Finding Moon

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 hell, Moon thought. “Or perhaps the friend’s telephone in Manila had been disco

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 na

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.”

WASHINGTON, April 23 (AP)-A spokesman for President Ford said today that sixty helicopters have been assembled on three aircraft carriers off the coast of Vietnam prepared for speedy evacuation of Americans if it becomes necessary.

Evening, The Fourteenth Day

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 furnishings. 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 shipped. 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 damned 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 cocks 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.