Dana Stabenow - So Sure Of Death

He went back outside and drew in a breath of that fresh air. It tasted good. It was a beautiful view, too, he thought, without knowing it joining Wy in her admiration of the fall of ground from in front of the bluff to the river below, the scattering of glittering lakes and streams, the distant surface of the bay gleaming blue in the sun. Yes, the old ones had known what they were doing when they built here. A defensible position, an accessible escape route, food, water and a vista that went on forever. He wondered what they had thought about the edge of the ocean where it vanished over the horizon. Did they fear it? Yearn after it? Was it where they ascended to heaven? Was it where they placed their gods' homes?

He turned and looked at the dig, the two tents, walls flapping in the afternoon breeze. The prospect seemed somehow forlorn, almost lonely, and a fragment of verse from his favorite poet came to his mind, describing another forsaken graveyard nobody visited. So sure of death was this place, too, from which living men shrank, as if denying a place of death denied your own. Liam knew better.

So did Don Nelson, now.

A mile from the dig he found the dump Nelson had referred to in his journal and, glad to delay the inevitable, stopped the fourwheeler. It was a mound of dirt fifty feet across, and some of it had been there long enough for the grass to sprout. There was even some Alaska cotton, white tufted blooms waving in the breeze, and some dwarf fireweed, although those two hardy plants would probably sprout before the lava cooled off after a volcanic eruption. Over the other, fresher dirt, there were marks of some tracked vehicle, a small bulldozer maybe, or a backhoe. Liam walked all the way around the mound, and found a hole dug in the far side, away from the dig. He wondered if Don Nelson had been digging there. He kicked at the sides of the hole, and the clods came away easily, not yet hardened into place by the passage of time. He didn't see anything but dirt and more dirt, so he climbed back on the four-wheeler.

It took over an hour to get to the Air Force base, and by the end of the journey Liam was heartily sick of trying to keep the four-wheeler upright. There was nothing intrinsically unstable in the design-handlebars, a seat and a freight rack equally balanced over four wheels-but for some reason it threw his balance off. The only time he'd been on the direct path to the base was when he'd been crossing it, and he'd had to get out and push his way through the mud three times, which didn't improve his frame of mind. The knowledge that he was going to face his father for the first time in over three years with a stained uniform and muddy footgear soured his mood even further.

He knew enough to go around the runway, not across it, but they were waiting for him anyway, a Jeep with a couple of M.P.'s in white helmets sitting in front, identical quizzical expressions on their very young faces. Military men always wore the same mustaches: a thin fringe of hair that never quite seemed to fill in. Theirs were brown and blond, and only served to make them look even younger and more government-issue than they already were.

Liam said who he was and what he wanted, and the driver slammed the Jeep in gear and made a wide, flamboyant circle around Liam to lead the way. Liam fell in behind, the fourwheeler marginally more stable now that he was on pavement.

He'd been born on an Air Force base in Germany, and he'd spent most of his formative years on Elmendorf Air Force Base in Anchorage. Here were the same regulation buildings lined up at the same regulation angles, the bunkhouses for the enlisted men, the shops and hangars lining the runways, the command and administrative offices, always the biggest buildings on any base. Everything was made of the same material, too, siding and shingles covered with regulation gray paint, all purchased in bulk by the Department of Defense from the lowest bidder, who was usually one of the larger contributors to reelection campaigns of members of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Squares of regulation-height grass fronted the living quarters and the administration building, and someone had taken the time to comb the banks of the Nushagak River for regulation-size rocks, paint them a regulation white and line them up around the regulated squares of lawn. The benevolent old sun bathed everything in deceptively mellow light, miles of gleaming black tarmac, the runnels of the corrugated tin roofs, the surface of the great river and the Bay beyond.

That selfsame sun positively glittered off the metal wings of the aircraft parked on both sides of the strip, outlining the silver fuselage of the jets, the camouflage patterns of the Hercs and the bright orange paint jobs of the AirSea Rescue units with almost painful clarity. Heavy equipment was lined up like soldiers next to a garage, a tractor with a big silver blade, a road grader with an even bigger blade, a dump truck, a front-end loader, a back-hoe and some others Liam didn't recognize. He'd bet the Air Force base's taxiways were clear of snow before the runway in Newenham was.

Liam followed the Jeep along a regulation route and pulled in next to them in front of the regulation Base Officers' Quarters, which naturally had the largest lawn, the nicest view and was the farthest away from those noisy runways. The M.P.'s got out, straightened their regulation uniforms and trod the regulation steps. The second waited for him, regulation door held open.

Liam interrupted his snide inner commentary with a pithy warning to pull up his regulation socks. Okay, he'd affronted his father, a career man, by refusing a similar life in the military, and he'd further annoyed Charles by being afraid to fly, thus condemning himself to a lifetime of not necessarily silent disapproval. That said, Colonel Charles Bradley Campbell was not the entire United States Air Force. Chinook Air Force Base was a pretty little base, neat and tidy, in a beautiful setting, and seemed prepared for action. The men and women stationed here were serving their country for a paltry remuneration and at considerable personal sacrifice, most of them far from homes and families. He brushed futilely at the dirt on his pants, squared his hat, thanked the men in the Jeep with grave courtesy and climbed the stairs, trying not to feel that he had descended from the tumbrel only to ascend to the guillotine.

There was a comfortably furnished sitting room, with chairs and couches and tables and lamps scattered here and there. A writing desk sat in one corner, furnished with notepaper, envelopes and pens. A small refrigerator hummed in another corner. A baseball game played on television, courtesy of the satellite dish on the roof outside. An open window looked toward the river and the opposite bank, a mile away. At night you could probably see the lights of Port of Call, the tiny little village perched at the eastern edge of the river mouth. Every five or six years a winter storm took out more of that sandy bank, and every year those who refused to give up and move into Newenham moved their houses back another ten feet.

The room held only one occupant. Charles Bradley Campbell flicked off the television and rose to his feet. The M.P.'s stiffened into braces and snapped off salutes. “Colonel Campbell? This is Alaska State Trooper Liam Campbell. He says he's looking for you.”

Liam's father gave Liam's uniform the once-over and his brows drew together. “I'm not sure I should claim him, boys.”

The boys didn't risk a smile.

“Dismissed,” Charles told them, and they fell back a step, pivoted and marched out.

“Dad,” Liam said.

“Son,” Charles said. He held out a hand. Liam took it. His father's grip was warm and strong and didn't linger. “How have you been?”

“Swell,” Liam said.