17

A cloud of red dust was hanging in the air in the direction of Route 1. The headlights of the lead vehicle gradually came into view through the dense dust. Yong Kyu checked his watch. Eleven forty. Looking over at the idling truck standing by at the Y-junction, he gave a wave. Slowly, the truck started to pull out onto the westbound road. Yong Kyu jumped in and the motor started to rev.

“Been to the supply warehouse before, haven’t you?”

“Yeah, twice.”

“Once the convoy passes by, be sure to stay right on its tail.”

The driver nodded. Yong Kyu had swapped his civilian outfit for American jungle fatigues. Like Toi, he was wearing sunglasses and had a .45 stuck in his belt, intentionally conspicuous. From now on, Yong Kyu would be in charge of the supply warehouse and the market. It was more than a necessity for investigative tasks; he was personally involved in the underground transactions. The captain had more faith in Yong Kyu than in the sergeant. The non-com team leader seemed to have written Yong Kyu off. Even in their quarters at the hotel, the team leader seldom said a word to him these days. He seemed to think Yong Kyu would soon be transferred to brigade headquarters.

The pact Yong Kyu had forged with the Vietnamese provincial government was unprecedented in the history of the detachment. It was a coup even the economic operations group of the American forces had never been able to manage. His bold black market dealings were quickly given a green light. From then on, the dealing connections would be furnishing a steady flow of detailed intelligence on the black market.

Yong Kyu now needed his own independent channels for purchasing goods. The safety and stability of his sources had to be such that the dealers would at once recognize him as an important figure in the market. And whenever the buyers reported a strong demand for this or that item, Yong Kyu had to prove he could supply those products quickly.

Among the merchants there was a common saying: “If you can sell from Turen, you can buy Ho Chi Minh.” Turen was the supply warehouse that handled all the war materiel and general supplies for the Vietnamese Second Army, not to mention all the American forces in the north central part of South Vietnam. Located northwest of Da Nang, it was defended at the rear by the US Marine Division at Dong Dao and by a dense contingent of ARVN troops, and its front was bounded by the Red Beach along Da Nang Bay.

At Turen, hundreds of Quonsets stood in rows on the sandy plain, shining brightly in the sun. Supply trucks from far-flung regions were constantly entering and exiting through the three gates. From antibiotics to analgesics, from razor blades to tanks, from typewriters to computers, everything Made in America could be found there. The easiest way for Yong Kyu to tap the reservoir at the Turen supply warehouse would be to siphon from the channel running through the supply logistics corps to brigade headquarters. But opening his own direct channel would be safer.

Without his own line of supply, there would always be a risk of other forces blocking him, and he would be open to accusations that his dealings were inappropriate for his special mission. But tapping into the Korea forces’ existing supply lines would later create problems and cause serious difficulties. If the Americans or the Vietnamese were to challenge him, they probably would let him off with a stern warning. But the Koreans would face difficulties as the others tightened their grip on them. Yong Kyu and Pointer could always resign, but it would still weaken their successors’ position in this mission.

Yong Kyu already had it in mind to set up a warehouse stocked with B-rations. Almost every commodity they packed and processed was on hand on Turen. Almost everything a man would ever need was there. About half of the stocks were military equipment and supplies like weapons, ammunition, and vehicles. The other half was made up of daily necessities and food, including luxury goods, which were the easiest commodities to sell on the black market.

There was a wide assortment of things that made the camp life of American soldiers more comfortable but which did nothing for combat readiness. For instance, the war would go on without raisins, but upon returning from a firefight, the Americans given a hot meal would hope to find raisins in their freshly baked muffins. And those were the kinds of items coveted by the residents of Da Nang. Of course, the consumers were not the peasants on the outskirts of the city who survived on a bit of fish and a handful of rice each day. It was the government bureaucrats, merchants, and families of military officers who were the loyal consumers of all the bountiful wonders liberated from the Turen supply warehouse. The links between these consumers and the dealers made up a complex ecosystem, not so different from a food chain of predators and prey found in the natural world.

Yong Kyu decided to concentrate on B-rations because these were goods that enjoyed a broad-based and stable demand in the local population. Food provisions were classified into three categories: unprocessed A-rations; B-rations that are semi-processed or partly cooked but still need to be cooked in combination with other ingredients; and C-rations that, for use in combat situations, are made for ready consumption.

