Free The Zenith by Duong Thu Huong

turned around to look at the soldiers even after he had already stepped inside the garden.Then he tried to analyze his strange sensations but was unable to come up with any satisfactory explanation. In such a state, he walked through the garden full of vibrantly colorful spring flowers, while his mind searched in the midst of a dark tunnel of bewilderment and suspicion. Before climbing to the third floor, he glanced up and saw Sau already standing there, looking down on the garden. He waved at Vu. Vu’s face flushed as he thought that Sau might have witnessed him turning around and looking at the soldiers; and very likely had guessed at the secret thoughts being born in his brain. The soldiers were Sau’s, chosen by him, paid by him personally, and he personally designed their privileges and applied disciplinary fines. Those soldiers without question would follow his personal orders. That was a reality known to all.
    Sau waited for him in the hall so that they could together walk into the reception room, which was very spacious, more like a place to play pool or ping pong. Next to some couches set beside one another, there was a table along the left wall, also ridiculously large, on which there were many assorted glasses and cups from different countries lined up in a long file for tea and filtered coffee. A young lad was busy there preparing drinks.
    Stepping into the room, Sau ordered: “Stop, leave it all there.”
    The servant disappeared at once like a ghost. Then Sau’s hand pointed him to a low armchair: “Sit down. Today I have business to take up with the Department of Foreign Affairs. I can’t receive you as long as usual. We shall work together quickly.”
    Having already sat down, Vu stood up at once, saying: “If you are busy, I will leave. We can meet another time.”
    “The matter is urgent; that’s why I summoned you so hurriedly.”
    “Even if urgent, I will still work according to procedures. I don’t want to bother others. I don’t accept working in a patchwork manner.”
    Sau stopped and looked at him attentively, as if stunned. Apparently nobody had dared talk with him that way for a long time. Apparently, too, it was very hard for him to swallow. And, apparently, he was not prepared to react to such a situation. An awkward moment passed.
    He suddenly smiled: “Why, now, do you get angry so easily? In the past people said you were cool like Jell-O…”
    “However you are born, you die the same way. That’s how it was put.”
    Playfully, Sau shook his head: “That’s not true. Your character changes with time. I have changed, not to become angry like you, but more playful. There’s this interesting point…”
    He started laughing loudly, a very delighted laughter: “What I am going tosay is not easily understood by those like you who have Confucian blood running thick in you; in fact, it even seems absurd…Listen here…”
    Sau approached close to his armchair, bent over, and laced each sentence with a delightful and unhidden malice: “In my old age, I suddenly like to look at pretty girls. It’s like cigarettes or pipes—you stop for decades then suddenly you crave them…If not for my work, each morning I would go to West Lake. There, at sunrise, groups of girls come to exercise and row boats, all of them about sixteen or seventeen, all pretty as if in a dream.”
    As he finished talking, he turned and went to the table against the wall, to pour coffee into two black cups. Vu quietly looked at the crow’s-feet around his eyes, realizing he had aged even though he still had that big and tall body with a light skin, the gift of a princely body bestowed by heaven, that he usually assesses half seriously and half in jest during casual discussions: “My body has enough strength to hold twelve different lifetimes, with enough agility to serve thirty-six women with dedication, from nubile ones to middle-aged beauties.”
    Behind every one of his jokes there is always someone buried in