Sugarland - Chapters 1-5 - Page 38

     He sat back and hitched his pants.

     “We're in the neighborhood, y'know,” he said. He jerked his thumb toward the front door. “The Nam is only about six hundred miles on the other side of the South China Sea. Philippine Airlines flies once a week to Ho Chi Minh City.”

     “But why kill an insurance investigator?”

     “An American. Provocation. It makes sense.”

     “I guess that was Collins's bad luck. To be the one they start with.”

     “You sure it hasn't happened before?” He sounded confidential. “People get shot here all the time. Even Americans. No passport can stop a bullet. But how it's perceived—it's all in the spin, my friend.”

     I felt tired, and a long way from where I had last slept. Cigarette smoke was more bitter here. Assassins rode motor tricycles. Money came in crayon colors, the Spanish fleet lay rotting across the road, and the place they used to call Saigon was an hour's jet ride distant.

     I reached for the check, but Dalzell got it first.

     “We'll let everybody's favorite uncle handle this one,” he said. “I'll call you tomorrow.”

     “Not too early. The way I feel, I may sleep past lunch.”

     “You think so. Most of the time, though, first night in from the States, a fella will wake up around three in the morning like he's been zinged with a cattle prod. And that's it—rest of the night, his eyes are wired open.”

     “I'll take a hot bath. It usually helps.”

     “Personally, I recommend some deep muscle therapy with one or two of the local practitioners.”

     He was watching the women again.

     “Till you know your way around, your best bet is the clubs up in Ermita, Del Pilar Street. You walk in, have a look, tell the mama-san which one you want, pay her bar fine, that's it. Half an hour, you're back here with Suzie