Bradley Denton - Blackburn

Jimmy looked north and saw that Todd had vanished over the crest of Clay Hill. When Todd found the kite, he would be in a big hurry to get home, so he would probably leave the wreck where it was. Jimmy could retrieve Doll-Baby later.

The kite had crashed well beyond the hill, which meant there was no way that Todd could return home in less than thirty minutes. But Jimmy could be there in ten. If Mr. and Mrs. Boyle were back early, he would say that he'd found the baby in the field. And oh, by the way, he had seen Todd climbing Clay Hill.

If the Boyles were on schedule, all the better. Long before Todd showed up, his parents would have found their soiled infant alone in the house. Todd's troubles were just beginning. Jimmy took Baby Tina to the south side of the tank and showed her the place where the words JIMMY BLACKBURN IS A PUSSY had been written. There wasn't even a smudge now.

Baby Tina gurgled, and he decided to do one more thing.

He put her into the backpack so that her head stuck out. He molded the canvas around her body and snugged it with the piece of monofilament that had held it to the catwalk. Then he took his rod and reel line, looped it through the shoulder straps, and tied it.

He released the brake on the Zebco's reverse. A firm grip on the crank would be important.

He kissed Baby Tina's ear and whispered, "You're an eagle."

Then he stood and swung her into the sky. He braced the rod on the rail and let Baby Tina fly toward earth as fast as he dared. For this one moment of her life, she would know how it felt to be free.

Blackburn walked into the U.S. Army recruiting office at the strip mall on East Kellogg and brought a blast of cold air with him. Papers on the Recruiter's desk went flying. The Recruiter, a burr-headed man in an olive uniform, left his chair and started picking them up.

"Sorry," Blackburn said.

The Recruiter grinned. "That's okay, son. Have a seat and I'll be right with you."

Blackburn sat in one of the two plastic chairs in front of the desk. His coat billowed and settled like a parachute. He picked up a model cannon from a stack of brochures and pointed it at the Recruiter.

"Boom," Blackburn said.

The Recruiter settled into the swivel chair on the other side of the desk. He stacked the papers on the desktop and placed a model of a Sherman tank on top of them. He nodded at the cannon in Blackburn's hand. "That's an authentic reproduction of a Civil War field piece."

"Union or Rebel?" Blackburn asked.

The Recruiter looked puzzled. "Either, I reckon."

Blackburn pointed it at him again. "Boom."

The Recruiter chuckled. "Are you interested in an Army career, son?"

Blackburn replaced the cannon on the brochures. "A friend of mine joined."

"I see. And that's inspired you, right?"

"Yes," Blackburn said. "That's a good way to put it. I'm feeling inspired."

The Recruiter frowned for an instant, and then his expression was all grin again. He held out his big, red right hand. "Master Sergeant Don Riggle here, son."

Blackburn stared at the Recruiter's hand. "You're the one," he said. He reached out and placed his hand in the Recruiter's. The sergeant's grip was like granite. Blackburn winced, and then was angry with himself. He pulled his hand back.

"And what's your name, son?" the Recruiter asked. His grin was still there, but suspicion crinkled the corners of his eyes. His eyes matched his uniform.

"Ernest Tompkins," Blackburn said.

The Recruiter pulled a piece of paper from under the tank and began writing on it with a steel pen. "And how old are you, Ernest?"

"I'm nineteen."

"High school graduate?"

"Yes." It was only a partial lie. Blackburn hadn't even had a senior year, but Ernie had.

"Which high school, son?"

"Wantoda Unified. East of here, in Tuttle County."

The Recruiter wrote it down. Then he looked up at Blackburn, his whole face smiling. The suspicion lines were gone. "And what sort of career training do you think you'd be interested in, Ernest?"

Blackburn considered. What would Ernie have said?

"I'm not sure," Blackburn said. "What have you got?"

The Recruiter's body made a gaseous noise. "You name it, son, and today's Army has it." His right forefinger, the size of a carrot, tapped the brochures under the cannon. "Communications technician. Air traffic controller. Smoke operations specialist. Automotive mechanic. Helicopter pilot. Chaplain's assistant. Sanitation specialist. Electrician. There's no end to the possibilities." He spread out the brochures. One of them was entitled Field Artillery: The Career with a Future.

"Lasers too?" Blackburn asked. Ernie had expressed an interest in lasers.

"Absolutely," the Recruiter said. "Laser technology out the wazoo." He laughed. His body made another gaseous noise.

Blackburn stared at the Recruiter. "Do you like the way I have my hair cut short, Sergeant?" he asked. His sandy hair was trimmed above his ears and collar. Ernie's hair had always been trimmed like that. Blackburn had never seen Ernie look shaggy.

The Recruiter frowned, then gave a chuckle. "Well, it's better than most young men these days, Ernest. Of course, it'll be cut shorter than that when you get to boot camp. More like mine." He ran a hand over his stubble.

Blackburn reached up and grasped the strands of hair hanging down on his forehead. He twisted them and looked past his hand at the Recruiter. "When I was thirteen I tried to grow it down to my waist," he said. "That was 1971. The sixties had just come to Kansas. That was the year the Student Union up in Lawrence burned."

The Recruiter's face turned stony. "I remember. I was at Fort Riley. Sure wanted to go over there and straighten things out. Looked for a while like we might get to."

Blackburn kept twisting his hair. "That was also the year Lieutenant Calley went to prison."

The Recruiter's eyes narrowed. "Are you here to sign up, son?"

Blackburn nodded. "Sure. Don't you remember?"

"Excuse me?"

Blackburn yanked out the twisted hairs and began to braid them. "This is what I wanted to do that year," he said. "I wanted to braid my hair and hide the braids in my coat. A long coat, like this one. This is Army surplus." He looked up from his braid. "The Army makes good coats."

The Recruiter scratched his jaw. "Thanks," he said.

"You're welcome." Blackburn looked back at his braid. "See, I figured that if anybody gave me any shit, I'd whip out those braids and snap the son of a bitch in the face. Pop his eyes out."

The Recruiter opened a desk drawer and pulled out more brochures. "Now, just take a look at these opportunities," he said.

"Infantry," Blackburn said.

"Excuse me?"

"I want to be in the infantry," Blackburn said. "That's where the shooting is, right? I know how to shoot."

"Well, now, son," the Recruiter said, spreading the new brochures on the desk as if they were a deck of cards, "there isn't much shooting these days. We're at peace."

"I know. We lost the war two years ago."

The Recruiter's nostrils flared. "We didn't lose anything," he said. His voice was low and hard.

"The communists took over South Vietnam," Blackburn said.

"The United States Army has never lost a war," the Recruiter said.

Blackburn considered. "I can respect that," he said. "If it's true, I can respect that a lot."

The Recruiter's eyes were steady. "It's true. No matter what you read in the papers or see on TV, you remember that. The U.S. Army doesn't lose. Ever."

"Would you stake your life on that?" Blackburn asked.

The Recruiter nodded. "I already have, son."

"Then sign me up."

The Recruiter and Blackburn filled out the rest of the form. Blackburn lied where necessary. Then he signed at the bottom of the page. The name he signed was "Ernest T. Tompkins III."