Return to Tomorrow (17 page)

Khen Sa was speaking. He pulled his thoughts away from Rachel and the frightened, accusing look in her eyes and made himself concentrate on what the warlord had to say.

“One hundred villages, five tribes bring their
jois
of opium gum here to me to be made into the best heroin there is,” he said, banging the handle of a riding crop against his palm. A
joi
weighed about three and a half pounds. Ten kilos of raw opium reduced down to about one kilo of morphine base. After that, it required only the addition of simple chemicals to refine the morphine into pure heroin. The process could be carried out in a room no larger than a bedroom. Khen Sa's refinery filled a barn-size building. “Would you like to see what your down payment of gold has bought you, Mr. Jackson?”

“Yes.”

Billy had joined him, walking at his side, a beautifully worked Shan knife stuck in his belt.

“Lonnie's lookin' out for the ladies,” he said quietly after nodding a respectful greeting to Khen Sa, who ignored him.

“Do you feel your women must be protected from my men, Mr. Jackson?” Khen Sa stopped suddenly, the riding crop tapping against his pant leg. He rocked back and forth from toe to heel. He was barefoot and came barely to Brett's shoulder, but the air of menace he exuded was unmistakable.

“I do not trust the women, sir. I have spent enough time tracking them down.” Brett waited patiently for the self-styled general to resume their walk.

The warlord watched him for a long moment. Billy stood quietly, waiting for Brett's cue as to how to proceed. The night sounds of the village settling into sleep around them countered the silence between the three men. “The
farang
woman bears watching,” Khen Sa agreed, suddenly resuming his strolling pace toward the windowless building hidden among a stand of huge teak trees, draped with streamers of moss and vines as big around as a man's arm. “She is either extremely brave or extremely foolish.”

“I don't think she's foolish, General.”

The refinery was a barn-like structure, open on the side facing the compound. A guard was stationed at each corner of the building. At a sharp command from Khen Sa, the closest one jumped to kickstart a small electric generator. Naked overhead bulbs began to glow dimly at intervals along the length of the building. The paraphernalia for reducing the raw opium into pure heroin consisted of three or four huge iron woks, a number of pots and kettles, plastic jerry cans of chemicals, barrels of water and back in a corner two or three small drums of what was probably gasoline to power the generator. Brett took it all in with one swift glance and kept walking.

Looking over Khen Sa's shoulder, Brett saw
jois
of raw opium stacked several feet high. Kept dry and under cover, it could be stored indefinitely. But directly in front of him was something far more valuable, and far more deadly.

“One hundred kilos of pure China White, Mr. Jackson,” Khen Sa said, making no effort to hide the satisfaction in his voice. “And I can promise you one hundred
more at date of delivery.” He made a sweeping gesture that indicated the as yet unprocessed raw opium beyond them.

Five hundred pounds of heroin, ready to be shipped to London, Hong Kong, San Francisco, New York, with a street value of over a hundred million dollars. Brett felt his heartbeat quicken, then slow to a heavy thudding in his chest.

“When can we take delivery?” Brett asked.

“In about three weeks,” Khen Sa replied. “You will, of course, bring the rest of the agreed upon price in gold at that time.”

“You'll have your money,” Brett said grimly.

“Good. Good. I have need of new weapons for my men, and the…businessmen…I am dealing with are growing impatient for payment. With those weapons I can rid my people of their Burmese oppressors forever.” He signaled for them to precede him out of the building. Brett didn't like turning his back on the man. He sounded like a megalomaniac, like a little two-bit Hitler. He wished he could turn around and pound him into the ground. But he'd have to bide his time, get the heroin, preferably without turning over any more of his backer's money, and then step back and watch the tyrant take his fall.

Once outside, Khen Sa barked a sharp command in Shan to the nearest guard and the generator sputtered into silence. The lights died, leaving them in near darkness once more. “The gasoline to feed that monster is almost as precious as the poppy dust,” he said with a chortle. Brett didn't bother to join in the laughter.

Above them, through a break in the trees, the moon
floated high and distant, bathing them all in cold silver light. “Shall we seal our bargain over a glass of whiskey, gentlemen?” Khen Sa suggested, including Billy in the invitation with a curt nod, as though only noticing him for the first time that very moment.

“Thank you, General.” Brett had no intention of getting drunk surrounded by fifty or sixty of Khen Sa's men, but it would be a major miscalculation to refuse to drink with the man at all.

With a wave of his riding crop, Khen Sa led the way to his private quarters. “Has it occurred to you to wonder why I have chosen to sell my opium to you, Mr. Jackson?” he asked conversationally as they walked.

