Free The Vietnam Reader by Stewart O’Nan Page A

them, “Vietcong are like the pederasts. Don’t feel so badly. It is their game.”
    Anderson nodded grimly, and they crossed the canal in single file; Anderson much taller than the Viets, his head barely above water, was amazed; just as much of them showed above water as of him.
    “The war is good for the leeches in the canal,” said one of the Viets, “that is all. A full meal for them today.”
    He nodded, and then moved back to the main path. At least they would be able to move quickly, while catching up with the rest of the unit.
    Anderson came upon them quicker than he expected. They had stopped and were gathered around a very small Vietnamese. They had formed a circle and the Vietnamese was standing with his hands up and his back to a tree; Dang was standing in front of him, towering over him, and Beaupre was behind Dang, towering over him. They get smaller and smaller, Anderson thought. As he approached, he heard Dang say, “Murderer, we have caught the murderer. VC dog. The dog.”
    “Got to be one of theirs,” Beaupre said. “Doesn’t weigh more than fifty pounds. All ours weigh more than that.”
    Dang was in charge of the interrogation. “A Communist VC,” he said to Anderson, “part of the ambush plot against us.”
    “He means the little scouting party you just went on,” Beaupre whispered.
    “Proceed with the interrogation of the Communist Vietcong prisoner,” Dang told Thuong. “I will assist when necessary.”
    The suspect said he was Hung Van Trung.
    “Of course that’s his name,” Beaupre told Anderson, “they all have that name, that or Trung Van Hung or Hung Van Hung.” His age was fifty-eight.
    “The Communist is probably lying about his age,” Dang said, “these people lie about everything.”
    Suspect said he owned a water buffalo: “Rich bastard, eh,” Beaupre said when Anderson translated, “usually they don’t even own a goddamn chicken by the time we catch them.”
    He came from the village of Ap Xuan Thong.
    “Is he a Communist? Ask him if he is a Communist.” Dang shouted and the prisoner began to mumble, a rambling guttural chant which seemed half song and half prayer.
    “Tell him we are interested in his relationship with Ho Chi Minh and not his relationship with Buddha,” Dang said.
    A corporal slapped the prisoner. He was loyal to the government, he insisted, he was sometimes a government agent.
    “Knees are too bony for one of ours,” Beaupre told Anderson. In fact the prisoner said he was in trouble because the local Communist cadre which was headed by Thuan Han Thuan (“How can the VC chief have the same name as our man there?” Beaupre said), suspected that he worked for the government and had taken his wife away last night when the Communists had come; when he mentioned the cadre chief’s name, he paused as if expecting that this would confirm his story.
    Dang asked him for his identification card, and he could produce none, and Dang slapped him. He claimed the Communists had taken it and he was slapped again. They asked him about children. He saidhe had three sons, and mentioned daughters, but seemed unsure of the number. Of the sons, he said, one had died of a disease. Which disease, he was asked; the yellow disease, he answered, and they all nodded yes, the yellow disease, that one, though later it turned out they were unsure exactly what the yellow disease was.
    “Yellow disease,” Beaupre said when told, “everybody in this goddamn country’s got that. How the hell can you die from it?”
    Two of the other sons had served with the government forces; he believed one was dead and one was alive.
    “What units?” Thuong asked, the tone of his voice reflecting his boredom with the interrogation. The prisoner said he did not know the units, but they fought against the Vietminh, he was sure of that.
    “Tell him that it is not the Vietminh, it is the Vietcong,” Dang said, and the corporal slapped him again.
    “Now tell us what happened,”