Opium (19 page)

“Really? Why not?'

Baptiste shook his head.

“Are you saying you can't do it?'

“He has a wife and child, for God's sake.” Francisci was married to a Lao girl, a niece of Rattakone himself; another reason he had been able to operate so successfully in Laos.

“You're breaking my heart. If I collected all the tears I have seen in my lifetime I would have enough to start my own ocean.”

Baptiste looked away.
Merde alors
. Oh, there were many things I will answer for one day, he thought, but murder wasn't yet one of them. He didn't think he could do it. He knew he didn't want to.

“Will you do it?'

“Why me. Rocco?'

“Because I want to see what you're made of. I need to know my son-in-law is going to be capable enough to run things after I am gone. If you don't do it I shall encourage Noelle to seek a divorce. She will not need much persuasion right now. You really have made a big mess of things there,
mon vieux
.”

Baptiste stared at the garden. He felt trapped. He was a bastard, that was for sure, but he wasn't a monster. “All right,” he mumbled. But even as he said it he promised himself that he would find some way out.

Chapter 34

I
T WAS Jean-Marie's birthday and Noelle had Chao prepare a special dinner. There was carp and lemon grass soup with mushrooms; a freshwater stingray, grilled; chicken fried with ginger; yellow wheat noodles, spicy green papaya salad, and to finish sticky rice in coconut milk cooked in bamboo. The meal was washed down with cold bottles of Tiger Beer that Bonaventure had had flown in from Singapore.

But for all the care that went into the preparation the meal did not go well. It was a strained affair with Noelle and Jean-Marie making all the conversation while Baptiste sat in gloomy silence, getting slowly drunk. He had not been himself since her father had got back from Saigon. Baptiste was many things, good and bad, but he rarely surrendered to melancholy or introspection. She wondered if his mood had been brought on by their marriage problems, or if it was something her father had said.

Afterwards they sat on the veranda with a bottle of Johnny Walker. Noelle mixed hers with soda water and lime juice. Jean-Marie was clearly embarrassed and had tried to paper over the long silences with nervous talk.

“That was a wonderful dinner,” he said, for the third time.

“It's good to see you back in Vientiane again. Isn't it, Baptiste?'

'... Of course.”

Noelle heard the hesitation in her husband's voice. Jean-Marie shrugged it off. He turned to her and said lightly: “I think he would be happier if I was flying for Air Laos and not the competition.”

Baptiste poured another drink.

“You know, you couldn't expect to have the field to yourself, Baptiste. Everyone wants a piece of the action. That's natural. Besides, there's enough opium for everyone to get out with money in their pockets at the end.”

Baptiste gave him a pitying look. “Perhaps,” he said almost sulkily. “But no one knows how long this is going to last.”

“Looks to me as if the Americans are here to stay. They won't let the communists take over. They think they are fighting the Third World War.”

“He's right,” Noelle said, 'the Americans think they invented Laos.” Privately she despised them; aggressive people with loud shirts and too much money. They had created a minor boom in the economy, the population had swelled to seventy thousand people, and her father no longer owned the only Mercedes Benz in the capital. There was even Scotch whiskey and French perfumes in the shops.

“I miss the old days, you and me, flying together' Baptiste said. “Everything was simple then.”

“Everything changes,” Jean-Marie said.

“Not always for the best.”

“You're so gloomy tonight,” Noelle said. “Poor Jean-Marie. You invite him here for his birthday and then make him depressed.”

Baptiste ignored her. “Why don't you ask Rocco for a job,” he said to Jean-Marie.

Jean-Marie laughed, caught off guard by this unexpected proposal. “Why would I want to do that?'

“It might be a good idea to try, that's all.”

“Francisci pays me well enough. I get twenty an hour. I happen to know Rocco only pays his guys fifteen.” He shook his head. “Anyway, Rocco has enough pilots. If he wants more, he knows where to find me.”

“I could fix things for you.”

“Why?'

“Old time's sake.”

Jean-Marie shook his head. “You're not making sense.”

“It's just you know what a bastard Rocco is. He might appreciate the gesture.”

“This is my father you're talking about,” Noelle said.

“Then you know what a prick he can be better than any of us,” Baptiste said.

There was an embarrassed silence. Baptiste lit a Gitanes.

“You smoke too much,” Noelle said.

“And you remind me too much.”

Jean-Marie finished his whiskey and made a theatrical gesture of looking at his watch. “I have to be going. I have an early flight to Pnom Penh in the morning.” He stood up.

“Think about what I said.”

“I've thought about it. The answer's still the same. Look, if you wanted me to be your partner again, Baptiste, that's different. But that's not what we're talking about, is it? It's nothing personal.”

“Yes, I know,” Baptiste said, and he returned to brooding silence.

Jean-Marie shot Noelle a look of bewilderment. She could only shrug her shoulders.

“Goodbye, Baptiste. Thank you for dinner.”

Baptiste did not reply, did not even stand up. He continued to stare at the darkness, the whisky cradled in his lap.

Noelle who escorted Jean-Marie to his car. “Is he okay?' he asked her at the front steps.

“How should I know? I'm only married to him.”

“I've never seen him like this.” He hesitated a moment. “Is everything all right between you two?'

“We are going to have our first child any day. Why shouldn't we be deliriously happy?'

“Don't give up on him. He's just a bit wild. Deep down he's a good guy.”

