Chasing the Wind (20 page)

The hope.

He rattled the ice in his glass and closed his eyes again. Mother had been there for him when Susan died only ten months later. Breast cancer had taken her. He shook his head. He'd never have thought, never dreamed that happiness could disappear so quickly, like a shooting star that blazes across the sky, lights everything up, then vanishes forever, leaving you to wonder if it was ever real.

Not long after, Mother had passed on too, leaving him alone.

He took a deep drink of the scotch and rolled it around in his mouth, then swallowed. It'd been difficult at first, being on his own, after the years of adrenaline highs in Europe and then coming back to Susan. He smiled to himself. Oh, the risks they had taken, the young men, all in the prime of their lives, feeling immortal each time they jumped and walked away.

Some didn't, of course. Walk away, that is.

Bingham shook his head. Those days were gone, and he'd let the sorrow of losing Susan and Mother weigh him down for the first few years after. But after a while he'd learned how to step out into the world and take charge. How to keep moving forward, to make things happen. To change fate.

Still, seeing Jude with Amalise tonight made him wonder what his life might have been if Susan had lived.

He finished off the drink and set it down with a heavy thud reminding himself again that those days were long gone. Life was good now. In fact, he was certain that millions would trade their lives to be in his shoes. Life was a game, and he was the winner.

"Anything else before we close up, Mister Murdoch?"

He looked at the waiter and memories dissolved. "No, thanks. Put it on my room. You know the number?"

"Certainly."

"And add ten for yourself."

"Thank you, sir." The waiter picked up the empty glass. "Have a good night."

He stood, tossed the napkin on the table, and glanced through the window at the church across the street. Jesuit, they called it. Mother used to drag him to church when he was a child. He turned away, smiling. She was Baptist. He'd always thought Baptists had the best songs. Hands in his pockets, jingling coins, he strolled to the door.

A waiter stood holding the door to the lobby open for him. Bingham nodded at the waiter and headed for the elevators, still ruminating. Amalise Catoir had spirit, like his mother had. She'd have liked Miss Catoir, he mused. Mother had believed in souls, too. He wondered if it was true that life goes on after death. He wondered if Susan and Mother were waiting for him somewhere.

He hoped so.

At the elevator he pressed the button and turned, watching the activity in the lobby. Bellboys lounged near the concierge desk, and people glided in and out of the Sazerac Bar. A foursome, two couples, sat drinking at a table in the lobby just outside the Sazerac, sparkling and laughing. Chandeliers blazed a path of light the length of the city block from O'Keefe to Baronne.

Bingham turned, facing the elevator, and hummed the only Baptist song that he could immediately recall, "Amazing Grace." Back in the days when the going got rough and he'd look out the plane before jumping, when he would look out into the black space and the only light he'd see was artillery fire down below, sometimes he'd let that song run through his mind as he took the leap and then let it carry him all the way to the ground.

The bell dinged as the elevator door opened and Bingham stepped in. As it rose, he pondered something Robert had said earlier in the day. Robert had
concerns
about Amalise, he'd said. Something was wrong with her attitude. He couldn't put his finger on it, but Robert was convinced she'd developed some kind of hostility toward the deal. He wanted her taken off the transaction team.

Bingham had nixed that idea. They'd need more than vague suspicions before even considering a talk with Mangen & Morris about one of their associates. Associates were valuable investments in the future of the firm.

So he'd arranged this evening's meal to judge that very question—if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself—and he'd seen nothing to justify Robert's concern. The girl was tougher than she looked. He liked the way she'd held her own this afternoon when Raymond and Preston had questioned some points she'd made on one of the agreements.

"Put a tail on her," Robert had urged.

Not yet. Bingham would wait and see, though he understood Robert's concern. So much money was at stake. Robert would snuff his own mother's lights if she got in the way of this deal. After all, this was his chance to step out of the long line of suits on Wall Street and make his mark. He was hungry.

But over the last few days Bingham had grown kind of fond of Amalise. There was something basically good in her nature. Yet one complaint from Robert would get her taken off this deal—a career-killing move. She deserved a chance.

