Finding Moon

The Fifteenth Day to, Alas, the Eighteenth Day

IT WAS EMBARRASSING. He remembered that part of it clearly enough. But much of the rest was either hazy or mixed with the confusing dreams that high fever provokes.

He recalled sitting on the deck after the heaving of his stomach finally wrenched to a stop. He recalled trembling with a chill, and the voice of Mr. Tung saying something in his oddly accented English about this seasickness, this mal de mer as Mr. Tung called it, being unusually premature, and laughing at his joke. And then he remembered the angry voice of Mr. Lee, speaking in a language that might have been Tagalog or Chinese or almost anything but English.

They took him belowdecks then, Captain Teele helping him down a narrow ladder. He’d sprawled on a bunk. And there was Osa van Winjgaarden leaning over him, asking what he thought was the matter, asking about pain, about what might be causing this, and he’d said something like it must have been something he’d eaten, and she had said, “I hope so.”

She’d stood over him, he remembered that clearly, frowning at him, holding the back of her hand against his forehead, taking his wrist and checking his pulse, looking worried.

“You are practicing medicine without a license,” Moon had said. The fever was back, and Osa’s hand felt cold on his skin. “If I have to throw up anymore, I’ll call my lawyer and have him file a malpractice-”

But he didn’t finish. Didn’t feel like trying to be funny. Felt, in fact, like closing his eyes and leaving all this behind. And so he had.

And now it was-what? Three days later? And almost sundown, so that would make it three and a half days.

“Well, it’s Wednesday,” Osa said. “And we left Puerto Princesa Sunday morning. So, yes. Three days you’ve been sick.”

Moon had just eaten a bowl of soup made of rice and something else-probably some sort of fish. It was very thin and warm and delicious. It sat uneasily in his stomach. But it was going to be all right, he could tell that. In fact, he could use another bowl.

“Good soup,” he said. “Excellent soup.”

“You should wait a little while,” Osa said. “Until we see what happens with your digestion.”

He was sitting on a roll of canvas, leaning back on a burlap sack full of something heavy-maybe rice. A bank of dark clouds closed off the horizon to the left, but the sky above was clear and the setting sun felt wonderful. Climbing up the ladder had left Moon feeling weak. But his head no longer ached. His stomach seemed to be dealing handsomely with the soup. No more nausea. A fresh breeze blew across his face and hummed through the rigging above him. The sea was dark blue, and Moon felt absolutely wonderful. I am actually going to find Ricky’s kid. I’m actually going to walk into the room and hand this child to Victoria Mathias and say, Well, Mother, here she is. Here’s your granddaughter. And then- He exhaled a huge sigh.

Osa was leaning against the railing, frowning at him. “You’re all right?”

“I’m fine,” he said. “Hungry. I feel like you should be telling me what I’ve been missing. First, where are we?”

“Well,” Osa said, “we’re on the Glory of the Sea and we are going to the mouth of the Mekong and I think we get there very soon. Tonight, I think. Captain Teele is just waiting until he believes it is a little safer. Otherwise, I think we have told you everything.”

“You did, I guess. But a lot of it-” He tapped his forehead with a finger. “You know. It’s all confused. I remember hearing people talking about the Filipino minesweeper. Rice, I think it was, and Mr. Lee. And I seem to remember the minesweeper didn’t chase us. And you told me the North Viets were almost at Saigon. Or maybe I dreamed that. And something about an air base being bombed.” He shrugged.

“I think I told you the airport had been shelled and no airplanes were landing. And the Vietnamese had put in a new president but the Communists wouldn’t negotiate with him.”

“I hoped maybe the good guys would have won while I was asleep,” Moon said. “Nothing good seems to happen for our side out here while I’m awake.”

“I think it’s even worse since you got sick. The Communists are winning everywhere.”

“Maybe that will solve a problem for us,” he said. “I mean, no more war. Peace. Maybe your brother will be safe now.”

Osa didn’t react to this. She was staring out toward the setting sun.

“Well,” he said, “who knows? Why not?”

“Mr. Teele said the Khmer Rouge radio didn’t sound very peaceful. He said they announced they had executed eleven government ministers.”

“You know how that is,” Moon said. “Things like that get exaggerated in the excitement. The press hears they’ve been shot and they’re just locked up.”

