Paul placed himself between Siona and the exit to the maths building. “Do you like classical music?” The sun shone through the glass doors behind him, making his ears appear reddish and almost transparent.
   “I suppose so,” Siona said, not wanting to admit that she knew very little about classical music as it seemed the sort of thing you should like. Her father listened to country and western on the radio, although he would switch off with a sigh and a shake of his head if the songs touched on drunkenness or infidelity. Siona’s mother listened to the Psalms or old and crackly recordings of a second cousin who was a Mod gold medal winner and sung in the traditional Gaelic style. The cousin’s voice was as shaky and trembly as the worn tape. Neither of them had any patience for modern music and Siona hadn’t had the courage to try to find out what she really liked.
    “Do you like Mozart?” Paul asked.
    “Oh, yes.” Siona said this with more conviction, because she had watched the film 'Amadeus' with some other students from her hall.
    “This Friday, the London Philharmonic Orchestra is giving a concert: symphonies 39 and 40. I thought it would be a nice way to celebrate getting through the first term. What about it?”
    Students jostled past in a hurry to get to the next lecture. Siona squinted at Paul, shading her eyes against the sun. They had gone to talks on cosmology together and in a café afterwards they had had heated discussions about whether space was straight or warped. However, an invitation to a concert felt like a date. She didn’t want to hurt his feelings by turning him down, and wished she'd said that she hated Mozart. “I'm not sure. I'm getting the train back to Glasgow the next day.”
“But you’ll still be here on Friday.” There was a touch of impatience in his clipped tones.
    “I'll need to pack on Friday night and get myself organised.”
    “Can't you pack beforehand? I've already bought the tickets and I won't be able to get my money back.” He sounded peeved. “It's just a small thing and I thought you’d enjoy it.”
   Siona experienced a brief flash of anger that he had already got the tickets, but immediately felt guilty about her lack of gratitude. He was right. It was just a small thing. She shouldn't read too much into it. “Okay, I'll go.” She stepped to the side to move past him, because he was still blocking the way to the door. “Thanks,” she added without much conviction.
    His mouth twitched upwards and he shot a glance at his watch. “That's sorted then. I'd better go. I’m running late for my next class.”
                                                                      #
   The next day, Siona waited until the last possible minute to go into her maths lecture. Paul was clever, polite, more knowledgeable than her and usually pleasant to talk to. However, she wanted, just for once, to break the habit of sitting beside him.
    She took a seat in the back from where she had a view of Paul's ash-blonde hair and reddish ears. He swivelled round, his glasses reflecting the overhead lights so that she couldn’t read his expression.
    As soon as the lecturer finished speaking, Siona squeezed out past two students who had arrived even later than her, and walked rapidly to her engineering lecture. 
Paul caught up with her at lunchtime when she was eating her sandwich in the common area. “I missed you in the maths lecture this morning.” It sounded almost like an accusation.
   She felt annoyed. He didn't own her. They didn't have any kind of arrangement to always sit together.
   He searched her face, as if he was uncertain of the outcome, and she felt guilty. He had been a friend, in a way, and perhaps she had been unkind. She said, “I was late so I just slipped in at the back.”
                                                                               #
   On Friday, she spent a lot of time trying to find the right clothes. She had to look as if she had made an effort and at the same time not wear anything which made her look as if she was trying to appear attractive. In the end, she settled on a pair of black trousers and a lobster pink shirt which was a birthday present from her mother. It didn't suit her, but it looked smart. She braided her hair and pinned it up at the back in a style which made her face look thin and severe.
    When they met in the entrance to the concert hall, Paul's smile was slow and appraising as if he were weighing up something he had just bought. He placed a hand on the small of her back to steer her over acres of deep red carpet and past cream walls with fancy plastered ceramics. Siona wanted to recoil, but it seemed rude to wriggle away after agreeing to come to the concert with him. When he handed over the tickets to the attendant at the door, she caught a glimpse of the price and wished she hadn’t; he had spent more on the tickets than her weekly food bill.
   They sat down in plush velvet chairs. Siona craned her head to take in the ornate plasterwork on the ceiling, and wishing that Paul would stop spoiling the moment by talking about the music they were going to hear in a voice that was just a little too loud. His tone conveyed both confidence and authority. No matter how knowledgeable she became, she would never be able to speak with such certainty. Now and then he leant towards her including her in his knowledge, “Of course, you know that Mozart ….”
   She had been afraid that he would discover her ignorance, but he seemed happy to talk. All she had to do was nod and smile. He didn’t notice or care that when it came to music, she couldn't interrupt and give her opinion in the way she did after science lectures.
   When the music began, he settled back in his chair and spread his legs so that his knee brushed against hers. She pulled her knees together and shrunk into herself, feeling as if her body was screaming, “Don't come any closer.”
   There was plenty to fill Siona’s mind: the music, the rapid flash of the musicians’ hands over their instruments and the people packed into the hall in quiet, rapt rows. However, every time she lost herself in the moment, Paul’s hand or knee brushed against hers, and she drew away. By the end of the concert, she felt as brittle as an autumn leaf from holding her body stiffly away from his. As they filed out into the lobby, she gathered all her energy and smiled. “Thank you for the lovely evening.”
   “Would you like a coffee?”
    “I need to get back,” Siona said. Her face felt tired from the effort of smiling.
    “We always go for a coffee after the cosmology lectures.”
    He sounded piqued. Siona felt bad about upsetting him after all the money he had spent on the tickets, and so she agreed. He led the way, turning into darker and quieter streets.
   “I think we’ve gone the wrong way,” Siona said. “It doesn’t look like you'll find a cafe around here.”
    “No, we’re in the right place. Only pubs are open at this time and I know you don't drink,” Paul went up a short flight of steps to a doorway. “So I thought we might as well come to my flat for a cup of coffee.”
   Siona felt her shoulders grow rigid and tight. Very few lights were on in the building. Perhaps everyone was in bed. “It’s too late. I need to get back. Where’s the nearest underground station?”
   Paul sighed, a long out breath that signalled his disappointment in her lack of trust. “If that’s what you want to do, but there’s no station near here. I’ll phone a taxi. Don’t worry. I’ll pay the fare.”
    He pressed a code to open the main door and looked back over his shoulder. “You might as well come in while you wait. You’ll be warmer inside.”
   He might have also added safer. Siona looked up and down the dark street and didn’t feel at all comfortable about standing there alone. She followed Paul up the stairs. His flat was just one room with a kitchen area at one end and a desk and sofa at the other. There were no flatmates to relieve the intimacy.
   He spoke into the phone and turned to her. “He says he’ll be at least half an hour. Maybe longer. They’re busy on Friday night. You might as well have a hot drink while you’re waiting.”
   To hide her nervousness, Siona tried to make conversation. “It must be nice to have your own place.”
