Quiller Salamander

24: SONG

Kim woke me just before noon.

He was the man Pringle used as a contact, knew where to find me, at the house of the one-legged girl. He told me that Slavsky, the Russian, had gone to the airfield.

I drove there in the Mine Action van I'd used before: they were perfect camouflage, you saw them everywhere looking for those bloody toys.

The peep was waiting for me inside the gate to the freight area, short, round-shouldered, pointed face, bush jacket, looked like a pleasant rat, the way Disney would draw one.

'Symes,' he said. Pringle had flown him in from Bangkok, said he was first class.

We hadn't made contact before so we exchanged code introductions and he got it wrong the first time and I had to insist before I was sure of security, I wasn't worried, it sometimes happens, you just have to check it out. Then I got him aboard the van.

'Did you signal the DIF?' I asked him.

'Yes, from the airline office.' Trans-Kampuchean Air Services.

'Where's Slavsky now?'

'Over there. The three jeeps and the staff car. He's in the car.'

A motorcade, looked important. Breakthrough?

We were standing off the target by a hundred yards so I got my 10 x 50s and focused, still couldn't see anything more of Slavsky but a pale blurred face behind the window.

'Where's your vehicle?' I asked Symes.

'By the gate.'

Battered jeep, and I noted the number plate. 'Stand off somewhere on the perimeter road,' I told him, 'and take up station when we move. If I lose the staff car, stay with it and contact the DIF when you can, give him the score. I'll pick it up from him as soon as I can find a phone.'

'Roger.' He slipped out of the van, moved at a loping walk to the nearest cover, the chain-link fence, shoulders hunched as you often see in surveillance people, the unconscious physical expression of their conscious need to hide.

I began watching the sky.

The noon heat was down, spreading a mirage across the airfield and leaving the line of sugar palms beyond the perimeter track standing in water.

We should keep it in mind that if in fact General Kheng intends to launch a missile attack on the capital on the nineteenth, we have only until midnight to stop him.

Did he think we didn't know that, for God's sake?

Chopper.

Did he think we couldn't count, read a calendar, know how to synchronize watches, manage our buttons, see the bloody obvious when it was staring us in the face?

Chopper, coming in low from the south, a Kamov KA-26, twin rotors, the same type, possibly the same machine, that had brought Colonel Choen here from Phnom Penh.

This was at noon plus twenty-six and I began noting the time because Salamander was obviously shifting into a new phase and it could be important for Pringle to know how things were developing, to know the time of the arrival and departure of vehicles and their travel patterns simply as a matter of keeping a moving target in the sights. This didn't mean he might not have to sit at his base for hours on end without a shred of information coming in from the field as the day drew out: it would depend on how and when we could find a telephone without breaking cover.

The Kamov was drifting in across the sugar palms towards the freight area, turning a few degrees before it touched down and blew the mirage beyond it into swirling mists.

I fine-tuned the focus again.

Two men got out of the staff car: Slavsky and a Cambodian in battledress with a Western-style army beret, officer rank. Five, six men climbed down from the helicopter, one of them leading the others across the tarmac. Salutes were exchanged, and as Slavsky came forward to shake hands I recognized the leader of the visiting group. I hadn't seen him before but he was the Khmer Rouge officer in the photographs I'd seen at the villa in Phnom Penh, standing close to Pol Pot in every shot, a younger man in jungle battledress with epaulettes and a peaked cap, one picture with his name below it: General Kheng.

16:12.

I'd started thinking by the twenty-four hour clock at this stage because signals were being exchanged and Pringle would be keeping an official record as they came in: I'd phoned him from an American drugstore opposite the Hotel du Lac soon after Slavsky and General Kheng had arrived there from the airfield.

Thirty minutes later they'd come out of the hotel together, shaking hands before Slavsky had got into his rental Chevrolet and turned south, possibly back to the airfield: I wasn't curious. Kheng was now the target and he'd climbed into the staff car, moving off with one of the camouflaged jeeps ahead of him and one behind.

He was still inside the white two-storey building next to the temple where I'd kept watch before, waiting for Colonel Choen. The general had been there for more than three hours now. There was no sign above the bullet-scarred doors but the building was obviously the local headquarters of the Khmer Rouge: since I'd been here I'd seen half a dozen jeeps arriving and leaving again, some carrying an officer with an escort, some with only a driver.

It was 17:23, with the late sun lowering across the skyline, when I decided it was time to take action. Flockhart had wanted to know the whereabouts of General Kheng and he now had that information, but it was beginning to look as if Kheng might have come here to stay the night at headquarters, bringing the deadline down to zero. If there were a conceivable chance of jumping ahead of him I wanted to take it, get information for Control, this time as to where Kheng would go next — back to the capital, out to the camp in the foothills here or to the main Khmer Rouge base in the jungle. Whatever Flockhart had in his mind, this information could now be critical, conclusive, as time ran out.