“The Khmer Rouge decapitated them,” Osa. said. “And the radio was ordering people in the city to turn in all the college professors, lawyers, and doctors. Business people. Everybody like that. And he heard another radio station broadcasting terrible reports. I think it was from a freighter sailing down the Mekong. It said all the people in some of the villages had been killed.”

Osa was looking away from him, to where cloud shadows were making their patterns on the sea.

“Awful,” she said, and shuddered, and then was silent.

Moon could think of nothing to say.

“Worse even than what I was telling you when you were sick.”

“I don’t remember much of it,” Moon said.

“Don’t,” she said, and wiped her sleeve across her face. She turned toward him.

“Part of the time you were delirious. Did you know that?” Suddenly she smiled. “Did you know you were calling me Debbie?”

“Oh,” Moon said.

“And talking to your mother quite a bit. You must have dreamed you’d done something very bad. You were telling her you were sorry. Several times you said that.”

“Well,” Moon said, “several times I did things that were bad.” Which really wasn’t what Osa van Winjgaarden wanted to talk about.

“This Debbie, I think she must be your sweet-heart.”

“What did I say?” And, as soon as he asked, wished he hadn’t. So, apparently, did Osa. She looked slightly abashed.

“Well, personal things sometimes.”

Time to change the subject. “I remember hearing you talking to Mr. Lee about getting me off the ship and to a doctor, and Mr. Lee saying there wasn’t a doctor, except the prison doctor,” Moon said. “And you said prison was better than being buried at sea. And I remember agreeing with you.”

“I thought you had dengue fever,” Osa said. “That is very bad business. You die from that.”

Moon had a sudden surprising thought. “But you would have gone to prison too. Not just me.”

Osa shrugged.

“And I think I remember somebody giving me sort of a bath,” Moon said. “With a wet towel or something, turning me over. Washing everywhere. Even behind my ears. I think it was you. Or was I dreaming?”

“It was to make you more comfortable,” Osa said, still looking out at the darkening sea.

“So I don’t guess I have any secrets anymore,” Moon said.

“No secrets?”

“I mean, I guess you know I am a little bit too fat around the middle. And have a scar on my hip. So forth.”

“Oh, yes. How did you get that terrible scar?”

Moon was silent for a moment. “When I turned over the jeep.”

Some slight variation in the wind caused the sail above them to make a flapping sound. Straight ahead, and high, four sea birds were circling. Long pointed wings. Albatross, perhaps, if they flew over the South China Sea. Gooney birds.

“And a man was killed in it,” Osa said slowly. “The friend who died in the accident you had. You talked about him when your fever was so high that first day.” She looked at him, face sad. “I think he must have been a very good Mend. You grieve for him.”

“Yes,” Moon said. “I do.”

Rice appeared at the top of the ladder, looked at them, climbed out, and walked toward the stern, where Captain Teele was doing something at the wheel.

“What did I say to my mother?”

“I didn’t listen,” Osa said. “Of course not.”

“But you heard enough to know I was talking to her. What did I say?”

He decided she wasn’t going to answer. Then she said, “I already told you. You said you were sorry.”

Rice was walking up.

“You decide you’re going to live?”

“With a little bit of luck,” Moon said. “And a little more of that soup.”

Rice sat on the canvas beside him. “Teele’s going to wait until about an hour before dawn. Then he’ll haul in the sail and go as close to the mouth as he can get. We’ll take the rubber boat and ride on into the new R. M. Air base. Then I’ll fire up a copter and we’ll get this business over with.”

Moon didn’t comment. The soup suddenly felt heavy in his stomach.

“If we’re lucky, Bob Yager will be there. If he is, we can get maybe four or five of those copters out of there. You know, fly two of them over to Thailand, leave one, fly back in the other, take a couple more. Keep doing it until we got all of ’em out that are ready to go.”

It took Moon about a second or two to understand the implications of this. What was a military helicopter worth? The army paid about a million dollars each, he guessed, depending on the model.

Used, and a fire sale situation, maybe three or four hundred thousand each. Maybe more. No way to guess.

“Yager,” Moon said. “I thought he was on the business end of things.”

“He was Ricky’s executive officer back when they were both in the service. He’d resigned his commission before Ricky did. Went into some sort of business in Saigon and Phnom Penh, the way I heard it, and then came along right after Ricky started R. M. Air. Chief pilot and deal maker. Last I heard he was in Malaysia, setting up a base down the peninsula for when the South Viets gave up.”