   He spooned coffee grains into a coffee machine. “My parents bought this place when I came up here to study. It’s not big, but it’s all I need. Most of the people in the other flats work in London during the week and go home to their families at the weekend.”
   Paul said. “Take off your coat. You might as well make yourself comfortable while you wait.”
   Siona slipped out of her coat and shivered as she sat down.
  Paul brought over the coffee and sat so close that their legs touched. Siona shifted along, her coffee slopping over into the saucer, and Paul settled again, so close that she felt the warmth of his body. She couldn’t go any farther, because she was right up against the arm of the sofa.
   Science seemed a safe, neutral topic, and so she began talking about what her engineering lecturer had said about global warming. “I had a lecture about global warming today. It was just an introduction, because we’re looking at renewable energy next term. It’s scary how the carbon dioxide’s just been rising since the industrial revolution.”
   “Don’t listen to that stuff about global warming,” Paul said. “It’s a load of tosh put out by liberals to make us pay much more for our energy. Renewable energy might seem harmless, but it will ruin the environment. Think what our countryside would look like covered in wind turbines.”
   Siona was surprised by the vehemence with which he said this. “How do you explain the rise in temperature over the last fifty years if the climate isn’t warming?”
   “The climate’s always been variable. We’re going through a warm phase right now. Just be glad that we’re not going through another ice age.”
   He said this so dismissively that Siona didn’t have the confidence to argue further, or tell him that when she saw the slides on wind turbines and solar heating systems, she had experienced a quiet moment of recognition; this was what she wanted to do when she finished her degree.
   He placed his hand on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. It could have been a friendly, reassuring gesture, but her body tightened, and she squirmed away saying, “I’ll just look out the window and check if the taxi’s here.”
   “Don’t bother. He’ll buzz at the door when he’s ready.”
   He told her how much his father would make on this flat when he sold it in four years’ time while his hand crept back. She felt guilty about appearing unfriendly or ungrateful and tolerated the weight of his hand on her shoulder. As he talked, as his hand slipped down her side and over the curve of her waist, grazing past the edge of her breast on the way. She hunched her shoulders and shrank into her core, disassociating herself from the feel of his fingers on her skin and trying but failing to follow what he was saying about carbon capture. Maybe he was just being pally, but surely he could tell from her body language that she was uncomfortable.
His hand crept down further and rested warm and hard on the curve of her buttocks. It was like the feel of a wasp creeping on her skin, or nails scraping across a blackboard. She leapt up and screamed, “Stop it!”
   He blinked at the strength of her reaction and stood up too, placing himself in front of her. “I thought you wanted this.”
   “I didn't. I never wanted us to be anything more than friends.”
    “You’ve been happy enough to let me take you out to a concert and bring you here for coffee.”
   “I thought you just wanted a friendly night out to celebrate the end of term.”
   A muscle moved between his mouth and his ear and he spat out the words.    “Friends pay their own way.”
    Her skin crawled, hot and prickly, as if each cell was on alert. A suffocating fear settled on her chest. She wanted to run, but her legs felt weak. No-one knew that she was here. Even if she yelled for help, the sound would be absorbed by the empty flats above and below. She had willingly walked into a trap.
    She forced herself to breathe quietly, digging her nails into her palms with the effort to appear calm. “I’m sorry if I gave the wrong impression. Please let me past. I’ll find my own way to the underground.”
    For a long moment he looked at her, his face flushed. He turned away and said, “If that’s the way you feel, then just go.”
   She ran as fast as she could, down the stairs and along the street. The tube station wasn’t far away at all; she reached it within five minutes.
                                                                       #
   She finished packing in a daze, stopping at intervals to rock back and forth, trying to block out memories of the evening. Every time her mind drifted toward sleep, she jolted awake with a memory of Paul’s fingers creeping down her side. She curled up into a ball, retreating deep inside as she shrank away from the memory of unwanted touch.
   A few hours later, she sat on the Glasgow train with her cheek pressed against the cool  glass of the window. Railway embankments, suburbs, industrial parks, waste ground and rain-sodden fields slid by beneath a grey, clinging sky. She felt apprehensive about going back to visit her parents, because she had changed so much in the last few months.
   By the time the crowded train jolted its way through the Midlands, Siona began to feel anger with herself, Paul, and her sheltered, respectable upbringing. When she met people who didn’t mean well, she was disastrously ill-prepared to deal with them. She had been trained to be kind and helpful and do her best to please. At times, she was even expected to be compliant to the point of sacrificing her own interests. 
   No-one had told her how to look out for herself. She wondered how she could have been so naïve as to think that she would be safer inside his flat than trying to find her own way to the station. Deep down she had known that Paul was trapping her, but she had overridden her instincts and colluded in the pretence that his intentions were nothing but friendly.
   As the train drew into Glasgow Central, Siona spotted her parents waiting on the platform. Her father pulled impatiently at his greying, ginger beard, and her mother appeared anxious as she scanned the passengers leaving the train.
    She waited a moment, and then took a deep breath and stepped out. Her father clapped her on the back as he took her bags. Her mother hugged her and then held her at arm’s length to look at her. “You haven’t changed at all, a ghraidh. How are things going?”
   “Fine.” Siona couldn’t quite look her mother in the eye. She was no longer the innocent girl who had left them, but perhaps that was a good thing.
 

Sravani Singampalli is a published writer and poet from India. She is presently pursuing doctor of pharmacy at JNTU KAKINADA university in Andhra Pradesh, India. 

