Black Heart, page 75
Certainly Eliott knew that had he not been so terrified of doing it, he would have struck off on his own years ago - at the time he had gained his legal majority. He had in fact brought
it up several times.
'Go ahead,' Delmar Davis Macomber had said. 'Leave this all
behind if you want. I won't stop you.'
He had been serious, even going so far as to transfer ten thousand dollars into Eliott's account to tide him over until he relocated, settled down and found a decent job.
But Eliott had never gone. He had packed his bags once, then sat staring at his plane ticket to San Francisco as the sun went down and the time of his flight came and went. And, at last, had ripped the ticket in two; his tears had already made the writing
on it illegible.
Now he suspected that his father had known all along that he would not board the flight. The acquiescence, the transfer of money had all been a sham. Delmar Davis Macomber had trained his son too well. He would not leave his father; he woul
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not leave the business that someday he would inherit and run. There was too much for him to learn. The stage, his father had gid many times, is no place to learn anything except deceit, '^nd since you obviously can't even pick up that, there's no use jn your pursuing a career in acting.'
Each remembered word was a blow he felt in a physical sense, pricing as they echoed in his mind.
There was the nature of true evil. The spectre of his father loomed like a great coiled serpent just beyond his shoulder, ready to strike if he moved a centimetre out of line. It wasn't the world he should fear, Eliott saw now. It was his father. It lad been his father all along.
He groaned, held his stomach. He felt ill. Joy's white bloated face floated through his mind's eye like a spear embedded in his brain. He had lost her but he could not lose that image. He groaned again, heard the knock at the door.
'Go away,' he whispered. 'Leave me alone.'
But the sound came again, more insistently this time and he urched to his feet, walking unsteadily to the front door if only to stop the noise. It was giving him a headache.
He opened the door. Khieu!
*
Kim had returned to New York. He had no more interest in the Panel's absurd demands; just as he had no more interest in working for the foundation. Such matters seemed pointless now. He had his own, more personal demands to fulfil.
He thought he had gauged it well. Tracy had had ample time to pick the way through the minefield of subtle clues Kim had ittfully provided for him; with Tracy's kind of talent only a few ud been needed to set him running in the right direction; those
lotos showing how his friend Holmgren had been murdered light have been enough.
Now was the time to return to close proximity to the ferret, '° shadow him every step of the way so that Kim, the instru"ent of his family's revenge, could be there when Tracy closed 'So that Kim himself could deal with Khieu Sokha in his own
!"ticular way. As for Macomber, he was Tracy's prize. Kim
('t no desire to handle him himself; even a ferret deserved a
I
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prize at the end of his run. Whatever Macomber had been Up to was entirely irrelevant to Kim; he had certainly known part of it, otherwise he would never have been in on John Holmgren's murder so swiftly.
Time seemed to escalate, decelerating to an entirely interior point Kim felt keenly the enormity of the weight he carried; the weight of his family, the combined strength of their spirits, who cried out for bloody vengeance.
Kim shivered slightly in anticipation as the taxi dodged traffic heading into Manhattan from LaGuardia. His eyes glowed. Now was the time of sweet vengeance.
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'May I come in?'
Eliott stared at his adopted brother as if he were a ghost fresh from his graveyard haunt. He stood numbly, not knowing what to do or even what to think.
Khieu was again his normal self: beautiful, well-dressed, supremely confident and self-composed. His face was freshly scrubbed, his black eyes bright and clear, his manner relaxed so that Eilott had difficulty connecting this Khieu with the horrordriven creature down in the depths of his father's basement. Perhaps, he thought feverishly, it had never happened. Maybe I dreamed it all.
'Eliott?'
He took a deep shuddering breath, his head nodding spasmodically like an ill-worked marionette.
'Sure.'
He closed the door and together they went into the living room. Khieu sat down.
'Would you like a drink?' Eliott asked, heading for the kitchen.
'Just a beer if you have it.'
