Finding Moon Part 15

MR. LEE ARRIVED AT THE HOTEL IN the same taxi that had brought Moon and Osa in from the airport. Osa, standing at the window of Moon's room, saw him climbing out of it.

"Is your Mr. Lum Lee a very small man?" she asked Moon. "And old? And does he wear an old white straw hat?"

"That sounds like Mr. Lee," Moon said. "But what would he be doing here?"

"Well, at least it's not the police coming after us. Not yet, anyway."

"They're probably right behind him," Moon- said, too drowsy to care much, thinking that in jail he could at least get some sleep. He had waited, too nervous even for dozing, for his two A.M. A.M. telephoning time. He'd learned that Dr. Serna was in surgery and had left a message that she would call him as soon as she had "anything definite to report." Then he had failed to reach Debbie, who was either out somewhere or simply wasn't answering the phone. Finally, he'd called the telephoning time. He'd learned that Dr. Serna was in surgery and had left a message that she would call him as soon as she had "anything definite to report." Then he had failed to reach Debbie, who was either out somewhere or simply wasn't answering the phone. Finally, he'd called the Press-Register Press-Register to learn how things were going there. to learn how things were going there.

They were not going well.

"Chaos," Hubbell said. "Rooney jumped off the wagon. I think he started nipping day before yesterday. I got on him about it. Told him to go home. Then yesterday he didn't show up. And this afternoon he walks in looking like h.e.l.l warmed over and smelling like the drunk tank and runs right into old Jerry."

Moon had started to say "Oh, s.h.i.+t," but swallowed it because Osa was standing by his window. She'd been there most of the day, waiting and watching. Osa was absolutely certain that the people who ran the prison would have connected the absence of George Rice to their visit with George Rice. But there was nothing they could do but wait. They had to be here when Rice came because, somehow, they had to persuade him to turn himself in.

Moon bit back the expletive and said, "Jerry fired him?"

And Hubbell said, "He sure as h.e.l.l did. He told him to clean out his desk and get his check from Edith."

"Silly b.a.s.t.a.r.d," Moon said. "You were already short-handed."

"To say the least," Hubbell said. "I've been coming in right after breakfast. Working about a twenty-eight-hour day."

"Well, hang in there," Moon said. "I'll get back as soon as I can."

"You still in Manila? What's the holdup? Before I forget it, the old man wants to talk to you. He's been b.i.t.c.hing about you being gone so long."

"Why didn't he call me?" And then he remembered why. "Oh. I guess I didn't give anybody my new number."

Hubbell laughed. "That ain't the reason. Overseas calls are expensive. He wants to do it on your nickel."

So Moon sat, holding the telephone to his ear, waiting for the publisher's secretary to get Shakeshaft on the phone and watching Osa standing by the window. A slender woman, graceful. Not Debbie's lush shape but lithe. Cla.s.sy.

"Mathias!" Shakeshaft shouted into his ear. "How long is this G.o.dd.a.m.n spring vacation of yours going to last?"

"I can't tell yet," Moon said. "I may know by tomorrow."

"I'm having a little trouble understanding all this," Shakeshaft said. "Are you still out there in Manila? And your momma's sick in Los Angeles? That's what I get from Hubbell, anyway. You want to tell me what the h.e.l.l you're doing in Manila while you're on my payroll? You find us some readers out there?"

"Well," Moon said, "it's some important family business. My mother was going to handle it. She got sick, so I had to go do it for her."

"And you don't know how long it's going to take you, this family business?"

"Not yet, I don't. "Moon said. "I think maybe I'll know by tomorrow."

"Well, I got family business too. Which is getting this G.o.dd.a.m.n paper out. And if you remember, we've got the vacation edition coming up. Got enough ads sold already for four special sections and n.o.body here to write the copy for it. And that Rooney you hired. That wino son of a b.i.t.c.h. Did Hubbell tell you about what happened?"

"He said you fired him," Moon said. "Maybe you should have waited."

Shakeshaft did not appreciate the implied criticism. "Maybe you shouldn't have hired him," he said. "I tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to hold your job open for you. Another day. Twenty-four more hours. You call me tomorrow and tell me you got your tickets and you're on your way back."

"If I can," Moon said. "I'm sorry I had to leave the paper in such a-"

"I don't want to hear any of that 'if I can' s.h.i.+t," Shakeshaft said. "if you can't, I'll get out the application file tomorrow morning and start interviewing people for your replacement."

"I'll-" Moon began, but Shakeshaft had hung up.

Moon put the telephone down and rubbed his ear. Osa was looking at him.

"Everything is good?"

"Everything is about normal," Moon said.

The telephone rang. It was Lum Lee. Mr. Lee hurried through the polite preliminaries. Mr. Lee hoped to confer with Mr. Mathias. Would that be convenient?

"Come on up," Moon said. But he hoped Lee wouldn't hurry. He wanted to think about being fired. If that was what was going to happen, and it sounded like it would, what would he do?