​It was a rainy day. The winds were tempestuous. I was sitting at the veranda with my cup of hot coffee. I was enjoying the cool weather and kept on staring at the rain and the swaying trees. All of a sudden I caught a glimpse of a moving light around a big mango tree. I started wondering what it could have been. My grandma was sitting beside me so, I told her about what I saw. She was startled at my words, came closer and asked me to repeat what I just said. In an articulate manner I repeated “I saw a moving light around a mango tree.” She hugged me tightly and took me inside without saying a single word. This made me even more curious and I wanted to know the reason behind this sudden quirky reaction of my grandma. We were having our supper but I still continued to think about the moving light I saw around that big mango tree. After the supper I immediately went to my grandma’s room and asked her the reason behind her strange reaction. I mean it was just a moving light, that’s it! nothing else. My grandma said that it wasn’t something so obvious and murmured into my ears that it was a very strange pisachi (a devil) with light on top of its head. Well, it actually sounded too funny and unrealistic to be believed. I burst out laughing and made light of my grandma. My grandma lost her temper and started shouting at me “what do you know about this pisachi, it took away my beloved son.” I saw tears rolling down her red cheeks. I hugged her and wiped off her tears. I apologised and asked her to narrate the story of that devil to me. My grandma started off by describing the special traits of that devil. She said that it appeared in many different forms. It used to roam around in disguise. She said that during night time it used to disguise as an animal with light on top of its head and lived on the trees. People in the village could actually know its presence because of this wavering light. It sounded very interesting. She told me that there were many rumours in our village about this strange devil. People used to say that it never attacked anybody directly and said that it used to visit everybody’s houses for help only on the days it used to rain heavily. If the owner of the house allowed her inside then the very next day the owner would die, my grandma said in a low tone. Then she told me that she heard many incidents about people dying because of this evil spirit. Even I did not believe in these rumours until the day my eldest son became a prey, my grandma said in grief. She became very emotional so I consoled her. After a long pause, she continued with her story. She said that the weather was very harsh and it rained very heavily the day before my uncle died. Around 11 o’ clock somebody knocked at the door and it was my uncle who opened the door. My grandma said that she was also standing beside him. A young lady with an innocent face in a red sari fully drenched by the rain was standing near the door way, my grandma said. She started pleading us for allowing her to stay in the house for just a night as it rained heavily and said that her own house was very far away so; it would be difficult for her to reach her house in such a harsh weather. “I shouted a very big No!” my grandma exclaimed. My son didn’t listen to me and convinced me to allow her stay as she was a lady. I knew that she was that awful pisachi who killed so many people. I decided not to sleep that day, she said. I tried controlling my drowsiness but somehow my eyes closed. When we woke up in the morning, she had already vanished without saying a word. Your uncle as usual went for his work and came home in the afternoon for lunch, my grandma continued. After his lunch, he decided to take a nap and by 5 o’ clock he was found dead on his bed. I broke down into tears and couldn’t believe that my son had died. My grandma couldn’t control her emotions anymore and her sobbing woke up everybody in our house. My parents scolded me for disturbing her and started consoling my grandma. My conscience wasn’t allowing me to believe this story. So, the very next day I went to my grandma and convinced her that uncle’s death just could have been a coincidence. I also gave many evidences but she refused to believe my words and my way of analyzing things. Not only my grandma but many people in my village still believe that their relatives died because of this ‘devil’. I am a modern- day girl so my conscience never allows me to believe these things but after listening to my grandma’s story even I fear looking at the trees and the moving light during night time. There are many kinds of fears in our society and the entire world which would never get erased like the fear of ghosts, demons, behemoths and other evil spirits. They will continue for years to centuries.       
       

​This is about my cousin Gordon who grew up rough.  Nobody, including his mother Thelma, knew for certain who his father was, only that he was black. Sadly, his mother who was my aunt, a drunk and a pill freak, was hardly the ideal mother.  By the fourth grade Gordon knew how to get himself fed, dressed, and off to school unassisted.  Whenever Thelma, who was my dad's half- sister, pulled one of her frequent disappearing acts my dad would fetch Gordon to stay at our house. My mom would launder and press all his clothes and often buy him a new pair of shoes or trousers.  In the seventh grade his residence with us became permanent when Thelma took a header off the Stoker Island Bridge.
Until I went away to university we shared a bedroom.  Gordon was obsessively neat; I wasn't, but he never complained about my piles of clothes or junk; he kept just the areas around his desk and our bunk beds tidy.   Because there was a tiny reading lamp on the bottom bunk, he asked to sleep there while I preferred being closer to the ceiling fan as it's hum seldom failed to lull me to sleep.  Gordon often read until late.  Sometimes we lay chatting into the night.
In grade school he had been picked on.   This for a variety of reasons:  he looked more negro than white, he was tiny, he had often worn the same unwashed clothes for days on end, he wore glasses, and our school was rife with snobbery as are most schools.  Too, our school was in an affluent district which seem to expose his poverty.  In seventh grade, with his nose broken, bruised and wonky, he faced an expulsion hearing for having broken the wrist an eighth grader who had called him "nigger boy".  Fortunately, my dad, an attorney, stood by his nephew and nothing other than the disfigured nose came of it.
 My father did not often show affection, not that he was cold, he was just a quiet, taciturn man.  I still harbor a suspicion that Dad preferred Gordon to me as Gordon was more like him and, truthfully much smarter than I.  However, I was not jealous as he was not only my cousin but my best friend, by far.  We shared confidences and covered for each other's peccadilloes.  Soon after he'd come to stay permanently with us, dad bought us chess sets and taught us the game.  We devoured chess and must have played thousands of games during our high school years.  Gordon beat me at least three out of four times, but I won enough to present a challenge.  Dad, however, usually kicked his ass all over the chess board.  Yeah, chess was big at our house.  Our two cats were called Bishop and Rook.
Although Gordon was an outsider who truly loathed the fucked up social-side of school, quietly he learned.  Other than phys-ed, he could pull value from every course he took, and actually liked math courses, Latin, and even wood shop.  He was a good student, a quiet and steady worker, the kind most teachers appreciate, however most of his teachers simply overlooked quiet, dark-skinned, little Gordon Fleck.  Although he had a strong bent for academics, it is odd that Wood Shop was his favorite class and, as it would turn out, his most important course, as Mr. Abrams his shop teacher in tenth grade, was the only teacher to recognize that special thing in Gordon and to take a liking to him, and that good man introduced Gordy to his personal hobby – wood carving.  Noticing a talent Gordon had working with a chisel one day he asked, "Would you like me to show you how to carve?"   He first taught Gordon how to carve simple things like boats and cars from small blocks of soft pine.  Later he presented him with a simple two-dollar Barlow pocket knife, though he insisted Gordy exchange a coin for the knife, the superstition holding that such would prevent the knife from cutting friendship.  Gordy indeed had a knack for this, and Mr. Abrams advanced his instruction to more difficult subjects like animals and bas reliefs executed in hard woods. He carved dozens of beautiful little figures during that year, improving steadily. By the end of his senior year he had become an artisan.  For the last two years of high school, after the last bell of the day, Gordy would trot down to Mr. Abram's woodshop and while the two sat and carved they would talk politics.  Mr. Abrams was probably the only liberal teacher in the entire school.  My Aunt June ran a small gift shop at the hospital and sold every piece she could finagle out of Gordon; he was that good.  He could carve anything – horses, dragons, any kind of fish or sea creature, but he particularly liked carving little images of people with exquisitely detailed faces.  He had a knack of caricaturizing faces in wood.  In our senior year he and Mr. Abrams split a thousand-dollar prize for their joint project "The Three Faces of Elvis" in walnut which took first place at the state fair's art festival.  He did stunning nine-inch bass wood busts of my mom and dad.  He always carried a chunk of wood with him along with his trusty Barlow pocketknife and a piece of sandpaper. 
Wood carving was not the only new find from Mr. Abrams who also introduced him to the ideals of the left.  He gave Gordy a well-worn little paperback copy of The Communist Manifesto.  Gordy became so engrossed in the little book he must have re-read it a dozen times.  Within a few weeks the little book was ragged, dog- eared and full of Gordy's penciled notes.  At night as we lay in our bunks he would read portions to me.  "Man, this shit is so good," he'd say, think about it.  What if the whole world was classless and everyone equal with public education and public health for everyone?  Think of it Gordon, women equal to men, Blacks, Asians, Indians equal to you almighty whites.  No kings, no popes, no industrialists controlling the masses with soldiers and police and superstitions.  Marx has this greed thing nailed, Billy.  I can so dig it."
