Dead and Kicking (3 page)

‘Wouldn’t have done it, sunshine,’ Jack had argued, ‘not firing piss-weak 9mm ammo. I knew the bastard. We covered each other’s backs a few times and he wasn’t that dumb, not by a long chalk. Maybe we could have him using a cut-down L2A1.’

The L2A1 was a heavy-barrelled, full-auto version of the 7.62mm standard-issue Oz Army’s self-loading rifle. The SAS chopped off the barrel, ditched the flash suppressor, stuck in a thirty-round mag and nicknamed it the Bitch. When you squeezed the trigger, you got enough flame and noise to scare the crap out of everyone within a couple of hundred metres, including the operator.

‘But the Owen gun is such a pretty-looking weapon, Jack,’ our 25-year-old wunderkind director had argued, ‘and you have to understand that looking good is what the film business is all about.’

‘It’s your show, mate,’ Jack had answered with a shrug. ‘No skin off my arse.’

Up to that point in filming VT had been happy to fly the director back from location when the shoot wrapped for the day, but after that conversation there always seemed to be some kind of mechanical glitch that kept the helicopter grounded until after the director left on a long, painfully slow drive back to the city.

The Huey was waiting in a clearing, the rotor blades slowly turning and VT in the pilot’s seat. We instinctively ducked our heads as we sprinted under the blades and Jack grabbed my heavy cases and easily hefted them into the chopper’s open rear cabin. He might have had silver-grey hair and been pushing sixty hard, but I reckoned he must have been almost as trim and fit as the day he first arrived in the ’Nam in ’67.

After securing my cases to the Huey’s deck, I strapped myself into one of the frayed webbing seats in the rear cargo area while Jack climbed into the co-pilot’s seat and pulled on a helmet. As VT opened the throttle, the whine of the jet turbine engine increased in pitch and the massive rotor blades turned faster and faster. VT glanced back to check that my seatbelt was fastened and I gave him the thumbs up.

There wasn’t too much about flying a Huey that VT didn’t know. He’d been a top helicopter pilot for the South Vietnamese Air Force during the war. Just before he pulled up on the control stick to get us airborne, he reached over and squeezed Jack’s thigh. Jack smiled and returned the gesture. VT had been Jack’s partner for the past thirty-five years.

‘Ain’t love grand,’ I said to myself, and then the Huey’s skids cleared the temporary landing ground in a choking whirlwind of dust and chaff and sticks and stones. Below us I could see the director and his personal assistant running towards the departing chopper, waving hopefully. I waved back as we climbed higher and they grew smaller and smaller.

Since filming was finished in Vietnam, and the rented ex-US military chopper had to be handed back to the government within the week, it was odds-on that VT wouldn’t be able to resist one last chance to show me what a Huey could do. I tightened my seatbelt and ten seconds later I heard his voice in my headphones yelling, ‘Hang on, Alby. Here we go!’ And then my world turned upside down.

The Hotel Indochine Luxe Royale had more words to its name than it had elevators, but was a nice place to shack up during the shoot. It had been built in the 1930s and, according to the brass plaque in the lobby, it was one of the many hundreds of hotels in Saigon where Graham Greene had stayed exclusively while researching
The Quiet American
. Restored to its original Art Deco glory in the 1990s, the hotel was centrally located, sedate and comfortable, and actually did have quite an interesting history.

‘Bugger me, the old Luxe Royale,’ Jack had said to me when we met a couple of days before filming began. ‘Biggest knocking shop in Saigon, back in the day.’

I’d glanced around at the wood-panelled and plushly carpeted lobby with its rattan armchairs and potted palms. ‘Really? This place was a brothel?’

‘You better believe it, mate,’ Jack had said. ‘That plaque should read “On this site more GIs contracted the clap than in any other place in South-East Asia”. I think they used to have a giant, flashing neon sign up on the roof advertising penicillin.’

My fourth-floor room had a small balcony opening onto a public square. It was a great place to unwind with a G & T after a long day and I was really going to miss the joint. Any bullet holes left by drunken partying American soldiers had long been papered over, along with those made by the Vietcong when they’d briefly taken the hotel during the ’68 Tet offensive. Today’s guests enjoyed king-sized beds, air-conditioning, 24-hour room service – now limited to food and booze only – and big marble bathrooms with plenty of hot water.

