The Daisy Ducks Read online

  "Then do it, Doc. I want to talk with you anyway."

  "Liatis, are you ever going back to your wife?"

  He shrugged his shoulders. They were average size, not a prizefighter's shoulders. He snapped a card down and grunted. I poured a linger of Dewar's and lighted a Punch corona. I cut a second cigar for Roantis and gave it to him. He balanced it neatly on the lip of the ashtray so it would be ready when he finished the Camel. The hands and arms were rock steady. He didn't appear drunk at all. How, I don't know.

  "Do you mind staying here until two?"

  "Nah. I'll stay as long as the booze holds out. Sorry about that little scrape, too. The guy asked for it, though. Didn't help the party, did it?"

  "Well, it was about closing time anyway. Listen, I'm in trouble with Mary —"

  "I know. Wanta split for a while?"

  "Where?"

  "A small country I know. Nice. You'd like it."

  "Hmmm. You know, Liatis, something strange is happening. A year or two ago I wouldn't have given it a thought. Now, I don't know . . . I just kinda feel like, like busting out of here. I can't explain —"

  "Don't need to. I know the feeling, Doc. Get it alla time. I had a hunch you're the type who gets that feeling, too. In fact, that's why I showed up tonight."

  I was wondering what he meant by this when I heard low voices coming from the kitchen. The kangaroo court was in session. The only thing standing between me and Mary's wrath was Roantis.

  "Well, whatever brought you here, I'm glad you're staying. Let's try to keep up a lively conversation. Something she'll like. Then maybe she'll fall asleep. I know that if a certain amount of time elapses, the possibility of violence will ebb. The slow hatred will remain, but not the violence."

  He leaned forward and looked me keenly in the eye. Smoke dribbled out of his nostrils. He held my forearm in an iron grip.

  "Listen, Doc. I meant what I said just now. I gotta talk to you. It's important."

  Mary came in with a mug of coffee and sat down at the card table, glaring at me in silence.

  "Sorry," I said. And I was.

  "You're not forgiven. And when Liatis leaves the ax will fall. By the way, Liatis, thanks for belting that jerk. I hated him from the start. Now, are you going back to your wife or not?"

  "Maybe, Mary. I don't know. How would you like to hear a story?"

  "About what?"

  "What happened in Cambodia in 1969. If your husband helps me, I think I stand to gain a couple hundred thousand bucks."

  "Why do you want Charlie to help?"

  "Because he's good at tracking things down. And he doesn't lose his nerve. I like him, Mary. I trust him too. I don't trust hardly anybody, you know. Doc can handle himself, and he's smart at figuring things out. Remember that fishing boat? He —"

  "Stop!" cried Mary. "Don't even talk about that!"

  "Amen," I said.

  Roantis took a pull of whiskey from the tumbler and lit his cigar. He inhaled a deep drag of it, and I winced. It didn't faze him; he let out the pungent smoke through his nose.

  "Nice taste,"‘ he murmured. "Anyway, Mary, if Doc can help me track down this thing, I'll give him half my share of the loot."

  "Loot? Liatis," I said, "did you say loot? I'm not sure I like the sound of that word. And what is this loot anyway, five pounds of uncut heroin?"

  He shrugged his shoulders and returned to the game of solitaire. It seemed the perfect game for him—a symbolic pastime for this battered soldier of fortune.

  "Wish I could say it was something else, Doc, but it ain't. It's Siu Lok's loot. That's what it is. And it's mine. Or mine and Vilarde's, f1fty-fifty, just like we agreed. Only trouble is, I think Vilarde's dead."

  Mary leaned closer during this brief recounting.

  "Then there was old Siu Lok. Nice guy. A shame they had to torture him. They took out their belt knives and skinned him alive, right in front of his own wife and children. Took all the skin off his head and chest. The villagers said later you could hear him howl a mile away—and that's through jungle, you know. Sound doesn't carry well through the jungle. And remember: he was an old guy. But you don't want to hear all this."

  Mary leaned still closer. She reached over and took a sip from my glass.

  "Who says?" she said.

  "Huh?"

  "Who says we don't?"

  Roantis stared at the columns of red and black cards. He swiftly mashed them into a pile, squared the deck, shuffled, and proceeded to repeat the game.

