Free Payback by Sam Stewart Page B

of piasters on the table. “C’mon,” he said, “I’ll take you to the heart of the lotus.”
    ***
    The sky had gone dark. A breeze, as listless and as tired as a yawn, was approaching from the river at the end of Tu Do, where monsoon rain clouds clotted and churned, circling and growling like dogs in the air.
    They corralled a taxi at the edge of Le Loi. Mack gave the driver an address in Cholon and they headed to the north now, away from the river, past the red brick cathedral that was built by the French and that stood at the corner like a roadside monument to good intentions. Between Saigon and the much older Chinese town of Cholon was a jerry-built clutter of urban sprawl. American intentions, consisting of cheap whitewashed buildings, most of them apartments, some of them converted into Houses of Love, and, between them, the thrown-together Vietnamese shacks, the Day-Glo colors of massage parlors, bars. On the outskirts of the airport, American billboards sprouted on the road: IN SAIGON, TOO, YOU HAVE A FRIEND AT CHASE MANHATTAN.… WELCOME TO SUNNY SAIGON/PAN AM .
    The rain broke the sky. Inside the taxi, it was something like riding in the innards of a drum. In the back of the taxi was symmetrical silence. Mack didn’t answer and Catlin didn’t ask.
    The cab veered sharply to a mud-puddled alley and stopped at a rusty-looking wrought-iron gate before a pink stucco villa. A large poinciana tree drooped beneath the rain, its bright red flowers surrendering, bloody and bowing to the storm.
    On the covered veranda, they emptied their boots and shook water from their hair. A girl was at the door now, a girl in a yellow-and-pink ao dai , making soft sounds at Mack. “Hoa,” Mack said, by way of introduction, and Hoa bowed her head, introducing them to air-cooled sweet-smelling rooms. Couches and carpets, girls in underwear and fanciful robes with peacocks and bright imaginary flowers, a cinnabar Buddha on a cloth-covered table surrounded by the driftings of incense and grass.
    Mack said, “Take a good look now and choose.”
    Catlin just stood there, hair still dripping, and looking at the choice as though he were standing at a bakery counter and mentally tasting.
    â€œTake two,” Mack said. “They’re small,” and he laughed. The girl in the yellow-and-pink ao dai was rubbing his shoulders.
    Catlin took his time. He didn’t want to choose something hard and stale. He wanted something softer. Younger than springtime. Softer than starlight. Something that wasn’t in this or any room. He decided on a girl who had hair like a waterfall spilling down her back, and the girl at Mack’s shoulder said, “Yes. Mai-song.” My Song—or something that sounded like it anyway.
    Mack said, “Come on,” and the two of them were moving up a carpeted staircase, turning to the left, passing long dark tables with parchment-shaded lamps, little hall trees in pots.
    They moved to a sitting room, part of what seemed to be a larger apartment. Mack disappeared, came back, tossed a blue satin bathrobe at Catlin. He said, “A few friends of mine are coming, okay?” and went off to a bedroom, closing an elaborate red lacquered door.
    Catlin undressed now and reached for the robe. On a lacquer table at the end of the couch was a silver cigarette box—half a dozen joints and a filigreed lighter. On a table at the side there were crystal decanters with silver dogtags: Whisky and Cognac, Vodka and Rhum . Catlin helped himself to a neat shot of whisky and tasted it slowly. It was polished and warm. He sat on the corner of a tapestry sofa in a blue satin bathrobe, pulling at a whisky and feeling out of place—or maybe out of time, or maybe just definitively out of his skull; off on a star trek; somebody’s hollered, “Mr. Spock, beam us up,” only something went flooey and a lot of his molecules had not yet arrived. He finished the