The Lotus Eaters: A Novel (49 page)

"You can't."

"Better for you two to go on alone. Maybe later, with Nha..."

Too exhausted to argue, I nodded. Mai sat wearily in the saddle of the rope sideways across my back, leaning her head on my shoulder. As I made my way off, Mother and Father remained standing by the splintered tree, and even now, in my mind's eye, that is where I still imagine them
.

"Forgive me," Mai whispered, "my foolishness." But I didn't listen. I started the walk south, in the direction of the army and safety, the direction of illusion
.

I lost track of time, but during the night Mai laid her fingers along my neck, my only comfort, my only goad
.

I walked through the night. I lost my sandals in the mud, walked on blisters, and then on bloodied, raw feet, not daring to stop even when I grew thirsty, until my throat cracked like a riverbed with dryness, but still I kept walking. I would die walking. During the night, Mai fell asleep, her hand falling away
.

And then like an angel, a
bodhisattva
of compassion, the sky lightened to a pearl gray in the east, and the great tired face of the sun appeared. As if the day itself were shamed to light the earth. So quiet that I heard the singing of a single bird in a tree as I passed, a miracle that day could follow such a night, and I reached the highway south, joining a throng of refugees like ourselves draining from the countryside. I murmured, throat like an open wound, over my shoulder, "We are close now."

I walked until I felt a tug at my sleeve and looked into the wrinkled face of an old grandmother. She shook her head sharply, as if shrugging off a ghost. I could not make out her words, so tired I simply noticed her sunken lips and the few blackened, betel-stained teeth in her mouth. She motioned with her hands to lie down, and the idea of sleep was suddenly overwhelming. I would have walked till I dropped over. I struggled to the tall grass at the side of the road, and only as I worked to loosen the knot of rope around my chest did I notice the cold heaviness of Mai's body, and as I slowly knelt down to let her off I realized I had felt no movement all night long, no warm breath, and now as I laid her in the long, lilac-tinted grass, and as her long hair draped down to the earth, I saw that she had the pearl gray pallor of death, and I knew, as the grandmother shook her head, quick as a bird, and handed me a small spray of yellow paper flowers before she turned away, that I had carried a corpse the whole night through, but somehow Mai's spirit had saved me
.

This is how the world ends in one instant and begins again the next
.

I crouched in the grass and saw that we were both covered in blood, that she had bled to death with our child. I looked up and down the highway, saw other bodies fallen by the side, and when I looked into the faces of the people, I saw we were all the living dead, no one had escaped
.

I bowed my head, the spray of flowers still gripped in my fingers. The paper ones the poor bought to place on family altars. Petals faded yellow and dusty from long use, the paper crumpled in places where the old woman had clutched them. But when I brought the spray to my face, I smelled the fresh orange blossoms of Mai's hair. And so I buried my wife, Mai, under the tree the bird sang in, placing the spray of flowers in her mouth. The blossoms were paper, yellow faded, already dusty from mourning, but they were all I had left to give
.

EIGHTEEN
Cat Cai Dau

Cut Off the Head

The next morning Linh
sought out Mrs. Xuan, who was feeding garbage to the catfish in the large village pond.

"We need a lacquered box of betel and areca. And gold earrings. Can you prepare a small feast--at least six dishes--for the entire village?" he asked.

He was pleased to see Mrs. Xuan's eyebrows shoot up, her gossip suddenly gone stale. She chewed on her lips as Linh gave her dollar bills. "For when?"

"Soon. A day or two at most. We must return to Saigon."

"Too soon," she said, figuring that time would allow her to dole out the information to Mr. Bao for greater profit.

He knew the old woman would not give up the tidy sum she would make. "Then we'll have the ceremony in Saigon instead. She prefers it--"

"No, no. Hungry bridegrooms. So impatient." Mrs. Xuan scrunched up her eyes in a failed effort to appear good-natured, quickly withdrawing her hand filled with dollar bills.