  "Stop that game and tell us, dammit! " said Mary. I slipped him a wink. Roantis flipped cards and puffed on the cigar. He could have been on Mars.

  "Well?"

  "Well what?"

  "Well why did they torture him? Who tortured him?"

  Annoyed, Roantis stifled a yawn of boredom.

  "Who did it? Why, the Khmer Rouge of course. They dint mind Siu Lok giving us the loot—hell, they dint even know about the goddamn loot. But I tink they knew he was a river pirate. 'Cause he was. But they were mad he told us about them."

  "The loot. What is this loot, Liatis?"

  He dug out his wallet. It was a tattered and crusty specimen made from elephant ear. He riffled through its contents: a collection of foreign and domestic bills in all denominations, old photo booth pictures of women (mostly Asians), membership cards of various self-defense and martial arts clubs, and some old and folded color snapshots until he found the item he wanted. It was a crinkled color Polaroid picture. He spun it over the felt table to us. Mary turned it upright and examined it.

  "A statue," she said. "A golden statue. Who is it, Buddha?"

  Taking the picture, I saw a shiny yellow figure set on a black velvet background. Underneath the statue was an embossed placard that said BARCLAYS BANK, LTD., KOWLOON. It appeared to be an official bank photograph, much like those taken by appraisers and insurance companies. The statue had a Hindu look to it and seemed to be a deity of some kind. It did not have the sagacious and placid expression of the great Buddha, nor his rotund physique. Its face was a fierce demon's, its stance a whirling leap, a frenzied fit of passion, rendered immobile in metal.

  "It's a statue of a guy called Siva," said Roantis absently. "It's a Hindu god, and this is his devil form. I guess he comes in a lot of flavors, like Howard Johnson's ice cream. Well, this variety is one of the nasty ones. All I care about is this: the thing is mostly gold. The bank appraiser's estimate was twelve karat. And see those doodads on his head and around his neck? Rubies and sapphires. Not the best grade, or huge. But real."

  I looked closely at the picture. Whoever had taken it had placed an upright ruler next to the piece. It was thirteen inches tall. The demon-god, who wore a bow and quiver on his back, held a trident in his hands. Wrapped around his bejeweled neck was a serpent. He was standing on one leg, as if dancing a jig. His foot rested on the fallen body of an enemy, who was also a demon-man. It did not look inviting or pleasant.

  "Okay, you've got us going. What's it worth?"

  "Guess."

  "As one who works with gold, I know what the piece could bring on the current market if it were pure gold, which it isn't, and assuming the piece is solid."

  "It's not," said Roantis. "If it was solid it'd weigh a ton."

  "And I'm no judge of gems. But they certainly look impressive and well set. Hell, I don't know. Between eighty and a hundred and twenty grand?"

  "Close, Doc. Hey, you're good. The appraisal was in sixty-nine, over ten years ago. And they wouldn't certify the appraisal. The piece weighs almost four kilos."

  "Let's see, that's uh —"

  "Eight point eight pounds," said Roantis.

  "Well?"

  "The guy said a hundred grand easy. I figure it could be worth double that," said Roantis, dragging on the cigar and sucking the smoke deep. "But we couldn't unload it for anywhere near that then. Now I think we can." `

  "And you want me to help you find it?"

  "Naw. I know where it is."

 
He reached inside his shirt and caught his stubby finger on a fine silver chain. An instant later he was holding a silver key in his hand. He took the chain from around his neck and flipped the key and chain onto the table. It was a safe deposit box key, deluxe model. It obviously went to a box that was not used for the family burial policy. Long and heavy and made of expensive metal, it had the figure of a Chinese dragon embossed on one side of the crown. On the reverse side were the words BARCLAYS BANK, KOWLOON. Then there was a number: 1001-A.

  "The Siva idol is in this bank box in Kowloon, across the harbor from Hong Kong, right where Ramon Vilarde and I put it just about ten years ago."

  "Well," said Mary, "you've got the key. What's holding you back?"

  "Look at the key closely, Mary. It says one thousand and one—A. There is also key number one thousand and one—B. A is no good without B. You need both keys to open the box. Both keys at the same time, along with a third key belonging to the bank. Guess who's got the other key?"

  "This guy Vilarde."

  "Yep." Roantis nodded. "So the two of us must be together at the Kowloon bank to get the statue. That's the way we set it up."

