Stephen Hunter - Point Of Impact

“But you did miss Bob Lee Swagger?”

“Not really. I picked him out, and made inquiries. I called Sheriff Tell in Polk County to find out if he’d had any recent troubles. He’d been sitting pretty, off by himself. They say the pattern with these guys is they begin to destabilize in the days before they make a hit. There was no sign of that. He didn’t fit any pattern and his sheriff vouched for him. Also, the only reason he was on the list was for that letter and the only reason the letter got him there was because it had four exclamation points. Four exclamation points! It seemed like a safe call to me. I can’t say I’d make it any different way now.”

“All right, Nick. I suppose you performed adequately . We can’t expect distinction twenty-four hours, seven days a week. Nick, I think I can save you from Secret Service, because they want some Bureau blood to let them off the hook. It was really their operation, and they got beaten.”

“They sure did.”

“But, I’ve talked to the director and we feel our position is strong. They could complain that we didn’t do a good job on the Charlies and we could complain that they were so poorly managed they couldn’t deal with the Charlies themselves. Mexican standoff, and I think they’ll back down. Now, Nick, I have to say, that arrest; it was badly bungled.”

“I know, Howard. I screwed up.”

“It looked so bad in the newspapers. And it looks bad inside the Bureau, too. We’re supposed to be able to handle situations like that.”

“I don’t know what to say, Howard. It was a desperate situation. Maybe I – I just don’t know, Howard.”

“Nick, you were in a desperate situation in 1986 in Tulsa and you mismanaged that, too.”

Nick was silent. Then, finally, he said, “Howard, I just want to be an FBI agent. That’s all I ever wanted.”

“Well, Nick…the director has left this call to me.”

Nick hated the fact that he was begging. But he tried to imagine a life without the one thing that mattered as much as his wife, which was the Bureau. He had to live a life without Myra now; but he couldn’t imagine one without the Bureau.

“Please don’t fire me, Howard. I know I haven’t been sharp lately. But I just lost my wife a few months ago…it just hasn’t been an easy time.”

“Nick, we need bodies on this thing. I’m going to suspend you without pay for a week, but it won’t go into effect for three months. Then I’m afraid it’ll have to.”

Nick nodded. It meant that within a month afterwards he’d be rotated back to the sticks and he’d never get out. It had taken him years to get to New Orleans. But it also meant, however provisionally, he’d be able to stay.

“I suppose I’ll be transferred then.”

“Nick, you know how it works. And I’m going to have to put a letter in your file. Like the other one.”

“Yes.”

“Nick, I don’t want to.”

“Okay, Howard.”

“I’m trying to cut you as much slack as I can.”

“Sure, I appreciate it,” Nick said.

Sure, I appreciate it! You prick, if you’d have kept your fucking trap shut six years ago, I’d have nailed that fuck right between the eyes and I’d be where you’re sitting and you’d be on your way back to Tulsa.

“You’re still in the Bureau, Nick.”

“I appreciate that, Howard.”

“But, Nick, no more mistakes. Do you understand. There can’t be another slipup.”

“There won’t be, Howard. I promise.”

When Bob crawled from the water just before dawn on the day after the shooting, his head seethed with rage and flashing pictures and hallucinations. His body was numb as the log under which it had floated and slightly swollen and soft from the long immersion; he smelled of diesel oil from the barge scum that coated the surface of the river below New Orleans. He reckoned he’d drifted fifty or so miles; around him were scrub pines, an infinity of them, and boggy marshes, a maze of them, and dense, interlocking cypress trees. Small things scurried and then went silent; far off, a bird made a strange and mournful sound, a screech of pain; then it went silent too.

You’re going to die , he thought.

There was nothing here but the sameness of jungle, its merciless face. And there’d be men in it too, soon enough, hunting him.

You’re back where you started, only you’re older and weaker .

He stumbled a few feet, went to his knees. When was the last time he’d eaten? Must have been yesterday, breakfast. He’d been shot twice, used his last drop of adrenaline in getting out of there, and floated in the sullen river for eighteen horrible hours, slung upside down under the goddamn log, only his nostrils flaring above the water.

So there it was: eat or die.

Didn’t matter if the wound was infected or not; if he didn’t eat he’d wear down fast, and the jungle would feed off him in a matter of hours.

Been in tougher fixes, yes I have, I do believe .

But he hadn’t. There was no chopper waiting to air-evac him if he could just make the LZ. There was nothing but this jungle and outside it a whole world set to do him in.

It must have been a bit after dawn. The air was very crisp and clean and smelled fresh as baby breath. The sun was still weak. It was feeding time, he knew it soon enough.

Then Bob happened to feel something hard against his leg, and realized the hardness had been there all night. He slid the pistol from his jeans pocket. It was a big stainless Smith & Wesson.45 automatic, their new Model 4506. No. No, by God, it wasn’t, it was that fancy new 10mm the FBI had started using. He wondered about the round. He’d trust his life to a.45, having fired a hundred thousand.45 cartridges in his time through a variety of Colts. But this new thing, a 10-mil? He didn’t know.

Man without a gun has got no chance, Bob thought. Man has a gun, he has a chance .

With a thumb as big as a brick, he pawed the magazine release. The mag fell out and he saw the agent had it loaded brimful with hollowpoints, like little brass Easter eggs down there. He sneaked a look to see if the man had the chamber stoked, and the gleam of brass from the seated cartridge answered him. Would they stand up under a soaking? Only one way to find out. He slid the magazine back, felt it lock and with a same brick thumb got the hammer back and locked.

He sat back, wishing he had more strength to find a position, or a trail, some place to hunt from, a good place to shoot from, a brace, anything. He had none of it. Only the gun. Overhead, the sun filtered through the dense tree cover, thin, not yet eight he reckoned. The shadows were blurry. Or was it his eyes going? Was he sliding off into nothingness, bled out like a deer shot quickly and not well.

He was hallucinating again. Strange, at this time he thought of Donny Fenn and all the scary moments in the boonies, and how at the real crazy-ass seconds, Donny’d begin to laugh a little, a hysterical giggle.

Donny, boy, you’d be laughing today if you could see old Bob and what’s become of him, sitting on his wet ass in some bog waiting on death or a creature .

But Bob couldn’t laugh. He tried to settle back. Seemed like there was a dim memory of sitting in the rain a while back a whole night through, waiting on Tim, the whitetail buck with the twelve-point spread. That was a long wet wait, wasn’t it? Oh, that was a hunt! He remembered the way Tim came blasting out of the foliage, like a ghost or a miracle, and how the rifle came up to him and he fired and knew how well he’d fired. That was a night, wasn’t it? Hit Tim above the spine with a bullet cast from epoxy; must have weighed less than 25 grains, atomized when it hit the flank but the shock knocked the sense out of Tim for a good five minutes.