The payment had been due on his truck April fifteenth. He'd missed that already. Then there was the house payment. He had-let's see-about eleven hundred in the bank. Enough to cover those. And Rooney owed him about four hundred dollars, which he'd probably never see. He owed maybe a hundred and fifty on the credit card, depending on how heavily Debbie had used it when he loaned it to her. He had about forty-five bucks of his own money left in his billfold, and his mother's stack of big bills which he hadn't touched so far. But then he must be a couple of thousand into his mother's credit card by now: the expensive Hotel Maynila and the plane ticket to Palawan and the money he'd spent buying himself some clothes. That had to be paid back.

But maybe he'd learn today that Rice hadn't escaped and there was no practical way to find the child and recover her. There would be nothing to do but call Shakeshaft and tell him he was on his way home. He yearned for that to happen. He did yearn for it, didn't he?

He looked at Osa, holding back the dusty curtain, watching for Rice or for the police. He'd miss her.

Mr. Lee's tap on the door was so polite that Moon barely heard it. He gave Moon his frail hand to shake, but in the dark eyes of Osa van Winjgaarden Mr. Lee somehow recognized a fellow Asian. To her he bowed over hands prayerfully pressed together. She returned the gesture exactly.

But otherwise today Mr. Lee made unusually short work of the polite formalities. He sat on the edge of the chair Moon had offered him and got right to the point.

"At the airport there were police," he said, his eyes on Moon's face. "It was said an inmate had left the penal inst.i.tution without permission. It was said the one who escaped was an American."

"Probably George Rice," Moon said.

"Yes," Lum Lee said. "And why do you say that? Could it be only because you understand there are very few Americans in the prison here?" Mr. Lee's expression suggested he doubted that.

"He told us he planned to get out."

"Ah," Lee said, nodding. "I am told that getting out is easy. Getting off the island is very hard. Did he suggest you help him accomplish that?"

"I think he expected a friend to fly in and pick him up."

"A friend?"

"Just a guess," Moon said, thinking, How much should I tell this little man? Have I already dug us deeper into trouble?

"Ah, yes," Lee said. "A guess. And since the police are still at the airport, and the police are still around the port at Puerto Princesa, I would guess that the friend has not yet come."

"That sounds logical," Moon said, wondering how Mr. Lee knew about the police at the port. Hadn't he come here directly from the airport?

Mr. Lee, deep in thought, extracted his cigar case, opened it, extracted a slim black cigar, and suddenly became aware of his rudeness. He gave Moon an apologetic look.

"If Osa doesn't mind," Moon said, "go ahead and smoke."

"Please do," Osa said.

"A bad habit," Mr. Lee said, lighting it. "But it sometimes seems to help one think. And now one needs to think."

"Trouble is, I can't think of anything helpful," Moon said.

"It all seems strange," Mr. Lee said. "Perhaps the friend of Mr. Rice betrayed him. Or perhaps Mr. Rice did not find a way to notify this friend of his need. Or of his schedule."

"Perhaps," Moon said. "Or-"

He paused, looked at Osa. Osa shrugged. What the h.e.l.l, Moon thought. "Or perhaps the friend's telephone in Manila had been disconnected. Perhaps there was no way the friend could be contacted."

Mr. Lee exhaled cigar smoke, careful to aim it away from them.

"Yes," he said. "Either way, the problem is the same for Mr. Rice." He looked at Moon, expression quizzical. "And for others."

He considered this, eyes down, hands folded across his waist.

"I would believe Mr. Rice to be a most shrewd man," Mr. Lee continued. "Reckless at times, but most intelligent." He nodded, agreeing with his conclusion. "Yes. He would never think he could simply walk up to the airport buildings in his prison uniform and wait for this friend to arrive. He would need to be certain that the friend was coming, and to know precisely when this friend would arrive. And precisely on what part of the runway he was landing his airplane. I believe that Mr. Rice would wish to conceal himself in the jungle until he saw this aircraft land. Then he would hurry out from the trees and get aboard before being detected."

"Exactly," Moon said.

"So he was coming here? To learn from you what arrangements had been made by his pilot friend?"

Moon nodded. "He was supposed to come last night. But he didn't make it."

"So now the police search for him." Mr. Lee reached for the telephone. Withdrew his hand with an apologetic look at Moon. "May I?-"

Moon gestured his permission.

"It will be necessary to speak in Chinese," Mr. Lee said. "I am afraid neither of you speak that language." He hesitated a moment, looking at Moon and then at Osa for confirmation. "I will apologize that such impoliteness is necessary, but my friend here at Puerto Princesa does not speak English."

It was a long conversation, involving at various times at least three people on the other end of the telephone.

Moon sat on the edge of the bed, looking away, watching Osa van Winjgaarden, who stood motionless at the window. He tried to read significance into the tone of Mr. Lee's voice and learned only that Mr. Lee seemed to be in charge. The tone suggested that Mr. Lee was not asking favors. Only once did he raise his voice in anything that might have been irritation. Once he paused and asked Moon if he remembered the name of the prison official who had been in charge of him. Moon didn't, but Osa provided the name of the lieutenant and Lum Lee repeated it into the telephone.