“You told us there wouldn’t be any pilots left,” Moon said. “Remember telling us that?”

Rice’s face showed no trace of embarrassment. “Did I say that? I guess I did, didn’t I. I was thinking you folks would have just left me there in prison and gone on about your business.”

“You’re right about that,” Moon said.

“It’s better this way anyway. First place, Yager will probably be gone by now. So I didn’t lie.”

Moon shrugged.

“No use leaving those copters for the Commies,” Rice said. “I’d rather blow ’ em up. And from what the radio is saying, there ain’t going to be no Army of the Republic of Vietnam after a few more days. They owe Ricky money now, and they’ll be owing a lot more.”

“You going to sell them? Is that the plan?”

“We could. But why not expand R. M. Air to Thailand or Malaysia?” Rice asked. “I guess it’s your company now. You being lUcky’s brother, I guess you inherit it. There’s sure as hell plenty of business out here. Hauling things around. And people.”

“First we go get Ricky’s daughter,” Moon said. “And take care of this other business.”

“Sure,” Rice said. “First things first.” He looked thoughtful. “You still have that map?”

“It’s with my stuff,” Moon said.

Osa brought it, and they spread it on the deck.

“Okay,” Rice said. “Here we are.” He tapped a fingertip on the blue of the South China Sea a half inch north of the westernmost of the seven mouths of the mighty Mekong. “When it gets a little darker, Captain Teele will pull in close as he can safely get this ship, and we’ll run the shore boat up to here.” He moved his fingertip to a dot just upstream from the mouth. “Long Phu is the village. Ricky was starting to move things down there the last I saw of things, so it should pretty much all be there by now. The ARVN general Ricky was working with owned a place down there, a dock sticking out into the Mekong with a warehouse. Had living quarters and a bunch of big sheds Ricky had ’em convert into repair hangars.”

He grinned at Moon.

“I think the general had been into smuggling. Probably still was. Anyway, when Ricky wanted a safer place for R. M. Air he worked out a deal with this fella. So we’ll pull in there about daylight and see what we find. If R. M. Air is still operating, then no problem. We just take a copter and get our business done. if everybody’s gone but some of the birds are left behind, we’ll fuel one up and get on with it. Or, if they didn’t get the birds moved down there then”-Rice moved his fingertip an inch up the river-“we sail on up the Mekong to the R. M. Air hangars at the airstrip outside Can Tho and take a copter from there.”

Rice paused, studying the map. Far out, near the horizon, Moon saw a red light reflecting from a sail. Then two more. Small craft, six or seven miles away, he guessed, and apparently outward bound.

“I’d guess Bob Yager will still be there,” he said. “Wherever the copters are. Yager would stick around until the last dog died.”

“Yeah,” Moon said.

“Sure,” Rice said. “Yager will be there. if he’s not, we can do it just as well without him.”

“You make it sound so easy,” Osa said. “Can you find anything in the darkness?”

Rice shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”

Moon was going to say, Because maybe the Vietcong will be shooting at us, but Osa answered the question.

“I remember flying up the river that day you took me to my brother’s mission,” she said. “It was like flying over green wilderness. Everywhere you looked you could see light reflecting off the water. All tangled up with streams and irrigation canals. Like a maze. I’d think you would get lost. Easy enough, maybe, in a helicopter where you can see the sea behind you and the mountains up ahead. But down on the water in a little boat how could anybody tell? Not in the dark.”

“Anybody couldn’t,” Rice said. “I can. I used to live on that goddamn river. Three hitches in the Brown Water Navy. With the Game Warden project.”

Rice looked from Osa to Moon and back, waiting for the question.

“Game Warden?” Moon said.

“The navy called the whole operation Market Garden,” Rice said. “And the river patrol part down here was Game Warden. The idea being to keep the VC from running their sampans up and down the rivers, hauling troops, ammunition, all that. The navy bought a bunch of little fiberglass boats. Shallow draft, hold four or five crewmen, and do maybe twenty-five knots, and we’d run up and down the rivers and the creeks and canals and raise hell with the VC.”

Rice became aware that his pride was showing and stopped. “Shows you how crazy I was,” he added.

