The Ranger - Ace Atkins [13]
Quinn nodded and went back to work. Stagg shuffled back to his car, the preacher followed wearing a cocky grin, and Quinn went back to the cab to start up the truck and load more onto the fire. Boom didn’t even look up until that pile was gone.
“We gonna be here all night?” Boom asked.
“Looks that way.”
“Your uncle got another bottle?”
“We haven’t finished this one yet.”
“Just thinking ahead. Don’t you Rangers lead the way?”
Must’ve been way past midnight by the time the bottle was gone, most of it going into Boom, who’d stretched out by the heat of the fire, lying on his back in the dead cold and looking skyward. They hadn’t talked in a long while, Quinn being used to long periods of silence and waiting, just getting used to the difference in the sounds, the familiarity and quietness. The last few years had played hell with his hearing, and when it got very quiet, he could hear a piercing electric pitch, his ears waiting for more gunfire and explosions, the big revving hum from a Chinook or Black Hawk right before it would lift off the sandy ground and drop them up in the mountains or the edge of a village made of rocks.
He tossed the empty bottle into the fire, squatting down and poking at the embers with a stick. Boom spoke; Quinn was surprised to hear his voice.
“You want to tell me about it?”
“You asking?” Quinn asked.
“I’ll just say I never expected you to step foot back in this town again.”
“Unless someone died.”
“Even then.”
“What do you want to know?”
“What’s been souring you?”
“I’m not soured.”
“Okay. You want to play it like that.”
“I’m not playing,” Quinn said.
“I see you got that Purple Heart, too.”
“I got hurt. Wasn’t a big deal. My problems with the Army don’t have a thing to do with that. My wounds were nothing, man.”
“What was it?”
“The Regiment thinks I’m too old to be storming the castle.”
“You don’t have to be a Ranger.”
“It’s the only thing I ever wanted to be. I could give a shit for regular Army.”
The last few sticks on the fire toppled over in the mound of ash, and Quinn found some more fallen branches and cedar logs to add to the pile. He warmed his hands and sat back on his haunches.
“How’d you get hurt?” Boom stretched out his legs.
“Hand-to-hand with the devout, hiding in some rocks near our LZ. He was on my back, yelling about Allah, me reaching for my M4 to neutralize the bastard when he yelled, ‘Bomb!’ ”
“In English.”
“Plain English.”
“Funny how we use the word neutralize. Sounds kinda nice.”
“Yeah.”
“Did you?”
“What?”
“Neutralize his ass.”
Quinn poked at the fire and shook his head. “Yep, but he shot me, too, while we scrambled for that bomb. And you?”
“My world got rocked on a convoy outside Fallujah.”
“That’s it?”
“All there is to tell. Hell of a thing when you see your goddamn arm lying down the road from you. Puts you in a different frame of mind.”
Boom started to laugh.
“Damn, Boom. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he said. “You know what I miss most?”
Quinn waited.
“Neutralizing all those motherfuckers,” he said. “I was pretty good at it. Riding convoy with that big-ass machine gun, protecting my boys. I liked that.”
“Performing what you’d been trained to do.”
The men didn’t talk for a while. You could hear coyotes up in the northern hills, and the sky was bright and clear. Quinn sat down and fell asleep watching the fire, a hot, even glow of red ashes. When he awoke sometime later, Boom had passed out on the ground. Quinn tried to wake him. But Boom wouldn’t stir, Quinn stepping down and lifting his friend’s massive weight up with his legs.
He tossed his friend over his shoulder, the weight crushing, and carried him up the hill just as first light burned weak and gray over the dead trees. Down the gravel road, a rangy cattle dog padded its way up to the front porch and waited for Quinn to open the door.
The dog cocked its head, studying him with two eyes of different colors.
“Howdy there, Hondo.”
5
Judge Blanton lived toward the northeast corner of Tibbehah County, right around the hamlet