I flashed my parking lights twice, and waited.

Symes came up from behind the van and put his face in the window.

'Look,' I said, 'there's something else I've got to do, so if I leave here at any time don't worry, just stay with the target wherever he goes. He was the leader of the group who got out of the chopper and his name is General Kheng. Signal the DIF as soon as you possibly can at every stage if he starts moving. Questions?'

'If he gets on a plane?'

'Find out where it's going and signal the DIF from the Air Services office.'

'Roger.'

He went back to his jeep.

It was an hour before I could make a move.

In the mirror I saw a Chinese jeep leaving the KR headquarters with an officer at the wheel, unescorted, and as it passed the end of the street I started up and took two rights and a left and saw the jeep bouncing over the potholes fifty yards ahead and took up the tail. It was following the same route as Colonel Choen had taken, but I needed to talk to this officer long before we reached the camp.

There were fewer buildings now, a few huts, then a wasteland of scrub and after a few miles a huddle of broken concrete slabs that might have been buildings once, before the revolution, their walls scarred with shrapnel and dead palm trees leaning across them. One of the buildings still stood, fissured and windowless, and I thought it looked suitable, well out of earshot from the nearest habitation and some way from the road.

The Chinese jeep was half a mile in front and it took two miles to catch up and overtake, and as I went past it I used the horn and held my hand up, asking the driver to stop, cutting in a little to reinforce the message as I hit the brakes and ran the van into the scrub and switched off the engine.

Then I left it there and trotted back to the jeep. The KR was sitting at the wheel with his right hand on the butt of his revolver so I relaxed him a little by introducing myself.

'Je suis un collegue de Slavsky!'

'Eh bien?'

I didn't say any more because I was close enough now and used a half-fist to his carotid artery to cut off the blood to the brain for a few seconds and then caught him as he keeled over, taking him round to the passenger seat and propping him there and slipping the gun out of its holster and pushing it into my belt. He was waking up a little now and I worked on the thyroid cartilage, enough to make him fight for breath, and while he was doing that I took the jeep in a U-turn and gunned up.

He was fluent in French then, hadn't asked me to repeat what I'd said; this I would have expected in a man of his rank: he wore captain's insignia.

There was cover for the jeep under some slabs of fallen concrete and I got the captain's assault rifle and the big flashlight from the back and slapped his forehead with a slack back-fist to shock the pineal gland as he tried to throw me with a thrust to the back of the knees, been sleeping like a fox, one eye open.

'Don't do that,' I told him in French, beginning tuition with the basics. 'I don't want you doing things like that.' He could understand, could hear me well enough, I knew that; he was just disorientated by the pineal strike: it's what we use it for.

The sun was down as I dragged him into the windowless building; the ground floor room had possibly been intended for storage: there was just the open doorway and a floor littered with debris thrown into relief by the flashlight — broken concrete and rusted iron bars and dead birds and a small skeleton the size of a rat. The doorway faced the scrub on the other side from the road, so the light wouldn't be seen by the traffic as the night came down.

Somewhere there was a cricket singing.

'Who are you?' the captain asked. His speech was slurred.

He was heavily built for an Asian, had muscle, would be well trained, probably, but not in unarmed combat: he should have gone for the coccyx out there, not the knees, could have paralyzed me if he'd done it fast.

'I don't want any questions,' I said.

'You told me you were a colleague of Slavsky's.'

'No questions — and that is the last time I'm going to tell you anything twice. Kneel down over there with your back to the wall.' I swung the assault rifle up. 'Do it now.'

The weapon seemed to impress him and he backed off against the wall but didn't kneel, stood watching me like a jungle cat, furious, a man of pride, what the shrink we use in training at Norfolk would categorize as strong, excitatory. Pride was something I could use, work on, given enough time.

I backed away too, as far as the opposite wall, and dropped the assault rifle and the revolver onto the floor, then moved towards the captain again until I was within striking distance.

'There are things you've got to understand,' I said. 'You're quite an educated man, and can probably think well, so it won't be difficult. You need to understand that you're my captive, and that there's nothing you can do, nothing at all, to free yourself. You must also understand that the only time I shall injure you is when you ask for it. Only then.'