The A-rations were handled at the MAC terminal across the smokestack bridge. They included vegetables—potatoes, onions, cabbage, celery, asparagus, lettuce, and peppers—and various kinds of frozen and processed meats—beef, pork, chicken, turkey, sardines, sausages—as well as fruits such as oranges, apples, bananas, dates, grapes, cherries, melons, and so on. The produce was mostly flown in from the US, in crates bearing the black stamps of farms in California, Florida, and Washington. The vegetables were even fresher than those picked near Hoi An and trucked into the Da Nang markets.

All the grains and flours—corn, barley, wheat, and rice—were kept at the MAC 36 cargo terminal and delivered directly from there, but all B and C-rations were warehoused at the Turen supply warehouse. B-rations included all the canned and packaged foodstuffs, ranging from spices like black pepper to salad dressing, sauces, raisins, almonds, walnuts, coffee, tea, butter, cheeses, pasta, etc. Yong Kyu was confident he could keep a firm grip on the marketing channels of Da Nang with B-rations alone. These commodities could be considered the cleanest of those that flowed through the black market. Though “clean,” after all, was only a relative expression. Once he had locked up a major chunk of the food trade, he could fumble his way into other daily necessities and luxury food items, one by one. Pham Quyen did not yet seem to think much of Yong Kyu’s involvement in the business. He had lived up to his promises and issued them a vehicle pass, which would expire after one month.

The Logistics Battalion truck convoy had emerged from brigade headquarters after loading supplies and was just past the Dong Dao crossroads, approaching the Y-junction. The Americans had given this intersection the nickname “Crap Crossing.” Human excrement collected in downtown Da Nang had been poured as fertilizer onto the vast, cactus-studded fields around the junction. Much of the stinking garbage from the city also found its way to the same site for dumping. The right fork of the junction led downtown, the left to the supply warehouse, and the stem of the “Y” was Route 1. In the center of the junction there was a platform that served as a traffic control box as well as a checkpoint for the Vietnamese Quartermaster Corps to conduct their inspections of the traffic passing by.

Yong Kyu had contacted Master Sergeant Yun and made arrangements for the use of a recreation center vehicle. He was supposed to give the driver twenty or thirty dollars as pocket money in the name of temporary duty allowance. It was a good opportunity for the rec center to do a little favor for CID. Yong Kyu watched the lead Jeep in the convoy make a left turn at the junction, followed by an armed escort vehicle. A cloud of red dust soon enveloped them. About twenty empty trucks rattled by, another armored personnel carrier trailing behind them.

“Get in line with them!”

The driver gunned the engine and pulled in behind the last vehicle. Maintaining constant speed and spacing, the convoy rumbled along Route 1, past the campside villages and small infantry units marching along the road. They entered the east gate of the Turen supply warehouse. Used oil had been poured over the dust, making the surface of the road look like asphalt. The sentries guarding the gate were busy controlling the heavy traffic. A lone vehicle entering the gate would be rigorously inspected, but by tagging along behind a scheduled convoy it could usually pass right in without being checked at all.

At Turen, the Allied Forces’ supply transports had priority over all other vehicles. The east gate was off-limits to Vietnamese vehicles, which had to go through tougher inspection procedures for access at the south gate near the ammunition dump. Once inside the warehouse, the transport trucks were sent to docks according to the supplies being loaded. Yong Kyu knew the number of the food warehouse dock and gave it to the driver.

The procedure for delivering supplies was simple enough: the officer in command submits a requisition form issued by the supply division of brigade headquarters to the warehouse supply office, which issues a delivery order. Upon receiving this document, the administrative officer at the loading dock loads the indicated quantity of goods and both parties sign off on the requisition receipt. Combat supplies such as ammunition could be requisitioned almost without limit, but other items had been allocated in advance according to ration standards and estimates of normal daily consumption for relevant units. Even so, supplies were always abundant and the warehouses always overflowing.