“The thought has crossed my mind,” Brett said cautiously. He had no idea how much Khen Sa knew about his previous dealings in the business, that all the other producers he'd dealt with in the past two years were either dead or in prison.

“You were not the only buyer to approach me, of course.”

“Of course. A man with your reputation for quality product must have many customers.”

“This is true.” The little man actually preened, like a banty rooster. Brett felt his lip curl in derision. “But I do not have the time to make separate deals with every buyer in the Golden Triangle. It diverts my attention from my people's fight for liberation from the Burmese.”

“Of course.” Brett gritted his teeth. What Khen Sa wanted was to get the Burmese off his back so that he could set up his own little empire. And by the looks of things, he was pretty close to doing just that.

“You, however, were the only one to offer me gold. I
have need of gold. And you were the only American.” He stopped outside his large, airy hut. “I particularly prefer to sell to Americans. You have been my best customers since 1968.”

R
ACHEL LIFTED THE WIGGLING
, squirming baby from where he was playing, naked on the sun-warmed stones, and deposited him in a big copper wok filled with water from the well at the center of the temple courtyard. He drew his legs up against his chest, a comical look of surprise and disbelief pulling his mouth into a rounded O of consternation when his toes touched the water. But he was soon splashing happily in his makeshift tub, as she lathered his chest and shoulders with a small cake of soap she found crumbling in the bottom of her faithful
yaam.
She looked up as a pair of shadows reached across the courtyard to fall at her feet. Billy and Lonnie were standing a little distance away, watching her bathe the baby. “Come on over,” she called, laughing, as Domha splashed water into his eyes and wrinkled up his face to let out a piercing howl, disturbing the ravens in the trees outside the sheltered courtyard. Several brilliantly colored red and green parrots also took exception at the unfamiliar cry and took wing above the ruined
wat.
Rachel wiped Domha's face with a cloth and cooed comforting words in Hlông. From a shaded nook a few feet away, Ahnle looked on and laughed at her son's display of temper.

“He is truly one of The People,” she explained, coloring prettily when she spied Billy and Lonnie advancing
on their little group. “We do not like water, unless it is in a cooking pot where it belongs.”

“My granddad used to say that about drinking the stuff,” Lonnie said, hunkering down on his heels and holding out a finger for Domha to grab onto. “The only time he touched a glass of water was if it had a double shot of whiskey in it.”

Rachel laughed and Ahnle smiled but Billy only grunted. He sat down by Ahnle, his legs pulled up, his wrists hanging loose across his knees.

“Come to think of it,” Lonnie continued, playing to his audience, “he didn't bathe in it any more than he had to, neither.”

Rachel shook her head and smiled; Ahnle laughed merrily, pleased to have gotten the joke, and this time even Billy smiled. Rachel glanced at her young friend, noticing the faint blush of color on her pale cheeks. The trip down from Khen Sa's mountain stronghold had been long and arduous, starting before sunup and ending after dark. When they reached the temple, Ahnle had fallen onto her pallet and slept the clock around. Late that morning she'd awakened, free of fever and well on the road to recovery.

Rachel lifted the baby out of the cooking pot and wrapped him in a length of worn and faded saffron-colored cotton, left behind by one of the young monks. She'd been sad to learn that the Acharya had died during the winter and his young followers had been called back to Chiang Mai by the abbot of their order.

“Here you go.” She deposited Domha, fresh and sweet-smelling, in his mother's lap. “Do you think he wants his bottle?”

Although the little boy was small for his age, and slightly undernourished, he was bright and alert and already beginning to creep around on all fours. She had the suspicion he would be toddling around their small, cramped hut at the camp before either she or Ahnle was ready for it.

“I have his bottle right here,” Ahnle said in careful English. “Please?” She held the baby out for Billy to take, so that she could fetch the bottle from her woven bag.

Billy was too surprised by the gesture to say no, Rachel decided, but his brows drew together in a thundercloud frown. “I haven't held a baby in twenty years,” he muttered, his hands inches away from the dangling Domha.

“It is a skill easily recalled,” Ahnle said, not daring to look at him.

“Where's the boy's father?” he asked abruptly, taking the baby and settling him gingerly on his knee. Rachel held her breath, hoping the infant didn't decide to do what babies often do after their baths. A wet pant leg would be the last straw, as far as Billy Todd was concerned.

