Across from the Rex Hotel, Dzung sat comfortably in his cyclo seat, smoking a cigarette and finishing his newspaper. Cong Ly and his friend had departed very early in the morning, saying only that they were traveling to the north. It was always like that with Cong Ly, mused the wiry cyclo driver as he flipped a page and continued to read. The American would disappear for a week or sometimes longer, never clearly saying where he was going or even what he was doing, and then return just as abruptly, filled with such a mix of exuberance and pathos that he could not help but touch Dzung’s heart.

Twenty yards away, across the street and down the sidewalk, a younger man braked his Honda to a halt and parked it among a long row of motorbikes. With his uncanny antenna, Dzung immediately sensed that the younger man was watching him as he took a ticket stub from the attendant who looked after the parked motorbikes. The unsmiling younger man pocketed the ticket stub and began walking toward Dzung. He had piercing eyes and a thin, gangsterlike mustache that drooped along the sides of his mouth. He was well-dressed, in dark gray slacks and a white shirt. And he was wearing leather shoes instead of sandals, which told Dzung that he was either a government official or a businessman.

The younger man crossed the street and stopped near Dzung’s cyclo. He lit a cigarette, surveying Dzung with an increasing arrogance, as if he were preparing to make an attack. A sudden, knowing tension filled Dzung as he rested under the younger man’s gaze. He ignored the man, continuing to read his newspaper, but every instinct in his body told him that for some reason he was in trouble.

Finally the man flicked his cigarette butt so that it bounced off the rear wheel of Dzung’s cyclo. Dzung looked down at the still-burning cigarette, which had landed near his feet. Then he looked over at the man. Their eyes locked for several seconds. Dzung’s expression did not change, but his insides were now humming with anticipation, as if he were just about to walk into an ambush during the war.

Dzung was not alone in his quick trepidation. The mood among all the usual hawkers, peddlers, and drivers across from the Rex had changed abruptly in the space of a few seconds. The two cyclo drivers who had been lounging next to Dzung jumped nervously from their seats and walked into the park behind them. Others watched from a careful distance. Feeling their stares, Dzung knew that he had only one choice, unless he were to become a pitiful beggar in front of his friends after all these years of insult and abuse. He climbed out of his cab and picked up the cigarette butt. Then he examined it as if it were a relic, or perhaps a piece of evidence.