Dzung spoke rapidly to Luong, who now leaned over and patted Muir reassuringly on a shoulder. “No problem!”

Muir was unconvinced. He called over to Condley. “Why should I trust them?”

Condley chuckled, comfortable on his cyclo throne. “Because if you don’t you’ll really have a problem.” He searched Muir’s reddened, sweating face as the traffic sped past them and noticed how tightly his hands gripped the side rails of the cyclo. For all his education, for all his competence, Muir was petrified simply to be out unprotected along the seedy edges of the city. “Calm down, Professor. If you ever double clutch out here you’re in trouble.”

“What does that mean?”

“You trust the people you’re supposed to trust and you fight the people you’re supposed to fight. And if you show no fear you’re the king.”

“King of what? This? Brandon, you’re irresponsible.” Muir mulled that, then let it go without further thought. He stared out at the chaotic clutter of renewal and decay existing side by side along the streets and at the river of traffic that surrounded them. They reached a major intersection and his head continually turned this way and that, registering his amazement as a blend of trucks, cars, motorbikes, motorized platforms, bicycles, and cyclos mixed together at vastly different speeds, not even always heading in the same direction. The two cyclo drivers deftly maneuvered them through the mass, managing a slow left turn as they picked up the road to District Four.

Professor Muir put a hand over his nose, trying not to breathe the mix of dust and exhaust fumes that had enveloped them. “I feel like I’m going to be sick. Do you actually think this is fun?”

Condley leaned back, glorying in it. “It’s more than fun. It’s life.”

Muir touched his clothes where the dust was settling on his sweat. “Not my life, Brandon! Fun is an evening at the Outrigger restaurant with good friends, having a wonderful wine, watching the most beautiful hula dancer in the world, with Waikiki Beach as my personal backdrop. That’s fun. This is . . . this is unnecessary! Unlike our little trip to Ninh Phuoc, which was a service to our country. It’s voyeuristic! It’s meddling in someone else’s catastrophe! I don’t need it.”

“Yeah, you do. You need it.”

“I didn’t come to Sai Gon for this.”

Condley shook his head with false concern. “Relax, I’m going to introduce you to some women.”

Muir looked ahead toward a decaying bridge choked with slow-moving traffic. “Do you know what my wife would think if I were killed in some Sai Gon bordello?”

Condley pointed back at Dzung, who was pedaling up the slight hill with a steady, pendulumlike rhythm that informed his hidden strength. “You’re not going to get hurt. This is one tough little guy. I guarantee.”