Now, as he walked, he asked God to bless them with abundance, happiness, and health.
Chapter Twenty-Two
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
– The Lord’s Prayer
They had camped in a thicket at the base of a hill and slept for several hours. As the sun started to rise, they were attacked by swarms of flies and mosquitoes, and a very foul smell that blew in from the west. Despite the discomfort, Crocker determined that it was too dangerous to move. Not until he scouted the area. So while Dawkins, Sam, and Akil covered themselves with the blankets and tarp and tried to rest, he set out alone.
It was an overcast spring day of moderate temperature with long streaks of gray in the sky-some dark, others taking on an almost lavender hue. The sweet smell of wildflowers and new leaves was blotted out by thick, disgusting rot whenever the wind blew. It caught in Crocker’s throat as he peered from behind bushes to look for signs of human life. Saw no houses, roads, or farms to the south or west. His view north and east was hindered by tall trees two hundred meters away.
Using whatever he could find for cover, he picked his way west to the base of a hill covered with the same red pines they had seen on the peninsula. The hill rose several hundred meters, with a rough, rocky base and no trails or roads leading upward.
As he used a branch to pull himself up, two jets ripped through the sky. He traced their dark profiles under the layers of cloud.
MiGs of some sort, he thought. Ridiculous fucking country.
Dang had explained that while the government spent most of its money on its million-man army, navy, and air force, a sizable segment of the estimated twenty-million-strong population was starving. He, his wife, and son were lucky, Dang said, because not only did he earn a modest salary as assistant manager of the local government farming cooperative, but they also grew crops of their own on their little plot of land. Especially in the northern part of the country, thousands of adults and children died each year from malnutrition. Thousands of others succumbed to dehydration and dysentery, which they got from eating roots, leaves, or cobs of unripe corn.
Sick, Crocker thought as he climbed three-quarters of the way up and started to circle south. Isn’t the first responsibility of any country to take care of its people? Sure, protecting them is important, but what’s the point of protecting them if they’re starving to death?
On the south side of the hill, the stench was stronger. Past the branches of some pines, he saw what looked like the tin roof of a guard tower below. He stopped, gathered himself, and, carefully proceeded west to a gap in the trees that afforded a better view.
What he saw took his breath away-a field stretching as far south as he could see, surrounded by a fifty-foot-high fence topped with barbed wire and guard towers. Scattered willy-nilly within the fences were very primitive lean-tos made from sheet metal and wood, and rusting shipping containers. Along the west fence stood a long warehouse-like structure with four large smokestacks emitting thick black smoke. Stacked at the far end were pyramids of tires.
When he looked closer, he saw that the men, women, and children carrying tires out of the plant were sticklike figures, so emaciated and gaunt that it was surprising they could even move, let alone lift or push anything.
Anger rose from the pit of his stomach. When he focused on the field of refuse that took up most of the camp, he was even more repulsed. Lying on the ground like clumps of garbage were people of all ages who appeared too weak to stand. Some had covered themselves with scraps of cardboard, paper, and wood.
Crocker was clenching his jaw so hard his teeth started to hurt.
How can people justify doing this kind of shit to one another? This is as evil as the most depraved images I’ve seen of the Nazi holocaust, and it exists today!
He wanted to do something-tear the fences down, or shout to the world about the camp’s existence. All he could do in the present was shake his head and ask, What the hell is wrong with mankind?
He had decided not to tell the others, so as not to dampen their spirits further. In fact, he wasn’t sure what to do with the information as he sat on his haunches between Dawkins and Akil, eating rice and sipping water, and thinking about home, and government, and why it was important not to vest power in any one party or individual. The founding fathers had gotten that right. You couldn’t trust anyone who wanted control over others.
Maybe the impulse itself was wrong. He felt a jittery uncertainty gnaw at the edges of his stomach as the sky turned dark and rain started to fall. What was a person’s responsibility when confronted with unthinkable evil like the one he had just seen? The answer involved some strange moral calculus that he couldn’t grasp in his current state. He had excuses-his responsibility to the men on his team, the fact that they were wanted men in an enemy country, their weakened condition and limited options. But none of them quieted his conscience, which twitched with outrage.
At least the rain diminished the smell as they packed their few belongings and continued south, across a field of knee-high corn and into the shrubbery along a ribbon of water. Frogs croaked, reminding him of summer. He and his brother loved catching fireflies. His brother had gone from precocious kid to long-haired drug dealer and user to responsible businessman and father. What is he doing now? What would he think of the camp I saw earlier? Would he tell me that as an American it wasn’t any of my business? If he said that, he’d be fucking wrong!
A light appeared in the distance and he stopped, knelt, and pumped his arm up and down to indicate to the others to drop, too. He heard gears grinding. In a field, a truck turned so that its lights faced northwest and stopped. The echo of men shouting reached their ears.
“You think they’re looking for us?” asked Dawkins at his elbow.
The rain hissed and splattered. He wiped the water from his brow and saw another truck approach and park parallel to the other one. The second truck appeared to be pulling a trailer. Both trucks left their headlights on and engines running.
“Don’t know.”
Men moved in front of the lights, casting shadows. He remembered Akil’s SIG Sauer, which he now carried tucked into a rope around his waist, and the fact that the mag in it had only six rounds.
“What should we do?” Dawkins asked with fear creeping into his voice.
He waited a minute to see if more trucks and soldiers would arrive. They didn’t. Thirty feet ahead, in the middle of the field, stood a mound of earth the size of a small car. Atop it was a dying tree, and surrounding it was dense foliage.
“Let’s hide over there,” Crocker whispered.
They hurried low to the ground. The trucks hadn’t moved, and the figures remained clustered around them. From where Crocker and company now waited, there was no cover to the south, only a fallow field of weeds and wildflowers that stretched half a mile.
“We’ll wait here until they leave,” Crocker whispered to the men huddled around him. Sam’s faced appeared twisted in pain. Crocker removed the last two aspirin from the vial Dang had given them.
“Take these.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“Take one, at least.”
Akil tilted the bottle of water and helped Sam wash it down.
“While we’re here and it’s raining, we should capture more water in the tarp and pans. You guys stay low and cover yourselves with the Kevlar. I’m gonna to try to find out what’s going on with the trucks.”