Blood & Tacos #3 (8 page)

“The first change Colonel Emmett made when he took command,” said Larson, “was to send out patrols after dark. It was unnecessary. Too risky. Everyone except the colonel knew it. The mission for this firebase is recon. You can’t recon in the jungle at night.”

Hines spat. “We have an outstanding record for targeting VC for the flyboys. We do our job. But doing our job wasn’t good enough for the colonel. He wanted a higher enemy body count so he could get himself a general’s star and he didn’t give a damn about sacrificing good men like Sergeant Williams for a promotion.”

Tara lifted her camera and snapped a picture of Hines.

They reached Williams’ hooch.

McCall entered the hooch alone. Tara lowered her camera and positioned herself between Hines and Larson in the entrance. Their grouped presence in the doorway deepened the interior gloom. The hooch was of uniform furnishings: cot, foot locker, a makeshift desk. McCall knelt on one knee to conduct a thorough search of the foot locker.

“Uh
huh
,” he said.

He rose, letting the lid of the locker snap shut. He exited the hooch, leafing through a small bound-leather volume.

Captain Larson craned his neck to try to make out the printing on the book.

“What did you find, Major?”

Hines guessed, “A Bible?”

McCall shook his head, snapping the book shut. “Not even close.”

Tara studied the book’s dimensions and appearance. “A diary.”

“When men keep one, it’s called a journal.”

Larson ran a broad palm across the bristle of his crew cut. “Why would Sergeant Williams keep a journal?”

“Why the hell wouldn’t he?” growled Hines. “I’ll bet he had plenty of stories to tell, going back to Korea.”

“Too bad he kept them to himself.” Larson extended his hand, palm up. “Mind if I take a look, Major? Maybe he wrote something that will help us.”

Tara said, “You could make bet on that.”

McCall slid the book into a pocket. “Sorry, Captain. First I’ll have a look for myself.”

Tara studied him. “You think that diary—excuse me, journal—holds a clue to who fragged the colonel?”

“That’s what I intend to find out.” McCall patted the book in his pocket. “Something tells me this is going to make for an interesting read, and I want to get started.”

Sergeant Hines said, “I’ll show you to the guest billets, for what they’re worth.” He glanced at his watch. “And it’s past chow time.”

Tara let herself into one of the guest billets—not her own—without announcing
her arrival.

McCall sat at a makeshift desk, a slab of plywood resting across two empty oil drums. Remaining seated, he pivoted with incredible speed, a blur of movement, freezing with the .45 in straight-armed target acquisition, its muzzle inches away from the center of Tara’s forehead.

She froze, lovely mouth agape, her green eyes wide, holding her breath in astonishment.

McCall sighed mightily, flicked on the safety and returned the .45 to its shoulder holster.

“Now there was a real temptation.” He returned to the material spread across the desk. “I thought we were going to avoid personal contact, Miss Carpenter.”

She stood beside him. She rested a hand on his shoulder. Her touch had always had its intended affect on him. He felt that humanizing affirmation borne of the touch of woman, of grace and beauty so uncommon, practically unknown in the harshness of war except as memories nursed by those who fought. She glimpsed the paperwork he’d been poring over: three personnel files, a yellow pad full of his notations, and the slim leather volume, folded open with the spine up.

She read aloud the names off the personnel files.

“Captain Larson, Lieutenant Grey, Sergeant Hines. I’m glad I don’t have to guess which one of those three fragged the colonel.”

McCall decided that he could either blow up or give up. This woman had a backbone of steel coupled with a tenacity that could wear down stone.

“And what makes you think the killer is one of them or that I’m guessing? It’s called investigating. What the hell am I going to do with you?”

An impish smile curved her lips, and with one graceful, impudent motion she was straddling his lap, her fingers entwined behind his neck, mischievous green eyes glistening, her lips, inviting, only inches away.

She whispered huskily in his ear, “I’ve got an idea what you could do about me.”

“You’re a vexatious wench.”

“Vexatious?”

“Sometimes I wish you were more of a nag. That would be easier to deal with.”

Realizing that he was serious, she lost some of her good humor. She withdrew from his lap.

“So what about the journal? Was it interesting?”

“What journal?”

At that instant, someone outside yelled, “
Incoming
!”

Then everything became drowned out by a startling, eerie whistling that increased in pitch and then was itself drowned out by a deafening explosion, an impacting blast that shook the hooch violently. Dust and red dirt powdered down upon them.

McCall grabbed the M-16 he’d been issued and rushed outside.

A night fog had fallen. A bursting flare overhead cast the base in surreal daylight. The first explosion had been a direct hit on the Huey that had brought them here, now nothing but an unrecognizable, flaming ruin. Everywhere on the base, soldiers were responding to the attack, some firing their M-l6s on the run, firing the weapons on full auto into the darkness beyond the perimeter. The artillery and the mortars and machine guns opened up, shredding the night with thunder and fury.

A whistling round missed McCall by inches, chipping off a chunk of the hooch doorframe. He felt a trickle of blood from a flying splinter, razor-thin along his cheek.

The next incoming mortar shell struck the main bunker. The Tactical Operations Command evaporated in a copper-red eruption of flame.

Then Tara was with him.

She said, “Damn but I wish they’d issued me a weapon. Don’t suppose I could borrow one of yours?”

McCall grabbed her wrist. “First let’s get you to cover. They’re targeting the hooches.”