I took a long shower while my images from the day’s shoot uploaded and downlinked to our production office on the Gold Coast and to MB&F, the movie’s marketing and PR people in New York. By the time I had towelled off and poured myself a whisky, my knees had stopped shaking from VT’s moves in the Huey. It made you wonder what the bloke could manage in an up-to-date attack chopper like an Apache or Super Cobra.

There was an email in my inbox from Julie Danko, who was in the US attending a counter-insurgency seminar at the Battle Command Training Center at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. ‘Congratulations on not getting suspended, demoted or fired for eight straight weeks, Alby,’ the email read. ‘Is this a new record?’

Julie worked with me at D.E.D. and had been my 2IC during the demoralising six-month stint I’d recently spent as acting Director-General. I had learnt a lot during that time, including the fact that I wasn’t cut out for management. I’d also learnt there was a lot more to Julie than met the eye – never mind that what met the eye was pretty spectacular.

After carefully packing all my serious camera gear into travelling cases and my spare clothes into a suitcase, I phoned reception for a bellboy. My cases would be shipped back to the Gold Coast studios, along with the rest of the production’s equipment, but with a week or two to kill I planned on staying on in Vietnam. I’d travel light, with just a passport, a backpack, a compact Nikon DSLR and a couple of lenses in a small camera bag, plus my tiny digital Leica D-Lux in my pocket.

When I wandered into the cocktail bar of the hotel just after nine there was a string quartet playing. Neatly dressed guests were sipping champagne and politely refusing canapés from passing waiters. The producer, director, screenwriter, various money men and the usual studio bods and hangers-on clocked me, immediately recognised that I wasn’t anybody important and went back to their networking.

‘I’ll help you with those, sport,’ I said, pinching a silver tray of deep-fried spring rolls from a waiter and kicking open the French doors leading out to where the real action was. ‘
Cha gio
, anyone?’ I yelled. ‘Get ’em while they’re hot.’

The Doors’ ‘Love Her Madly’ was blasting out over an open marble terrace packed with crew and actors, local production office people, girlfriends, boyfriends and assorted camp followers. A film crew on location usually sorts itself into a number of temporary relationships, most of which don’t survive past the end of the shoot.

My time in Vietnam had been romance-free, which Jack impolitely attributed to a lack of desperation on the part of the unattached female members of the crew. I’ll admit my track record with women hadn’t been too impressive lately. There’d been the stunning Major Grace Goodluck, who’d claimed to work for the US Justice Department and had loved me and left me after shooting our local CIA chief full of holes. And there’d been Lieutenant Clare Kingston, a US Navy weapons specialist who’d been kidnapped almost out of my bed to arm stolen nukes for a wealthy conservationist who had a bone to pick with the Japanese about whaling.

Then, of course, there was Julie, who’d recently come between me and a dozen submachine gun bullets fired by a psycho ex-paratrooper named Chapman Pergo on a rocky island off the Tasmanian coast. Her bulletproof vest had saved us both and I’d blasted half a magazine from Julie’s MP5K in Pergo’s direction before SASR troopers had taken him out. After an incident involving some mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, I was still trying to figure out exactly where I stood with Julie.

In the middle of the crowded terrace I found Damien, the first assistant director, with Kirsten, who was doing make-up on the film. They’d met on a shoot a long time back and were recently married and looking amazingly happy.

‘Here’s a belated wedding present,’ I said, handing Damien the tray of spring rolls. ‘Knock yourselves out.’

Kirsten and Damien were chatting with Brett Tozer, one of the film’s associate producers. The old film-industry gag defines associate producers as people who are morally bankrupt enough to associate with the producer. In reality, no-one in the film business cares if anyone is morally bankrupt as long as they are liquid enough to kick in some cash. Brett’s employer, the New York PR and marketing conglomerate Markham Barkin & Fargo, had done just that, securing Brett his slot on the production. He seemed like a nice bloke, for a Yank, and we were getting along. He was wearing a suit I hadn’t seen before.

‘Not more new threads?’ I said, as he helped himself to a couple of the spring rolls.

Brett nodded. Soon after arriving in Saigon I’d introduced him to a local tailor who’d run me up a couple of very nice retro safari jackets, just like the ones all the butch war correspondents had worn in the 1960s. The bloke could also whip up an excellent made-to-measure business suit in less than three days. This had come in handy for Brett after he’d discovered on-set film catering is a never-ending feast and a real temptation for people with not much to do in the actual filmmaking process – like associate producers. My tailor friend was probably well on his way to owning a couple of new houses thanks to Brett’s constantly expanding waistline.

