Days of Affliction by Brian Carland

Author:Brian Carland
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: thriller, love story, vietnam war, prostitution, spy, tet offensive, child molester
Publisher: Brian Carland

Roger sat on the priest’s bunk underneath the large crucifix and stared at his boots. Someone had cleaned them off and spot cleaned his fatigue trousers. The trousers were still damp in places. It looked like some of the bloodstain had not come out. He had sat for a half hour by himself in the priest’s room, in his shorts and fatigue jacket, until Father Jean had returned with the cleaned items, silently handing them to him.

Now Father Jean stood at the window and Roger sat on the bunk. They both listened to the voice. Someone was going up and down the streets below in a captured jeep making an announcement with a bull horn. Except for an occasional burst of small arms fire in some distant quadrant and the repetitive scratchy voice the city was quiet. The announcement stopped for half a minute then began again, this time on a more distant street, the timbre of the voice more tinny.

“What’s he saying?” Roger asked.

Father Jean turned around. “He says there has been a general uprising. The Peoples Army has captured this city and several more Provincial Capitals. They have captured the American Embassy in Saigon. Within a few days the whole country will be liberated from the foreign oppressors and their puppet rulers. They want one member of each family to go to the Governor’s Residence and register the family. There will be a rally for young people under twenty this afternoon at four at the governor’s residence.” The priest picked a cigarette out of a pack on his little table in the center of the room and lit it with a long wooden match.

“Is it true?” Roger asked.

“Who can tell? They have certainly occupied this part of the city. For us, for the moment, that is all that matters.” The priest drew deeply on his cigarette. “How did you get the blood on your clothing?” he asked as he exhaled a cloud of smoke.

Roger looked up at him. The priest seemed otherworldly in his black cassock, surrounded by a swirl of blue smoke. After a moment's hesitation he shrugged and gave the priest a brief version of his escape across the town, including his encounter with the VC on the back street.

“The girl,” the priest said pushing his glasses up to the top of his nose with a thumb, “the girl who told you to come here. What was her name?”

“Mai.”

“Half of them are named Mai. What other names did she have?”

“I don’t know.”

The priest stared at him unblinkingly for a long moment. Roger shifted his gaze to the window.

“Did she have a little shrine to the Virgin in her room?”

Roger looked back at him in surprise. “Yes. How’d you know?”

“She is one of my parishioners.” The priest sighed. “I had secured a job for her as a maid at your camp beginning next week.” He was silent a while, smoking his cigarette. Finally he crushed it out in a broken bowel on the table. “Listen to me, Roger.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.