"Not a chance. The VC got the radio when they got the radio man."
"Shit!"
" 'Shit,' " echoed the stocky little Tex-Mex sergeant. Still with a voice of calm he said, "Not a total loss, though, since that was Lieutenant Dong's excuse for taking off. And we're better off without him. I'm going to get to work on setting up whatever we can of a perimeter." Without another word he crawled off toward a knot of soldiers hiding, poorly, in a little shell crater.
Where does he get it; the courage, the calm? wondered an admiring Jack Schmidt.
* * *
"Jack? JACK?"
Focus returned to the old general's eyes. "Sorry, Juani. I was . . . wandering. Thinking about Jorge. It occurs to me that at the precise moment we were caught in that ambush your new president and her ex were calling us murderers and baby killers. Jorge Montoya: a baby killer!"
* * *
Dei Gloria Mission, Waco, Texas
" . . . in nomine Patrii, Filioque et Spiritu Sancti."
A very young baby squalled under the Baptismal waters pouring from the vessel in the hands of Father Montoya.
Holding the baby, Elpidia—the diminutive fifteen-year-old mother—looked up at the priest nervously. The Latin words were close enough to the girl's native—albeit poor—Spanish that she sensed the meaning of the words, if not their theological implications. There had been little of God in the girl's short, unholy life. In truth, there had been little of anything good. Drugs, sex, sex for drugs, sex for money to buy drugs; these had been her universe and her faith.
But that had changed. . . .
* * *
The slender, tiny, and provocatively clad Mexican prostitute shivered in the cold, windy night of a San Antonio winter. Doing her best to shield her half exposed budding breasts from the wind, the hooker walked past the little gray pornographic bookstore opposite a well-lit used car lot already fronted by several working girls on their nightly patrol. Knowing this was not her area, and the girls already there might object strongly to competition, she continued on her way up Broadway to another area where the streetwalkers gathered.
"Hi Elpi," greeted one of the transvestites standing outside the bright and cheery Wendy's. "Cold night to be dressed for 'work.' "
"No help for it, Susan." Politely, Elpidia used the "girl's" working name. "Got to feed the baby and my man."
Susan nodded her understanding. He (She? It?) likewise was bound as tightly as any slave to the needs, drug needs in both cases, of a derelict.
The girl continued on to the next corner and began her sales pitch. This was a simple procedure; she gave the "look" to every passing car that seemed likely to be holding a man, barring only those that were certain to contain a police officer.
The look? It was something easy to perform, hard to describe, and shared equally by every prostitute who had ever peddled herself on a corner. Part direct stare, part inviting smile, part something subliminal, the "look" advertised her services and prices in a way no other form of advertising could compete with.
Shortly a car pulled over. A quick negotiation session was concluded. Elpidia entered the car, took her money, and proceeded to work.
Half a night and seven autos later, Elpidia was considering calling it a day. Then she reconsidered the beating that was sure to follow if she didn't bring home enough money for her boyfriend's expensive habit and decided on one more try.
She gave the look to a passing Ford Taurus and was immediately rewarded. The Taurus slowed, turned right, and came to a stop just around the corner. The girl hurried over.
"Looking for a da . . . ?" she asked, then stopped cold, her hooker's false smile suddenly turning to dread as she recognized the clerical collar on the driver as he turned a severe gaze toward her.
"How old are you, girl?"
* * *
Elpidia no longer wore the garb of a prostitute. She no longer painted her face, in part, to cover the bruises. Instead, from mission stores she wore clothes that, even though used, still made her look like a real human being rather than some streetwalking piece of meat.
Wrapping the newly baptized baby in a fluffy mission-owned towel, Elpidia clutched it to her breast, patting it dry and whispering soothing motherly sounds. "There, there my little baby. There, there mi alma, mi corozon. Hush little Pedro. Mama's here and she'll never let anything bad for you happen."
Father Montoya smiled. He thought, I might have had a child like this girl. I might have been a grandfather this day.
The good father turned away from the girl and her baby, turned toward the several dozen people, most of them young people, who made up the population of the mission.
He began, "Today we welcome this child into the warm brotherhood of Christ. We give it, through our Holy Father, a new life, an eternal life. Not for him the never ending death of unbelief, of faithlessness to God."
"But I hasten to add, it is only through the courage of this little boy's young mother that he was allowed to see the light of day at all. For many, too many, young boys and girls the darkness comes before they even are given the chance to see the light. . . ."
* * *
Washington, DC
Bright winter light streamed through the windows, bathing the cold stones of the Capitol Building, as Rottemeyer, surrounded by her sycophants and security, entered to address a joint session of Congress.
The Congress she was to address was nearly perfect, her instrument, her tool. It consisted of 535 members, 100 senators and 435 members of the House of Representatives. Not all of either group were present, though the vast majority were. Fifty-five senators were from her own Democratic Party, though three of these were far more Republican than many Republicans. Of the 45 Republicans, three were nominal; "RINOs" they were called, Republican In Name Only. These could be counted on to vote her way about three times in four. Of the members of the House, she had an acceptable, even substantial, majority as well. Never since Franklin Delano Roosevelt held near dictatorial power before and during the Second World War had a President of the United States wielded such overwhelming political force at home. Even the Supreme Court was so evenly balanced—though she hoped to unbalance it very soon—that it was most unlikely to interfere with Rottemeyer's plans in any significant way.
The assembled Congress stood and clapped as she walked down the aisleway to the rostrum, though the Republicans, most of them, did so out of mere politeness, devoid of enthusiasm.
Senator Ross Goldsmith (Republican, New Mexico) was extremely successful in hiding his enthusiasm. But then, the enthusiasm of the bespectacled, graying, balding old man was so tiny in scope he could have hidden it under a gnat. His hands moved together, rhythmically . . . but they never quite touched.
Standing opposite, Goldsmith's old personal friend and old political enemy, Harry Feldman (Representative, Democrat, New York), noticed Goldsmith's hands, smiled, and redoubled his own efforts.
Goldsmith simply glared as Feldman mouthed the words, "spoilsport."
Reaching the rostrum, Rottemeyer smiled at her Vice-President, Walter Madison Howe, by repute a moderate midwesterner, in fact a purely political animal of little principle. The smile hid her immediate thought, Reactionary moron. Turning away, she opened the folder containing her speech. This was a mere formality; she knew it by heart.