Some days earlier, Yong Kyu had visited Turen in his Jeep. He had fostered an acquaintance with a certain corporal on the administrative staff at the B-ration warehouse. Yong Kyu knew from the corporal’s clipboard that he was a section chief. His clipboard held a requisition receipt ledger—once any given number of pallets had been loaded, the corporal would do a count and then sign the receipt along with the driver of the truck, then he would tear off the top copy and hand it over, keeping the carbon copy beneath to submit to his superior for inventory control.

This American corporal was a typical white with brown hair and lots of freckles. It wasn’t easy for Yong Kyu to make deals with Blacks. If the counterpart in a transaction was a black soldier, there were two things to watch out for: he might turn out to be unreliable, and also there could be a breakdown in cooperation on the other side; if the senior American was black, white soldiers often refused to join in on the deal.

The soldiers in the convoy parked their vehicles along the docks and headed off for the mess hall. While they were having lunch, the documents would be processed and the loading would commence in the early afternoon. Yong Kyu walked over toward the warehouse. Each block unit of the warehouse contained twenty warehouses, enormous corrugated metal Quonsets lined up in straight rows, each the size of an auditorium. Above each dock door was posted the kind and quantity of the goods stored inside. Forklifts were busy moving back and forth, and container trucks were constantly going in and out from the offloading docks on the other side of the warehouses. On the piers in front of the Quonsets, American soldiers in running shirts or stripped to the waist were breaking out cartons or jockeying packages inside with pallet jacks.

Yong Kyu loitered about looking for the corporal. Nobody paid him any attention. His uniform was exactly like their own, except that his sunglasses and openly displayed pistol made them take him for an officer. At last Yong Kyu spotted the corporal sitting at a desk inside one of the Quonsets. He was in a sleeveless shirt and drinking a Coke.

“How are you? Hot out.”

The corporal threw a quick glance his way. “Who are you?”

Yong Kyu tapped him on the shoulder. “I’m Sergeant Ahn, forgot me already? I was here two days ago.”

The corporal whistled, shaking his head. “Hey, that whiskey you laid on me was a real hit. The guys in our barracks got loaded.”

On his last visit Yong Kyu had given him three bottles of Johnnie Walker Black Label. One right word to the soldier in charge of requisitions would easily get you three boxes of coffee for free. But Yong Kyu had purposely given him whiskey, which was forbidden to soldiers below the rank of sergeant.

“Thanks for the coffee you gave me last time, my friends said it ought to be enough to last for a few years.”

The corporal got up and went over to the icebox in the corner. “Care for a cold drink?”

“No, thanks. I’m all right.”

“How about a beer?”

“I’m on duty.”

Nevertheless the corporal came back over with a can of beer.

“Officers? My ass. Don’t worry, fighting the heat is also a war, y’know.”

Yong Kyu lounged on the desk, stretching his legs side by side with the corporal.

“You’re not a career soldier, huh?”

“Nope, they dragged me out here. My motorcycle is rusting back home when I should be out riding flat track races. Well, only six months left in my hitch now.”

“Corporal, I only know your rank. What’s your name?”

“Leonardo, but they just call me Leon. I’m from Chicago. You know Chicago? A big city.”

“Yes, I’ve heard of it, Leon. Your name sounds Italian.”

“Same as the old man who painted the Mona Lisa. My grandfather emigrated to America. I’ve never been to Italy.”

“I like it.”

“Like what?”

“The Italian name. It goes with Chicago. We hear lots of stories about the gangsters, from the movies.”

“We’ve got one in the family. A Mafia man.”

Yong Kyu crushed the empty can and tossed it over the desk into the wastebasket. “How’s the duty going?”

“Here?” Leon stuck his tongue halfway out.

“I’m sick and tired of it. I’d rather be in a combat unit. Time passes too slowly here.”

“Do you know why I came to Vietnam?”

“No. Hell, I don’t even know why I came here. Shit, OK, why did you come?”

Yong Kyu removed his sunglasses.

“I came because you people called. That’s why.”

“I didn’t call you. I got drunk one weekend, and when I woke up on Monday I found an enlistment notice in my mailbox. So off I go to basic training.”

“What’re you going to do when you go home and get discharged?”

“Well, first I guess I’ll ride my motorcycle as much as I want. Then I’ll make some money.”

“Can you get out of here on off-duty days?”