Eliott came back in a moment with Kirens for both of them. 'I hope you don't mind drinking out of the bottle.'
Khieu lifted a hand, waved Eliott's words away. He took i sip of the beer, set the bottle down on a side table. 'I don't have much time but I wanted to stop by and thank you.'
'Thank you?' Eliott parroted stupidly.
'For telling me.' Khieu leaned forward, touched Eliott on the knee. A siren screamed by outside, diminishing. Eliott had not bothered to close the windows and turn on the air conditioning *hen he had come home. The sounds of Indian summer in the Clty were strong, a solid reminder of the seasons changing; the
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abrupt slide into autumn was not far off. 'I wanted you to know how much I appreciate it.'
This calm, cool Khieu in the face of the knowledge he had been provided, set the fright off in Eliott again. He began to say something, choked on it. He swallowed hard, tried again. 'What ... are you going to do about it?'
'Do about it?' Khieu looked around the room as if he had never seen it before. 'Nothing.'
'But don't you want to?' Eliott stared hard at him trying to understand him. 'You must. I know enough '
'No, you don't.' Khieu's eyes lighted on Eliott's. 'And perhaps it's time that you did.' His voice, though softer, lower than Eliott's, nevertheless cut through his adopted brother's strident tones. 'You should hear what even our father doesn't know. You've earned it, after all.' He rose, went silently across the carpet to stand behind the chair in which Eliott sat. 'He knows and you know that my older brother, Samnang, was murdered by the Khmer Rouge; as you told me, our father initiated the lies which caused the murder. But neither of you knows how it happened.'
'Khieu ' Eliott said, fidgeting. He was becoming extremely
uncomfortable.
'Quiet,' Khieu whispered. He put a hand on Eliott's shoulder, squeezing. 'You may not know this but the Khmer Rouge's favourite method of execution, when they weren't crucifying people and hanging them from trees along well-trod paths in the jungle, was to beat someone to death. Traitors and the like. They did this as tradition because in the early days when they were forming they could not afford to waste ammunition.
This is what they did to Sam. They beat him until they knew he was dying. Then they called me out and thrust a club into my hand.' He leaned down so that Eliott felt his lips brush against his ear and tried to shy away. But Khieu had a firm 8rlP on him and would not let him go. 'Can you guess what naf^ pened then, brother? Can you picture what they made me oo-
Eliott's mouth was dry and he was trembling. He n° over and over again. Yes, oh, yes! he could imagine. The Khmau had forced Khieu to kill his own brother. HIS ey
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squeezed shut but he could not stop the flow of tears. My God! How could he have done it? How could he not? What alternative did Khieu have but to take up the club and use it? If he did not, they would kill him and kill Samnang But still. But still. Oh, God!
'I'm sorry,' he whispered over and over again. 'I'm sorry.'
'Are you?' Khieu came around from behind the chair, knelt at Eliott's feet, his depthless black eyes staring up into Eliott's, magnified by the tears. 'Yes,' he said, wonderment in his voice, 'I really think you mean it.' His hands closed over his adopted brother's. 'Now we're close,' he said gently. 'Finally there is something we can share. A secret only the two of us know. There's a bond now. Yes. Nothing can disturb that. It's ours, alone.'
He rose, drew Eliott up, their hands still clasped tightly. Khieu put his arm around his brother. 'Now come on,' he said softly. 'Let's go back home. Together.'
And they went, apsara licking at Khieu's heels all the way, her bloated belly sliding grindingly along the asphalt just outside the taxi that rattled them downtown. And when he looked into the rearview mirror, he saw her headless form dancing there. And when he glanced behind them, he saw her image once again, twisted and distorted into ten-thousand tiny fragments by the rain drops clinging tenaciously to the rear window.
The wipers made a sad soughing sound like the wind through the high Cambodian palms. When the fast-moving thunderheads turned the sky yellow and purple from the bruises of the "ghtning.