Just behind Brett, my mate Boxer was sitting at a table sipping a cocktail and drinking in the adoring looks of a couple of local extras. With Boxer, girls always seemed to come in pairs, which I could never figure out. Who knew that a bloke who had the build of a Greek god, chiselled good looks, blond hair, blue eyes, a dry wit, charm and the air of a bad boy plus the glamour of a job in the film industry would attract women?

‘Heading back to Sydney soon, Boxer?’ I asked. ‘To be with the wives and kids?’

One of the girls gave him an angry look.

‘Ignore him,’ Boxer said, slipping his arms around both women. ‘He’s just a sad, jealous little man. Trust me, I only have eyes for you, babe, and for you.’

The angry looks were redirected towards me, and Boxer grinned and winked. Bastard. I spotted Jack and VT standing at the edge of the terrace, which was a great excuse for making myself scarce.

The Luxe Royale’s terrace fronted a brightly lit square, noisy with street vendors, pedestrians, cars, motor scooters and the odd cyclo, the Vietnamese version of the three-wheeled pedal-powered bicycle taxi. The raucous din of engines and car horns, the humidity, the smells of street food, sweat, incense and leaded petrol fumes all added up to my favourite word: Asia.

A tall, slender Vietnamese woman wearing a diaphanous white silk
ao dai
was standing with the two men. The
ao dai
, a high-necked, long-sleeved, ankle-length tunic split at the sides and worn over matching trousers, has got to be the sleekest, most graceful and sensual national dress going.

I guessed the woman was in her late twenties, almost my height and nicely curved in some excellent places. A small white flower was tucked behind one ear and her long, glossy black hair was swept up, framing the most beautiful face I’d seen in a very long time.

‘Alby, Mr Murdoch,’ VT said. ‘I would like to present Miss Nhu Hoang.’

Miss Hoang was gorgeous. She smiled and held out a delicate hand with long elegant fingers. As our skin touched, I felt an electric tingle shoot up my arm, run across my shoulders and down my legs, all the way to my toes. I knew instantly I was about to get myself into a whole lot of trouble.

‘I’m very pleased to meet you, Mr Murdoch,’ Miss Hoang said in perfect English, with just a slight hint of an American accent.

Jack took a sip of his champagne. ‘Miss Hoang is the granddaughter of VT’s sister,’ he said, giving me a look that I read as a warning to behave myself.

‘Miss Hoang is an officer with the national police,’ VT said, his voice giving me the same warning.

‘Some of my best friends are coppers,’ I said, reluctantly releasing Miss Hoang’s hand, ‘and believe me, none of them could wear a dress like that, not even the women.’

I took two glasses of champagne from a passing waiter and offered one to Miss Hoang, who accepted it with a smile.

‘Miss Hoang is also the national police pistol champion,’ VT said.

It was game, set and match in the ‘warn Alby to behave himself’ stakes. I looked Miss Hoang up and down. That
ao dai
was one hell of an outfit.

‘You don’t appear to be armed at the moment, Miss Hoang,’ I said. ‘I mean, not as far as I can see.’

She smiled. ‘Looks can be deceiving, Mr Murdoch.’

I knew that to be a fact from bitter experience.

‘I hear from Uncle you are interested in the cuisine of our country, Mr Murdoch.’

I nodded. ‘I’ve got a couple of weeks to kill so I’m planning to go wandering, hit some markets and maybe take a few cooking lessons.’

‘Please just ask if there is any way I can be of assistance,’ she said.

Jack gave me that look again.

‘You guys still planning on heading north?’ I asked.

Jack nodded. ‘Probably. The production has the chopper leased till the end of the week so we’ve got clearance to fly up that way to visit some of VT’s relatives near Hanoi. Then we thought we might take a quick side-trip out to have a squiz at Dien Bien Phu. The joint was a bit out of reach last time I visited Vietnam.’

Jack was a military history buff and Dien Bien Phu had military history in spades. The valley near Vietnam’s north-western border with Laos was where the French colonial government had built a massive and heavily fortified base in 1954. They’d crammed it full of Algerian and Vietnamese soldiers and elite French Foreign Legionnaires, and dared Ho Chi Minh’s Vietminh rebels to bring it on. Bad call. When the smoke finally cleared, the fortress was pretty much obliterated, along with most of the men inside it. The majority of those who survived the catastrophe died in captivity.