“Not easy to go all the way downtown. Just outside the camp around here, sometimes.”

“Good, let’s go to China Beach sometime.”

“Sure, easy to get there.”

“Leon, you got any fruit salad in here? My boss is crazy about that junk. First thing he eats in the morning. So I came over to see if I could get some.”

The corporal quickly got up, saying, “Come with me, I’ll give you a couple of boxes.”

Two boxes would mean twenty-four cans. Leon walked through the maze of the warehouse until he reached a certain spot where he started lifting cartons to check their labels. The whole area was filled with cartons of various canned fruits. He lifted up one box and put it on his shoulder, pointing with his finger at another.

“There, take that one yourself.”

They each brought out a box and set them down on the desk at the entrance. Yong Kyu took out a ten-dollar military certificate and held it out to Leon, who looked confused.

“What’s this?”

“Don’t you recognize it? It’s money. I don’t have anything in exchange this time. Just take it.”

“That’s a ten, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, be a big spender when you go out on R & R.”

“Want some more fruit salad?”

“No, this is enough. By the way, how about coming downtown with me next weekend?”

“Downtown is off-limits for us. We get stopped at the checkpoint on the outskirts of the city.”

“That’s OK, I’ll come and pick you up. You just get a leave pass.”

Leon whistled again. “That’s great. Downtown, huh? Who the hell are you anyway?”

“I’m Westy’s old man.”

The corporal cackled until his faced turned red. Yong Kyu, the father of the commander of the American forces. Yong Kyu loaded the boxes on the truck and the driver drove out from the Turen supply warehouse. The driver laughed and said the whole thing seemed absurd.

“And for just this, two measly boxes, you asked for a truck to come all the way here?”

“I was just dipping a toe in. Let me cover your pocket money for today.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

Yong Kyu had the truck stop in front of the Bamboo Club. He unloaded the boxes and left them with a vendor on the street. He said to the driver, “Tell Sergeant Yun I said thanks. I’ll be dropping by next week.”

It happened to be lunch hour and inside the Bamboo he found Vietnamese civilians sitting around sipping drinks. They appeared to be merchants or bureaucrats. During the day the patrons were mostly Vietnamese, but at night it was mostly Western soldiers. Toi was at a table in the corner. Sitting beside him was an oily-haired middle-aged man in a white shirt.

“Did you cut a deal?” asked Toi.

“Who’s this?” Yong Kyu asked, glancing at the other man.

“Major Pham sent him. I met him for the first time today.”

“He promised to meet me when he gets leave Saturday.”

Toi nodded. “Then we should have the goods in our hands by sometime next week.”

When Toi said something in Vietnamese to the middle-aged man, the latter bowed slightly.

“Do you speak English?” Yong Kyu asked him.

“Very little. A few words for business,” the man mumbled with a thick guttural accent.

“If Major Pham sent him, he must be in on the dealing channels on their side . . . do you know anything about this man?”

“No, not yet. Perhaps within three days I’ll be able to tell you about his cousins’ cousins. I talked with him a little before you came in, and it seems he’s got channels to the town merchants throughout the central region, including Quang Tri, Hue, Bien Hien, Hoi An and as far south as Quang Ngai. I’d say you could count the men in Da Nang with his kind of trading network on your two hands. Looks like he’s been doing business with the provincial government for a very long time.”

“Ask him if he owns a store.”

“A merchant like him wouldn’t bother with retail selling. He probably has warehouses and vehicles.”

Toi asked the man something, then interpreted the reply for Yong Kyu.

“He has eight big transport trucks. As for warehouses, he has two small ones in the Le Loi market and a bigger warehouse across the river.”

“Good. Can he rent a store in Le Loi market we can use?”

“He says we can share his younger brother’s office. Of course, we should pay a little as rent.”

“What kinds of things does he need?”

Once again Toi did not relay the question and instead looked scornfully at Yong Kyu.

“Confident, are you? So, you planning to empty all of Turen yourself? This man wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the order from Pham Quyen, and I can tell he doesn’t have a very high opinion of us.”

“Ask him anyway.”

Toi asked the man, who looked at his watch and then curtly mumbled something.

“He says demand for salad dressing is pretty high right now.”

