One evening, a week after they had moved in together,and after an hour of silence, he put down his notebook and said,
"Thuy, you are my Anti-Muse."
"An- ti-muse? What's that?"
"A Muse inspires an artist to create, you inspire me to destroy."
She did not know what to say.
The next night she woke and saw him sat at the foot of their bed. It was hot and stuffy in their tiny bedroom. The world outside was silent, as if they were alone in all the dark world. As her eyes accustomed to the gloom, she saw that he was holding a glass of vodka, and his head was bowed down low.
"Whats wrong," she whispered.
He shuddered, and then gulped down his vodka.
"I can't sleep," he replied.
"Why?"
"Planning something big."
"I know... How big?"
"The Governor General's Palace."
"Tell me about it in the morning."
She embraced him, and gently pulled him down into her bed.
His plan was genius in its simplicity, and monstrous in its brutality. Steven and Erik would attack simultaneously at midnight on Tet eve. Whilst the rest of Vietnam was celebrating, they would delver a crushing bombardment.
When Thuy heard the plan she clung to her lover passionately.
"You are crazy," she said, "I love it."
And yet, still, something went wrong.
When she was a little girl, her father had deserted her, and her family, without any explanation.
Thuy had been so angry that she had picked up her dad's radio and smashed it against the wall. For one moment, before guilt or regret, she had felt overjoyed. She saw it break into hundreds of pieces, and she felt powerful. She could control things, she could destroy thing...
That was how she had felt when she had thrown her hand grenade at the Police Station.
Their house was in the far north of the city, near the river. It had been built by a failed dutch trader,and retained a Dutch style in its high, arched roof. It had only two stories, living room on the ground floor,and a bedroom above. It had an outhouse in the tiny back yard, and,most importantly, a cellar.
The cellar was accessed by a trap-door which was easily concealed from above.
To Thuy, their house represented freedom; to Steven it was a strategic base.
Erik would often visit the house, unexpectedly, and spend the night sleeping on the living room floor.He had learnt to trust Thuy, but he preferred to speak in Russian, so she rarely understood him. Still, she knew that he and Steven were planning something.
Steven had changed since the incident on her birthday, and even more after they had moved in together.On the one hand, he was generally more confident, more dynamic, more passionate. On the other hand, he had become prone to melancholic moods, where he would sit in silence for hours, scribbling in his private notebook.
He no longer went to visit ' Elderado'.
It was clear that Steven and Erik were planning some thing very big.
