The Cold Six Thousand - James Ellroy [196]
The kadre was kautious. Pete said trust no one. Pete decreed poly tests. Laurent ran said tests. Laurent ran the Port Sulphur hot seats. Wayne tested clean. Flash tested clean. Ditto Fuentes and Arredondo.
The Cuban runs worked. Mucho runs with no glitches and shit. Bob worked. Laurent worked. They shagged guns. They hid their sources. They said they hit the Minutemen. They said they hit John Birch. They said they tapped Army QMs.
Bob played it close. Bob cited need-to-know laws and source restrictions. Bob shagged good guns. Bob made concessions.
His sources feared tracebacks. His sources dipped their guns. His sources burned serial numbers. Pete hated it. Pete craved confiscation. Let’s tell the Beard that it’s us.
Bob shagged good guns. Bob shagged dipped guns. Pete went along with it.
The funnel ran to Cuba. The funnel ran back. The funnel ran information. Fuentes reported. Arredondo assisted.
Dig it: Skirmishes/village raids/running fire. Varaguay/Las Tunas/ Puerto Guinico. Insurgents hit. Insurgents kill. Insurgents die. Insurgents find replacements.
Good, but:
No major battles yet. No major progress discernible. No kadre guns thus decisive.
Wayne loved the Cuba runs. Wayne ate Dexedrine. Wayne notched seven run-notches. Dick Wenzel played skipper. Pete made two runs. Flash and Laurent made seven.
They got close. They dropped guns off. They shot inland. They torched huts. They scalped Fidelistos. They saved the scalps. They dry-cured them. They burned on their initials. They tallied them. They nailed them up. They served as boat decorations.
Wayne had sixteen scalps. Flash had twelve scalps. Laurent and Pete had nine each. Pete craved more. Pete craved escalation.
The war escalated. Their crops escalated. White horse escalated konkurrent. Mesplède ran Tiger Kamp solo. Mesplède brought in reinforcements.
Chuck was dead. Tran was dead. Pete was stateside. Laurent was stateside. Flash was stateside. Wayne was on rotation. Mesplède needed help. Mesplède bought more Marvs. Mesplède bought some Can Lao goons. They backstopped him. They ran the slaves. They surveilled the chemists.
Wayne knew the Tran story. Pete told him late. Pete said it’s all kool. Mr. Kao’s boys rent the lab. They work there on your rotations. It’s kosher. Goons guard your lab. Said goons pay tribute to Stanton.
The war escalated. Big troop stats swelled through ’66. Kao escalated. Kao pushed horse in France. Kao pushed horse in Saigon.
To slants only. No round-eyes. No GI biz.
Kao formed a dope squad. It was all Can Lao and all klandestine. They swarmed Saigon. They trashed “O” dens. They made them horse pads.
They ran said pads. They sold horse. They kept said pads klean. They scrubbed floors and swabbed spikes.
Kao had his fiefdom. Kao had export and Saigon. The kadre had Vegas.
They shared lab space. They shared vats. They shared guinea pigs. Junkies swarmed the Go-Go. Junkies geezed upstairs. Kao’s chemists used them. They brewed new formulas. They tested dosages. They notched fatalities.
Wayne rotated east. Wayne saw the war grow. Wayne saw horse grow konkurrent. Wayne rotated west. Wayne saw the war grow—every night on TV.
Barb saw the war. Barb loathed the war. Barb watched the war on TV. There’s Barb. She’s in Da Nang. She scores this white powder.
She toured Da Nang. She saw the maimed. She saw Pete fucked up. She dug pills. She craved more. She found it. She found horse. She sniffed horse. She disproved Pete’s assertion: We control horse/we contain horse/all whites verboten.
Barb flew home. Barb brought hospital snapshots. Barb watched the war on TV.
She had Pete full-time. She loved it. Pete loves the war. Barb hates the war. Barb sparks their war for real.
She ragged the war. She talked antiwar shit. She rode horseback.
She took tastes. It went up her nose. It went there under Pete’s eyes. She scored horse. She disproved Pete. She disproved containment.
Small tastes. No arc up to skin pops. No mainline spikes.
Wayne knew she did it. Pete didn’t. Wayne looked