“I see. If he wants, I can deliver the goods this time on Monday. Price?”

“Instead of talking price, isn’t it more urgent to settle the delivery procedures and the method of sale? The price can be negotiated at a suitable amount when the market is checked.”

Toi had a point. Yong Kyu sunk back into his chair.

“You’re right. I don’t now. Discuss it with him your way.”

Toi spoke with the middle-aged man in Vietnamese. “Have you done many deals with Major Pham?”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t see what that has to do with what we’re doing here.”

“My friend here says he’ll bring the salad dressing you want this time next Monday. How do you want to handle it?”

“What’s the quantity, exactly?”

“Well . . . about one truckload.”

“If it’s only a single truck, then it won’t be more than two pallets. Ordinarily a pallet is twenty cartons, so it’ll be forty boxes altogether. But in case of cans, it may be different. Twelve cans make one box, and the total quantity is less. Anyway, for that amount we won’t need a full container, a conex box will be fine and down at the pier terminal there are plenty that belong to the provincial administration. We’ll give you a number and a key and you’ll deliver the goods down there. Be sure not to forget the key. When we pay you for the goods, you just hand over the key to us. That’s all.”

“You said you have your own warehouse, so why ask us to deliver the goods to storage?”

“Depending on the market situation, the goods might go to our warehouse or end up across the river. But deals of this kind are generally done with keys and drops. In case we want to resell to another party, we can just leave the goods in the conex box for them to pick up.”

“We haven’t settled on a price.”

“It fluctuates quite a bit. In a business like this we have to trust each other. A dealing line is like a lifeline we both are holding onto. The going rate for salad oil has been around 2300 piasters for a large box and 1900 for a small one.”

“Can you pay in dollars?”

“You mean hard cash?”

“No, military dollars will do.”

“We can pay however our partner wants. But if you ask for military currency, there’s a service commission of 20 percent. Stateside cash would cost up to 30 percent. So if payment is in military currency, the large boxes will be eighteen dollars and fifteen for the small. Depending on what the seller wants, in some cases we can also pay in gold, in money orders, or in the currency of a third country.”

“So, you’re in the money-changing business too?”

“There are ways to get it done.”

“How about doing our deal in military currency?”

“We’ll prepare it that way.”

“What other items would be good?”

The merchant thought for a while.

“The goods we’re handling are already set, and we’re not intruding on the business of others. I’ve mainly been dealing in rice, and it was only after getting to know Major Pham that I laid my hands on cement. Processed food is also one of our lines. There are a few others, but they only handle a bit of the military supplies.”

“Can we go and see the office now?”

“You mean, my office?”

“We’d like to see both yours and your brother’s.”

The merchant grinned and showed his cautious side. “I know almost nothing about you people. Once the deal starts, you’ll have to come by anyway. Well, I think I’ll excuse myself now. I’ll see you here on Monday same time.”

The merchant spoke to Toi, then he turned to Yong Kyu who had been sitting there like an imbecile and said in English, “See you again.”

After the man left, Toi and Yong Kyu had fried chicken and beer for lunch. Yong Kyu checked the time and reported to the captain over the phone.

“I’ve just come from Turen, sir. I also met the man sent by the Vietnamese side.”

“Let’s have lunch together.”

“We already finished lunch, sir.”

“Anything you need?”

“Well . . . not over the phone.”

“All right, I’ll be over in a minute.”

Yong Kyu turned to Toi and said, “Pointer said he’d come over here.”

“Should I leave the two of you alone?”

“No, that’s not necessary.”

Shortly afterwards Captain Kim appeared in the doorway. Dressed in white pants and a white T-shirt, he looked like he was on his way to a tennis club. When the captain took a seat in front of them, Yong Kyu briefed him on the developments to date.

“We’ll be needing about three hundred dollars, sir.”

“That much for the principal?”

“Half of the sum will go to making friends with that boy from Turen, Leon. It’ll cost at least a hundred, anyway. I have about a hundred fifty on me, though.”

“Fine. The question is how fast we can track down the NLF dealing lines. Once we accomplish that, the rest of our dealings can be justified.”

“The American team probably has Vietnamese out running their investigation. On our side, Toi and I plan to run the store ourselves.”