  Roantis chuckled softly, ironically, to himself dragging again on the cigar. He let the smoke creep downward out his nostrils like an Chinese dragon.

  "That was the only way to set it up. First of all, it was loot. It is loot. We had to stash it fast in four days of R and R." Mary leaned over to Roantis, shaking her head slowly. She said it still wasn't clear. Why had they left it over there in the bank box? Could he start from the beginning? just what I wanted to hear; he had her going now. I volunteered to make coffee and rose from the table. Roantis said he needed another tumbler of Scotch. Sure he did. But I decided to get him a weak one anyway, since he was getting me off the hook. I walked to the kitchen. The hallway shapes and textures swept by me as if in a dream. The silence sang in my head. I was still a little buzzed. Funny how sometimes you don't notice until after the party. As I was putting the coffee on the phone rang. It was quarter to two. Now who could have the bad manners to call at this hour? I answered it.

  "Doc? Brian here. Listen: I'm finally home now and going to bed. I had a cruiser stop Newcombe even before he got to the station. He got belligerent when questioned by the officer. So they took him in and he failed the breath test. Now I made him a little deal —"

  "That you'd thought up beforehand?"

  "Yeah, well maybe. We drop him off at his house and let him off the hook if he, forgets about what happened at your place. Naturally he cooperated. But we entered the DUI anyway, which is serious. I can hold that over him for a while if he gets belligerent again. But the guy's definitely got personality problems. I'm really glad the DUI will carry a jail sentence soon. I'm sick of cleaning dead kids out of cars with a sponge."

  "Thanks a million, Brian. I'm sure Roantis will be grateful too."

  "Oh yeah. About him. I checked on your friend Liatis Roantis, who bears an uncanny resemblance to a Doberman pinscher. Did you know he wears paper?"

  "He what?"

  "You know. He's got a sheet. A record. It's not brief either. A whole string of assaults. Two deaths. You know this?"

  "Oh sure. It's common knowledge around the club."

  "The club? What club is it, for Chrissakes, the SS?"

  "It's the BYMCU in town. He teaches martial arts there. He's also a director."

  "Well watch him—he smells like trouble to me. If I were you, I'd drop him like a red rivet. I mean, look at tonight. Consider it. Things like that happen too often here and the selectmen are on top of me like roofing compound, you know?"

  "I know."

  "And I heard about the hanky-panky with Janice DeGroot, too. It's the talk of the town, Doc. I heard she was draped around you like the kudzu."

  "That's not, uh, entirely true, Brian."

  "Izzat so? That's what they all say. I bet Mary's steamed. I don't blame her either. I bet you're in trouble."

  I thanked him and took the coffee and booze back to the porch. On the way, I said goodnight to Jack and Tony, who were trundling upstairs. They wished me goodnight, but not with genuine filial warmth. I didn't blame them. I wasn't happy with Dr. Charles Adams this night. I knew I had asked for the trouble I was in. But somehow I wasn't totally sorry. What was this strange restlessness in me?

  "You walked?" Mary was saying incredulously as I came back into the porch.

  "Uh-huh. Oh hiya Doc. You're just in time to hear the story." And so, declining coffee and taking up his tumblerful of malt whiskey, Liatis Roantis began his tale of war, death, and the golden dancing demon.

  2

  "I GUESS I better give you a little background first," Roantis said, "so you'll understand just why we went into Cambodia in the first place. Cambodia was a neutral country, and therefore safe from American and Vietnamese military action. But see, the enemy used the place to stockpile their arms and ammo that had been shipped down by the Ho Chi Minh Trail. So for years we carried out secret cross-border raids in both Cambodia and Laos. It was done under a secret group called the SOG, Special Operations Group. And it used men from all branches: army, navy, and air force, who worked together. The time I led the Daisy Ducks down past Rang and the Fish Hook was my fourth trip through eastern Cambodia."

  "The what?" asked Mary. "The Daisy Ducks? "

  "Yeah. See, Mary, operations and teams have code names and letter designations. Our designation was Delta-Delta, double-D. So we called ourselves the Daisy Ducks. When we were designated double-M, Mike-Mike, we called our team the Molly Maguires."

  "How come you named yourselves after females?" I asked.

  He thought for a minute and shrugged, saying he supposed it was tradition. "Why do flyers name their planes girl names?" he asked. "Here she is . . ."