When Linh told Helen
of his plans for a ceremony, she was quiet. The implications of their time together had not sunk in for her, yet after hearing his story, she knew that he was dead serious. Only Americans thought that Vietnam was as permissive as the brothels and G.I. bars in Saigon. The society was conservative, a relationship outside marriage unheard-of. At times Linh seemed even more foreign now that he was her lover than before when they had been only friends. "Does this have something to do with Mr. Bao? Will he be angry when he finds out?"

"It's important to save face. But it's important for me also," he said. A wild gambit, but he thought the idea of lust would be understandable to Bao and protect Helen. For the last year, Mr. Bao had been consumed with his drug business, Linh with his work, and their reports to the NVA had been empty for a long time. In desperation to appear busy, Bao had slowly pieced together the idea of Helen being captured by the Viet Cong, taken prisoner. Maybe even allowing her to take pictures of the other side, leaking some of them out. He thought that would create new interest in his assignment, quell the talk of his being reassigned to a less lucrative post in the North.

"Why not have a civil ceremony in Saigon, with Gary and the others?"

"This first. A Buddhist ceremony for us."

"You know I can't have a child."

"You are my family," he said.

Helen rubbed her forehead. She had been living in a dream world in the hamlet, and now he was forcing her to think fast, but her thoughts came sluggishly. How could she explain the infidelity of her heart, that asleep in his arms she couldn't help if her dreams were still of Darrow. The pain of being in the war with Linh and the pain of being away from him were equal, were driving her mad. She had broken, become something else. She didn't know what yet. Could you love someone in the process of changing? She did love Linh. As much as a ghost loved. The mind treacherous.

The ceremony was simple
, only a dozen people comprising the whole village attending. Both the bride and groom decades younger than the youngest guest. A quiet, subdued afternoon, the clouds having finally spread, wind speeding overhead and spitting raindrops. The times were lean in the countryside no matter how much money one had, and Mrs. Xuan could not buy a proper pig for the feast, so she had made do with catfish, shrimp, and buffalo.

Linh stood with Helen before a small altar of joss sticks, borrowing his aunt's pictures of his parents, brothers and sister, and Mai. A glass of rice alcohol and a plate of food offered in celebration. He bowed over the lacquer box of betel leaves and areca nuts, to signify unity and faithfulness in the marriage, then gave Helen the traditional set of gold hoop earrings to complete the marriage vows. It scared him to feel so hopeful for the future.

The old village women stood huddled at the back of the house, Mrs. Xuan in the middle. All during the brief ceremony, they eyed the plates of food brought and placed on the center table. When Linh clapped his hands and invited everyone to eat, they fell on the food with ravenous eyes and clawing fingers.

After they had eaten, their stomachs as tight as drums, the villagers settled down in the garden for a long night of drinking, but Linh scolded them away, pushing them out of the house with the remaining dishes of food, out of the garden with bottles of beer. The three old men grinned and said he was an anxious groom, but one of the women, Mrs. Xuan's best friend, said that he had already been at the duties of a groom for the last week, and they all burst out laughing.

"Enough," Linh said. "Leave us alone."

Helen, oblivious to all the talk, sat near the pool watching the clouds chase their way in front of the moon. When everyone was gone, Linh came out to her. "Don't you feel the drops? You're wet."

"I'm happy."

He carried her into the house, and they made love, past desire, past hunger, past exhaustion. His thirst for her had changed, grown greater, like drinking sea water only to feel more parched with each drink. He woke the next day, late in the afternoon, his face thinner, dark circles under his eyes like bruised fruit, but as soon as he touched her skin his desire again became electric, and he wanted to conquer each part of her all over once more.

Now it was Helen who searched out Mrs. Xuan for meals. The old woman approved of the American's new wifeliness. Helen brought food to Linh while he slept, and she sponged him off with cool water after they both were soaked with sweat, sore down to the muscle and bone. It gave her a deep plea sure to take care of him during those days, something that he had never allowed before. Finally, like a fever, their passion broke, and they floated in the calm left behind.

It became more and more clear in the intervening days that Helen and Linh could not love each other fiercely, selfishly, as young lovers. They loved each other like secular saints, too selfless for reckless passion, too aware of each other's pain and the avoidance of it. They loved with a middle-aged caution.

