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By Root 849 0

Podulski's wife would never be the same. Though each man had other children, the void created by the loss of one was like a chasm never to be bridged, and as much as each might tell himself that, yes, it was worth the price, no man who could rationalize the death of a child could truly be called a man at all, and their real feelings were reinforced by the same humanity that compelled them to a life of sacrifice. This was all the more true because each had feelings about the war that the more polite called 'doubts,' and which they called something else, but only among themselves.

'Remember the time Bobby went into the pool to get Mike Goodwin's little girl - saved her life?' Podulski asked. 'I just got a note from Mike. Little Amy had twins last week, two little girls. She married an engineer down in Houston, works for NASA.'

'I didn't even know she was married. How old is she now?' James asked.

'Oh, she must be twenty ... twenty-five? Remember her freckles, how the sun used to breed them down at Jax?'

'Little Amy,' Greer said quietly. 'How they grow.' Maybe she wouldn't have drowned that hot July day, but it was one more thing to remember about his son. One life saved, maybe three? That was something, wasn't it? Greer asked himself.

The three men turned and left the grave without a word, heading slowly back to the driveway. They had to stop there. A funeral procession was coming up the hill, soldiers of the Third Infantry Regiment, 'The Old Guard,' doing their somber duty, laying another man to rest. The admirals lined up again, saluting the flag draped on the casket and the man within. The young Lieutenant commanding the detail did the same. He saw that one of the flag officers wore the pale blue ribbon denoting the Medal of Honor, and the severity of his gesture conveyed the depth of his respect.

'Well, there goes another one,' Greer said with quiet bitterness after they had passed by. 'Dear God, what are we burying these kids for?'

' "Pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe ..." ' Cas quoted. 'Wasn't all that long ago, was it? But when it came time to put the chips on the table, where were the bastards?'

'We are the chips, Cas,' Dutch Maxwell replied. 'This is the table.'

Normal men might have wept, but these were not normal men. Each surveyed the land dotted with white stones. This had been the front lawn of Robert E. Lee once - the house was still atop the hill - and the placement of the cemetery had been the cruel gesture of a government that had felt itself betrayed by the officer. And yet Lee had in the end given his ancestral home to the service of those men whom he had most loved. That was the kindest irony of this day, Maxwell reflected.

'How do things look up the river, James?'

'Could be better, Dutch. I have orders to clean house. I need a pretty big broom.'

'Have you been briefed in on boxwood green?'

'No.' Greer turned and cracked his first smile of the day. It wasn't much, but it was something, the others told themselves. 'Do I want to be?'

'We'll probably need your help.'

'Under the table?'

'You know what happened with kingpin,' Casimir Podulski noted.

'They were damned lucky to get out,' Greer agreed. 'Keeping this one tight, eh?'

'You bet we are.'

'Let me know what you need. You'll get everything I can find. You doing the "three" work, Cas?'

'That's right.' Any designator with a -3 at the end denoted the operations and planning department, and Podulski had a gift for that. His eyes glittered as brightly as his Wings of Gold in the morning sun.

'Good,' Greer observed. 'How's little Dutch doing?'

'Flying for Delta now. Copilot, he'll make captain in due course, and I'll be a grandfather in another month or so.'

'Really? Congratulations, my friend.'

'I don't blame him for getting out. I used to, but not now.'

'What's the name of the SEAL who went in to get him?'

'Kelly. He's out, too,' Maxwell said.

'You should have gotten the Medal for him, Dutch,' Podulski said. 'I read the citation. That was as hairy as they come.'

'I made him a