Spreading butter lightly on his bread, the captain murmured, “Right, if the two of you are planted in Le Loi market, we’ll get a line on most of the dealers in Da Nang one at a time. We’ve got to get a grip on all the black market channels of the Koreans, including the Hong Kong Group. Once we have them in our hands, we can squeeze them by the throat.”

“Even now we can put a squeeze on the Hong Kong Group, sir. If we blockade the PX, those guys will come begging on their own.”

“It won’t be that easy thanks to our team leader. He’s shown their chairman too many vulnerable spots.”

Yong Kyu thought about the staff sergeant. In three months he would be headed back home. For him, ten thousand dollars was a considerable sum. He’d once said that he would love to buy some land in the countryside, to save his family from the life of tenant farmers. Had he not said that he volunteered for the army to escape a hard life as a farmer with too many mouths to feed? His replacement with a new sergeant would not bring any major changes to the current situation. If the leader stayed, for Yong Kyu it would mean a not-so-inconvenient continuation of the status quo for another three months. Counting the time in his head, Yong Kyu plotted it out month by month.

“I have an idea, sir. I’ll speak to the team leader. I’ll have him move in on the scene when the Hong Kong Group makes some deal. The leader can slip away and . . . lock up that bastard they call ‘Pig.’ Then, Chairman Pak will come to you, sir, with his tail between his legs. We’ll get such a firm grip on their balls they won’t know which way to turn. Once we catch that group, the rest will just fall into our hands.”

“Will the team leader agree to do that?”

“The sergeant will listen to me, sir. I’ve helped them get through the checkpoints several times. As his subordinate I had no choice, sir.”

“I already knew about that.”

“He’s got to help his men get ready to return home. It’s wise to have the leader in full control of the PX.”

As an afterthought, the captain said to Toi, “Looks like you and Sergeant Ahn are making a great team.”

“In Vietnam, we call men like him ‘quick as a lizard.’”

“I’ll see to it that you get an allowance on top of your salary.”

“No need for an allowance, but I have a favor to ask. I’ve already discussed it with Sergeant Ahn. Give me an opening every now and then.”

“What kind of opening?”

“When the sergeant’s goods are purchased, let me have a chance to invest a little in the buys. A couple of boxes would be enough.”

“All right, I guess that’ll be more of a help to you.”

On Saturday Yong Kyu took the company Jeep and drove out to Turen supply warehouse. As Toi had said, he was quick as a lizard, for he had become a decent driver within a month after his transfer to Da Nang. He flashed his ID at the east gate and went around to the soldiers’ barracks. Finished with the day’s duty, some soldiers were tossing a football around. Leon was among them, soaked with sweat. He must not have expected Yong Kyu to keep his promise, and looked surprised to see him. Within a few minutes he had run inside and come back out, freshly shaven and in civilian clothes.

“Where should we go? China Beach?”

“I’ve been there lots of times.”

“Let’s head downtown, anyway. It’s been a while since you were there, right?”

At this, Leon got excited and whistled loudly.

“That’s an off-limits zone for us. I’ve never been there.”

Leon looked much younger now than when he was in uniform.

“You like to drink, don’t you?”

“Sure.”

“All right if you don’t make it back tonight?”

“Don’t bother with that. If I get caught, hell, I’ll dig ditches or run around the grounds, no big deal. Anyway, I’ll be safe if I make it back to the barracks by tomorrow. The sergeant has gone down to China Beach himself.”

“Will he stay there tonight?”

“I think so. Every weekend he’s been playing poker with some navy officers.”

“What’s his name?”

“Stapley.”

Yong Kyu turned off from Route 1 towards downtown Da Nang. There was a checkpoint, but civilian company vehicles were just waved through. The Vietnamese QC sentry made a slow hand gesture. Soon they were crossing Le Loi Boulevard into the crowded streets of the old market and veering up Puohung Street. He had no intention of going to the Bamboo, for it was a gathering place for too many other black marketeers. He drove a few blocks farther and pulled into an alley line with stores near the mouth of Doc Lap Boulevard. He parked in a back alley where some young boy peddlers were thronging. Leon looked nervously about.

“Where we going?”

“Now we’re becoming complete civilians.”

