to know that.
'It would mean more, this ‘parole' of which you speak, if I had the faintest idea how I might escape,' Adam said. 'I don't, not that I haven't thought about it.'
'I'm sure you have,' Labaan agreed. 'Be unworthy of you not to at least try to think of a way. Allah knows, I've spent enough time, both before and after your capture, thinking about how to prevent it.' The older man's hand swept around, indicating, so Adam thought, not merely the building in which he was held but the entire abandoned city. 'So will you give me your parole? You word as a man of honor that you will not try to escape?'
'It wouldn't matter,' Adam replied. 'With or without my word, I can't leave here. I can't leave the girl. You knew that would happen when you gave her to me, I'm sure. But for what it's worth, fine, you have my ‘parole.' Such as it is.'
Labaan nodded, more relieved than happy. 'I'll give the orders not to shackle you anymore,' he said. 'And I'll pull the guards back out of earshot from your door. Who knows; maybe without us listening you'll get that girl with child. Then I'll have a better hold on you even than she is.'
'Do you have children, Labaan?' Adam asked. The guard scowled; Adam had no idea why.
For a time Labaan was silent. Then he said, sadly and perhaps a bit distantly, 'I had. Two girls. And a wife, of course.'
'Had?'
'Dead. Killed.'
Adam suddenly felt sick. Sure, Labaan was his kidnapper. But even in that he was only doing his duty as he saw it. In every particular, otherwise, he'd been as kind as he could be.
'I'm so sorry,' Adam replied. 'Was it my . . . ' He let the question trail off.
Labaan shook his head. 'Your people? No. No, I don't know who killed them. It was during the troubles that attended the breakup of what used to be a country. But I am sure of two things. One is that the Marehan had nothing to do with it; my family was nowhere near any place your people inhabit.'
'And the other?' Adam asked.
Again Labaan went silent for some time. 'And the other,' he finally answered, sighing, 'and the other is that whoever did it, they were not of my people. Which is how I learned that one can only have faith in one's own blood.'
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
Oral delivery aims at persuasion and
making the listener believe they are converted.
Few persons are capable of being convinced;
the majority allow themselves to be persuaded.
-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
D-42, Assembly Area Alpha-Base Camp, Amazonia, Brazil
The twice-weekly marches had gradually been worked up from six miles at a fairly slow place and minimal equipment (barring the heavy mortars, which were always brought along for pain's sake) to twelve at a near killing pace. It was hard on the old men's knees, in itself, but their weight was dropping and that helped a bit. Maybe more importantly, they'd gotten used to regular pain again, pain in the back, pain in the knees, pain in the feet, and pain in all the muscles in between.
From the 'street' outside of his darkened tent, Reilly heard the first sergeant giving the orders, 'Foot inspection in thirty minutes. Platoon sergeants take charge of your platoons.' This was followed by Platoon Sergeant, ex-Sergeant Major, Schetrompf shouting, 'You pussies don't need thirty minutes. Besides, the sun-such as it is-will be down by then. Squad leaders, you have ten to get 'em ready. Snap and pop, assholes, snap and pop.' Epolito added, 'The same goes for you, Third Herd.'
Reilly made his way to his cot and sat down at the foot of it, wearily and heavily. 'Oh, God,' he moaned, softly, 'my feet hurt.'
Lana came in, dropped her rucksack down, plopped her shapely posterior on the ground, and leaned her back against the tent's center pole. She was wearing a green T-shirt that stuck to her body in all the best places. 'You know,' she said, 'there's a lot to be said for just being a girl . . . pampered . . . soft . . . protected . . . spoiled. Maybe this whole feminist thing is a bad mistake.'
Reilly knew she wasn't serious, or not entirely serious. 'You heard Top. Get your boots off.'
'I can't,' she replied. 'It hurts too much even to think about.'
That much he did believe. He flipped the shoulder straps off of his rucksack and lay back, then rolled off the cot to the tent's dirt floor. On all fours he crawled toward her until he'd reached her feet.
'You don't have . . . '
'Shut up,' Reilly said, as he began unlacing her boots. He undid the laces on both before pulling off first the left one, then the right. Thickly cushioned but now wet boot socks followed. These, smelly things that they were, he stuffed into the boots. There was just barely enough light to see by, filtering through the tent's roof, walls, and door. At least there was now that his eyes were accustomed to it.
He examined her feet with a critical eye. 'Tsk,' he said, on seeing the prominent blisters. 'You don't march much in Tzahal'-the Israeli Army-'do you?'
'Not so much,' she admitted. 'Not since the fifties when we went almost completely mechanized. Oh, sure, there's some in initial training and then rarely after that.' She thought about that last statement and amended it, 'Really rarely.'
'It shows. How long have they been like this?'
'Couple of weeks.'
'And you didn't see the medics?' His voice was full of reproach, even as his mind thought, Good girl. Tough girl. You make me proud of you.
'I'm not a whiner.' And besides, I didn't want to disappoint you.
'I guess not,' he agreed. 'Wait here while I go get Sergeant Coffee.'
He started to rise but her hand shot up and pulled him back to the ground, considerably nearer to her than he'd been. 'Wait,' she said. 'It can wait.'
'For what?'
