"I thought I was liberating American POW's," Remo said stubbornly.
That upset Hom even more. "There are no American POW's in Vietnam," he yelled. "We are not like that. Though you bomb us, we forgave you. These are bui doi, dust of life. What you call Amerasians. They are the mongrel children of Saigon prostitutes and American killer soldiers."
"They say they're prisoners," Remo said. The young captives crouched behind him. The girl, her green eyes fearful, clung to Remo's T-shirt. She looked all of nineteen. Her face had the look of a jib that had been cranked too tight.
"Lies! They are here because no one wants them. We feed them, give them work. They are grateful."
"Take us home, American," the prisoners whispered. "Take us to America."
"I think that speaks for itself," Remo pointed out. He folded his arms, ignoring the pointing rifles.
"You are very smug, American," said Mr. Hom. "You spit on the generous hospitality of the Vietnamese people. I think you should return to America. You will learn nothing here."
"I didn't come here to learn your propaganda," Remo said. "And I'm not budging until I know these people won't be hurt."
Mr. Hom hesitated. He felt the eyes of the tour group upon him. His next words dripped sarcasm. "Perhaps you are still bitter about having retreated from the victorious People's Liberation Army. Hmmm?"
"We didn't retreat, remember?" Remo said. "We signed a peace treaty in Paris. Your people promised to stay in the North and ours in the South. It took you about a year to muster the courage to violate it."
"We liberated the South," Hom said stiffly.
"You couldn't win on the battlefield, so you tricked us with a treaty you never intended to uphold. Then you stabbed everyone in the back."
"We won."
"Maybe it's not over yet," Remo said. His voice held an edge that made Mr. Hom wipe suddenly sweaty palms on his whipcord breeches.
Mr. Hom barked orders in Vietnamese. The guards lowered their weapons. Two went around a corner. They came back driving a Land Rover.
"You will be driven back to Ho Chi Minh City," Mr. Hom said petulantly. "There your money will be refunded and you will be put on a flight away from Vietnam. Perhaps one day you will realize the goodness of the forgiving Vietnamese people and we will allow you to return."
Remo, knowing he had no chance of doing anything for the Amerasian prisoners under the circumstances, shrugged as if it didn't matter. He said, "Okay," and turned to the huddle of frightened half-Vietnamese, half-American faces.
"Sorry," he said loudly. Then he whispered, "Sit tight. I'll be back."
Remo allowed himself to be escorted to the waiting Land Rover and driven out of the camp gates. The amplified voice of Mr. Hom followed him down the road. Hom was informing the tour group that in America, many people felt bitterness over their failure to impose their will on the Vietnamese people. But the Vietnamese were strong from thousands of years of struggle. No one would ever divide them again.
Chapter 11
Less than a mile down the road, darkness fell with the stark suddenness that Remo remembered so clearly even after twenty years.
The soldiers sat in the front of the Land Rover. Remo sat in back. The driver was preoccupied with watching the road ahead. He had only his headlights to see by. Remo reached out and squeezed the other soldier's neck until he felt the man go loose. Remo kept him sitting upright while they stumbled through ruts in the road.
When the driver slowed to negotiate a sharp turn, Remo brought his fist down on his helmet like a mallet striking a bell. The driver collapsed like a puppet. Remo shoved him onto the roadside and slipped behind the wheel. He braked, kicked the other soldier into the dirt, and spun the Land Rover around.
Remo drove until he recognized a diseased banana tree that was near the reeducation camp, and pulled off the road. On foot he crept up to the perimeter fence and went over it like a black cat.
He drifted through the camp, keeping in the shadows. The lethargy of the day had fled. He felt alert once again. Maybe it had been the heat after all.
The tour group was eating in a wooden building, and behind it Remo found several Land Rovers and a canvas-backed truck. Reasoning that the kitchen was at the back of the big building, he slipped to the door. It came open at his touch. Inside, an elderly Vietnamese cook was busy pulling wooden pallets of fresh bread from a huge oven. Remo went to a cupboard and ransacked it. When he left the kitchen unseen, two canvas sacks bulged under his arms.