“Civilians?”

“That’s right. Let’s wash off the soldier scum.”

Unable to grasp what Yong Kyu meant, Leon walked edgily a few steps behind him. They came up to a glass storefront with a sign overhead reading “Steam Bath.” Yong Kyu bought the tickets and they pushed aside a curtain to see a long hall. A boy standing there took the tickets and led them into a small room. They took off their clothes, put them into a basket and headed into the baths. Leon laughed loudly. “What the hell are we doing, anyway?”

“A maintenance job. Wow, your dick is enormous.”

“Shit, yours looks like a frog.”

Bursting into laughter, Leon slapped Yong Kyu on the butt. When they opened the door inside, hot steam came rolling out in a steady stream.

“Hey, I don’t like it.”

“Listen, you should get the sweat out of your system. It’s good for you.”

They went in and sat down in the hot steam bath. Along the wall were seats that looked like stairs. The middle of the space was packed with bamboo branches from out of which steam was pouring upwards. Leon was covering his mouth and nose with a towel. Yong Kyu spoke.

“Take a look. There’s a pile of pebbles down there heated by fire. They’re covered with herbs.”

“It smells awful.”

“It’s not that bad, is it?”

They came out again, pulverized from the heat and the sweating. As they finished washing off with cold water, two girls came in and waited with huge towels. They were scantily clad and wore real flowers in their hair. With one arm Leon leaned on the girl who was drying his body and said, “She’s killing me.”

“Slow down, she’s just a kid.”

“Hey, you shit. It’s been over two months for me. The mere sight of that fucking uniform makes me want to puke.”

The girl smiled, slightly nudging Leon away. Yong Kyu went over to the bed first and lay down, and Leon then came over and lay down on the next bed. The girls were about to pull the curtains when Yong Kyu stopped them.

“I’d like to talk about business.”

Leon opened his eyes wide and tried to read the expression on Yong Kyu’s face.

“I want us to be friends. Friends must never cheat one another. I want to buy things from you.”

“Coffee, you mean? Well, I’ll give you the damn stuff free.”

“Not just a couple of boxes, I mean I want to buy as much as you can handle.”

Leon was silent. Instead of replying, he tapped the head of his bed with his finger, thinking. Yong Kyu went on.

“When you get back home, how much do you think you can make? What can you earn in a week?”

“Well, maybe between a hundred and two hundred. I spend it all on the weekend.”

“You can make ten times that. Look around, there’s a mountain of goods piled up in the warehouse. There’s everything there.”

Leon let out a short laugh. “I know the whole story. And there are many divisions in our warehouse where goods are being sold.”

“So much the better. Our supply vehicle goes to Turen every day. Once a day, or once every other day, whichever you like is fine with me.”

“Once every other day sounds good. We rotate, you know.”

“Let me have two pallets of salad oil on Monday.”

“Big or small?”

“Big would be better.”

Leon held out his hand for Yong Kyu to shake.

“If it’s only B-rations, I can let you have as much as you want.”

They shook hands. The girls were pressing, rubbing, and patting their shoulders and spines, moving down toward the calves.

“I think I can trust you. You’re not greedy,” Leon said.

“Your sergeant, did you say Stapley was his name? What’s his job?”

“He’s in charge of checking all the warehouses in our section. But he’s got no power over us and rarely interferes. A nice guy.”

“Career soldier?”

“No, he was drafted, too. He hates this war.”

“You, too?”

“I don’t know. I just want to go home soon.”

“All right, we’ll talk more later. Enjoy yourself.”

Yong Kyu signaled with his eye and the girls pulled the curtains together.

From the other side of the partition came the sound of Leon and the other girl laughing, then the sound of bare flesh slapping. Caressing Yong Kyu with her fingertips, the girl with him asked, “What do you want me to do?”

“What do you recommend?”

“Hands, body, special . . . prices are different.”

“How different?”

“Five-dollar difference.”

“I’ll give you thirty. Do them all to that guy.”

“He already has a girl.”

“Do a double for him.”

With a look of disdain, the girl stared down at Yong Kyu with narrowed eyes and the corners of her mouth twitching upward, then she moved over into the next compartment. The whispering and giggling of the two girls could be heard together with eruptions of convulsive laughter from Leon.