  He unfastened his shirtsleeve and drew it up. There was nothing remarkable about the arm. It was not bulging with muscle, although it was heavily lined with blood vessels. I had noticed Roantis's tattoos before, but never paid much attention. The one he pointed to now was remarkable, and still showed the brightly colored ink. The other tattoos were faded purple lines, but this one was clean and crisp and showed a lot of detail. Roantis said it was done in Okinawa, and that Japanese tattoos were the best and most intricate. Both Mary and I laughed when we saw it. There on Roantis's arm, in full jump gear, was none other than Daisy Duck herself, complete with paratrooper boots, huge eyes and beak, and the big red bow she wore on her head. And she was wearing her red dress too. Except the propwash and her falling had swooshed it up a bit, revealing a pair of lacy panties. Only Daisy wasn't smiling; she was irritated. She wore a snarl as she clutched her chute cords. Behind her, three smaller chutes fell in the distance. On her webbing were three frag grenades and a submachine gun.

  Underneath was a furled ribbon with the following inscription: Long Range Patrol Daisy Ducks—Long Binh, Vietnam—1969. And above the entire scene, the crescent AIRBORNE flash. But what

  caught our eyes was Daisy's quote, underneath the ribbon. She was saying:

  "M1ND IF WE DROP IN?"

  Mary said she thought the tattoo was cute. Roantis stared at her and shook his head slightly.

  "Yeah, but thing is, Mary, I don't think you'd wanta meet our Daisy. She was a nasty broad." He paused briefly in reflection, staring at the cards on the table. A hint of regret invaded the eyes. "She was pretty mean was ol' Daisy. Killed a lot of people . . ."

  "So what was the mission of the Daisy Ducks in Cambodia?" I asked, not wanting him to stop. I didn't want Roantis morose and introspective. I wanted him talking. He swigged his drink, popped a Camel, and continued.

  "Our mission was to sneak up on their supply dumps and blow them up, killing as many enemy as we could. We did it, too. You bet."

  "How many men were there with the Daisy Ducks?" I asked.

  "Eight."

  "Eight? You really mean only eight?"

  "Only eight. And it was enough. Between us we destroyed thousands of to
ns of materiel and killed maybe a thousand people."

  "C'mon Roantis, that's a lot of enemy."

  "We were good, Doc. We were very good. But we had a system that made it almost easy as long as we stayed invisible. But the bad part of it was—the bad part of it is—that we killed everybody. I said we killed a thousand people, not enemy. I'm sure a lot of them were civilians. Some of them must've been kids, too."

  He took a long pull from the tumbler and I realized that he was—finally—drunk. His eyes were glazed and he appeared to wither and shrink before my eyes. He worked his jaws; I could see the muscles on the side of his face bunch and jump as he ground his teeth. He wiped his forehead and wearily ran his fingers through his stringy gray hair. He looked old and tired. He looked like Bogart in the drunk scene of Casablanca. Mary, realizing his pain, suggested he stop and that I drive him home. Roantis lived in Jamaica Plain. I told her I was in no shape to drive anywhere, especially all the way to Jamaica Plain and back. She was about to summon the boys, or wake them, when he shooed her off.

  "I'm okay, Mary. Stop it. I jus' get a li'l depressed when I think of it sometimes. I'll finish this drink and then get some coffee. Now I need a cigarette too. Or else I need —"

  He got up and walked from the porch.

  "Where are you going?" I asked.

  "Be right back, folks. Don't go away . . ."

  We heard him on the stairway, and Mary yelled to him that there was a bathroom on the first floor. He seemed not to hear her.

  "Is he going to be sick?"

  "Not likely."

  During his absence Mary clasped and unclasped her hands and glared icily at me.

  "Sorry," I said.

  "Am I that unattractive?"

  "Course not. You're gorgeous. And it was stupid and immature of us. It was the booze making us act out vague, middle-aged fantasies. Do you think if Janice and I really wanted to fool around we'd do it here, during a party? C'mon. And as stupid as it was, I don't think you should make more of it than it deserves. I'll tell you what it is, Mary: I'm bored. And when that happens I do dumb things. And I've been restless lately. I'm not in the mood to be a suburban physician right now. I want to do something a little riskier. Or maybe just different. Now, you see—What's that I smell?"