Maybe I could dig some of it, but hell's bells it was communism. "Damn it, Gordy, your hero is the original fuckin' communist. They're the enemy, buddy.  Doesn't that say something to you?" 
"Ism's schism's, Billy, I dig the message.  Marx explains so well why, so many things are fucked up.  Why there is poverty amid wealth.  Capitalism stokes greed, Billy.  But I know what you're saying.  Yeah, the Russians and the Chinese come down hard on their people.  Dissent will get a body locked up.  That's wrong, but see, that isn't what Marx was about.  Also despite their leaders' heavy handedness, the Soviet Union and in Red China have taken quantum leaps forward from the bad old days of czars and war lords.  Cuba too.  But here in the industrial world the difference isn't so much a matter of want as it is greed, unfettered greed.  Look at all those shitty rich kids at school. Strip them of their fifty-dollar sweaters, their hundred-dollar gym shoes, their cars, their parents Country Club elitism and they'd probably be decent without their well-taught, greedy senses of superiority and class.  It's like a virus passed from parents to offspring.  You don't know how good it felt to twist that fucker's wrist until it snapped, and to hear him beg for mercy.  Even then I wanted to piss on the rich puke.  I don't know yet how I feel about communism.  Seems like the Soviets and the Chinese have twisted it way too tight; yep, there's a dark side to their brand of communism.    What I do know though is that I share the ideals in Marx's little book and that I can see clearly that there's also a nasty dark side of capitalism.  And don't worry Billy, I don't talk about this with anyone except you and Mr. Abrams and he's cool."  I asked him if Mr. Abrams was a communist?  "Definitely not," he said, " Mr. Abrams said he would never join any political party, especially one that's so hated in America.  He told me, "Gordon, I'd bet that you will never join any party, there's more anarchist than socialist in you. Eventually all political parties fall out of favor.  When they get defensive they become dangerous.  You need look no further than Senator McCarthy."  He said the governments put names on list and come after you like they did in Hollywood.  Besides, I like some, not all, of Marx's ideas."  Still, I could not understand this; I worried about his flirtation with such a fucked-up ideology.
"Well, I'm thankful you know that it's best not air that in public."  I felt honored that he'd discuss his burgeoning views on capitalism and socialism with me but not even mom or dad.  Still, his notions were fucked up.  Shit, you'd think that everyone knew that communism was bad news.
Dad kept a sailboat on the lake and that's where Gordy and I spent weekends and summers, at the lake sailing.  Gordy had a part-time job at the boat works.  We loved the water and he loved boats.  Sometimes he talked about joining the Navy; he loved anything nautical.  The sailboat was a draw and we could sometimes pick up girls from the vacation cabins, but none of the things we'd hoped for ever even came close to happening. 
In 1965 I went off to the university while Gordon elected to stay at home to attend classes at the community college and work at the boat yard.  His introduction to higher education must have been poor.  His letters complained of "professorial arrogance" and incompetence.  He was quickly done with it. At the end of his first semester he dropped out.  He attempted to join the Navy but could not pass the physical because of a heart murmur.  However, he applied to and was accepted to the Merchant Marine Academy at Kingsport where the examining physician either missed or overlooked the heart murmur.  There his neatness, intelligence, and diligence served him well with his graduating in three years with a bachelor of science and a United States Coast Guard unlimited license as a Merchant Marine Officer and Third Mate ticket.  He came to my graduation ceremony in his Merchant Marine Officer's uniform looking so smart. Normally Merchant Marine Academy graduates are automatically commission as Ensigns in the Naval Reserve; Gordon's heart murmur and deteriorating eyesight however disqualified him from this usual commissioning.  He had two weeks leave before reporting to his first billet as Third Mate aboard The Mercury Flyer, a cargo vessel under Panamanian registry.  I had little time to spend with Gordon as I had become engaged to be married and would begin law school in a week.  Before we parted he gave to me a beautiful polished cherry wood bas relief of the two of us head to head over a chess board, our clearly identifiable faces set with determination.  It is the thing I value above all other possessions.
Gordy loved going to sea and he loved his ship.  I received his post cards and occasional letters from exotic places like Singapore, Manila, Sydney, like this from Djakarta:
 Life at sea suits me fine, Billy.  There's a general air of equality and a man is respected pretty much on how he performs his work and the honor of his word.  No one gives a shit who you might have been or where you came from as long as you work hard and are fair in your dealings.  Our crew is an international mix of Lascars, Filipinos, Chinese, Americans etc. Some with pasts it's best not to ask about, something which bothers no one.  Our captain is a 70-year-old Greek with 55 years at sea.  I work for the chief mate, Mr. Jollicoeur, who, while rather disdainful of Merchant Marine Academy graduates (who he refers to as sea pussy) has taken to pushing much responsibility upon me.  He insists that I am present on the bridge for any evolution, especially navigation tasks like shooting the stars, and he has me in the holds when we take on or off-load cargo.  He even had me operating the cargo boom when we took on containers of furniture in Manila!  I knew I was gonna love this life!  
After the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, the war in Viet Nam intensified and I counted ourselves lucky because I qualified for a college deferment and because Gordy's heart murmur protected him from military service.  However, after only two years at sea, he had failed a requisite annual visual acuity test and sadly, he lost his ticket thereby ending, his beloved merchant marine career. I knew his loss was a crushing blow, and I worried over its impact upon my best friend.  His letters began reflecting an uncharacteristic sour state of mind, and were filled with complaints: Despite his qualifications he was having trouble finding a decent job that offered a future; he felt he was a failure.  This self-pity was for him abnormal, but understandable.   Gordon was not a "people person" and I reckoned this dark mood dampened his job interviews.  In his letters he blamed potential employers, labeling them racists and dumbshits.  Too, he ranted at what he termed "the criminality "of the war in Viet Nam.  Using his savings and began travelling from port to port up the coast in search of a nautical job.  Ultimately, he found a good position managing the office of a Canadian company in Vancouver, Pacific Crest Shipping.  There he threw himself into learning commercial maritime laws and shipping regulations.  And there he had his first love affair, this with a forty-year old secretary in the ILO office, Ruby Carrington who happened to be a bona fide card carrying communist.