They returned to Saigon
, and Linh moved into the crooked apartment in Cholon. She could have brought no other man there, it being both sacrament and sacrilege.

Within days Linh received the expected message that Mr. Bao wanted to have a meeting. He had anticipated as much. He sent back a message that the situation was too risky to meet in the city. Instead, they would meet at the house in the Ho Bo woods.

Linh took military trucks up to Cu Chi, then rode on civilian motorcycles and bicycles the final leg of the journey. On the prearranged night, he stopped for a leisurely meal at a street vendor's, making sure to get several men in conversation, periodically dipping his hand into his pocket, reassuring himself with the smooth touch of wire. After eating, he walked alone the final hours to the deserted cabin set deep in the woods.

The wind started up at sunset and blew with force, shaking leaves from trees, bending branches, dropping fruit not yet ready to fall. Linh had found great happiness during his weeks with Helen, but now he felt the weight and drag of that love. Ashamed at his relief to be alone again, walking on the deserted road, it occurred to him that he could keep walking and never turn around. A coward's thought. The wind wiped away the clouds; the sky burned sharp and glittering with stars like broken glass on blacktop. Linh hurried his step.

Mr. Bao lounged at a crude wooden table, drinking from a bottle of expensive Napoleon brandy. In the light of the lantern on the table's edge, he looked tired and smaller than Linh had remembered him. The graying at his temples, too, was more pronounced, and there were dark circles under his eyes. A pewter-topped cane was propped beside him. Many years had passed since they began their meetings. When he saw Linh, he smiled, revealing stubby brown teeth.

"Didn't hear you approach," he said. "Join me."

"Why not?" Linh sat at the chair opposite.

"I hear we should be making nuptial toasts."

Linh said nothing, only smiled.

"Indeed, when Mrs. Thi Xuan told me the whole village was invited, I wondered if my invitation had gone astray."

Again Linh said nothing.

"Come, we don't have all night. The question, it seems to me, is what do we do with the situation now."

"This is good brandy," Linh said, looking into his glass.

"You like the taste? Maybe your American can buy it for you now."

"Why do anything? I'm still your eyes and ears. I influence coverage as I can." Linh was confronted again with knowing how a situation should be handled but hoping against hope that it could be otherwise.

Mr. Bao laughed out loud as if he'd been told a good joke, then wiped at his eyes. "Things can't remain as they are. Uncle is waning, the powers are realigning themselves, some will go up and some down, loyalties will be reassessed."

"I see."

Mr. Bao wiped his hand across his lips, jabbed his index finger on the table between them to emphasize his point. "Let's be frank, my friend. Neither of us are political men. I've been on a loose rein, some would say overlooked, and I've allowed you the same. Now is the time to show your loyalty."

"What are you saying?" At long last, marrying Helen, he had shown his loyalty, and they both knew it.

"What do we do with her now? What do we do with you for so blatantly acting on your own?"

Linh drank his glass of brandy down in one gulp. Mr. Bao raised his eyebrows but poured another round.

"My job was nothing more than providing what ever information came my way. We are going here; we are going there. Very little," Linh said. He studied the hut, saw a tail of dust blowing through a crack in the wall, illuminated across the lantern's beam as it settled on the table, on their glasses, on Mr. Bao's wrinkled and sickly face.

"True, most of what you give us is useless. What you did was infiltrate. You are in place. You are trusted. We never gave you credit for being much of a soldier or a spy. Mainly a lover." Mr. Bao giggled.

"Then let me go on."

"We are both men of the world," Mr. Bao said, his voice low and purring. "Women are hard to ignore. You and I have never believed in the war so much anyway. It is our sideline. But now we will show our allegiance, to survive."

"What do you want me to do?"

"I'll say the marriage was to gain her confidence. Take her back to the border. Another exclusive like the one you arranged on the Ho Chi Minh trail. This time have her captured. Let her be in on it or let her believe as she does. She takes pictures that are smuggled out."