I gave a slow if somewhat tentative nod, then said, “I’m very worried about what will happen to the new well, though. We must protect it from the Taliban.”
Shilmani translated, and Burki suddenly threw up his hands and climbed back in the car.
I looked at Shilmani. “What did I say?”
Shilmani took a deep breath. “He doesn’t want you to protect the well from the Taliban, remember?”
“Yeah,” I groaned. “Now I do. I’m in a difficult situation right now. If I can just remove Zahed, then maybe your boss can negotiate for water rights with the next guy.”
“He’s very upset about the bridge. We have to drive fifteen kilometers to cross at the next one.”
“Why do you need to cross?”
“To make our deliveries in Sangsar.”
“To the Taliban.”
He glanced away. “Scott, I did not contact any of your men. Why are you here?”
“I need you to help me find Zahed.”
“It’s too dangerous for me right now — especially with the bridge destroyed.”
Burki started hollering for Shilmani to finish up. I raised a palm. “It’s okay. For now. When you’re ready.”
His eyes grew glassy before he looked away and finished loading his last jug.
My boots dragged through the sand as I crossed back to the Hummer.
I thought about that little girl who’d been raped and kept pinning that on Zahed so he could remain the “bad guy” in my head. But then I heard Harruck saying that maybe she’d been raped without Zahed’s knowledge. Maybe he wasn’t linked to a lot of the crime going on. Maybe he would, in the end, do much more for the people than the government could.
After biting my lips and swearing once more, I hopped into the Hummer, and the private took the wheel. “Where to now, sir?”
“They got a bar around here?”
He laughed. “Uh, no, sir.”
I smelled something. Gasoline. Burning. I looked at the private. “Get out!”
TEN
I opened the door and looked back to spot a burning rag stuffed into our open fuel tank. Both the private and I ran from the truck just as, in the next second, the tank ruptured under a muffled explosion and flames began rushing up the sides. There was no heaving of the HMMWV off the ground, no cinema-like burst of flames, but black smoke and a thick stench spread quickly as I drew my sidearm and scanned the row of houses behind us.
There he was. A kid, maybe eighteen. Running.
“Come on!” I shouted to the private.
Off to my left, Shilmani and Burki were already on their way off, but the truck stopped. Shilmani bailed out and started after us.
The private, whose name I’d already forgotten, and I charged down the street after the wiry guy, who sprinted like a triathlete. We reached the next intersection, glanced around at all the laundry spanning the alleyways, and the kid was gone.
“I’m sorry, sir,” said the private.
“Yeah. Call it in.”
As the private got on his radio, I walked back toward Shilmani, who threw his hands in the air and yelled, “It won’t be a big attack now. It’ll be this. Every day. Day after day. Until they wear you down.”
“I get it,” I answered. “But I’m pretty tough. We’re tough. They don’t torch one Hummer and expect me to go home. No way, pal.”
“This is not the war you expected. This will never be the war you expected.” He spun on his heel and jogged back toward Burki and the truck, now sagging under the weight of water jugs.
We left the alley and returned to the small crowd watching our truck burn. That was two Hummers I’d lost since coming to Senjaray. I was cursed.
The private told me at least three other patrols had also been attacked in a coordinated effort by Taliban residing inside the village. Shilmani was, of course, right. We’d be harassed and terrorized, even as we tried to help.
I was in my quarters, reviewing all the data Army intelligence had gathered from the aforementioned Predator drones, when Harruck arrived. He stood in the doorway with the XO at his shoulder.
“Next time you head into town, I’ll need you with a more heavily armed escort,” he said tersely.
“Next time I’ll ride my bike. Then again, they might try to blow that up, too.”
“Well, there it is, Scott. Before you got here, my patrols were attacked two, maybe three times at the most. Now it’s begun.”
“You know, I actually considered what you said — putting the word out to Zahed. But I can’t even find a way to do that.”
“You can’t stop trying.”
“I want to meet with Kundi and the provincial governor — what the hell’s his name again?”
“You mean the district governor. Naimut Gul,” he said. “And they call the meeting a
“You going to get Zahed to sign it, too?”
He just glared at me. “I assume you spoke to Bronco?”
“You think I wouldn’t?”
Harruck grinned weakly. “He’s no help. I’ve already tried. His buddies in Kandahar handle our prisoners, and that’s about the extent of it. I think they’re working on something with the opium trade that goes way over Zahed’s head.”
“Have you tried tailing him?”
“Who? Bronco? I don’t have the resources.”
“I do. Maybe I’m not your biggest problem here, Simon. Maybe he is…”
“The agency’s got its own agenda, no doubt. I even heard a rumor about the NSA having field agents out here, but I think my mission is too damned simple to be on their radar.”
“You never know…”
I spent about a week laying low and examining imagery from the drones, trying to pick out Zahed among the thousands of people living in his village. Twice, I’d thought I’d seen him in the bazaar, but I couldn’t be sure. A half dozen Army intelligence analysts back home were doing the same thing, but I always thought a guy behind a desk somewhere in Virginia might not notice the same things as a grunt in the sand.
My Ghosts continued to pose as regular Army and help with defenses along the defile leading down into Senjaray. Harruck’s patrols were harassed by gunfire a few more times, but no one was hurt, and the attackers, after firing a few rounds, fled before they could be caught. I contended that teenagers sympathetic to the Taliban were to blame.
Anderson, along with the Army Corps of Engineers and a half dozen other aid groups, began moving in building materials and breaking ground for the school and the police station, which would be constructed directly north of the defile so that locals could best defend them from attack.
Our replacement Cross-Coms arrived, but I was hesitant to have the guys use them until we pinpointed the source of the disruption.
I assigned Ramirez and Beasley to maintain surveillance on Bronco, who’d been spending a lot of time with landowner Kundi, water man Burki, and a few more of the elders from Senjaray and the other towns in the district.
Bronco hadn’t gone over to Sangsar, as I suspected he would. Ramirez told me that the engineers had