Father is coming tonight to pick up his papers on the
Australian combine merger. He glanced at his watch and
VMW signed him the time: 7.40. He began to count i* down.
tarty more mjnutes untii Macomber's world exploded into
c
ite e Paid off the driver and they got out. Up the limestone tick! OU8h the darkened, silent house. The French clock
n8 on, counting down the minutes. Just twenty. hea/6 y°U hunSry?' Khieu said and, when Eliott shook his
' n°' sa'd, 'I haven't been hungry in three days.'
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Their shoe soles made no sound at all on the thick pile carpet They might have been wraiths without any substance had it not been for the flitting of their reflections in hanging mirrors, the lick of their thin shadows on the walls.
'Let's go upstairs.' Khieu's voice hung eerily, inundating the silence, in turn being dissipated.
Eliott looked at him. Ever since he had crept down the basement stairs and found Khieu hunched over Joy's corpse, he had felt oddly disconnected. He barely felt the movement of his legs now and certainly could not discern any life in his feet. It was as if he were floating, adrift like a balloon, his movements totally at the whim of the surrounding currents.
It was as if, in vomiting up his father's secrets to Khieu, he had expended the amount of initiative given to him and now, bankrupt, he was helpless, incapable of determining his own fate. He was returning to the long twilight of his adolescence when the misery of confusion every day overwhelmed him when, virtually friendless, the barrenness of his present caused him to fear the future.
The same fear of the future rode his shoulders now like a death shroud, weighing him down. What would happen to him? He felt as if Khieu were the only person in the world who understood him. His father was motivated only by manipulation; when he required Eliott to jump through one of his difficultly placed hoops, he turned on the charm. Whereas Khieu's power was laced with a kind of compassion towards Eliott. As Khieu had said, they shared secrets, torn pasts ... and they had been manipulated and lied to in precisely the same manner.
And Khieu's closeness, his arms around him, made Eliott feel safe, secure, warm; emotions alien to him, too beautiful to ever
let go of.
They reached the top of the stairs and went down the dimly lit hallway. They reached the threshold of Eliott's old
bedroom.
'You remember your old room,' he said softly in Eliott's ear
as they crossed over the threshold.
Eliott looked around. 'Everything's the same. It's as if I never
left.'
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'That's the way your father wanted it,' Khieu whispered. 'He vvants you back, Eliott. He never liked the fact of your leaving. To him it meant you were slipping out from under his thumb.'
'I was,' Elliott said, dazed. 'I had to.' He turned to face Khieu. 'You of all people should understand that.' He could see Khieu's eyes shining, their dark centres very alive.
'Oh, I do. I do.' Khieu kept his arm around Eliott's waist. 'I ivas proud of you when you made the move. I wish -' his eyes dipped for a moment 'well, I wish I could have been able to do that.'
'But you still can!' Some animation came into Eliott's voice. 'I'll help you. We'll do it together.'
Khieu's eyes were sad and he gripped Eliott all the harder. 'Unfortunately, it's far too late for me.'
'What do you mean?'
'I can't ...' He stopped, turned away. 'This is very difficult for me to say ... to anyone. Even you.'
Eliott reached out, touched his arm. 'What is it, Khieu?' His voice was soft, concerned. 'Can't I help you? I want to. I want to make up for all ... for how I've treated you all these years. That will make me happy.'
Khieu turned in the semi-darkness. His face was streaked with shadow as if he were some creature emerging into a deep forest's clearing. His eyes were steady and Eliott knew he had made up his mind. Khieu would tell him. The ultimate secret shared between just these two. He shivered in anticipation.
When Khieu spoke again, his voice had changed pitch. It was lower, filled with basso rumblings, heavy vibrations that caught in Eliott's ear, stuck there, running round and round. His voice was a whisper but urgent and somehow totally free of sibilants.
'I have spent many years in the kind of hell I thought I was leaving when ... our father brought me here to America ... way from the war, the Khmer Rouge, my blasted family.
