Charlie Martz and Other Stories by Elmore Leonard

firing began, even though over a hundred yards away, she would drop to the floor.
    For a while she watched the villagers filing by on their way to the spectacle. Some of them would be killed, no doubt. Well, they deserved to die, Ah Min decided, for supporting the recreation of these English.
    Even the weather supports them, she thought disgustedly. Today the usual afternoon rain had held off.
    Soon then, from the reaction of the crowd, she knew the games had begun. It was shortly after this that Yeop came into the office. A carbine was slung over his shoulder.
    â€œWork on Sunday?” the Malay said from the doorway.
    Ah Min rolled a sheet of paper into her typewriter. “I must practice this every day to be worth my wage.” Looking at him then she sensed his self-consciousness and almost smiled.
    â€œIs watching me your idea or Mr. Clad’s?”
    â€œWatching you?”
    â€œIsn’t that what you’re doing?”
    â€œI guard the cars.”
    Ah Min smiled. “Then we can be sure none will run away.”
    Yeop fumbled the screen door striking his head against it as he left and again Ah Min smiled. Watching me must be his idea, she thought. Only Yeop would think of so stupid a reason for being here.
    An hour passed, then another. Her anxiety began to mount and more often now she faced the window, her gaze held on the stands and the corner of the badminton court that was visible.
    Still, when the door opened, she knew instantly that no one had passed the front of the office or had come directly from the road. She turned, still expecting to see Yeop again; but the thin, unsmiling, tight-faced man in the doorway was Tam Lee.
    She saw the revolver and parang in his belt. She saw the unwavering unblinking expression of his eyes, and she knew why he was here. He moved past her, looking into Clad’s office, then motioned her inside.
    â€œThey failed,” he said.
    â€œThey?”
    He moved toward her. “There is no time for that today. Just do one last good thing and don’t scream.”
    â€œYou ran into an ambush and you think—”
    â€œAlmost. My forward men found them. We tried first one way around, then the other, but their lines protect Ladang on three sides. No isolated patrol; an entire battalion of Gurkhas deployed and waiting.”
    â€œGurkhas! There are none of those here.”
    But even as she spoke, as she heard Tam Lee say, “I know those animals when I see them,” she remembered a note on the wall and remembered a Colonel Gordon Mitchell and remembered Clad talking to him on the telephone, remembering part of it, not all, but enough—his words about a field problem.
    â€œMitch, why not march them up here? Let them bash about in the woods for the day . . .”
    Of all the days—Ah Min stopped. She heard Clad again using the same words over the telephone. “Of all the days to pick for a field problem . . . I know, I should have phoned you before but . . .”
    She provided the rest herself, though it was still Clad’s voice in her mind : But my girl misplaced my note to call you.
    On the left side of the board, she thought dully, instead of the right.
    They had come, perhaps arriving sometime during the night; but up early and already maneuvering, their lines dug in, firmly established in time for Tam Lee. Of course he would think it was an ambush. Anyone would. And there would be no convincing him otherwise.
    She was aware of Tam again, the parang already in his hand, the blade not glistening but hard and cold looking. She closed her eyes and let him come to her.
    I won’t scream, she thought. But she sucked in her breath, gasping and tightening as the parang went into her. She was already dead when, moments later, three rapid-fire reports of a carbine came from the front of the bungalow.
    T HE STRAITS TIMES HEADLINED the incident in its Monday edition.
    LEADER OF LADANG GANG SLAIN!
    A three-column picture showed Tam