They stormed into the battle, dodging strobe-like explosions. Shouts filled the air along with the stench of destruction, of burnt gunpowder, of killing and dying. McCall led her to a nearby pile of debris somewhat in the shadows; empty oil drums and discarded machine parts. A good place to stash a troublesome wife until the fighting was over. A round pinged off an overhanging piece of metal. She was right. He could not leave her unarmed.

He handed her his M-16. “Here. You qualified with one of these on the range back home. Time for practical application. Keep your head down. You are a non-combatant.” He unleathered the .45 from its shoulder holster and flicked off the safety. “I’ve got to keep moving, to help out.”

She took hold of the rifle, wholly comfortable with it. Then her eyes were distracted by something.

“Cord, look.”

He whirled, half knowing what to expect. Then he saw it too.

Through the disorganized melee of battle, a soldier, whose features were obscured, darted through the tumultuous firefight with determined haste, staying low to avoid incoming fire, one hand steadying his helmet as he ran, appearing to McCall to be somehow disengaged from the battle, particularly when he gained the hooch the McCalls had just vacated. The soldier entered the guest billet.

“Wait here,” said McCall, and he bolted.

“Right,” Tara said to herself.

She gave McCall a ten-count. Then she slung the M-16 over her shoulder by its strap and followed him.

McCall hesitated at the entrance to the hooch, the .45 automatic held down at his side, his presence undetected by the man inside because of the ferocious battle raging around them and because the soldier was preoccupied, in the process of reaching for the slim black book on the desk.

McCall said, “It’s not a journal.”

Larson whirled. His expression struggled between surprise and panic.

“Major, I can explain.”

They had to raise their voices to be heard above the cacophony outside.

“Captain, I’m arresting you,” said McCall. “You murdered Colonel Emmett. You fragged a fellow officer.”

Larson drew his broad, farmer’s body up straight, doing his best to reassert command even if he was outranked.

“Arrest me? On the strength of what? Every man on this base wanted to see that bastard dead.”

“Yeah, but you’re the one who went for the bait.” McCall nodded to the black book. “That’s no journal. It’s a notebook that I always carry. I had it on me when I knelt down to search Williams’ foot locker, and with the dim lighting inside the hooch and a little sleight of hand I had everyone thinking I’d found it there. I wanted to see if I could smoke out someone with a guilty conscience, and it looks like I succeeded. You wanted to see if Williams incriminated you in a journal after you confided in him that you were going to frag the colonel. Maybe I hadn’t gotten to that page yet and you could steal the book before I did. It was a crazy long shot, but it was the only chance you saw, so you went for it. A soldier like Sergeant Williams would tell you to bite your tongue and follow orders.”

A jolt of raw, bitter emotion erupted from Larson. “That’s exactly what he told me. Let it alone, Williams said. Follow orders. Right, follow orders. Sounds real honorable but look what it got the sarge and those other men of Bravo Company. Emmett was killing my men, goddammit. He had to be stopped, and I stopped him.”

A shell struck the next hooch over with a thunderous
crack!
like a lightning strike. Shouts for “
Medic! Medic!
” could be heard.

Larson lunged at McCall. “
Bastard!
”

McCall had hoped that sight of the .45 would discourage something like this, but Larson wasn’t about to be taken easily. McCall brought up the .45.

The
snap!
of a camera flashbulb came from close behind his ear.

Tara had crept up from outside and eavesdropped. The white flash seared the interior of the hooch, not impairing McCall’s vision because it came from behind him. The flash startled, stunned and stopped Larson. He reflexively threw his arms up to cover his eyes.

Tara said, “Gotcha!”

McCall brought his .45 around in a swipe that cracked the side of Larson’s head. Larson’s knees buckled and he collapsed. McCall pinned Larson with a boot to his back. He holstered the .45 and reached for the handcuffs attached to his belt. He spared a quick glance over his shoulder.

The beauty of his wife’s face was smudged with grime. Her red hair was tangled. She looked stunning.

He said, “Thanks, hon.”

Larson’s face, against the earthen floor, was an emotionless mask.

“You’ve got this all wrong, Major. Yeah, I thought it was Williams’ journal that you found. I came for a look to see if he thought anyone on base killed Emmett, to see if he wrote that down. I didn’t frag anybody.’’

“Sergeant Hines will fess up,” said McCall. “He gave you your alibi when he said you and he were together prepping for the IG inspection. But Sergeant Hines is lying because he hated Emmett too. You weren’t in the TOC bunker with your First Sergeant when Emmett was killed. I’ll go to work on Top’s conscience and his duty under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, and when he breaks, Captain, I’ll have the proof I need.”

Larson sneered. “What the hell kind of a soldier are you? Whose side are you on, McCall? I’m on the side of
our
troops. That’s more important than any VC body count so some fat-assed colonel can advance his career. You think I could let that go on?
Our
body count is my concern. Emmett got what he deserved. You know that, in your heart.”

“You’re out of luck, Captain. It’s my job to take you in.”

Someone outside yelled, “
Incoming!
” and again the air was split by that fast-approaching, ear-piercing whistle.

McCall sprang at Tara without hesitation, yelling to the man on the floor, “Move, Larson! Save yourself!

Larson got to his feet but made no effort to move.

He said in a calm voice, “Up yours, Major.”

With the incoming whistle growing impossibly loud, McCall plowed into Tara with enough force to knock her off her feet, sending them both airborne, pitching them outside of the hooch and onto ground. They landed together. Cord’s arms were around her. They rolled a few times before coming to a stop with Cord on top.