'I was grateful to him; more grateful than you could ever "low. He knew my psychology and used that. In showing me TOW he had destroyed the murderers of my brother, he knew we situation he put me in. He trained me and then he set me loose like a dog on a tightly-held leash to do his bidding.'
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and then it'll be over.' Khieu let go of Eliott at last, backed awav to the sill of the open doorway. He stopped when he heard Eliott's strained voice. 'Yes?'
'Good-bye, Khieu.'
'Good-bye, man vieux.'
The chanting began some time after than. Eliott could hear it clearly, curling down the hallway, drifting in the twilight of the room, the twilight of his life. He was saddened by Khieu's parting but he was also gladdened by what he had been assigned to do. It made him feel important and full of worth. Of all the people in the world, Khieu had chosen him. Because they were closer than brothers. Eliott had always wanted a brother; and never considered Khieu one. Now he knew what it was like to have a sibling. It filled him with unnamed emotions, made him want to cry with joy and sorrow at the same time.
He felt alive.
The chanting went on and on and Eliott thought he could smell the intense odour of the incense. How he had once hated that smell. How he loved it now. He could picture Khieu, naked, on his knees in front of the Buddha.
The loaded pistol was heavy in his hand and he could feel a slight film of sweat building between his palm and the warming metal. He wanted to take his hand away, wipe the grip down but he was terrified that in that moment, the chanting would come to an end and he would see Khieu's shadow like a spectre rearing up before him, filling the open doorway with its harsh spill of light, and he would be unready to perform the task given to him. He could not chance that. This moment was too important for him.
His eyes burned with tears or perhaps the mist of incense wafting to him from down the hall. He blinked constantly to clear his vision. The night seemed calm and still around him. But alive and sentient, hovering expectantly. He did not feel alone. Khieu was with him now, standing still at his side, giving him strength and guidance. Eliott ached with his brother's pain. My brother, he thought. My brother.
The chanting stopped.
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penetration. It was what they said he was best at when he came to them seeking a job. Because his father was Louis Richter, they took him in. They put him through a six-day battery of tests and this they determined was his speciality.
It had been confirmed thirteen months later by Jinsoku himself, on the day he had graduated from the Mines. 'You, my friend,' the old man had said, 'have the mind of a ferret. They'll set you loose and you'll go down the hole for them. You'll find whatever it is they want you to find; you'll do it in cases where others have failed.
'But it's a heavy burden you'll carry. The better you are, the more they'll come to rely on you. The more missions they'll shove at you. Physically, that's no problem at all. It's the emotional side that concerns me. This is between us... not for their ears.
'You'll be under pressure. Listen to me now and don't interrupt. I don't expect you to understand this. Just remember it when the time comes. Get out before the overload. I have no desire to see you end up in a padded room. I've put too many hours of myself into you.' He knew it was the closest the old man could come to acknowledging the friendship that had developed between them at the Mines. So he remembered.
It was what was going through Tracy's mind now as he began the penetration. The one thing he did best. Or had done. He had taken Jinsoku's advice and had got out. Now he knew he must do it one last time and he wondered.
Gramercy Park South those two blocks on East Twentieth Street - was quieter than the rest of the surrounding area. It was how its residents wanted it. The black iron-fenced park itself was dark, locked tight. Few vehicles passed by. A few couples walked hand in hand, enjoying the respite from the vice-jawed pace of the city.
Tracy, in dark-coloured clothes, was inconspicuous as he moved at a leisurely pace behind two lovers, their pressed shoulders affording him an excellent screen from anyone chancing to look east from a window vantage point.
Haifa block in, the couple moved to their right, crossing the
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street towards the leafy park. He waited for a moment, watching a dog root around in the gutter until its owner lost patience jerking at the leash. Tracy sauntered along behind her for perhaps a hundred yards, until his shadow stretched out in front of her as they passed a streetlight. She started, turned her head partly around to look at him. He quickened his pace slightly ignoring her as he went past and her interest waned.
