Apricots by John E Holloway

Author:John E Holloway
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: War story. Fiction. Historical Fiction.
Publisher: Indigo River Publishing
Published: 2020-02-04T16:13:25+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

The New York Times

“Invasion Troops Trained to Make Surprise Raids.”

October 26, 1983—“The Marine amphibious unit that is fighting in Grenada had been scheduled to go to Lebanon and relieve the Marine unit in Beirut. An amphibious unit has five tanks, five 155-millimeter howitzers, eight 81-millimeter mortars, and four Cobra helicopter gunships. The infantry companies are also equipped with amphibious armored personnel carriers.”

At 06:30, Forrest attended the Colonel’s staff meeting held around the ramp of one of the C7s. The entire staff was there, including intelligence, operations, and logistics officers. The Colonel gave an overview of the operation, and each staff officer spoke briefly on his area of responsibility. When it was the intelligence officer’s turn, Gunner Johnson stepped up closer to the ramp. He was tall and thin and old. He wore thick glasses that made him look goggle-eyed, and he had crow’s feet around the eyes, a dark tan, white hair, and yellow teeth. “The PRA is collapsing,” he reported. “We have Richmond Hill, St. Georges, Grenville, Pearl’s Airport. The Army has the southern end of the island secured, including Point Salinas Airfield and the two medical school campuses. We think there are small bands of hard-core PRA still operating, looking for sniper or ambush opportunities. Bernard Coard and Hudson Austin are still out there somewhere. We have information that they have been using a house up in the mountains. We have an informant to guide us up there.”

Three hours later, Forrest’s three-amtrac patrol sat on a hard surface road near the top of the mountain behind St. Georges. The guide, who was sitting on top of four-zero to the left of the turret, pointed to a dirt driveway that wound up the ridge through the jungle. Forrest picked up his M-16 and walked out into the street. He took a deep breath of cool mountain air and thought how it reminded him of mornings in May when he and his father would head out onto the bay at dawn searching for schooling bluefish. It was a delicious smell.

Forrest stood facing the driveway. The guide walked up beside him.

“Dat it.” The guide pointed up the driveway. “Dat der is de way to de big man’s house.”

“Ever been up there before?”

“I’m de pool man.”

Forrest laughed. “You a pool man?”

“Dat right, Chief. What so funny?”

“Nothing.” Forrest smiled at the shriveled looking man. “Why you help’n us?”

“’Cause what he did to Maurice.”

Forrest nodded. “What’s the layout up there?”

The man looked confused. “What dat you say?”

“Where is the house, the pool, how far up?”

“House up der about so far, couple of bends. House on de right. Pool behind de house.”

“Anybody up there now?”

The guide shrugged. “Don’t know, Chief.”

The Gunny walked up.“What’s the plan, LT?”

“Any ideas, Gunny?”

“I’d say leave the hogs here in the street. It’s too cramped and hard to see up there. One ballsy fucker with a pile of RPGs could fuck us up pretty good.”

Forrest looked at the thick foliage on the hillside, then turned and looked out at the sea.

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