The Enemy

“Three-hour drive,” she said.

“And he’s here now.”

“Who is he?”

I called post headquarters. Asked the question. They told me who he was. I put the phone down and looked straight at Summer.

“He’s Delta,” I said. “He was a defector from Bulgaria. They brought him in as an instructor. He knows stuff our guys don’t.”

I got up from my desk and stepped over to the map on the wall. Put my own fingers on the pushpins. Little finger on Fort Bird, index finger on Columbia. It was like I was validating a theory by touch alone. A hundred and fifty miles. Three hours and twelve minutes to get there, three hours and thirty-seven minutes to get back. I did the math in my head. An average speed of forty-seven miles an hour going, and forty-one coming back. At night, on empty roads, in a Chevrolet Corvette. He could have done it with the parking brake on.

“Should we have him picked up?” Summer said.

“No,” I said. “I’ll do it myself. I’ll go over there.”

“Is that smart?”

“Probably not. But I don’t want those guys to think they got to me.”

“I’ll come with you,” she said.

“OK,” I said.

It was five o’clock in the afternoon, exactly thirty-six hours to the minute since Trifonov arrived back on-post. The weather was dull and cold. We took sidearms and handcuffs and evidence bags. We walked to the MP motor pool and found a Humvee that had a cage partition bolted behind the front seats and no inside handles on the back doors. Summer drove. She parked at Delta’s prison gate. The sentry let us through on foot. We walked around the outside of the main block until I found the entrance to their NCO Club. I stopped, and Summer stopped beside me.

“You going in there?” she said.

“Just for a minute.”

“Alone?”

I nodded. “Then we’re going to their armory.”

“Not smart,” she said. “I should come in with you.”

“Why?”

She hesitated. “As a witness, I guess.”

“To what?”

“To whatever they do to you.”

I smiled, briefly.

“Terrific,” I said.

I pushed in through the door. The place was pretty crowded. The light was dim and the air was full of smoke. There was a lot of noise. Then people saw me and went quiet. I moved onward. People stood where they were. Stock-still. Then they turned to face me. I pushed past them, one by one. Through the crowd. Nobody moved out of my way. They bumped me with their shoulders, left and right. I bumped back, in the silence. I stand six feet five inches tall and I weigh two hundred thirty pounds. I can hold my own in a shoving competition.

I made it through the lobby and moved into the bar. Same thing happened. The noise died fast. People turned toward me. Stared at me. I pushed and shoved and bumped my way through the room. There was nothing to hear except tense breathing and the scrape of feet on the floor and the soft thump of shoulder on shoulder. I kept my eyes on the far wall. The young guy with the beard and the tan stepped out into my path. He had a glass of beer in his hand. I kept going straight and he leaned to his right and we collided and his glass slopped half its contents on the linoleum tile.

“You spilled my drink,” he said.

I stopped. Looked down at the floor. Then I looked into his eyes.

“Lick it up,” I said.

We stood face-to-face for a second. Then I moved on past him. I felt an itch in my back. I knew he was staring at me. But I wasn’t about to turn around. No way. Not unless I heard a bottle shatter against a table behind me.

I didn’t hear a bottle. I made it all the way to the far wall. Touched it like a swimmer at the end of a lap. Turned around and started back. The return journey was no different. The room was silent. I picked up the pace a little. Drove faster through the crowd. Bumped harder. Momentum has its advantages. By the time I was ten paces from the lobby people were starting to move out of my way. They were backing off a little.

I figured we had communicated effectively. So in the lobby I started to deviate slightly from a purely straight path. Other people returned the compliment. I made it back to the entrance like any other civilized person in a crowded situation. I stopped at the door. Turned around. Scanned the faces in the room, slowly, one group at a time, one thousand, two thousand, three thousand, four thousand. Then I turned my back on them all and stepped out into the cold fresh air.

Summer wasn’t there.

I looked around and a second later saw her slip out of a service entrance ten feet away. It had gotten her in behind the bar. I figured she had been watching my back.

She looked at me.

“Now you know,” she said.

“Know what?”

“How the first black soldier felt. And the first woman.”