There was just enough sugar to pour into the gas tank of every vehicle. Remo replaced the gas caps and found his way to the barracks where the Amerasians were kept. A soldier in green was nailing bamboo splints across the broken window. Remo put him to sleep with a single chopping blow and removed the bamboo with quick tugs. He poked his head in.
"Next bus leaves in two minutes," he called. "You can buy your tickets on board."
They poured out of the window like lemmings. Remo helped the younger ones over the sill. When he had them collected in a group, he put his fingers to his mouth to gesture for quiet.
"Now, listen. I can get you out of here and away. But after that, you're on your own. Understand?"
They nodded, their faces pale and grateful.
"Okay," Remo said. "Single file, and follow me. Don't bunch up."
He led them to the next barracks and then to the one nearest the gate. Motioning for them to stay out of sight, Remo slipped to the gate and approached the guard.
Remo was almost up to him when his foot hit a rock. It was the strangest thing. He should have seen the rock. At the very least, he should have sensed it before kicking it. He was trained not to betray himself. But he had.
The guard spun. His Ak-47 hung from a shoulder strap. He brought it up snappily. Remo was quicker. He grabbed the weapon by barrel and stock, and spun like a top. The centrifugal force made the guard let go. The strap held for three revolutions, then snapped. The guard sailed over the fence and crashed into the upper branches of a rubber tree: He lay still.
Remo broke the padlock, kicked the gate open, and waved for the others to come.
They started off single file, but the open gate was too much for them. The orderly escape became a rout. Still clutching the captured rifle, Remo yanked the external lever that opened the folding bus doors. He slid behind the wheel as the others found seats and huddled under the exposed window glass. In a moment, Remo had hot-wired the ignition and got going. The sound of the bus rumbling brought excited yells from the camp. Engines started growling, but the engines didn't catch. That would be the sugar. Remo grinned.
In the rearview mirror Remo saw the Vietnamese soldiers pile into the road, some dropping into a shooting crouch, others bringing their rifles to shoulder height.
Mr. Hom, hopping up and down like an animated pelican, slapped their rifle barrels down before they could fire. He swore at them, pointing to the gawking tour group, who were watching the brave soldiers of the new Vietnam trying to organize pursuit without vehicles.
Remo grinned again. It reminded him of the day in September 1967 when he stole a North Vietnamese tank from under the noses of its sleeping crew. He pushed the accelerator to the floor, driving after the setting sun, toward Cambodia.
It was many miles before Remo hit a roadblock.
Two Land Rovers were parked nose-to-nose, blocking the road. About a dozen soldiers were standing in single-file formation in front of the Land Rovers, their rifles high and unwavering. They reminded Remo of paintings of the British Redcoats standing in strict military formation while American guerrillas picked them off from behind cover. Remo grunted to himself as he slowed the bus. The Vietnamese were acting like real soldiers now. That would be their mistake.
Remo barked, "Everybody get on the floor," to his passengers, yanked the door-opening handle with one hand, and scooped up his rifle with the other. He stopped. Noticing the rifle, he asked himself in a dazed voice, "What the hell am I doing?" Chiun would kill him if he caught him using a firearm. Remo left the weapon behind and walked into the bus's headlight glow with his hands hanging loose and empty.
He smiled as he approached the toylike soldiers.
"Is this the Road to Mandalay?" he asked cheerfully. "Or am I in the wrong movie?"
A dozen safeties clicked off at once.
"Yep," Remo said. "Wrong movie. I want Tarzan goes to Vietnam."
And without any preliminary tensing of muscle or other betraying action, Remo vanished from the twin spray of headlights.
The Vietnamese soldiers blinked. One of them barked an order. The soldiers advanced into the light, walking abreast.