeve, wiped a spot expertly with a swab and jabbed him quickly with the needle. Instantly, Delaney's pain evaporated. He felt a warm glow and all was well. He was floating on a lovely gentle summer breeze. All was well. Then everything went warm and dark.

*

Delaney dreamed about Ben and about Natalia:

Even the drug could not mask the pain he felt about how they had died, how they had died because they had been somewhere dangerous with him. As always, Natalia lay under a thin blanket of Quebec snow. Ben was partly covered in leaves and humid Asian earth. In the impossible logic of dreams they were in the same woods, in a climate that allowed for snow and tropical heat at the same time. The bodies lay still, not far from each other, and Delaney thought his heart might burst with grief and guilt. He called out wordlessly to them but they did not stir. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, he said to them, over and over again. The words made no sound. He wanted them to hear. He wanted to bury them both properly, with proper gravestones and epitaphs and flowers. He looked in vain for a shovel, for caskets, for stones. But there was only the deep woods and the leaves on the ground and the heat and the silence and the snow. Even the drug could not mask his pain.

When Delaney woke up it looked like morning. Brassy sunlight was streaming into a small window. He was lying on a bottom bunk bed, naked under a rough blanket. Somehow he had ended up on a bunk bed somewhere in the barn. Someone had taken off his wet clothes and put him into a bed.

He was dazed, groggy and incredibly stiff and sore. He lay looking up at the slats and mattress above him. He raised one hand to a series of small bandages that had been taped to the worst of the cuts on his face and head.

Someone said quietly: “The sleeper awakes.” A South African accent.

Delaney turned stiffly on his side. Stefan was sitting on a lower bunk on the opposite side of the room, drinking coffee from a large mug.

“Dima always gives a very large shot when he's playing medic. The Russians don't play around when they're giving people needles,” Stefan said.

Delaney said nothing, still too dazed to speak. He ached everywhere.

“You've slept almost 20 hours,” Stefan said.

“What day is this?” Delaney managed to say.

“Thursday.”

Delaney said nothing for a moment. Then he said: “Ben.”

“We buried him yesterday afternoon,” Stefan said, sipping coffee. Delaney lay quiet.

“You guys are amateurs,” Stefan said. “Your driver reached for a gun. Bad move. My man shot him.”

Delaney closed his eyes.

“You better get up. We need to talk. Figure out what to do with you,” Stefan said. He stood up and threw some camouflage pants and a black T-shirt on the bed. “Your clothes are finished. Soaked and wrecked. Wear these. I'll be back.”

Stefan walked out of the room, carrying his coffee. He left the door open. Delaney struggled slowly into the clothes, every muscle aching from the exertion of yesterday and the beating. His ribs were very sore. He drank some water from a bottle on a table, and then sat back down on the bed with his head spinning.

Stefan came back in with Dima. The medic looked him over briefly and pulled up one of Delaney's eyelids again. “He's fine,” Dima said.

Stefan and Dima sat on wooden chairs. Delaney sat with his back against the wall, knees up and bare feet on the blanket, watching them from his bottom bunk. He could hear voices from other rooms and from the yard outside. He smelled eggs and bacon cooking and suddenly felt very hungry.

“We figure that you are a friend of Kellner's,” Stefan said eventually.

“I am a friend of Kellner's,” Delaney said. “I told your guy that. Bobby.”

“Why are you looking for him?” Stefan said. Dima sat watching the conversation as he might a slow tennis match. Not terribly interested but waiting for the game to heat up.

“I'm his friend. He's gone missing.”

“Someone asked you to find him?”

“Yes, his editor. And his girlfriend.”

“So you come all the way over here from Canada to try to find him.” “That's right.”

“You're close friends.”

“Yes. Pretty close. His editor asked me to come.”

“You see Kellner a lot?”

“No. He lives in Bangkok, I live in Montreal.” Stefan paused, looked over at Dima, said nothing for a while.

“Do you know where Kellner is?” Delaney said.

“He's late,” Dima said.

“Late?”

“Yes,” Dima said.