He went on watching me. I'd put the flashlight on the floor to one side, its beam directed towards him. It shadowed his face, making it look like a mask lit obliquely to give it drama; the light was reflected in his narrowed, amber eyes. It would take days to break a man like this one physically. It could be done; it can always be done; but I hadn't got days, only a few hours. The quickest way would be to destroy him from the inside, reduce his persona, his creaturehood, to nothing.

'I told you to kneel,' I said, 'and this is the second time.' He tried to block it but wasn't fast enough and the strike rocked his head back and it hit the wall and for a moment I thought I'd misjudged things, used too much force, but he didn't go out, he just stood watching me, surprise in his eyes, I'd started to make him think. There wasn't any blood: it had just been a hammer-fist to the forehead.

'Remember,' I told him, 'you'll be injured only when you ask for it. Kneel.'

I gave him a few seconds but he didn't move, watched me with the anger coming back into his eyes now that he could think straight again, so I went across to the opposite wall to fetch the assault rifle, turning my back to him, already hunched over to the correct degree so that as he made his run I went straight into a basic aikido roll that flung him against the wall, then caught him as he came down so that he didn't land anywhere near the two guns.

'Don't do things like that,' I told him. 'I don't want you to do things like that. You need to think more, with your brain instead of your gut. This is an intellectual exercise we're doing together, can't you see that by now?'

He didn't answer, mainly because he'd hit the wall with quite a lot of impact and it had left him disoriented.

The man who teaches interrogation techniques at Norfolk is a Chinese, Yang Taifang. The Chief of Signals had him pulled out of a prison in the Province of Fukien when no one was looking, because the first two or three years of his thirteen-year sentence had been spent under intensive interrogation, so he knows which end the flint goes in. 'Must remember,' he says, 'not much good talking to subject when fully conscious. Must first disorientate, and this easy. Save excellent amount of time this way.' He can't speak too clearly because of what they did to his face: some of the motor nerves are gone; but mentally he's still very bright and his memory is sharp. 'First, disorientate,' he says, using his own verbal spelling. 'Then humiliate, especially if subject proud man, like soldier.'

When the captain could stand up I pushed him across the room and turned him round to face me. 'Do you remember,' I asked him, 'what happens when you make me tell you twice to do something?'

He was trying to watch me but his eyes couldn't quite focus.

'Yes.'

Breakthrough.

'Kneel.'

I don't think he went down onto his knees with any conscious intent; it was just that he was aching a lot and felt like letting his body collapse.

'That's good,' I said, and ripped the linen name tag off his battledress and gave it to him. 'Eat that.'

I waited, listening to the cricket singing.

'Is that your name?' I asked him.

'Yes.'

'I want you to eat it, and if I have to ask you a second time you know what's going to happen.'

His eyes still couldn't focus very well: he'd hit his head when we went through the aikido roll, and it had affected the occipital area. He looked at the name tab, then at me.

'Eat?'

'Yes.'

He put it into his mouth.

'Just chew it a bit, then swallow. Don't choke.'

Faint light swept the open doorway as something went past on the road. The heat of the day had been trapped in here, and sweat had started running on the man in front of me, this now temporary man, the captain.

Then he spat the name tab into my face and I drove one finger into the trigeminal nerve between the neck and the point of the jawbone and he screamed because pain in that area is instant and agonizing.

I wiped my face and picked up the name tab and held it out for him. 'Take it,' I said.

Tears streamed on his face, and for the first time I had to think of the girl with one leg, who was sore under her arms because she still wasn't used to her new crutches.

'I don't want to tell you what to do,' I said, 'more than once.'

Two seconds, three seconds, four, five, then he put the name tab into his mouth. He wasn't watching me any more, was looking down.

'Don't waste my time,' I told him, two seconds, three, then he swallowed.

'Was that your name?'

'Yes.'

'What did you do with your name?'

He looked up at me now, head a little on one side.

'What?' he asked me.

'Can you hear me all right?'

It took time. 'This side.'

'All right. Keep your head turned like that.' Perhaps he'd burst an eardrum somewhere along the line, and I didn't want to make any punitive strikes if he hadn't heard the command; it wouldn't get us anywhere.

'I'm going to ask you again,' I said, 'because you might not have heard me the first time. What did you do with your name?'

'Swallow it.'

The left hemisphere a little dulled, I'd have to be careful: I didn't want to impair his memory, because that was what I was here to listen to when the time came. The time wasn't now: he wasn't ready yet, would clam up, whatever I did to him, finito.

I looked at my watch. We'd been working for thirty-four minutes. Outside the building, dark was down: I could see it through the doorway. The flashlight was still bright but I didn't know how long the battery would last: we'd only just started, and it would be another two hours, perhaps three, before I could ask the first question, and even then I would have to do it with extreme care.

