Up Country (76 page)

We followed a road that paralleled the train tracks, which I noticed were narrow-gauge. I could see the station ahead, and it, too, was a new concrete slab structure, the original station being probably the first casualty of the war.

We entered the station house and saw hundreds of people at two ticket windows, and hundreds more camped on the Hanoi-bound platform. There were a few people on the westbound platform for the train to China, which was only about 1,500 meters up the line.

The station clock said 6:40, and it looked like we’d be waiting in line for an hour and might not get a seat. The next train, according to the posted schedule, left at 6:30
P.M.
and got to Hanoi at 5:30 Saturday morning.

I didn’t need to be in Hanoi until Saturday, but I didn’t want to hang around Lao Cai for twelve hours. Plus, it’s sometimes nice to show up early and surprise people.

I said to Susan, “Why don’t you use your charm and your American bucks and jump the line?”

“I was about to do that.” She went to the front of one of the lines and spoke to a young man. Money changed hands and within ten minutes, she returned with two tickets to Hanoi. She said, “I got us each a soft seat for ten bucks, plus I bought the kid a sleeper bunk for seventeen bucks, and gave him another five. Are you keeping track of our expenses?”

“I’ll just put in for combat pay. Actually, since you’re with me, I can also put in for hazardous duty pay.”

“You’re funny.”

Not a joke.

We moved out to the platform where hundreds of people stood, sat, and lay on the cold concrete. The narrow-gauge train was on a siding, and it looked like the Toonerville Trolley.

The sky was light, but overcast, and the temperature was in the mid-fifties. There were a number of young backpackers and middle-aged Western tourists, and many of them wore recently purchased articles of Montagnard clothing from different tribes, probably mixing tribes as well as genders. The real Montagnards on the platform thought this was funny and were pointing and snickering.

Susan lit a cigarette and asked me, “How much money was combat pay?”

“Fifty-five bucks a month. Six hundred and sixty dollars a year. Not that good a deal. Meanwhile, guys like Edward Blake, who weren’t out in the jungle getting their asses shot off, did things like black market, currency
dealing, and outright looting. Some people here got rich off the war, most got killed, wounded, or fucked up, plus, of course, fifty-five bucks a month for their troubles.”

Susan thought a moment and then said, “I can see why you’d take this personally.”

I didn’t reply.

She asked me, “I wonder if Blake got that loot home.”

“We may never know, but it wasn’t that difficult. Before you went home, you got checked out here to make sure you weren’t bringing home drugs or military ordnance. Other than that, they didn’t care what you brought home in your duffel bag. At the U.S. end, Customs just waved you through because they knew you’d been checked for drugs and explosives at this end. Also, officers, like Captain Blake, were on the honor system.”

She nodded and said, “Behind every great fortune, there is a crime.”

Because this was a border town, there were too many uniformed guys around, mostly border patrol types, but also a lot of heavily armed soldiers, as though they were expecting another war momentarily. This place was a little creepy, but there were enough adventure travelers from Europe, Australia, and America to provide us some cover.

Border cops began patrolling the platform, asking people for ID and soliciting contributions for the widows and orphans fund. I noticed that they gave the ethnic Chinese a really hard time, and also they were picking on Westerners who were alone or in small groups without a guide.

Susan, too, noticed this and said to me, “See that group over there? I think they’re Americans. Let’s mingle.”

I knew they were Americans because two of the guys were wearing shorts in fifty-degree weather, and the women had bought and put on enough Montagnard jewelry to look like radar antennas.

We walked over to the tour group of about twenty Americans who had a male Viet guide with them.

Susan, who’s more sociable than I am, struck up a conversation with a few of the ladies. They talked jewelry and fabrics.

The cops kept their distance from us.

At about 7
A.M.
, the Toonerville Trolley started to move off the siding and ran onto the main single-line track and stopped at the platform. Susan said good-bye to her new friends, and we went to our car in the short eight-car train. We boarded car Number 2 and found our seats.

The coach was narrow, with only two seats on the left, and the aisle running along the windows to the right.

We put our backpacks overhead, and Susan said, “You take the aisle so you can stretch a little. This is really cramped.” We sat.

Neither of us spoke, and I think we both realized that we’d had more than our share of good luck, and we shouldn’t comment on it. Of course, skill, brains, and experience had a lot to do with it, too. As it turned out, Susan Weber was a good traveling companion. I wondered if I’d have made it on my own, and I knew that I’d be wondering about that for the rest of my life.

