“It’s, like, ‘Let the good times roll.’“
Frank Leopole rapped his bronzed knuckles on the polished table. The chatter in the room abated.
“Okay. This meeting is about filling out the training team.” He nodded to SSI’s director of training.
Dr. Omar Mohammed was the Iranian-born son of a shah’s diplomat, valued for his versatility. In addition to supervising SSI training, he was an accomplished linguist, having grown up with Farsi, French, English, and Arabic. Now he spoke four other languages besides. He began, “Jack and I contacted David Main. He’s still our DoD liaison, and now that he’s a full colonel he can tap some assets that were less certain before.”
Leopole beamed. “Doc, you’re just determined to see your picture on the hostile targets at Benning, aren’t you?”
The PhD leaned back, hands comfortably clasped behind his head. “It’s all relative. After all, we recruit from the top of the milk bottle so we can skim the cream. Yes, Special Forces soldiers fluent in Arabic are high-value assets, as the saying goes. Which is precisely why we pay them what they’re worth on the open market.” He arched an eyebrow. “Once their obligations are fulfilled, of course.”
Retired Gunnery Sergeant Daniel Foyte caught Leopole’s eye. They were longtime friends and connoisseurs of Tennessee sippin’ whiskey.
“Just a quick question. How good do we want the Chadians to be?”
“How do you mean?” Mohammed asked.
“I mean, considering what their government’s like, do we really want to train these clients to the highest possible standard?”
Mohammed stared at the far wall, visualizing the stories he had heard about the
“I respectfully disagree, Colonel.” As Mohammed defaulted to the more respectful term — he might have addressed Leopole by his given name. “I believe they are directly linked.”
Privately, Leopole ceded his colleague’s point. But he did not want to give SSI the impression that he ever held any qualms about accepting a contract. “I understand your concern, Omar. I really do. But let’s be totally honest: it’s more a matter of degree than substance. However long we work with the Chadians, they’re not likely to come up to more than third-class military status. There’s too much of a cultural gap, and if that appears racist, so be it.”
“You seem to be saying, let our team develop these clients to their full potential, even though we know the end result will be inferior.”
“Only by our standards, Omar. By their standards they’ll be six-hundred-pound gorillas.”
Mohammed nodded slowly. “Very well.” As the meeting proceeded, he penned himself a note for discussion with Mike Derringer.
“Did you ever see
J. J. Johnson knew that he had just asked a rhetorical question. Jason Boscombe’s taste in cinema ran in two directions: action and skin, not necessarily in that order. Fishing lay far, far down the former Ranger’s list of interests.
“Yeah, I watched it on TV with my mom. She liked it because of the photography and stuff.”
Johnson finished tying a fly to Bosco’s line. The Parachute Adams dangled at the end of the tippet. “Well, I figured you being from Ellensburg, you’d have some fisherman’s blood in you.”
Bosco frowned perceptibly. “I was more into hunting than fishing. My old man liked to go after steelhead, but he and I…” His voice trailed off.
Johnson ignored the tacit message. He knew that Boscombe had seldom returned to eastern Washington after his mother’s death. “Well, the reason I ask about the movie is that it showed fly casting as an accuracy game. That’s the great thing about it: you don’t have to get a strike to enjoy it.”
“If you say so.”
“I do say so.” Johnson handed the spare rod to Bosco and unreeled a length of line from his own. Standing on the bank, he looked at the calm, gray water and found what he wanted. “Target. Eleven o’clock, fifteen meters.”
Bosco searched in the direction indicated. “You mean that leaf?”
“That’s it.” Johnson whipped his graphite rod back and forth two or three times, then made his cast. The fly alit five inches from the target. “Damn.”
“What do you mean, ‘damn’? Looked like you almost hit it!”
“Naw, too short. I’ll try again.” Johnson made a longer cast next time, placing the fly three inches beyond the leaf.
“You got it bracketed, dude. Fire for effect!”
Johnson grinned. “Well, you don’t actually want to hit your fish. You want to put the fly within a couple inches of his nose so he’ll be able to grab it. But don’t just let it float there. Real bugs don’t act that way. They sort of skitter across the water, like this.” The fisherman gave his rod a series of short, precise strokes that drew the Adams hopping across the surface.
A trout rose to the bait, snapped at the fly, and dived.
“Whoa!” Bosco exclaimed. “You got ‘im, J. J.! Awesome!” He slapped his friend on the back. “How’d you know he was there?”
“Ah, you learn.” He tugged on his rod, enjoying the small adrenaline spike and the tension of the fish fighting on the other end.
He did not admit that the trout had surprised him as much as it did Bosco.
Abruptly the line went slack. “He slipped the hook,” Johnson said calmly. “Didn’t sink it when he took the fly. But we’ll stay with Parachutes for a while, since they’re about the most versatile surface flies around. I’ll change to Woolly Buggers later in the day.”
Bosco hefted his rod and looked around. The reservoir was ringed with tall evergreens, their piney scent filling the morning air. “This is nice, J. J. Better than I thought. Where should I try?”
“Hey, I knew you’d like it here.” He pointed to his right. “Step out on those flat rocks. That way you’ll be clear of the trees when you cast. Remember, back to ten o’clock and forward to two.”
“Gotcha.”
Johnson watched his friend for the first few casts. Like most beginners, Bosco exaggerated the pause at the ten and two positions, but eventually the casts became more fluid and the range increased. During the morning he even got a couple of strikes.
At the lunch break, the discussion turned to shop talk.
Bosco began with more subtlety than usual. “Admiral Derringer’s a fisherman, isn’t he? Does he ever go fly fishing?”
“Don’t think so. Far as I know he’s into deep-sea fishing. He got a near record marlin last year.”
“Yeah, I remember him talking about that,” Bosco replied. He regarded the former Foreign Legionnaire. “Just before we went to Pakistan, wasn’t it?”
Johnson shook his head. “I don’t know for sure. I was still pretty new with the company at the time.”
“Well, Breezy and I really like working for SSI. We’re going to Chad, you know.”
Bosco began to avert his eyes, then riveted them on Johnson’s. “How am I doing?”
Johnson lifted his Coors, took a sip, then set the beer down. “You know, you missed your calling.”
“Yeah? How’s that?”
“Well, you’re a shit-hot recruiter, that’s all.”
Bosco flicked his head as if avoiding a gnat. “J. J., what are you trying to say?”
“I’m trying to say, dude, that I’m in. I’ll go to Chad.”
Boscombe’s eyes widened in realization. “You sumbitch! You already made up your mind!”