Beginning work in the Pacific Crest office, Gordy had not recovered from the depression he'd slid into when his career at sea collapsed.  Until Ruby his salvation had been work, where he had buried himself in learning maritime law and in managing the office on the docks of Vancouver. Week by week he absorbed maritime law, torts, and contractual law at work.  And week by week Ruby Carrington drew him out of the fog of gloom he'd suffered for a year and a half.  Warm, sensitive, and nurturing, her attentions and intelligence restored balance to Gordy's life.  He at last had an ear that would listen to him, and Ruby understood him with a depth I probably never achieved.  The two lovers picnicked in Stanley Park and took Sunday dinners in Chinatown.  His heart soared when she invited him to move in with her.  Ruby's friends, including a few fellow communists and Gordy, enjoyed discussions they'd have over big spaghetti and wine dinners twice a month at someone's apartment.  While friends pinged on him to join the party, Ruby did not, as she knew his feelings.  His bent toward socialism was strong, but so too was his skepticism regarding the harder aspects of life in countries under communist party control.  Ruby's friends acknowledged such problems but advanced that only with a younger generation would justice be able to rise.  These young communists believed that youth and time would lead the world ultimately and inevitably to the worker's paradise.  It seemed to him that their young minds were clouded by the romanticism of the movement.  He scoffed at their Che Guevara tee shirts.  Although Gordon disagreed, he was energized by the arguments.  One issue on which everyone agreed was the travesty of the American war in Vietnam.  There was fervor among most Canadians against the war.  Some even travelled south to attend anti-war protests in Seattle and Portland, and on the docks, Ruby's ILO gang bosses were giving preferential temporary hiring to American draft-dodgers and deserters.  For his part, Gordon had several anti-war letters published in The Vancouver Sun. His letters to me from Canada showed that he had come out of his funk.
"These Canadians are so much like us in speech, tastes, and mannerisms but socially and politically much more conservative.  Also, they enjoy a national pride we seem to have lost.  Ruby has been a godsend.  She's opened some of the windows I'd closed when I lost my Third Mate's ticket, she's led me to see that there are some good people out and about.  Her coterie of intellectuals gathers twice a month for wine and spaghetti and late-night discussions like you described at your university.  It's stimulating.  She's a peach, I tell you.  
My work goes very well.  Pacific Crest Shipping is a small fleet of three RO/RO (roll on/roll off) container ships working Pacific ports.  Get this-- last year we trafficked twice in Haiphong – that's in N. Viet Nam!  Even though up here they are very conservative politically, just about everybody. excepting some military and old men, is against the American involvement in Viet Nam.    Canada ain't at war, god bless 'em.
Our company's owned by a consortium of wealthy Canadian-Chinese who live here in Vancouver.  My boss, the General Manager, is Anthony Yang whom I very much like and admire.  He tells me he's grooming me to take his position, and has taught me much. He's very bright and hard-working.  Some nights we don't close the office until ten o'clock.  Good work and a good woman-- what more does one need?  Speaking of good women, Ruby and are flying in for your wedding on the 16th, you lucky duck!  See you then, Billy Boy."
About a month after Billy's wedding Anthony Yang asked Gordon to a private dinner at the Hotel Georgia with two of the powerful men from the conglomerate.  There they confided to Gordon that they and other members of the consortium were ready to make Anthony a partner.  Further Anthony had convinced them that Gordon had been a rare find, a treasure and would be fully capable to fill his old job as General Manager.  There was one caveat, the old men demanded Gordon to sail one voyage aboard each of the company's ships.  This would allow important personal interfaces with ship's masters and sea-going officers and allow Gordon to observe how well company policy is carried out at sea. This, to the consortium was crucial.  When Anthony asked if Gordon had any objections to going to sea for a few months, Gordon's face beamed.  "Are you kidding, Tony; just throw me in that briar patch."  Later he suggested that he sign on as purser rather than passenger.  Everyone loved the idea. 
He signed aboard the Pacific Jade Star as purser one day before the ship completed loading and sailed for Honolulu.  From there the ship would discharge and load cargo in Singapore, Djakarta, and Yokahama before its return to Vancouver two months later.  The purser's job was simple accounting and administrative duties dealing with port authorities, but he took pains to do extra favors for the officers and crew, like getting a crew member's visa renewed in port, or taking pains to secure the freshest lobster, choice cuts of meat, and fresh fruits for the mess.  Jade Star seldom spent more than two days in port so there was scant opportunity for sight-seeing or pleasure.  He relished being back at sea and spent as much time on the bridge.  Captain Capello, as salty as they come, loved to spin yarns seated in the elevated captain's starboard swivel chair.  As Gordon was a good listener and loved ships and the sea, the Captain and Gordon struck a good rapport.  The voyage was a complete success.  Back in Vancouver, Gordon handed Anthony Yang the detailed report on JADE STAR's operations included facts, recommendations, and opinions.  So impressed were the old men of the consortium that they awarded Gordon a thousand-dollar bonus before he set sail on his second voyage aboard Pacific Crest's Lotus Dream. 
Upon sailing Lotus Dream's only known port of call was Osaka to off-load twenty-two frozen food containers and take on seventeen units of televisions.  To reduce time in port, container ships often sail knowing only the next port of call.  Like most shipping lines, Pacific Crest relied on radio communications to provide updates to itineraries.  Midway across the Pacific orders for Lotus Dream to take on containers of truck parts and motorcycles in Hong Kong for delivery to the port of Haiphong.
 Aboard the ship were seven Americans whom the First Mate called into a meeting.  While in Haiphong they would under no circumstances leave the ship, and they were ordered to not even approach the brow.  He explained that the North Vietnamese would know Americans were aboard from the crew lists required by the Harbor Master.  The protocol specified that as long as American crew did not set foot on North Vietnamese soil their safety would be honored.  There had been no problems to date.
So busy was the Port of Haiphong that the Lotus Star had to wait two days moored to a channel buoy in the roads among other ships in line, while Chinese and Soviet cargo ships discharged priority military cargo.  That first night in the roads Gordon was seized by an acute pain in his belly.  Next morning his was febrile, nauseous and the pain increased.  It soon became clear that he was suffering an appendicitis attack.   First Mate Jollicoeur, a Canadian, radioed ashore for an ambulance.  As he stepped from the radio room he ordered Gordon carried into the ship's boat. First Mate Jollicoeur personally delivered him pier-side to a battered Datsun pickup truck painted with a red cross.  On the way to the hospital Gordon's appendix burst. His next two weeks were in the Haiphong Hospital as he slowly recovered from acute peritonitis.  He would later learn that without the Lotus Star's complete inventory of antibiotics from the medical locker, twenty lbs. of tinned coffee, and a case of Johnny Walker Red hand delivered to the Viet hospital one hour before Lotus Star's departure, by First Mate Jollicoeur, Gordon would surely have died.
