Requiem for an Assassin

picked up. “Yeah.”
    “I’m here,” Hilger said. “In the city. Where are you?”
    I put a fifty-thousand dong note on the table and started moving. “District One. You?”
    “The same. Where are we going to do this?”
    I kept moving, watching the sidewalk and street. “You know the HSBC building?”
    “No, but I’m sure I can find it.”
    “Ask anyone. You can see it from most of District One—there aren’t many high-rises. There’s a coffee shop on the ground floor. Meet me there in ten minutes.”
    I clicked off and headed into the Rex. Two minutes later, I was in my third-floor balcony perch. No one had fixed the lightbulb. I set up the camera and tripod, then looked down at the statue of Ho through the 400mm telephoto lens. I could see every detail. If anyone asked, I was just a Japanese photography hobbyist, trying to capture the essence of the plaza below me. But I didn’t expect to be challenged. The Rex was never that kind of place.
    Ten minutes later, my phone rang again. It was Hilger. “You’re not here,” he said.
    “I got nervous. I wanted something more public.”
    There was a pause. “Don’t fuck with me, Rain. If I abort this meeting, your friend is going to die.”
    That was a bluff. Whatever he wanted from me, he wanted it badly enough to have come this far. I could safely take him along a little farther.
    “I’m not fucking with you,” I said. “Just walk to the City Hall, the huge French building a block south of you. There’s a plaza in front of the building with a statue of Ho Chi Minh. Lots of people around. Meet me in front of the statue.”
    Two minutes later, he showed. Through the camera lens, I could see everything in the brightly lit plaza, even the beads of perspiration on Hilger’s face. His right side was to me. I didn’t see an earpiece. So far, so good.
    This time I called him. “Are you there yet?” I asked.
    He looked around. “Yeah, I’m here. Why aren’t you?”
    “I’m being careful.”
    “You’re being too careful. You’re going to blow this whole thing.”
    “How do I know you’re not setting me up?
    “You’re the one who asked for this meeting, remember?”
    There was a pause. I said, “There’s a shopping center right in front of you, if your back is to City Hall. Saigon Tax, the one with the big Motorola sign on the façade, across the street from the Sheraton. With a Citibank building visible behind it. I’m inside, in the Góc Saigon café. Rooftop of the shopping center. Come on up and you can find me.”
    I watched him glance behind, then to the sides, then up at the buildings around him. I waited, and was rewarded with a close view of his left ear—empty, like his right. His eyes swept right over the dark spot where I stood. That’s right, I thought. I might be here. Or in Saigon Tax. Or in a room at the Sheraton. Or maybe I set up video in one of the vans in front of the Rex and I’m watching you remotely. Or I’m not watching you at all. The point is, you don’t fucking know.
    He clicked off without a word and headed up the plaza, toward Saigon Tax. I tracked him through the camera for a moment, then watched the plaza unaided.
    A few seconds later, I spotted a burly blond guy moving casually behind Hilger and in the same direction. I looked through the camera and saw that his eyes were everywhere, taking in all the details, his head tracking slowly left and right as he walked. The visual alertness was out of sync with the casual gait, and I made him as Hilger’s backup. I made him so fast, in fact, that I wondered for a moment whether he was supposed to serve not just as backup, but also as a distraction. The idea is, the opposition knows you’re looking for backup, or for surveillance, or whatever, so it serves up exactly what you expect. And because you’ve now spotted the danger you knew was going to be there, your mind unconsciously closes to other, less obvious possibilities. I knew there was going to be something…oh, there it is! is the mindset of amateurs and others without much hope of longevity in this business. I knew there was going to be something…there’s one, now where are the others? is the mindset of survivors.
    The guy kept gliding forward like a panther, confident, balanced. He was wearing rectangular, wireless glasses, and felt vaguely European to me. I wondered if he was the one who had picked up the phone when I first called from Paris. There was a readiness about him, not just in his