“What do you think we are all doing up here?” Stefan asked. “Guys like us. What kind of people do you think we are?”

“Soldiers, obviously,” Delaney said.

“Seven of us, here, at Kellner's place,” Stefan said. “Two South Africans. One Nigerian guy, two Brits, a Yank and a Russian. All together in a nice little Thai farm, just visiting Kellner for a while. Right?”

“Mercenaries,” Delaney said. “I don't care.”

“Reporter man,” Stefan said.

“You tell me Kellner's OK, I'm gone,” Delaney said. “I will tell his girlfriend and his editor he's OK and that's that.”

“Just like that,” Stefan said. “And what about your driver? What would you tell his wife and family? And the police.”

“I wouldn't tell the police,” Delaney said. Dima lit a cigarette.

“You don't know where Kellner is?” he said.

“No,” Delaney said.

“You know a man named Mordecai Cohen?” Stefan said.

“Yes. He's also a friend of Kellner's. Do you know him?”

“Cohen is worried about you,” Stefan said.

“About me?”

“Yes. He thought you might get into some trouble on your trip up here. Reporter trouble.”

“I didn't tell him I was coming up here,” Delaney said.

“He said we should expect you. He is not so sure you are a friend of Kellner's. A real friend. That got us worried, as you can imagine. That made us cut short our little R&R trip yesterday to come back here to see what the hell you were up to.”

Delaney's concentration was improving, but his body still ached badly. Cohen had some connection, too, it was clear now, with this band of soldiers. Almost certainly with Kellner's knowledge.

“Why wouldn't you tell Cohen you were coming up to Kellner's house?” Dima said.

“Because it was none of his business. He's an asshole, drugged out half the time. Unreliable.”

“He's a friend of Kellner's too, no?” Dima said. “Why wouldn't you tell him where you were headed?”

“Because it's none of his business what I do. What Kellner does.”

“But it's your business,” Stefan said.

“Yes,” Delaney said.“If someone asks me to make it my business.”

“Reporter man,” Stefan said, getting up. “You worry me.”

“I can see that,” Delaney said.

“Let's go and eat,” Dima said.

They all went out to a sort of communal kitchen, Delaney walking slow and stiff. Still barefoot. Tom, the American, and Sammy, one of the two stocky Brits, were sitting at the long table, eating kids' breakfast cereal from large bowls. The package sat near them: Cocoa Puffs. They both looked up but said nothing as Delaney came in. This morning they were wearing fatigues and black combat boots.

Dima spooned out some scrambled eggs from a pot on the stove and took some bacon and sausage from a pan. He sliced bread and motioned for Delaney to sit and eat. Delaney ate quickly and hungrily. Dima and Stefan ate with him. No one spoke.

From outside he heard low voices in the yard. There was a sense of people killing time, waiting. Delaney knew that they must be waiting for Kellner or word from Kellner before embarking on something together.

Tom and Sammy got up to go, putting their bowls in a sink piled high with dirty dishes and glasses and cutlery. As they walked past, Tom said: “Lucky man.”

Stefan and Dima lit cigarettes.

“We've got to figure out what to do with you,” Stefan said eventually. “Yes,” Delaney said.

“Kellner would be upset with us if we killed you,” Stefan said.

“Yes.”

“If you are his friend.”

“Even if I'm not. Kellner's not the type to just sit around while people he knows get shot.”

“You're quite sure about that.”

“Yes.”

“Tell me then, reporter man. Tell me what you know. We know you were looking around in Kellner's room. Bobby tells us so. You might as well tell me straight what you know, because you're not going anywhere and maybe, maybe, you can persuade me what's best to do next.”

Delaney told them most of what he had discovered upstairs in Kellner's house. He told them that he thought they were all about to go on some sort of mercenary assignment to help protect an Australian business project, probably construction, probably in Mongla.

He told them he could also see there was another plan, much less clear, to go into Rangoon, maybe after a big change in the first plan, maybe a doublecross of some sort. And he told them he could see some connection with Aung San Suu Kyi throughout Kellner's planning, throughout much of what he had discovered in Bangkok and now in Mae Sot.