“When was that?” Moon asked.

“I started with the project in ‘sixty-seven. Transferred in. Did two hitches in the little PBRs- anybody but the navy would call ’ em River Patrol Boats but the navy made ’ em Patrol Boats River. Then I shifted over to the Floyd County, one of the LSTs they converted as base ships for the boats. We’d anchor way out in the channel and be mother hen for the PBRs. That’s how I got into copters,” Rice said. “They fitted the Floyd out with a copter deck and we played mama for the Huey gunships.”

“How’d you learn to fly?”

“Went along as crew,” Rice said. “I was a chief petty officer, a regular navy lifer. You can do pretty much what you want to do after you learn the system. I got friendly with the pilots. Watched how they did it. Took over when the pilot wanted to eat his lunch or take a break. That’s how I met your brother.”

“He hired you out of the navy?”

“I was quitting anyway,” Rice said. “Had in my twenty, and the navy was phasing out to go home. I’d met Ricky when we were transferring our Hueys over to the Vietnam navy and he was doing their maintenance. I told him I didn’t want to go back to the States-nothing for me there, and he said stick around, he could use me. Yager was already part of Ricky’s team by then, and he sort of gave me the finishing touches.” Rice laughed. “Like how to put one down without bouncing it.”

Captain Teele was standing by the mast now, studying the sails through binoculars.

“Okay,” Moon said. “We get in. We get a copter. Now where do we go to get the child?”

“Here’s where we go look,” Rice said. He moved his finger westward from Can Tho, across the Cambodian border, into a range of hills the mapmaker had identified as the Elephant Mountains.

“See this little road here along the coast? Little dot there called Kampot. Stream runs through it and dumps into the Gulf of Siam. Well, we fly five miles up the coast beyond that, then turn right and head due north, right up the ridge. Seventeen miles, you come to a series of clearings. Four of ’em. And in the fourth one, a little village. Ten, maybe twelve buildings, cluster of little terraced rice paddies.”

Rice looked up at Moon. “You got anything to write with?”

“Afraid not,” Moon said. Back in the prison, on the other side of the moat, Rice hadn’t been able to remember how to reach this village. He’d said it was something he’d have to sort of find somehow.

He’d only remembered the name was Vin Ba and it was near the Vietnam border.

“Here,” Osa said, and handed Rice a pen.

Rice made a tiny X on the map. And out in the Gulf wrote Vin Ba-four clearings in a row.

Osa was looking over his shoulder. “I think that’s not too far from the village where my brother-”

“Right about here,” Rice said. “On this next ridge. There’s a little village down in the valley- maybe a couple of hundred people with some terraced rice paddies. And up on the ridge in the forest there’s a Montagnard settlement where Osa’s brother has his little clinic. Osa will remember it.” He made a second X, folded the map, and handed it to Moon.

Lum Lee was standing beside Teele now, looking through the binoculars. Without them, Moon could now make out five craft, all small, three with sails.

Rice was looking at Moon, expression curious. “What are you thinking about this business?”

Moon shrugged.

“Scared?”

“Yeah. Matter of fact, I am.”

Rice laughed. “But you’ll go on in,” he said. “Ricky told me about you.”

From behind them came the voice of Mr. Lee. “On the radio just a minute ago they were saying that Pol Pot has made a broadcast. They will cleanse Cambodia of oppression and corruption by returning their country to Zero Year. They will go back to the simple, clean ways. No more parasite predators living in the filth of the cities. The cities will be emptied. People will go back to the land.”

“My God,” Osa said. “What will that mean?”

“Maybe it is political rhetoric,” Mr. Lee said. “But we were listening to Radio Jakarta earlier. They said Pol Pot’s army was evacuating Phnom Penh. The soldiers were forcing everybody out of their houses and marching them out into the country.”

Rice was grinning, the sunset red on his face. “We’re just in time,” he said. “Everybody is going to be too busy with their own worries to pay attention to us.”

“Yes,” Mr. Lee said, “maybe so.” And he made a sweeping gesture to take the seven little craft now visible in the dying light. “Just in time. In a few hours we are going in. Everybody else is coming out.”

RED FORCES WITHIN MILE OF SAIGON

AS TANKS AND ARTILLERY CLOSE IN

– New York Times, APRIL 28, 1975