Tossing his coat over a chair as he entered his suite, Bingham frowned. He would certainly be disappointed if he had guessed wrong about Amalise Catoir.

Phnom Penh, Cambodia 1975

Samantha screamed and slumped, still conscious
but unable to move. Oliver dragged her up the last few feet of the rough surface of the ramp, jolting another scream from her as she landed in the dark hold of the plane. She lay there panting as the plane began a laborious turn, preparing for takeoff, and she heard the hatch door grinding closed behind her.

With a lurch they started down the runway. The hold was dusty, simmering with heat and the stench of human fear. Still gasping for breath, suddenly she remembered. The child! She rolled her head to the side where Oliver sat, and peering through the dim lights she saw the boy huddled just beyond him, hunched on the floor against the fuselage, eyes wide as he stared back at her.

A sudden dizziness overcame her, then another rush of pain, and she felt limp, as if she were floating. She tried to tell Oliver about this, but his face kept disappearing, moving in close to her and then receding. She could see his mouth working, and she felt his hand on her forehead, but his voice was submerged beneath the roar of the engines. Then he faded away entirely.

When she woke, Oliver was bending over her, calling her name. He was a blur at first, as though her brain had managed to wrap the injured part of her in cotton to dull the pain. With the plane dipping and rumbling under her, nausea rose. But one thought emerged above the pain and the fear and the nausea, drowning out the others.

"Oliver," she said, and he bent, put his ear close to her lips.

It was a struggle to speak, but she forced the words up from her chest. "My purse." She turned her head and her cheek rubbed the strap still wrapped about her shoulders. "Here. It's here."

He nodded, seeming to understand.

She closed her eyes, lips tight, pressing against the pain.

Oliver put his mouth to her ear. "Be still, Sam. It won't be long now. We're headed for Saigon."

"Will I die?"

"No." He pulled back and brushed the hair from her forehead. "It's your hip. You'll be all right. Just hang on."

She had to tell him, had to get the words out while there was still time, before they landed. Before the child was discovered. "The child . . ."

He began shaking his head.

"Inside my purse.
Please,
Oliver. Look inside."

Oliver looked at her and then down at the purse that lay beside her. Gently he picked it up.

She nodded.

He twisted the clasp and opened the flap. "What am I looking for?"

"Blue envelope." She exhaled the words, watching him.

Oliver reached in and pulled out a wallet, then the red silk pouch tied at the top in which she'd stored her mother's jewelry, her keys, and a comb. He set these items on the floor of the fuselage, and each time she frowned and shook her head.

Then he pulled out an envelope and held it up. "This?"

She nodded. "Yes." Her midsection burned. "Now the jewelry."

He arched his brows, looked down at the pile he'd created beside him, pushed the things around. Then he picked up the small red pouch and dangled it over her, so that she could see. When she nodded, he untied the frayed ribbon that held it tight, and she said in a rasping voice, "The silver pin . . . need the silver pin."

Her leg was on fire, she was certain, and Oliver simply hadn't noticed. The fire would spread, and perhaps the plane would burst into flames and they'd all die a slow, torturous death in this squalid hold.

When he held up the silver pin, she looked at it and thought it must have come from another lifetime.

Suddenly the plane lurched, and she cried out again. Oliver slipped his arms around her, lifting her shoulders just inches from the floor, bracing her. She grasped his arm. "Oliver, listen to me. Listen!"

Again he leaned in close until his cheek was touching hers, and his voice was thick. "I'm listening, Sam. Just tell me what you want."

Each word was a needle of pain as she spoke, explaining what she wanted. When at last he nodded that he understood—it seemed a long time—she was able to form a smile, to let him know that she was all right, and watching. And to mask the pain so he'd let go.

"Go on," she said, nodding her head toward the boy.
"Please!"

Gently Oliver lowered Sam back down. Holding onto the broach and the envelope, he closed the pouch, tying it tight, and stuffed it back into her purse with her other things. Sam rolled her head to watch as Oliver pushed across the floor toward the boy.