“How deep, Jean-Marie?'

“Just keep digging,” he said, and gave her a rueful grin. “I'm sure he loves you.”

“I feel like a barnacle, just hanging on for the ride. Goodbye, Jean-Mar'. I'll keep you posted.”

“Good night, Noelle. And thank you again for dinner.” He kissed her hand and for a moment their eyes met and she saw the longing in them. Then he got in his car and drove away..

Now why can't I fall in love with a man like that? she asked herself. Quiet, pleasant, courageous, honest. No. Within a week I would be bored to death. Me, I choose a bastard, and then hate him all along for being everything I knew he was when I met him.

C'est fou!

She put a hand to the roundness of her stomach and felt a kick inside. The child seemed to sense her moods and respond to them. Well, that's one good thing, she thought. You're not in the least like your father.

***

During the wet season the
bonzes
withdrew to their temples for a period of seclusion and meditation. The city no longer rang to the raucous din of the
bouns
. Today the
wat
was silent, and the stoned courtyard glistened like a snake's back, wet with rain. The interior of the temple was cool, golden Buddha statues glowed dully in the joss-heavy gloom.

The Blind Bonze was revered and celebrated across Laos. He had once placed his forecast of the winning number of the national lottery in a sealed envelope. When the envelope was opened, the forecast was found to be correct. Since then, he had adamantly refused to repeat the performance, even to augment the temple's funds.

The Blind Bonze knelt on a bamboo mat before a silver image of the Buddha, 'contemplating the Boddhi tree.” Chao, Noelle's
boyesse
, helped her to sit, her knees drawn to the side, and she bowed her head so that it was a lower than the monk's, a gesture of respect. Then she waited for him to speak. She knew, from his reputation, that she might have to wait minutes or hours. Although he was blind, he would know she was there, without her having to greet him.

He knelt in front of the image, his hands held together in a
wai
, a burning stick of incense gripped between the palms. His eyes were white, sightless, the pupils turned back in his head, blind from birth.

The rain began again, pouring from the eaves in little waterfalls, flooding the courtyard. After a few minutes she shifted uncomfortably, her legs cramping. What are you doing here? she asked herself. You're a Catholic, and a grown woman. Why are you bothering with all this superstitious nonsense? What is it you want to hear from this old monk? That Baptiste will change and that you will live happily ever after?

“Your son is growing big,” the bonze said suddenly, in French. “He will come soon.”

Noelle stared at him. How could he have known she was pregnant?

All she could think of to say was: “The doctor says not for another month.”

The bonze inclined his head in respect to the doctor. The white sclera of his eyes returned their sightless gaze to the Buddha. “You are angry,” he said, softly.

“With my husband.”

“Yes. You are unsure what to do.”

Noelle experienced a prickle of unease.

“There will be three men in your life,” the monk said. “Two you will choose, one will choose you. Each will bring you a measure of pain, and a measure of joy. In the end you will have to choose between your blood and your heart.”

“And what should I do?' Noelle heard herself say.

“That is for you to decide.” The old monk started to shiver, as if he was very cold. “There is only one way you can change your fate, as it is written on your forehead.”

“One way?'

“If you abandon your baby son, a new fate will be written. That is the only way.”

Noelle tried to struggle to her feet. She didn't want to hear any more. But she couldn't rise without help, and she called for Chao.

The Bonze shuddered once more, and then he turned his head towards her as if he could see her with the blank white moons of his eyes. “Do not struggle,” he said.

Then he lowered his head and raised his hands in
wai
towards the silver Buddha.

Noelle took a handful of banknotes from her purse and dropped them on the bonze's mat. “Get me out of here,” she said to Chao.

She went home, feeling drained, and tried to sleep. But instead she stared into the dripping garden and heard the Blind Bonze whispering to her over and over again:
“If you abandon your baby son, a new fate will be written. That is the only way.”

I will forget that I ever went there, she told herself. It's just superstition. One blind old man cannot know what lies in my future.

“In the end you will have to choose between your blood and your heart.”

I won't think about it anymore. It's just superstition. I should never have gone.

Chapter 35

B
APTISTE got out to Wattay an hour after dawn. Already the clouds were piling up in the south west, boiling up into the sky like lava, building the thunderheads that would sweep over the city in the afternoon. The air was sticky warm, Baptiste's freshly ironed shirt was already drenched with perspiration.

The Air America pilots piled out of their bus, heading out to the STOL's and Cessnas that waited at one end of the pasture, or gathered in little groups outside the operations hut.

Baptiste's own Beechcraft was still outside its hangar, being loaded with the rice and ammunition Bonaventure had contracted to drop to a beleaguered Lao garrison in the mountains south of the Plain of Jars.

He parked the Packard under the trees. As he climbed out, he recognised Jean-Marie's ancient Buick, a few yards away. He saw his blonde hair by the old shed that served as a hangar for Francisci's Cessna.

He broke into a run. “Jean-Marie!'

Jean-Marie was about to climb into the cockpit. He stopped and looked up. “Baptiste?'

Baptiste was out of breath by the time he reached the hangar.

“What's wrong?' Jean-Marie asked him.

“What are you doing?'

“What the fuck does it look like I'm doing?'

“Where's Francisci? I thought he was supposed to be flying to Pnom Penh this morning.”

“How do you know so much about our flight schedules?'