“Hey, Sarge, you’re crazy! This is too much!”

Without responding, Yong Kyu put his clothes back on. He smoked a cigarette absentmindedly and listened to the gradual changes in the sound of their heavy breathing, the moving flesh and the laughs. He was detached. Thirty dollars for a girl, sixty for two, plus ten dollars for the bath—for a grand total of seventy dollars he’d bought hell’s pleasures. The girls would suck the marrow out of the bastard and leave him a drained pulp . . . just as the goods heaped up in Leon’s warehouse had made the larger and more grandiose hell prosper.

Yong Kyu thought of the porn films he used to watch with the administrative agents back at the Grand Hotel. The constant hunger, the lack, the incessant material quest. The next day Yong Kyu had found his way into this bathhouse during duty hours. And he had come back once more with the team leader. He pictured sperm crawling on the screens like worms. His body was mindlessly hung between his legs.

He saw the countless limbs and blobs of flesh swept up into vinyl bags for disposal, the stench of the blood, the rotting wounds, the flesh swollen with an amber brown tinge, the sticky pus oozing around, the swarming maggots, the hordes of lizards ceaselessly slipping in and out of the hellish holes in torn and severed parts of corpses, . . . our machines, our poisons, our weapons, our own despair, hell is a frenzied festival of all the things we’ve produced, ourselves included.

Drink, drink, you’ll feel great at heart, peel and eat while it’s still soft and tender, chew it, relish it, suck it, suck it, stick it in deep and suck it, see you in a clean bedroom with graceful designs and tasteful decor, soft touch, for diminishing stamina, for indigestion, it’ll make you younger, it’ll make you sleep, stocks and savings and investments will make a deluge of money, of rifles machine guns rockets grenades cannon napalm helicopters tanks kill me take the GI money and run for the room down the hall, hey, whore here’s your customer, take him to your room sit down lie down undress go ahead spread insert suck pay soldiers of the Cross rise up for the Lord go away brimstone is burning God bless Americans God bless America.

When the smokescreen of this horrible blood-drenched war is gone, we shall see our finance still standing firm. And we shall also find money to drop on the next place, and money to rebuild the razed and ruined world. And we also shall find dollars that will illuminate the earth with a victorious peace by burning the lights in the factories once again.

Standing amidst the lower-class pleasure spots and GI bars, the Saigon branches of the Bank of America and the Chase Manhattan Bank resemble a modern granite forest sunk deep into the psammitic soil. These edifices were built especially to withstand the condition you know by the name of “war.” That is, the windows of the banks are bulletproof, and the walls are of reinforced materials designed to hold up against bombings and mortar attacks. If there had been no American power in Vietnam, then no American banks ever would have been built there. The economy of any nation that depends on American money will in time become America-oriented.

Yong Kyu took out his wallet and removed a red ten-dollar military certificate. Then he folded up sixty dollars more and placed it on the table where the girls would easily find and take it.

“I’ll be waiting for you in the car.”

Yong Kyu spat out those words above the blended noise of moaning, sniffling, and panting, then walked out into the corridor.

The old man at the ticket booth looked up at him with a vacant stare. Outside, the heat was still burning, reflected from the cement sidewalks. Hot air enveloped his eyes. Suddenly, Yong Kyu felt heavy at heart. Sure, treat him to a fine meal, maybe at the French restaurant down by the White Elephant. What the hell, it would all work out somehow. Garçon, a bottle of champagne, if you please.

Wait, a diplomatic mission this is not. Business ought to be a bit more barbaric. Right, a secret room would be perfect. There must be strong whiskey and the exquisite skills of naked women. Let’s call Toi. He should know all about it. The familiar sound of a grenade exploding could be heard only a block away. Instinctively, Yong Kyu pressed himself against the wall. A moment later, a roll of machine gun fire was audible. ARVN guards patrolling the street could be heard barking signals to each other. Across the street, people were cowering on the ground or else had dashed into nearby buildings. A terrorist attack by urban guerrillas, apparently. A little while later, armored personnel carriers and Jeeps were speeding by and the streets once more became animated with life. Slowly Yong Kyu crawled into the Jeep and fell asleep with the front door open.