“He has gone to Germany.” She still didn't look at him. Hlông women very seldom made eye contact with a man. Rachel wished Ahnle would overcome that particular tribal taboo. She was going to have to be more aggressive if she wanted to break down the barricades Billy was throwing up between them.

“He didn't marry you?” Billy seemed intent on watching the baby, who was trying to rip the breast pocket off his shirt to see what was inside.

Ahnle lifted her head, looked at Billy for the space
of two heartbeats. His head swung in her direction and their eyes clashed, then skipped away. “No. He did not choose to make me his wife.”

“Jackass,” Billy mumbled under his breath.

“My brother took Domha back to our village when he was very small. He said I could not care for him in the camp. After I met Rachel I grew stronger within myself. I knew I must get him back. My friend helped me.” She looked at Rachel sitting cross-legged by the wok, washing Domha's black pants and shirt, and smiled. Rachel smiled back, her throat tight with tears. The baby started to fuss. Ahnle looked away. “I think you hold him too tightly,” she said, hesitant once more.

“Yeah.” Billy eased his grip on the little boy and began to dandle him gently on his knee. Domha started to giggle. The adults all smiled, one more reluctantly than the others.

“You are good with him. Do you have children in America?”

“If I had any children they'd be older than you are,” Billy growled. Lonnie glanced at Rachel and winked. The two of them might as well not have existed, as far as Ahnle and Billy were concerned.

“Here it comes,” Lonnie whispered, breaking off a long blade of grass that was growing between the cracks of two paving stones.

“Do you have a wife?”

Billy stopped bouncing the baby, who immediately took exception to his ride ending. “Not anymore.”

“Good. But I would not mind a lot if you did have a wife.” Ahnle looked at her hands but Rachel saw the edges of a smile curve her lips.

“What the hell do you mean by that?” Billy was starting to look concerned. Lonnie stuck the blade of grass in his mouth and started to chew. Rachel squeezed the water out of the baby clothes and smoothed them over the warm stones surrounding the temple well to dry, then sat back to see what would happen next.

“Nothing,” Ahnle said sweetly, too sweetly. Rachel began to realize there was more grit to the girl than even she had suspected.

“Ahnle. Forget it.” Billy sounded trapped. Lonnie gave a snort of laughter that earned him a sharp, harried glance from his comrade-at-arms. “I'm too old for you.”

“Too old?” Ahnle sounded genuinely surprised. “Oh no. You are just the correct age for taking a second wife.”

“Second wife?” He thrust the baby into his mother's arms and rose to his feet in one hurried movement. “Where the hell did you get a crackbrained idea like that? The last thing in the world I want is to be tied down with a wife and kid. With a wife who's a kid herself.” He turned on his heel and marched out of the courtyard, leaving the rest of them sitting in stunned silence.

“Oh dear, what have I done?” Ahnle sounded close to tears. “I have shamed myself and Billy, too.” She lifted Domha to her shoulder and sniffed back a tear.

“You sure ruffled the old rooster's feathers.” Lonnie's cheerful voice made Ahnle lift her head and look at him.

“I should not have been so bold. But my brother is not here to arrange a marriage for me. I only wanted to let Billy Todd know that I would consent to be his second
wife. But he says he has no other. I would be a good wife. I can cook and plant corn and sew and weave. I have proven that I can bear a child.” She looked puzzled and sad and Rachel realized that although she'd come far in her understanding of Western ways, she still had a lot to learn. “
Farangs
don't pick their wives for the same reasons that The People do,” Lonnie said, before Rachel could voice her thoughts. “Most of the time they marry for love.”

“That is not practical,” Ahnle said, hushing Domha by offering him a bottle of powdered milk. He nestled into the crook of her arm and suckled greedily.

“You've got that right, but it's the way we do things. I'm not sayin' old Bill don't have it bad for you, but he thinks he's too damned old to be a good husband. I guess it's up to you to change his mind.”

“Is this true?” Ahnle asked Rachel, her tear-bright eyes beginning to sparkle with new hope, and something more, something she'd only just admitted to herself, Rachel suspected. The strange, inexplicable feelings she'd been harboring for Billy Todd were not all practical considerations of choosing a husband according to custom. She was in love. Rachel saw the realization dawn on her face like an explosion of light beneath the surface of her skin.

“It is true. But you cannot make another love you,” Rachel cautioned, as she held out her hands to take Domha, so that Ahnle could go in search of Billy and do battle for his reluctant heart.

“I know that. But I can try.” She hurried out of the
courtyard, leaving Rachel and the baby alone with Lonnie.

