“Lieutenant,” Tyreen said, “I’d explain it to you if I thought I’d believe it myself.”
He was trying to conceal the fact that he was breathing hard. He watched the others come up — Saville and Sergeant Khang and, finally, Hooker cursing in a lackluster monotone and trying to clear a dented cartridge out of his submachine gun.
Saville started talking to McKuen. Tyreen walked away and stopped Sergeant Khang. “Does that road go by the water station on the railroad?”
“Yes, sir. Two, three miles back.”
“Find out if that jeep’s still working.”
McKuen was speaking loudly to Saville: “I want to resign, Captain. I want to quit.”
Looking pleased, Saville said, “Sure, George. Just wait a minute, and I’ll call you a taxi.”
It was the first time in a long time that Tyreen had seen Saville smile.
Chapter Forty-six
1015 Hours
The water tank was a solitary structure in the rain forest, deserted and silent. They got out of the jeep, and Sergeant Khang was complaining: “Maybe it worked for us once, Colonel, but that kind of stunt can’t work twice in a row. We’ll get our pants shot off.”
The tracks came out of the jungle, passed the tall water tower, and plunged back into timber and undergrowth. The river lapped its banks. A tiny wooden dock jutted out into the water.
Tyreen told Khang, “Loosen some wires under the hood, in case they want to check your story.”
The jeep stood beside the tracks. Khang threw up his hands. “Colonel, I’ve known since we left Saigon that you were out of your gourd. But I’m still alive, playing it your way. So whatever you say, sir.”
Tyreen said, “There ought to be a freight along soon. Hooker...?”
Hooker put his ear to the track and got up shaking his head. George McKuen, a disheveled scarecrow in tattered cloth and bandages, sat on the front fender. Saville gave him a package of rations, and McKuen attacked the food like a drug addict snatching an overdue fix. But other than hunger he revealed all the feelings of a cement slab. Tyreen’s lips pushed out and down, keeping time. He took note of the lifelessness of McKuen’s expression. Don’t think about it, he thought. There was too much to think about. He pictured Nhu Van Sun and Corporal Smith and Warrant Officer Shannon and the delicate features of Lin Thao. And the echoes of Captain Eddie Kreizler’s talk kept banging around. Who do you think you are — General Robert E. Lee?
He realized that McKuen was talking to him:
“... have to fill it in a little slow for us country boys, Colonel, but do we by any chance have the wherewithal to be extractin’ ourselves from this bloody hinterland?”
Saville answered the question. “We got our orders this morning by radio. Blow the bridge and get down the river. A submarine from the Seventh Fleet will pick us up at midnight at the mouth of the Sang Chu.”
“Blow the bridge,” McKuen said, “and travel forty miles of jungle river. In — what? — twelve hours, maybe? Thirteen hours? Captain, I could conceivably be wrong, but nobody here looks like Tarzan to me.” He considered it. “Still and all, I’m thinkin’ if we don’t get there by midnight, we won’t get there at all. Am I right, gentlemen?”
No one troubled to answer him. McKuen nodded as if to confirm his estimate.
Tyreen said, “There may be a flatcar back near the tail of the train with an antiaircraft crew. Theodore, that’s your job. Sergeant Hooker, you’ll have about eighteen minutes to set your charges on the engine. And remember this: a nearmiss counts in a game of horseshoes, but not up here. Use a sixty-second fuse, and don’t light it until you get my signal. As soon as the fuse is lit, we leave the train. Sergeant Khang and I will keep the engine crew occupied. Any questions?”
McKuen said, “What about me?”
“You’re just along for the ride, Lieutenant.”
“That’ll be bloody refreshing for a change.”
But McKuen’s eyes were bloodshot, and his tone was dull, and the slack attitude of his body belied the good humor of his words.
Tyreen nodded to the others and crossed the tracks. He took a post, hidden in a thicket of bamboo, and waited for the others to join him. “Relax. Smoke if you want. Hooker, check your equipment.”
George McKuen’s sudden grin was a spasm of clenched teeth and drawn lips. “This time,” he said, “I’ll see that bridge smashed to bloody hell, or know the reason why.”
Chapter Forty-seven
1050 Hours
The train reached its sliding halt with a sigh of brake shoes. Smoke chuffed from the engine stack, and Tyreen saw the inscription on one slat-sided boxcar: Hommes 52–56, Chevaux 12. The train curved away into the jungle; its rear end was out of sight. Faintly, over exhalations of steam, Tyreen heard Sergeant Khang on the far side of the train talking to the engineer. The engineer and the fireman and the armed guard all crowded over to the far side of the engine to talk to Khang. Tyreen made a brief hand signal and stepped out of the bamboo.
He crossed the five-yard distance with rapid strides and followed Saville up into the engine cab. Saville had his gun braced on his hip. The tone of Khang’s voice changed, and the engine guard stiffened. Saville spoke calmly in Vietnamese and reached around to relieve the guard of his weapon.
Hooker and McKuen climbed up. Sergeant Khang looked both ways along the track and swung up. He said, “Take on water and proceed. We are not here. You understand?” He was talking to the engine driver.
The engineer was a middle-aged man with watery eyes and sloping chin. He blinked rapidly. His face was whipped red by wind. Tyreen’s gun muzzle lifted to cover the crew. The fireman was a hard chunk of a man with a keen, violent temper mirrored in his face. George McKuen said, “I’m thinking we’ll be doing our own coal-shoveling before this ride’s over, Colonel.”
“Watch him,” Tyreen agreed.
J. D. Hooker crouched down to lay out his equipment. Tyreen braced himself on the tender platform, giving Hooker room to work. Tyreen said, “All right, Theodore.”
Saville dropped off the engine and trotted back alongside the train. Sergeant Khang tied the sentry with his own belt and bootlaces. The man spoke bitterly.
The fireman rammed his shovel into the tender’s coal with a blow that could sever a man’s body. Sergeant Khang spoke a mild command; the engineer reached for his throttle. His tongue licked out rapidly.
Air brakes wheezed, and the big wheels spun before they took a grip on the tracks. The engine ground forward. Back half the length of the train, Theodore Saville reached for a boxcar ladder and swung up as the car rolled past. Saville swarmed up to the top of the car and ran back along the swaying catwalks. Tyreen lost sight of him around the curve in the track.
McKuen said, “The good Captain’s one landmark I didn’t expect to raise again. What happens if he has to fight a duel with an antiaircraft gun?”
Hooker made a pattern of tamping jelly, explosive blocks, wires and fuses and caps. Sergeant Khang bent down and rolled the trussed guard off the train. The guard’s angry shouting followed them. Wheel-trucks chattered on the rails. A red blaze glared in the open firebox, shining on Hooker’s face. Like a young spider, he seemed to thrive on the oppressive heat. The roadbed traveled a soggy, uneven course through jungle corridors. The engineer clutched his throttle; his eyes drained, and he stared petulantly straight ahead past the boiler.
A demolition cap rolled with the motion of the engine, and Hooker made a grab for it. The fireman’s quick eyes did not miss that; his powerful grip tightened on the coal spade. Iron wheels drummed on rail-splices, gathering speed. Tyreen spoke to Nguyen Khang: “Tell him to keep his speed down.”