The Orphan Master's Son_ A Novel - Adam Johnson [69]
“How could you not use lights?” she asked.
“Doesn’t your army have goggles that see in the dark?”
“Honestly,” she said, “I don’t think Americans have done that kind of fighting since Vietnam. My uncle was one of them, a tunnel rat. These days, if there was a situation underground, they’d send a bot.”
“A bot?”
“You know, a robot, remote controlled,” she said. “They’ve got some beauties.”
The Minister’s pole bent as a fish ran with the lure. The Minister kicked his shoes off and stepped ankle-deep into the water. It put up a tremendous struggle, the pole moving this way and that, and Jun Do thought there must be a more placid variety of fish to stock a pond with. The Minister’s shirt was soaked with sweat when he finally reeled the fish close. Tommy landed it, a fat, white thing. Tommy removed the hook, and then held it high, for everyone to see, a finger in its gaping mouth to demonstrate the jaws. Then Tommy released the fish back into the pond.
“My fish!” the Minister shouted. He took a step forward in anger.
“Minister,” Dr. Song called and rushed over. He placed his hands on the Minister’s shoulders, which were rising and falling. “Minister,” Dr. Song said more softly.
“Why don’t we move right along to target practice,” the Senator suggested.
They walked a short pace through the desert. Dr. Song had a difficult time taking the uneven terrain in his dress shoes, though he would accept no help.
The Minister spoke, and Jun Do translated: “The Minister has heard that Texas is home to a most poisonous snake. He desires to shoot one, so that he might see if it is more powerful than our country’s dreaded rock mamushi.”
“In the middle of the day,” the Senator said, “rattlesnakes are down in their holes, where it’s cool. In the morning, that’s when they’re out and about.”
Jun Do relayed this to the Minister, who said, “Tell the American Senator to have his black helper pour water down the snake’s hole, and I will shoot the specimen when it emerges.”
Hearing the answer, the Senator smiled, shook his head. “The problem is the rattlesnake’s protected.”
Jun Do translated, yet the Minister was confused. “Protected from what?” he wanted to know.
Jun Do asked the Senator, “From what is the snake protected?”
“From the people,” the Senator said. “The law protects them.”
This was found most humorous by the Minister, that a vicious, man-killing snake would be protected from its victims.
They came to a shooting bench with several Wild West revolvers lined up. Various cans had been placed at a distance as a shooting gallery. The .45 caliber revolvers were heavy and worn and, the Senator assured them, had all revoked the lives of men. His great-grandfather had been a sheriff in this county, and these pistols had been taken as evidence in murder cases.
Dr. Song declined to shoot. “I do not trust my hands,” he said, and sat in the shade.
The Senator said that his shooting days were behind him, too.
Tommy began loading the weapons. “We got plenty of pistols,” he told Wanda. “You going to give us a demonstration?”
She was refastening her ponytail. “Who, me?” she asked. “I don’t think so. The Senator would be mad if I embarrassed our guests.”
The Minister, however, was in his element. He set about wielding the pistols as if he’d spent his days smoking and conversing and firing at things propped in the distance by his servants, rather than parked at a curb reading the daily Rodong Sinmun, waiting for his boss Dr. Song to finish with his meetings.
“Korea,” Dr. Song said, “is a land of mountains. Gunshots bring swift responses from the canyon walls. Here, the bang goes off into the distance, never to return.”
Jun Do agreed. It was a truly lonesome thing to have such a commotion be swallowed by the landscape, to have the sound of fire make no echo.
The Minister was surprisingly accurate, and soon he was feigning quick draws and attempting trick shots as Tommy reloaded for him. They all watched the Minister