The first Vietnamese phrases that Gordon would learn were for "Thank you, doctor, thank you nurses," this learned from Dr. Ong Wang who had performed three belly surgeries on him, it was a week after his last surgery before he was able to sit up. Kindly old Dr. Wang informed him that his ship had sent his possessions ashore before sailing and he could have these when he left the hospital.  "First some officers must see you.  Please remember to be very respectful, do you understand?"  Aware of his precarious position, how could he be anything but respectful?  Two uniformed officers, a man and a woman came to his bedside to interview Gordon.  From his pillow, he bowed first to the man, then to the woman and addressed them with the traditional Vietnamese greeting he'd learned minutes before from Dr. Wang.  Addressing him as Mister Fleck, they asked his military status.  Each was very stern in demeanor. The man questioned why he held no commission in the Naval reserve.  Dr. Wang was summoned and listened intently at Gordon's chest for three minutes then confirmed his heart murmur.  "Since your country is at war with The Democratic Republic of Viet Nam, you are enemy," the woman informed Gordon.  "You must come with us."   Over Dr. Wang's protests, Gordon was placed on a stretcher, carried to a waiting pickup, and driven propped-up between the two officers in the back of a tiny taxi to prison located in village some fifteen kilometers from Haiphong.  There he was placed in a cell by himself.  And there Gordon would slowly and painfully recover, regaining his strength little by little while learning the language and customs of Viet Nam from one of his jailers, Ong Le, a former teacher, now a soldier who had been drafted, and who was studying English.  Ong Le had a gift for simplifying instruction, and teaching Gordon, a Westerner, the nuances of the tonal language.  All lessons began with drills which stressed each of the tonal inflections.   After each practice session Ong Le and he would exchange a list of fifty words to memorize by the next day.  Gordon always ended his list for Ong Le with a colloquial phrase, like "See you later, alligator."   Within three weeks, his coherent sentences could be easily understood and by six weeks he surprised himself one night by dreaming in Vietnamese, so easily did the language come to him, much to Ong Le's credit.
Once Gordon became ambulatory he was sent out on work details sweeping streets, tending graves at a military cemetery, cleaning fish.  The street sweeping detail was detestable as residents always stared and sometimes cursed him and even spat upon him. Children, when no adults were present, would approach at times to touch his dark skin or his hair.  On work details the food ration was a meager rice ball and bowl of soup daily.  On good days the soup would contain a small piece of fish or pork.  Back in his cell officers came to interrogate him, asking the same questions over and over.  "What is your military status?  You are Navy Officer, yes?  Tell us the truth, Mr. Fleck."  And over and over again he recounted his history.   He was forbidden to talk or interact with the other prisoners and was the only one in a private cell.  He was permitted to speak only with the military men in charge of the jail. These were wounded men reassigned from combat to home duty.   The peacetime jailers and town policemen had been drafted into the army leaving wounded military replacements to supervise the small prison. The jail's prisoners were Vietnamese charged with stealing, avoiding the draft, or desertion.  Perhaps as soldiers his keepers intrinsically knew that Gordon was not military, but they were curious about the life of their negro American ward.  Technically he was not a prisoner of war; his confinement was a precaution to protect the people from the influence of spies and foreign provocateurs.  Consequently, his keepers, while initially aloof, were not cruel in their treatment of Gordon as they would have been had he been a military POW.  His food ration improved.   He was told he was not a prisoner.  When he asked, "if I'm not a prisoner, what am I, and why am I in jail?  "You are "special category foreigner, Mister Fleck, maybe later you are prisoner of war.  Now you are "special category foreigner" don't ask questions.  Only thing just be good."   
One sunny morning he was issued a new set of pajamas, escorted by two soldiers to a jeep, driven back to the hospital in Haiphong, and placed in freshly made bed. Friendly old Dr. Wang came into the room smiling and asking to see his scar.  Examining him he spoke in a low tone.  "Some people come here to make pictures.  Very important.  You must smile and show appreciation.  Do you understand?"  Indeed, later that morning three Germans came to his bedside, two men and a woman.  One man set up still and motion picture cameras while the other rigged a microphone on a boom over Gordon's head.  The woman introduced herself as Gertrude Schlosser representing the newspaper Nueus Deutschland.  The brief interview was a pleasant change from the routine of work details.  Yes, he said, the North Vietnamese, have treated me decently, considering my country is at war and currently bombing innocent civilians here.  He praised Dr. Wang and the nurses at Haiphong Hospital and said that he admired the courage of the Vietnamese people.  No, he had not been in contact with any military prisoners of war. It was a short interview.  The Germans' larger interests were scheduled interviews with captured American flyers.  Frau Schlosser and her engineers thanked him and presented him with a few flat tins of German cigarettes.  He'd give half the cigarettes to Dr. Wang and trade the others to the head jailer, Sergeant Bui.  The little tins he would keep.
Several kilometers to the north and to the west of the prison's village were air bases, which the Americans frequently bombed usually at night.  On those nights guards and prisoners trooped outside into sand bag bunkers to feel the earth shake, to breathe dust, and fight mosquitoes by the dim yellow light of a single candle. The bombings were so frequent that most had adopted a stoic attitude and took the bombing as a routine annoyance unless personal losses were experienced. Sometimes people and structures nearby were hit.  Gordon spent an entire week on a work detail alongside townspeople repairing a heavily damaged bridge.  He admired these little people's pluck in the face of such powerful giants.  
Sometime during his second month he was given his small bag of personal possessions which the ship had delivered to the hospital.   Most welcome were socks, shoes, and a shirt.  On afternoon he noticed Sergeant Bui, the sergeant in charge, paring his fingernails with his own beloved old Barlow. 
Gordon bowed.  "Sergeant, you have found my lost knife.  Thank you.  Please will you return it?  I have carried that little knife for ten years.  Since I was only this tall."
A wry smile crossed the sergeant's face.  "No, no.  Not yours.  This knife is mine,  similar like yours maybe.  I have had it for eleven years."
Bowing once more, Gordon replied, "I salute your very good choice of knives.  If you were ever to think of acquiring a better knife, I would be disposed to trade this wristwatch."  In this bargain his eighty-dollar Seiko changed hands for his beloved two-dollar Barlow.  Included in the deal were the last of the German cigarettes and the sergeant's guarantee that Gordon could keep his knife, despite the jail's regulations.  The diversion the knife provided was a godsend to Gordon.  In the evenings he set about wood-carving.  His first project was a little bust with the sergeant's face sternly peering beneath a military helmet. This present greatly impressed the sergeant, and was followed by little busts of the other three guards.  These treasures and his improving linguistic abilities warmed them to him and he sometimes he found an extra ration or a candy in his cell.  The soldiers eased into a familiarity, softened the tone of their voices, and spoke easily and friendly with Gordon, a serious student of their language.
