Courage Under Fire by Patrick Sheane Duncan

Courage Under Fire by Patrick Sheane Duncan

Author:Patrick Sheane Duncan [Duncan, Patrick Sheane]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: military fiction, war
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Published: 2020-01-24T00:00:00+00:00


7

Serling sat in the room on a chair with weak springs and stared at two things on the coffee table— the Walden 201 file and the bottle of George Dickel. He sat there for a long time.

He unscrewed the cap from the bottle, then tightened it back down. He took out a legal tablet and wrote up a report on Altameyer, printing neatly so that someone else could type it for him.

Debating with himself about how much to tell Bruno, not wanting the little man to overreact, Serling wrote the report without holding back anything. If he decided to censor the report to Bruno he would just make changes in the typed copy.

When the report was done, he put it and the Walden file into his briefcase. All that was left on the table was the bottle.

Fort Benning was quiet, even peaceful, at two in the morning. Serling walked aimlessly, just wandering, relishing the cool, damp air. He strolled through the middle of the Physical Training Course, past the apparatus and raised platforms for the supervising instructors.

The bottle was in his back pocket, a constant reminder.

The field was dark, but at one edge stood a phone booth that was lit from inside. In the light fog that was drifting across the ground the phone booth glowed. A beacon for a lonely man.

Serling walked across the field and over to the phone booth and stepped inside under the light. He took the bottle from his pocket and put it on top of the phone and dialed.

There was a rattle and a clunk on the other end.

“Hello?” The voice was slurred with sleep.

“Hi, hon.”

“Nat?! Where are you?” Serling liked Meredith’s voice when she first woke up. There was a bit of little girl in it and a bit of a sexy rasp.

“Still at Benning. I’ll be in San Antonio in a day or two. At a hotel. I’m tired of BOQs and Fort Sam is limited in accommodations. I was thinking of stopping at the Alamo, get the kids T-shirts. I thought I should ask you about the sizes.”

“Nat, you know their sizes better than I do.” The sleepiness that was in her voice at first was gone now. “What’s going on?”

Serling looked at the bottle before he spoke.

“You always call me on it, don’t you?”

“And you do the same for me. That’s how it’s always worked.”

There was another moment of silence. Then she spoke softly.

“What is it, Nat?”

Serling’s thumb worked at the remnants of the plastic seal on the bottle.

“Nothing. I just wanted to talk to somebody who doesn’t salute, I guess. A halfway friendly voice.”

“Well, do you want me to rattle on for a minute?”

“Please.”

“Let’s see. Something’s wrong with the new fridge. The light doesn’t come on when you open the door. And no, it’s not the bulb. Lynn lost a tooth. We did the whole tooth-fairy bit, she found a quarter under her pillow. So I catch Roger with a pair of pliers trying to get little Barry Kravel to yank a few of his bicuspids.



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