S. Tooley - When the dead speak

Ling Toy marveled at the camaraderie of the black men and the loyalty of the Americans to their cause. But he still couldn’t understand why there were separate units for blacks and whites.

Hap took a long drag off his cigarette and winced.

“ Still got those cramps?” Booker lowered his muscular frame onto a flat rock next to Hap.

Hap nodded. “Feels like someone’s puttin’ my intestines through a wringer.”

“ Bad river.” Ling Toy stood up, his clothes hanging loosely over his frail body.

Booker sucked long and deep off his cigarette, savoring one of the few luxuries of combat. “That’s what you guys get for bathin’ in that river two days ago. I told you there’s enough stuff floating in these rivers to make you sick for a month. Even a guy your size, Hap.”

Hap nodded toward Bubba and Shadow. “Did Base confirm that the injured are the guys who were missing?”

“ Yes. We’re looking at what’s left of Task Force Kelly. They were dispatched to Mushima Valley yesterday. Supposed to climb Hill Fifty-six and report back. It doesn’t seem they ever made it up that hill. The last communications Base received yesterday was that the civilians they had found were decoys.”

Along the horizon, a number of smoke trails spelled the demise of more villages. Beyond kelly green rice fields, Ling Toy could see the sun, a huge yellow ball setting quickly. He listened, deciphering the words Hap and Booker spoke, how they wondered how the North Koreans could be so brutal in their killing by the looks of those who didn’t make it out of the valley.

“ Not Korean,” Ling Toy offered. He waved a hand toward the injured. “Chinese. They do this.”

“ Bull shit. There ain’t no damn Chinese here.” A figure stepped out of the shadows and flicked a cigarette butt at Hap’s feet. He wore his khaki shirt tied at his waist in such a way that his Sergeant’s stripe and several odd-shaped pins were exposed. He glared at Hap with eyes that were sinister, mysterious, and dangerous, as his shoe slowly ground the lit butt into the dirt.

Ling Toy didn’t like the white sergeant who was called P.K. There were four white soldiers who had shown up right after the survivors had been pulled from the valley, claimed they had been separated from their unit. All four of them treated the black soldiers cruelly. But the white sergeant, he was the worst. He eyed Booker’s unit and even Ling Toy, as if they were the lowest form of life.

Lincoln awoke with a start, the memories too vivid, too painful. He shivered, wiped the sweat from his forehead and pushed the papers away. One of the Chicago Tribune papers opened part way. He froze when he saw the picture. He’d remember those cold eyes anywhere. The leering smile was a mask of lies and deception. After all these years, Lincoln would never forget that face.

He read the description under the picture about the Illinois state representative who had recently held a reception at his home in Chasen Heights. The picture was of Preston Kellogg Hilliard. Lincoln knew him as P.K.

“You’ve been staring at the screen all day. You didn’t finish the dessert that lady brought you,” Janet said. She looked over at the platter of cookies and brownies and took one of each.

“Ummmm,” Jake mumbled.

“Who was that woman?” Janet asked.

“Abby? That’s Sam’s mom. Great lady.”

“She just kinda snuck up out of nowhere. Scared the hell out of me.”

“She has a way of sneaking up on people. It’s in her genes.”

He leaned back and watched the computer screen freeze as it processed his command. The second shift was drifting into the room. He looked at his watch. Sometime within the last hour Sam had left for home.

“Captain Murphy never came back?”

“No. Sam asked me six times. Guess she didn’t like that memo Dennis wrote.”

Jake looked up at her. She was leaning on the corner of his desk. Her white skirt hit her mid-thigh. The hot pink blouse didn’t have enough buttons to conceal her cleavage. A gold necklace around her neck held a small gold typewriter that had the pleasure of resting comfortably in the valley of that cleavage.

“If you don’t have plans for dinner, Jake, I have spaghetti sauce simmering in a crock pot at home.”

Jake smiled. Janet was a catch for any lucky guy. He had taken her to dinner once years ago. He had no intention of it being any more than a friendly dinner. But she took him home to meet her two young kids. She had been newly divorced at that time and scared to death of being a single parent. She was looking for a father for her kids, but Jake wanted no part of it.

“Thanks, Janet, but I’ll have to take a rain check.” He handed her the container of cookies and brownies. “Here, take these home to the kids.”

He watched her walk away and felt guilty that he couldn’t even bring himself to have a friendly dinner for fear he might give her the wrong impression. She was too nice to be used. That’s basically what he did — used women. And they used him. They each knew ahead of time that the relationship would be purely physical, maybe dinner every now and then. But never any family-type dates like a trip to the zoo or shopping, where the woman would gush over furniture and place settings and make subtle remarks like, “When WE get a place of our own,” or “Wouldn’t it be nice to have…?”

He rubbed his eyes with his palms and stared back at the computer. The printer beeped. He pressed the paper feed button and stood to rip the pages off.

Brandon swaggered in from the break room. “How’s the Dragon Lady? That broad had a hell of a lot of nerve planting ideas into Camille’s head.” He worked a toothpick around between his teeth.

“You should be concentrating more on getting your home life back in order and less about Sergeant Casey.” Jake gathered the pages into a file folder and headed for the elevator.

“My home life is fine, but do let me know if you need any help with your project. It would be my distinct pleasure,” Brandon called out.

Jake stepped onto the elevator and stared back at Brandon. The prick Murphy had filled Brandon in on their conversation.

“Not in this lifetime, ass,” Jake whispered as the elevator doors closed.

Sam closed the glass doors of the fireplace in the study. The flames engulfed the photos, the edges curling up, the paper disintegrating into ashes.

Governor Avery Meacham leaned back against the sofa and heaved a sigh of relief. Due to unexpected meetings, he had been unable to make it to Sam’s until late in the afternoon.

Not an overbearing figure, Governor Meacham looked more like someone’s math teacher. An accountant by trade, he had managed to balance the state’s books with money to spare in the three years he had been in office. He had abolished the school boards his first year, insisted on more parental involvement, and more accountability by the teachers.

Creases had deepened around his eyes as if the whole ordeal had aged him ten years. “I thought I could handle it myself. I thought, naively, that the threats were just that… threats.”

Sam took a seat on the sofa next to Governor Meacham. “What is the significance of July nineteenth?”

“My wife and I are flying to England on the eighteenth to spend time with our son. He’s stationed there, in the Air Force.” Governor Meacham clasped his hands together prayer style. “I wanted my family out of the country if Preston decided to go public with the photos.”

Seeing that the photos had been reduced to ashes, Sam turned off the fireplace just as someone knocked on the study door.

“Are you ready, Dear?” A petite blond wearing a tailored navy suit and a quick smile, peered into the study. Nancy Meacham cradled a box in her hand. Abby followed her in.