Another Man's Moccasins

It was silent at the table for a minute. “Look, this country is crawling with drugs, and a lot of the shit comes from our very own CIA. There’s bhanj growing all over the place, opium in the highlands, and ma thuyi heroin is the cottage industry of choice.” He lifted his beer and tipped mine in a toast. “Pick your poison. Hell, watch this.”

He motioned to an ARVN captain, who disengaged from a group at the far end of the bar and promenaded over in polished boots, a sky-blue flight suit, and an honest-to-God white silk scarf. As adjuncts to the USAF, the Vietnamese flyers were allowed a certain amount of freedom in assembling their uniforms, most of which were, well, flamboyant.

He smiled and inclined his head to Baranski as the matinee idol turned to me. “Lieutenant Longmire, this is Hollywood Hoang.” The small man extended a hand, and I shook it; his nails were clean, clipped, and polished, his skin lotioned smooth—I figured him for quite the dandy. “Hollywood here can get you anything you need.” He grinned at the helicopter pilot. “Hollywood, I need to score a pound of legendary Montagnard grass. How much?”

“One carton Marlboro.” His accent had just a touch of French and was remarkably cultured even with the lack of prepositions. He glanced at me. “This for you, Lieutenant?”

“No.”

Baranski was laughing. “You get my point?”

The flyboy interrupted. “Half carton.”

“That’s okay, thanks.”

“Half carton is very good price.”

“I’m sure, but I’m really not interested.”

He gave a slight shrug and smiled. “If anything you need, I get for you.”

I watched him swagger back to the bar and glanced at Baranski. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Anything. Anything you want, he can get. He was Central Office of South Vietnam when they were fighting the French, but now he’s got ties to the CIA, so whatever you want he can get it.” He watched me as I scraped the rest of the palm tree off my beer label and stared at the table. “Hey, don’t make the long face, Longmire. Battalion headquarters don’t know shit. Do you have any idea how many personnel we have going in and out of here every day?” He leaned back in his chair, waved his cigarette in the air, and laughed. “This air base is roughly the size of LaGuardia Airport back in the states. We got air force, navy, and army personnel, not to mention you grunts; we got South Vietnamese, Cambodians, Thais, Laotians, and the odd NVA running through this place every day. Now, do you think we have any idea what they’ve got with them when they get here, what they have when they leave, or what they might’ve left here once they are gone?”

I looked up. “Tough job.”

“Impossible is more like it.” He took a deep breath and leaned in, placing his elbows on the table and looking at me over the empties. “The shit is everywhere, and if you go around asking a bunch of stupid questions and causing a lot of trouble, you’re going to end up dead; that’s your business.” He pointed a finger at his most recent partner, still passed out on the table. “But you might get us killed, too, and that shit is a no-go. You sabe?”

I looked at him blankly, still trying to figure it all out.

“Look, fucking new guy. I was sent up here six weeks ago; I drink too much, smoke too much, bird-dog a few ao dai...” He glanced around and then leaned in even closer. “And then I got with the program. I’m an investigator with CID. And then along comes Second Lieutenant Walter Longmire and we’ve got a new sheriff in town? Fuck you.” We sat there in silence, looking past each other, listening to the music and the idle chatter at the bar. “Why don’t you tell me what it is that’s got the bug up battalion’s ass, and I’ll try to narrow our field of operations.”

"U.S. Marine PFC James Tuley, of Toledo, Ohio.”

Baranski thought about it. “Never met him.” The horn section in “Rescue Me” started up from the jukebox as the blond man shouted, “Damn it, I said no more splib music!”

A few more of the black soldiers glared at us as I slowly started to stand. “Well, you missed your chance. He died of a heroin overdose in-flight from this air base about two weeks ago.”

He shook his head and motioned for two more beers. “So let me guess; there’s a Governor Tuley, or a Senator Tuley back in O-hi-O that wants to know why his little boy died of a drug overdose in sunny South Vietnam?”

I didn’t say anything. I didn’t say anything about how James Tuley’s father was neither a senator nor a governor, but a night watchman at an automobile parts plant. I didn’t say anything about a Marine investigator who took an interest when he read that a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird was found on the body of the young man from the wrong side of the Toledo tracks.

I took my beer from the passing waitress and moved toward the battered upright alongside the bar. More than a few faces watched my approach. It was time to introduce the Boy-Howdy Beau-Coups Good Times Lounge inhabitants to live music and to the wonders of James P. Johnson, Fats Waller, Joe Turner, Art Tatum, and the Harlem Stride.