“I bet they'll be married inside a month.” He looked enormously pleased with himself, happy, relaxed, and Rachel knew he was high. She hesitated momentarily before handing him the baby he'd reached out his arms to take, and hated herself for doing so.

“Don't sweat it,” he said, sensing her reluctance. “I'm about as straight as I can get anymore. I won't hurt him.”

“I didn't think you would.” She watched as he settled the baby in the crook of his arm and gave him his bottle. “Lonnie, why don't you get some help for your addiction?”

“I have. Brett's got me in three or four rehab centers, but no luck. I'm hooked, Rachel.”

“If you tried again I'd help…we'd all help.”

He shook his head and there was a world of sadness in the matter-of-fact gesture. “I can't, Rachel. And maybe, deep down, I don't want to. There's too much there to remember, stuff I don't ever want to think about again. That's how I got hooked. I saw what it did for the other guys, how it took away their hurtin' and gave them back their dreams. Some nights, when the past is too close….”

“Don't let the past destroy your future….”

“It's the same for you,” he said bluntly. Rachel couldn't meet his candid gaze. She watched the baby, instead, as his eyes grew heavy and then blinked open again, fighting sleep. “You've got memories stuffed away, down inside you in a hole so dark and so deep you pray they
won't ever get close enough to sneak into your dreams again. Don't you?” he pressed.

“Yes.” Rachel continued to watch as the baby, contented and full, drifted off to sleep.

“I've seen it in your eyes when you're around men,” Lonnie went on, his ruined voice a rough whisper above the sound of bird song and wind through the palms. “You were scared at Khen Sa's camp and in the Teak Doll. I can guess some of the reasons for that. What I can't understand is why, sometimes, I see those same ghosts in your eyes when you look at him.”

Rachel lifted her eyes and saw him staring down at Domha. Sensing her gaze, he raised his head and waited for her answer, his green eyes filled with pain and resignation.

“Because I had a son. He was never strong and happy and healthy, as Domha is. He died a few days after he was born. I hated…. the man…. who was his father. And I hated the baby. Until I held him in my arms. And then it was too late.” Rachel looked past Lonnie, trying to blink back the tears that came too easily these days, trying to keep the ghosts at bay, and saw Brett watching her.

How long had he been there?
Had he overheard her exchange of confidences with Lonnie? What could she say now that he knew about her son? Would he see the rest of her secrets in her eyes? He read people so well. If she told him her pregnancy had resulted from a random act of violence, as she'd told the others, would he believe her? Or would he know that she was lying?

She'd hidden the truth so well, for so long, she had begun to believe it herself….

“I have to go,” she said, so urgently that Lonnie
handed Domha to her without another word. “I have to go.” She stood up, holding the sleeping baby tightly to her breast, and fled.

 

T
HE MOON WAS FULL AGAIN
, as it had been the first night Rachel had come to the temple nearly a year ago. Brett sucked on the stem of his pipe to keep the tobacco burning steadily, but he did so absently, his attention fixed on the courtyard below the parapet where he stood.

Behind him, the jungle settled into uneasy sleep. Cicadas sang in the flame trees, birds tittered and argued among themselves as they dozed off. Somewhere off in the distance the roar of a hunting cat echoed through the trees. He noted and catalogued each sound, each silvered flash of movement, with a predator's objectivity, yet his eyes never left the woman bathing at the temple wall.

She was naked and moonlight sparkled in her hair like diamond drops, rippled down the curve of her spine and over the gentle swell of her hips like a lover's caress. She knew he was there, watching, yet she didn't turn around. She wrapped a length of Thai silk, whose color he could only guess at in the moonlight, around herself and tucked in the ends sarong-style above her breasts. Kneeling, she poured fresh water into the copper wok in which she'd bathed Ahnle's baby that afternoon and began to wash her hair. He watched a moment longer, then left the parapet without making a sound to disturb the night and descended the griffin staircase.

Rachel was still kneeling on the flat stones surrounding the well. Her hair was wet and glistening as she poured water from a bowl over her head to rinse out the
soap. He dropped to the balls of his feet and touched her shoulder lightly. “Let me help.”

She turned her head, looked at him for a long, heart-stopping handful of seconds, then nodded. “All right.”

He picked up the bowl and poured the clear cool water over her hair. She smelled of soap and clean, damp skin and wet silk. His fingers brushed across the nape of her neck. Her skin was smooth as velvet and milky white in the moonlight, her movements graceful as she twisted the water from her hair and wrapped her head in another length of silk. She sat back on her heels and took the empty bowl from his hands.