At 7:40, the train pulled out of the station, and we were on our way to Hanoi.

The tracks ran along the north bank of the Red River, and on both sides of the river, the Tonkinese Alps stretched along the valley. With a little imagination, I could picture myself in Europe going someplace nice.

The coach was filled with Viets and Westerners, and there were people standing in the vestibule, but no squatters in the narrow aisle beside us.

We sat in silence awhile, watching the scenery, which was actually quite spectacular. The train made a lot of noise over the tracks, and I realized the coach wasn’t heated. I also assumed there was no bar car.

Susan turned away from the window and looked at me. She said, “So far, so good.”

“So far, so good.”

She asked, “So, was I a good buddy?”

“Am I home in one piece yet?”

She lit a cigarette and looked out the window for a few minutes, then asked me, “What are your instructions regarding Hanoi?”

“What are
yours?”

She didn’t reply for a while, then said, “I was told to go to the embassy for a debriefing.”

I asked her, “Are there Viet police guards around the embassy?”

She replied, “Well, I’ve only been there once . . . but yes, there’s a Vietnamese police post. Plus I was told there were undercover embassy watchers, checking out everyone who goes in or out, and even taking photos, and sometimes they stop people.”

“What were you doing in the embassy?”

“Just visiting.”

“Right.”

She asked me again, “What are your instructions?”

I replied, “I was told to go to the Metropole and await further instructions. I may or may not be contacted. I may or may not be wanted in the embassy. I’m to leave for another city tomorrow—”

“Bangkok. I saw your tickets, and so did Colonel Mang.”

“Right. The Metropole is out, Hanoi airport is out, and the embassy is watched.”

“So? What are we going to do?”

“Is the Hanoi Hilton still open?”

“This is not a joke.”

“I make jokes when I’m tense. Anyway, am I to understand from you that Vice President Blake is visiting Hanoi?”

“He’s here to see his old friend, Ambassador Patrick Quinn, and to participate in a conference on MIAs, and I’m sure a few other less publicized meetings with the Vietnamese government.”

I nodded. “He should also have an unscheduled meeting. With us.”

Susan didn’t reply for a while, then said, “That might be a good idea, or a very bad idea.”

“If he knows about this problem, he wants to be in Hanoi where he can have some hands-on control of the situation where and when the mission ends. We can help him with that.”

Susan replied, “I honestly don’t know if he’s aware that he has a problem. But other people do, and I think Mr. Blake will be made aware of it in Hanoi. The bad news, Mr. Vice President, is that we know you murdered three Viets and an American officer in Vietnam. The good news, sir, is that we have the situation under control.”

“It’s not under control,” I pointed out.

“It was supposed to be.”

The train continued east toward Hanoi. Susan and I discussed a few ideas and options and tried to come up with a game plan. I made believe I trusted her completely. She made believe, too.

I kept getting the feeling that I wasn’t supposed to have gotten this far, and that Susan was making adjustments for my living presence. But that might be too paranoid. Maybe I was supposed to make it as far as Bangkok, then be evaluated as to how much I found out, and, as Mr. Conway said, how I would be dealt with. Maybe Susan was supposed to be a witness for
or against me. And maybe my friend, Karl, who cared about me, was to be my judge. I asked Susan, “Are you supposed to go to Bangkok?”

She didn’t reply.

“Hello? Susan?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” I pointed out to her, “If there exists a possibility that I might need to be . . . let’s say, given a full military funeral before I was ready for one, has it occurred to you that you, too, might be in a similar predicament?”

“It has occurred to me.”

“Good.” I left it at that.

We moved into the rising sun, toward Hanoi, toward the end of the mission, and toward the end of my third, and definitely last, tour of duty in Vietnam.

T
he train from Lao Cai moved slowly through the northern outskirts of Hanoi, and at 6:34
P.M.
, we pulled into Long Bien Station.

The journey from sultry, sinful Saigon had taken me to the battlefields of South Vietnam and into the heart of my own darkness, and up country on a journey of discovery and hopefully self-awareness.

I had finally come to terms with this place, as had a lot of men who’d been here, and as had a lot of my generation, men and women, who hadn’t been to Vietnam, but who had lived through Vietnam so many years ago.

And yet, at unexpected moments, the war still had the power to haunt our dreams and intrude into our waking hours. And for Edward Blake, this was one of those times.

Hanoi