'You swallowed your name?'

'Bat.'

'In French. Stick to French. You swallowed your name?'

'Yes.'

'You ate it?'

'Yes.'

'Who are you, then? Give me your rank and name.'

'I am Captain Saloth.'

The same as Pol Pot's real name: perhaps this man had adopted it, was full of borrowed pride.

'No,' I said, 'you're nothing now. You have eaten your rank and your name, so now you are nothing. What are you?'

'I am Captain — '

'You're not listening. When I tell you something, it's always right. If you contradict me, you know what will happen to you. Now, what are you?'

'I am Captain — '

Screamed again because I worked on the same nerve.

I waited, listening to the cricket's song. The nothing was silent now, its eyes shut and the tears dripping from its face, its knees folding at last as I knew they would.

'Don't do that. Kneel upright. Knees straight. Can you hear me?'

The nothing said nothing. I had to think of the former Captain Saloth in that way now to create the reality. What was real in my mind must be made real in his.

'Can you hear me?'

'Yes.'

'Then straighten your knees.' Waited. 'Good. Now, I've told you what you are, remember? You are nothing. Listen carefully to the question. What are you?'

The song of the cricket had stopped.

The nothing was swaying slightly from side to side. The agony of the last strike would still be burning through the nerves; it would last for some time, perhaps for days, would be tender for weeks, months. I know this: it was a month before I could even shave there after I came out of the underground cell in Zagreb.

'Are you going to make me ask you the same question twice?'

It flinched. 'No.'

'Do you remember the question?'

Its face looked at me, the eyes flickering with pain, the head held slightly to one side, the tears drying on the blotchy skin. I thought of the other girl, the one in the photograph on the wall of the mine-clearing office, smiling, radiant, used to her crutches by now, no problem, held in a bear hug by the two grinning men.

It said something in Khmer.

'French. Always speak French.'

'What question?'

'Listen,' I said, 'you're not paying enough attention. I'm going to tell you what you are, and then you're going to answer my question. Now listen carefully. This is what you are: you are nothing.' I waited, watching it to see if it understood. I thought it did: there was still intelligence in the eyes and the swaying had stopped. 'So here comes the question. What are you?'

It was silent. It didn't move. It looked like the remains of a wood carving half destroyed by time, the head angled on the neck, the eyes splintered, the mouth half open and askew. But I could hear it breathing, and in the sound of its breathing there was a faint musical note, a kind of mewing that loudened suddenly into speech.

'Nothing.'

I look at my watch, the last chance I shall get because the battery of the flashlight is running low.

The time is 21:39.

We have been here for two and a half hours, something like that.

It seems longer, much longer.

I watch its face as the light grows dim. It's still alive, and still conscious. There wasn't very much more to do since it recognized itself as nothing: that was the breakthrough. But we needed more time between the questions and the answers, because sometimes it remembered its pride and did silly things, and there is now a gash on my face and I can feel the blood caked there, itching as it dries, a trophy won by inattention, but then I'm tired too, and I feel some of its pain. All men are brothers, however divided by their lunatic ideologies.

The cricket is singing again, and in the rectangle of the doorway there is moonlight.

'Who are you?'

'Nobody. Nothing.'

'You are my prisoner. What are you?'

'I am your prisoner.'

'Your life is in my hands. Do you want to live?'

'My life is — '

'Listen to the question. Do you want to live?'

'Pain. Want end of pain.'

The light is very dim now, just a glow.

It is still kneeling, immediately in front of me. I can smell its sweat. It reeks. It can smell mine. I reek. I can smell its blood. It can smell mine. All men are pigs.

The light goes out.

'Your pain will end, if you're very careful.'

I think it is swaying, in the pale light from the doorway, from the moon. I think I am swaying too. It's getting late. I didn't sleep last night. I slept for a few hours today but this has been tiring for the psyche, which is exhausted by the endless need to withhold compassion even from this thing, this child-crippler, this hero of the holocaust to come.

'What did I tell you?'

'My pain end, if I care, take care.'

I think there's just enough consciousness, just enough memory, to have made it worth while, worth coming here, worth talking with my brother pig.

'How will you take care?'

'Take care, yes.'

'You will take care by answering my questions truthfully. I shall know if you are lying.'

Blind suddenly, my eyes closing. I open them again. I must take care too. 'Shall I know if you lie to me?'

'Lie.'

'Listen to the question. Shall I know if you lie to me?'

'Yes.'

'Then we'll begin. But the pain will only end if you take care not to lie. Do you understand what I'm saying?'

'Yes.'

Harken ye then to the cricket's song.

'How long will General Kheng remain at Headquarters?'