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Authors: Chuck Logan
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hiding out and setting people up, gaining their trust and then busting them.”
Unconsciously, Broker patted his chest pocket for a cigarette. Nina reached in her purse and passed him the crumpled Gauloises. Hennessy cognac and the French fags —Broker had a precise memory of the last time he’d seen Ray Pryce take a Gauloise from the gold cigarette case that his wife, Marian, had given him. They were standing on the rolling deck of a Vietnamese minesweep that lay off the coast of Vietnam; it was April 29, 1975.
Just like Ray used to do, Broker tapped the short, fat French cigarette on his thumbnail and put it to his lips. Nina clicked the lighter and stated, “Dammit, don’t you get it. General LaPorte’s been over there posing as an environmentalist taking pictures of the bottom of the South China Sea.”
Broker inhaled the strong tobacco and tightened the bolts on his masking smile to ward off Nina’s raving attempt to raise the dead. More than that, he resented her confident quick-study routine. Her zeal. Her confidence. She was starting to have that effect on him. The urge to prove her wrong was almost a sneer behind his lips.
“He found it, that’s what Tuna’s getting at,” she asserted. “I have a map with a coordinate. I have a sonar image of a wrecked U.S. Army Chinook helicopter, laying in one hundred feet of water off the coast of central Vietnam. I snuck it from LaPorte’s office last night in New Orleans. That’s why he’s after me. The genie is out of the bottle, Broker.”
“The Hue gold,” said Broker in a hollow voice.
“The Hue gold. Ten tons of it. Which my father did not steal.”
11
F OR ALL HE KNEW, THE HUE GOLD REALLY WAS A myth. He had, after all, never actually seen it. No one had. But that one elongated syllable—gold—got stuck in his ears and reverberated in the drafty acoustics of the underground garage.
And, damn, the confident look on her face pissed him off. Watching him nibble around the hook. Finally he put the note in his pocket and grumbled, “You better come with me.”
She nodded, loaded her bags, and hopped into the Jeep.
Broker pulled into a FINA station, filled the Cherokee with super unleaded and continued through town without speaking. Tuna alone he could discount. But Tuna and Trin…He stopped at a tobacco shop and bought a carton of cigarettes, American Spirits.
“Starting smoking again, huh? You nervous?” said Nina.
“They don’t have chemical additives. They’re good for you.”
“I get it. Health food cigarettes—”
“Shut up,” said Broker.
At his place, he ignored several neighbors who came out to stare at him. Stepping around smashed furniture, Nina heated water and made instant coffee. They took the coffee into his backyard and gazed down the river valley.
“Aren’t you going to clean up?” she asked.
“Up north.”
“What about breakfast?”
“We’ll stop on the road. Right now I just want to get out of town.”
“Oh. Look.”
Five carnival-striped hot air balloons, which had launched out of Lakeland, south of town, sailed low up the river. Absurd embellishments presented on the day, Broker thought that they should trail Monty Python’s Flying Circus captions. Like the number five written in the sky…
There had been five of them. Ray was dead. Tuna was dying. That left three…What would it be like, seeing LaPorte after all these years ?
He had glimpsed him occasionally on television. Usually on MacNeil-Lehrer , brought on as a military expert during Grenada, Beirut, Panama, the Gulf War. He had a reputation as a frosty critic of the overreliance on technology in the touchy-feely volunteer army.
Slowly Broker withdrew the folded piece of notebook paper from his pocket and smoothed it on his thigh.
Find Trin .
He looked up. Nina watched him carefully fold the note and tuck it in his chest pocket. “Well, I’m going to take a shower, after I pour some Spic ‘n’ Span in the tub,” she said.
Alone in
Unconsciously, Broker patted his chest pocket for a cigarette. Nina reached in her purse and passed him the crumpled Gauloises. Hennessy cognac and the French fags —Broker had a precise memory of the last time he’d seen Ray Pryce take a Gauloise from the gold cigarette case that his wife, Marian, had given him. They were standing on the rolling deck of a Vietnamese minesweep that lay off the coast of Vietnam; it was April 29, 1975.
Just like Ray used to do, Broker tapped the short, fat French cigarette on his thumbnail and put it to his lips. Nina clicked the lighter and stated, “Dammit, don’t you get it. General LaPorte’s been over there posing as an environmentalist taking pictures of the bottom of the South China Sea.”
Broker inhaled the strong tobacco and tightened the bolts on his masking smile to ward off Nina’s raving attempt to raise the dead. More than that, he resented her confident quick-study routine. Her zeal. Her confidence. She was starting to have that effect on him. The urge to prove her wrong was almost a sneer behind his lips.
“He found it, that’s what Tuna’s getting at,” she asserted. “I have a map with a coordinate. I have a sonar image of a wrecked U.S. Army Chinook helicopter, laying in one hundred feet of water off the coast of central Vietnam. I snuck it from LaPorte’s office last night in New Orleans. That’s why he’s after me. The genie is out of the bottle, Broker.”
“The Hue gold,” said Broker in a hollow voice.
“The Hue gold. Ten tons of it. Which my father did not steal.”
11
F OR ALL HE KNEW, THE HUE GOLD REALLY WAS A myth. He had, after all, never actually seen it. No one had. But that one elongated syllable—gold—got stuck in his ears and reverberated in the drafty acoustics of the underground garage.
And, damn, the confident look on her face pissed him off. Watching him nibble around the hook. Finally he put the note in his pocket and grumbled, “You better come with me.”
She nodded, loaded her bags, and hopped into the Jeep.
Broker pulled into a FINA station, filled the Cherokee with super unleaded and continued through town without speaking. Tuna alone he could discount. But Tuna and Trin…He stopped at a tobacco shop and bought a carton of cigarettes, American Spirits.
“Starting smoking again, huh? You nervous?” said Nina.
“They don’t have chemical additives. They’re good for you.”
“I get it. Health food cigarettes—”
“Shut up,” said Broker.
At his place, he ignored several neighbors who came out to stare at him. Stepping around smashed furniture, Nina heated water and made instant coffee. They took the coffee into his backyard and gazed down the river valley.
“Aren’t you going to clean up?” she asked.
“Up north.”
“What about breakfast?”
“We’ll stop on the road. Right now I just want to get out of town.”
“Oh. Look.”
Five carnival-striped hot air balloons, which had launched out of Lakeland, south of town, sailed low up the river. Absurd embellishments presented on the day, Broker thought that they should trail Monty Python’s Flying Circus captions. Like the number five written in the sky…
There had been five of them. Ray was dead. Tuna was dying. That left three…What would it be like, seeing LaPorte after all these years ?
He had glimpsed him occasionally on television. Usually on MacNeil-Lehrer , brought on as a military expert during Grenada, Beirut, Panama, the Gulf War. He had a reputation as a frosty critic of the overreliance on technology in the touchy-feely volunteer army.
Slowly Broker withdrew the folded piece of notebook paper from his pocket and smoothed it on his thigh.
Find Trin .
He looked up. Nina watched him carefully fold the note and tuck it in his chest pocket. “Well, I’m going to take a shower, after I pour some Spic ‘n’ Span in the tub,” she said.
Alone in
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