"Stay with her," Oliver barked to someone nearby. A body slid close. A soft hand, a woman's hand, stroked her forehead. Sam's eyes were riveted on Oliver and the boy. Even from here she could see the child's fear. On Oliver's approach, the boy drew into himself, like a turtle into its shell. His eyes darted to her and back to Oliver again. But he did not move. He sat very still, looking down as Oliver reached him.

Oliver slipped the folded envelope into the pocket of the boy's ragged shirt and used the silver broach to pin it to the cloth.

When he'd completed his mission, Oliver patted the child's head and swung around to face Sam. Past him she could see the boy's shirtfront pocket sagging under the weight of the broach and the envelope pinned inside. She nodded.

"Who is he?" Oliver asked when he'd reached Sam again. He rested his hand on her shoulder. The plane bucked in the wind, and a moan escaped as Sam turned her head to look at him. To thank him.

"He was lost," she said with a deep, shuddering breath. "I couldn't leave him. His . . . his sponsor's name is on the envelope. On the back. Tell them." The plane banked, starting its descent. She gripped his arm. "It's written on the back, his U.S. sponsor!" She shouted over the roar. "Tell them, will you?"

He nodded.

"Get him onto Operation Babylift out of Saigon."

Oliver frowned. "Khmer refugees go through Thailand."

Sam squeezed her eyes shut and opened them again. "Please! Just get it done." She held his eyes as seconds passed. "Please," she whispered again. "Promise. Promise."

"We'll take care of him." Oliver lifted her into his arms, buffering her from a series of rocking bumps. "But it'll be a mess."

The fire inside had spread, as she'd known it would. She closed her eyes, conscious that she'd extracted a hard promise from Oliver. Operation Babylift, already overburdened, was scrambling to ferry thousands of Vietnamese orphans from Saigon just ahead of the coming VC invasion.

"A mess. That's what I'm counting on," she murmured. Chaos would save the child. The bureaucratic nightmare of evacuation would allow for a slip here and there.

She groaned, and Oliver held her closer. "I'll fix it somehow, Sam. We'll get him on one of those planes. And to his sponsor."

She was dizzy, feeling the nausea. "Promise?" She opened her eyes and fixed them on his.

How strange. Oliver was under water now. His face wavered, swayed, and receded. "Promise," she heard him say from afar. "Don't worry, Sam. You'll be all right."

And then everything faded away.

New Orleans—1977

At two o'clock in the morning
Amalise lay in her bed in the house on Broadway, eyes refusing to close as she stared at the ceiling, worrying about Jude and Rebecca and the deal and the conference room and the family on Kerlerec Street, everything wheeling, spinning, buzzing inside like a swarm of bees. She fought to banish the misery she'd seen on Caroline's face earlier. She fought to banish the sight of Luke's sorrowful mien and thoughts of what might have caused a child to feel like that.

She talked to Abba for a while, praying and listening for guidance. Yet when at last she finally slept, she dreamt of the wreckage caused by Bingham Murdoch's project, knowing that she'd had a hand in it.

Poets have said that startling revelations hide in the mist and shadows of time between wakefulness and sleep, those first seconds in the morning when you're lying in bed and dreams are just slipping away. Hang on to those dreams, they've said. Amalise had known since she was a child that this waking time was when Abba sometimes planted little seeds of inspiration.

When the alarm on the table by her bed urged her awake at six o'clock, she did not move at first, instead letting herself sink deeper into the softness around her. She looked at nothing as the mist drifted around in her head, slowly streaming into the ether like silken ribbons, dissolving as her mind began to clear.

That's when the idea struck.

It tiptoed in, slipping past her guard. She mulled it over for a few minutes as a sort of academic exercise.
If this . . . then that,
while sketchy details rose in her mind. She stretched long in the bed, pointing her toes under the blanket, enjoying the idea and the feel of her muscles coming alive.

She rolled onto her side and fluffed the pillow beneath her head. And all at once the mist cleared. Robert's face emerged, his obsidian eyes burrowing into her mind, searching, probing. She gave the pillow a poke and then a little punch. Then she sat up straight and kicked the covers off, swinging her feet to the cold floor.