Osa had looked away from the window then and watched Lee. Her face registered puzzlement, then surprise, then intense interest. It occurred to Moon that Osa as a child had had a Chinese nanny. She would understand Chinese, or at least a little of it.

She looked at him and then moved her hands down where they would not be visible to Mr. Lee and made with her fingers the tong signals she had shown.

Mr. Lee hung up.

"Thank you very much," he said. "Now I think we should go into Puerto Princesa and make some arrangements."

"I'll have to wait for Rice," Moon said. "We can't-"

"We go now," Lum Lee said. "The police are coming."

"For us?" Moon said. Not that he hadn't been expecting it.

"Yes," Mr. Lee said. "I think they would have been here much earlier, but your lieutenant had the day off." He was moving toward the door. "Quickly, now. Quickly."

The anxiety in Mr. Lee's expression spoke as loud as the words. Moon stuffed everything he had into his bag in a matter of seconds. Even so, he found Osa in the hall, bag packed, waiting.

Mr. Lee was walking, rapidly and silently, down the hallway toward them. "A policeman has just come into the lobby," he said. "Is there another stairway down?"

"There's a little porch at the end of the building, and a door opens out onto it," Moon said. "Maybe it's a fire escape."

It was. They scrambled down the ladder.

"Where are we going?" Moon asked.

"Where the police won't find you," Mr. Lee said. "Until we can collect Mr. Rice."

WAs.h.i.+NGTON, April 23 (AP)-A spokesman for President Ford said today that sixty helicopters have been a.s.sembled on three aircraft carriers off the coast of Vietnam prepared for speedy evacuation of Americans if it becomes necessary.

THE PLACE WHERE MR. LEE had arranged to hide them proved to be a ramshackle two-story house on a potholed street of ramshackle two-story houses near the port that gave Puerto Princesa its name. The house was built partly of concrete blocks, partly of planking, and partly of bamboo logs, roofed partly with tile and partly with palm thatching-pretty much in keeping with the low-income urban architecture Moon had been noticing in the Philippines. What was less common, or so Moon presumed, was the section of flooring in the back hall. Mr. Tung, who Moon now presumed was the homeowner as well as their cabdriver, slid away the hallway rug, lifted this section, exposed a steep stairway, and led them down it into a large room with a concrete floor. Three of the walls and about four-fifths of the remaining one were also of concrete.

The remaining fraction of a wall opened into a screen of bamboo poles. Mr. Tung pulled this back and peered out into what look to Moon like a bamboo forest. Mr. Tung nodded and refastened the cord that held the screen closed. He said, "I hope there will be comfort here," bowed deeply over tented hands, and hurried up the stairway, where, Moon presumed, Mr. Lee was awaiting him.

"I think we have been put in cold storage for a while," Moon said, inspecting the furnis.h.i.+ngs. They included three small beds, two folding cots, a worn plastic sofa, a fairly new overstuffed chair, and a round wooden table with four wooden chairs. Around the three concrete walls pallets were stacked, the sort on which heavy materials are s.h.i.+pped. Behind the pallets up to about three feet above the floor, the walls were discolored with water stains.

Moon sat on the sofa, feeling dizzy from lost sleep. And maybe a little bit feverish and headachy besides. He decided not to think about this. He was caught up in the tides of fate. He would discontinue thinking until he had something positive and productive to think about. Maybe he'd get some sleep. The last two nights there'd been d.a.m.ned little of that.

Osa had untied the cord, pulled back the bamboo an inch or two, and peered out.

"How clever," she said.

Moon yawned. Clever? He'd look later. But it had been clever the way Mr. Lee had gotten them here unseen. Lee had told them to appear at the side entrance of the hotel with whatever they had to take with them. He told them exactly when to be there. And just as they got to the door, the jeepney cab had pulled up with its rain curtains down. They'd slid into the back seat and left. It was the jeepney with the fighting c.o.c.ks on the hood, but this time the driver was an older fellow wearing a flowered necktie and a seersucker jacket. His hair was short-cropped and gray. Mr. Lee had introduced him as Mr. Tung. Moon guessed he was a Malay, but Tung and Lum Lee were communicating in something that sounded like Chinese.

"Pretty soon we will get to a house where you will stay for a while," Mr. Lee had said without turning. "Mr. Tung will park his cab beside the side porch. He and I will get out and go into the house, and all the luggage will be carried in. But you will stay for some time in the cab."

"Until all the neighbors get their curiosity satisfied and stop looking out their windows," Moon said.

Mr. Lee had laughed. "Most astute," he said. "I think you must live in a small town."

Now Osa was still fiddling with the bamboo screen.

"You should see this," she said. "It works like what we Dutch would call a water gate." She laughed. "I think maybe our good hosts here do some smuggling."