Sergeant Bui, career NVA with eight years' service had been sent south two years earlier in charge of a mortar crew.  He'd taken a serious shrapnel wound in his right foot during an American artillery barrage, had been given first aid, then placed on a truck packed with other wounded to be hidden under the forest's canopy during the day then driven for two nights back north.  He limped and sometimes Gordon could see him wince, but he did not complain and did not relate war stories even when Gordon pressed.  Of the others, two were young, maybe nineteen or twenty, volunteers and Ong Le, his teacher, who was a thirty-year-old draftee.  All had been sent south and all had suffered debilitating wounds that put them out of combat.  The boy called Vinh had survived a bullet through his neck which left his head in a permanent position, requiring that he turn his entire body to adjust his field of vision.  Trinh the other boy had lost most use of his left arm from burns, probably from white phosphorus or napalm.  Ong Le had lost an eye. Considering that each one's experience in the south had been grim, they were visibly appreciative of the soft duty minding this small prison, thus serving the war effort by releasing the regular civilian crew for induction and service down south.  Both boys looked up to Sergeant Bui and always seemed eager to please.  Ong Le, educated and older than the others, was called uncle.  Sergeant Bui had status from his years' service in the army and rank as well as a likable nature. Too, he had been decorated for "heroic valor under fire from the enemy."  Since the trading of the Seiko for the Barlow, Sergeant Bui had warmed to Gordon.  All of them were curious to learn about Americans. They asked the cost of everything:  bread, bicycles, cars, rent, motorcycles, shoes—everything, they wanted to know how much American soldiers were paid.  When he estimated that a soldier of equal rank and time in service to the sergeant would probably earn about $400 monthly, they initially refused to believe him.  Were negroes paid as much as whites?   Had the police ever sent attack dogs after Gordon or other negroes he knew?  One day upon returning to his cell from work detail, on the little table lay a box covered in inked stamps and seals. The care package Anthony Wang had sent two months earlier containing: vitamins, coffee, tinned bacon, and Heath Bars.  A note read: "Hang on Gordon, we're working to get you home." 
As his keepers relaxed and grew more and more comfortable with him, life eased.  No longer did they lock his little cell which they called his "tiny house," and often they shared leftovers and tea from their meals, Sergeant Bui even brought him candles.  Only when foreign journalists were in the town did he have to go out on working details. He was still forbidden to mix with or even talk to real prisoners in the jail.  Clearly, he enjoyed a special status. 
Gordon set about carving a chess set.  He dove into this project and carved the king, queen and bishops as traditional figurines, however his pawns wore the conical straw hats of Southeast Asian peasants carrying Kalashnikovs rifles, and the knights were erect, stern-faced uniformed NVA. The figurines were quickly and roughly carved, without Gordon's usual finesse and attention to finer details; still, the project took two months to complete.  The chess board he fashioned from bamboo strips, half of which he'd darkened in a tannic acid solution he'd made from bamboo leaves and urine.  Playing chess with the now good-natured sergeant broke the dullness of the rainy monsoon afternoons when wind and rain beat upon the tin roof. 
One such rainy afternoon the sergeant handed Gordon a tattered envelope, date stamped forty-five days earlier from Vancouver, B.C.
"Gordon, I cannot detail all the things we've done, but prospects are looking positive for your release.  I have an appointment with someone in the North Vietnamese Embassy in Ottawa this Friday.  I will deliver to them letters for you from Ruby and your family, copies of the Vancouver Sun in which your anti-war letters appear and an affidavit your lady friend Ruby obtained from the Chairman of the Communist Party in British Colombia verifying the party's knowledge your strong anti-war stand. Keep strong.  Keep the faith, my very dear friend."  This buoyed his spirits immensely.  He felt so good that he allowed the sergeant to win two games that afternoon.  He would never learn that Anthony Yang had negotiated a several thousand dollars bribe for Gordon's release.  Gordon stayed strong and he kept the faith and sure enough just before Thanksgiving he was escorted by two soldiers to a Dutch container ship whose next port of call was Long Beach, California.  Before leaving, he shook hands with Ong Le, thanking him with a gift of his empty cigarette tins and socks. He smiled at his teacher and said, "See you later, alligator."  Ong Le replied, "After a while, crocodile." To Sergeant Bui he presented a little bas relief of himself and the sergeant playing chess, probably like the one he gave me.  Sergeant Bui in turn presented Gordon with an elephant hide billfold in which he included a picture of himself with his wife and two small children.  On the reverse of the photograph Sergeant Bui's address and this note, "Maybe after we win this war, you and me friends, yes?"  To the good doctor Ong Wang, he presented the rough carved chess set which brought tears from the old man.
During the crossing aboard the Haarlem Droom, Gordon would gain five pounds and remain in a state of continual wonder at the three meals a day, each with meat, of hot water, of hearing English spoken, of clean clothes, and of laughter.  Captain De Groot welcomed him on the ship's bridge during morning hours and entertained him with sea stories and cups of delicious, rich, hot chocolate.  Late afternoon and evenings he napped or played chess with the crew.  The radio officer sent radio grams to Ruby, Anthony, and to family.  Entering Long Beach harbor, the ship's lookouts reported an unusual crowd at the assigned loading pier. Captain De Groot addressed the mate on watch, "Ah, must be for our good passenger.  With a pair of binoculars Gordon's scan of the pier caused his heart to skip a beat when he spotted Ruby, Anthony Yang, in a smart blue suit standing next to Gordon's mother and father.  The binoculars did not reveal that among those present were two federal agents from the FBI who promptly and professionally placed my cousin Gordon Fleck under arrest and escorted him through the crowd to a black station wagon which drove him to the Federal Corrections Facility, Terminal Island.
My cousin was charged with violation of the "aid and comfort to the enemy" clause in the treason statute, confined, and informed that he faced a possible sentence of life in a federal penitentiary.  My dad, a lawyer, was present at his bail hearing which lasted all of five minutes and which denied bail to Gordon.  The government's case against Gordon rested on an interview published in the East German newspaper Neues Deutschland picturing Gordon smiling from a hospital bed and in which he praises the North Vietnamese war efforts and from a newsreel from Soviet Television showing Gordon filling sandbags with North Vietnamese workers at a bombed-out bridge reconstruction site near Haiphong.  The Government's lawyers offered a deal. In return for Gordon's guilty plea the government would agree to a one-year sentence at the Federal Minimum-Security facility located on Eglin Air Force Base in Florida nick-named Club Fed.  Gordon would have extraordinary privileges and even be able to leave the facility under certain conditions.  In the froth and momentum of the antiwar movement, the government was extremely anxious to prevent Gordon from becoming a poster boy for the movement.  Just that spring, upwards of a quarter of a million antiwar demonstrators had marched on Washington. 
When I visited him at his Florida facility he told me that dad wanted to fight the case in the courts, but Gordy did not. He shared the government's fear that he would become a celebrity.  He would heed Anthony Yang's advice that upon his release he would quietly apply for Canadian citizenship. 
The Federal prisoner facility at Eglin Air Force Base was a special "country-club" spot for convicted politicians, judges, and special non-violent politically sensitive cases like Gordon's.  Quarters were the top floor of a modern enlisted men's barracks with two to a room and shared bath, and a recreation lounge.  His roommate was a hugely fat former state legislator convicted of accepting bribes.  Gordon's duties consisted of trimming hedges and raking sand traps at the air base's golf course three days a week.  Twice a month he could be signed out for three hours by family members for lunch in town. 
The year's confinement returned him to his chief diversions, reading and wood carving.  Ironically his sentence afforded him the freedom of the leisure time that would result in his achieving not only retribution for his government's shabby treatment, but wealth as well.
It was during this time that I was recruited to act in secret as Gordon's agent in a matter he wished kept from the government.  After his return from North Vietnam a flurry of letters flew between him and Rose.  She visited him shortly after he arrived at the Florida facility and during that visit plans were laid.  One week before his scheduled release Rose would again visit.  Carrying Gordon's identification and a Power of Attorney I had picked up at an office supply store, I presented myself to the clerk of the court for Okaloosa County and with Rose I obtained a marriage license in Gordon's name.  "He's in the hospital for a liver transplant.  It's important that Rose and he marry before the operation.  I hope you can understand the urgency, sir." That done it was no problem to find a willing minister.  There are more preachers than mailmen in Florida.  I was able to sign Gordon out for an afternoon luncheon one afternoon just days before his release.  On the dining deck of Franco's Fantastic Seafood, overlooking the Gulf of Mexico, Gordon and Rose were married by the Rev. Jojo Sledge of the Calvary Temple Gospel Church who finished the solemn vows with the flourish of, "I now pronounce ya'll man and wife.  You kin kiss the bride, sir.  Halleluiah, Praise the Lord!   Our parents, Anthony Yang, and I felt as though we had pulled a fast one on the government and we were quite merry., however if we had known the true state of Gordon's health we would not have felt such joy.  Only to Rose had he disclosed that he had returned from Viet Nam with a heart condition.
The honeymoon in British Colombia was kicked off with a spaghetti dinner attended by a host of old friends, longshoremen, Pacific Crest employees, and communists who presented the happy couple with a week's stay at Giant Bear Lodge at the north end of Vancouver Island. 
As mentioned earlier, Gordon had returned to his beloved avocation of wood carving.  The rough set he had executed in N. Vietnam and presented to the good Dr. Wang had inspired him to carve another, and with the gift of time imposed by the sentence, he intended to perfect the figurines to be done, this time in much greater detail and in hardwood to be finished smooth.  I was able to deliver seasoned chunks of live oak, an extremely hard wood.  Old Ironsides, in fact, had been constructed of Florida live harvested from the Gulf coast not far from where he was confined.  The white figures, the N. Vietnamese whose pawns, the same Viet Cong soldiers in conical bamboo hats and bearing AK47 rifles, were executed in minute detail.  Each rook was a pit of sharpened punji stakes, knights were helmeted NVA solders holding rifles with fixed bayonets at port arms. The two bishops were images of the hero General Giap in splendid uniform.  The white queen was a uniformed North Viet Nam Army woman, representing the many female soldiers.  The king was none other than the venerable Ho Chi Minh.
Carved in walnut, the black side's king was a grinning Richard Nixon leaning in a forward slouch, rubbing his hands together, his queen, the unmistakable image of evil Dr. Henry Kissinger standing expressionless with briefcase in hand.  Detailed images of the bespectacled, flat, unsmiling face of Robert McNamera served as bishops, helicopters for knights, and delicately carved aircraft, their wings armed with bombs and missiles, served as rooks.  Pawns were helmeted GI's with M14 rifles with fixed bayonets.  At the time of his release he had not finished carving the final figures of the fighter aircraft. These he finished in Canada some months later carving the most difficult pieces by copying details from a plastic model of the A4 Skyhawk.  The chess set was exquisite; each piece hand polished in a natural finish, white in live oak, black in rubbed walnut.  He was immensely proud of this work of consummate artistry.  He sent photographs to his old mentor Mr. Abrams.  It was his best work.
The Sunday Vancouver Sun ran a two-page feature on the carving of the chess set.  The paper hailed Gordon as "one of Canada's premier artisans" a tribute not missed by the office of immigration.  He had been relying on his marriage to Rose to ensure approval of his request for Canadian citizenship. A week following the publication, his application was approved, and he was sworn in as a Canadian citizen.  The feature drew attention from other media and soon Gordon received occasional requests for interviews and photos from newspapers and magazines, some foreign.
One visitor was a Mr. Clive Jamison representing the company that had made the plastic model of the A4 Skyhawk.  Mr. Jamison, like Gordon, was half-black and like Gordon had been a picked-on, introverted boy who had been fascinated with constructing models from materials he found. His love of model making had led him to his job.  The two men instantly became friends.   His company, he said would like to use his images in small plastic figurines for cheap chess sets to be made available in several hundred retail outlets in North America and Europe.  Gordon would receive an up-front payment and royalties from each sale. 
As an aside and on a personal level, Mr. Jamison further suggested that Gordon have the figures cast in their larger sizes in bronze and copper.  "Listen, Gordon, put these on an eighteen-inch leather board and you can command five or six hundred dollars a set.  Think about it, Gordon.  If you're interested in doing that, I'd like in on it."  
"The money's not important," Gordon told him, "but I do so like the idea."
 By the end of his first year in Canada, in partnership with Anthony Yang, Clive Jamison, Rose and me, the Art of War Company was launched in Vancouver naming Rose Fleck president and general manager.  Gordon preferred to remain a silent partner.  "I don't give a shit about the money.  I've got Rose," he told me, "she's all the wealth I need."  He did insist, however, that the casting of the chess pieces by done in Viet Nam.  The $150,000 invested by the company would be recovered by the first few month's orders.  Photo ads in prominent newspapers and magazines in North American and European cities were met with an explosion of orders.  Art of War expanded from a rented office to its own office building in Vancouver, and the Nha Do Foundry in Hanoi hired a dozen additional employees to meet the demands.  Gordon was proud that thirty-two individual orders originated from members of the United States Congress.  Ironically the figurines were cast from smelted brass artillery casings and copper wire salvaged from military wreckage.  Soon after President Nixon's 1974 resignation, Gordon was quoted in an interview, "I'm proud to have had small part in memorializing this most delicious check mate."
Rose and Gordon would have two healthy children, a boy called Anthony and a girl Emma.  My father worked tirelessly for an appeal to Gordon's conviction, and in 1978 Gordon received a full pardon from President Jimmy Carter. Sadly, this pardon came just three days before Gordon suffered a fatal heart attack in Vancouver. 
By the terms of Gordon's will initial grants of $50,000 followed by twelve percent of Art of War, Ltd. profits sponsor an orphanage in Haiphong and another for mixed-race children in Ho Chi Minh City.  All of us miss my beloved cousin Gordon Fleck: hero, artist, and Canadian citizen.
                                                                           #end#