Did Walker abduct Gracie Ann Brice for revenge against Colonel Brice? And who is Major Charles Woodrow Walker? And where is he now?
The big man named Jacko was saying, “I remember one time, me and the major, we got these two VC up in the chopper, five hundred feet off the deck. The major’s interrogating them-where’s your base camp, how many men, and so on. The one gook, he keeps saying, ‘Doo Mommie,’ which means ‘fuck your mama’ in Viet. Well, the major finally got his fill, so he grabs the dink and throws his ass right out the door. We hear him screaming all the way down. Then the major grabs the other dink-that sumbitch pisses hisself. And he talks, gives us the coordinates of their base camp. We called in the B-52s the next morning. They wiped that camp and about five hundred gooks off the face of the earth.”
Jacko smiled like he was remembering his last birthday party.
“You lived for those days.”
Junior said, “What’d you do with the other gook?”
“Oh, we threw him out, too. Five-hundred-foot dive into a rice paddy.”
Jacko now had a faraway look on his face, like Sylvia when she talked of her old country.
“Best years of my life. Hell, killing, drinking, and fucking-to an Okie from Henryetta, Vietnam wasn’t no war, it was a goddamned vacation.” He shook his head. “Politicians fucked up a pretty good war.”
They were sitting in a McDonald’s drive-through waiting for their order. Gracie was listening. Junior was wide-eyed.
“Gosh, I love to hear them stories,” he said.
Jacko said, “Course, when McNamara and Johnson sent in the draftees and the war became a goddamn TV show back home, I knew my Oriental vacation was coming to an end. But I didn’t know my Army career was coming to an end when Viper team humped into the Quang Tri province that day in ’68 or when we humped out that night. I just followed the major in and followed the major out and in between we wasted some gooks. Just another day in paradise. But the Army sacrificed Viper team to the mob.” He sucked on his cigarette, blew out smoke, and said, “Because Lieutenant Ben Brice couldn’t keep his fuckin’ mouth shut.”
“Why didn’t the major kill Brice after he ratted you out?”
“After the court-martial, CIA hired us to greenback in Cambodia-CIA, they don’t give a shit about politics.” He chuckled. “With SOG, the major reported to the president. With the CIA, he reported to no one. Anyway, Brice, he was a native by then, living in the zoo with the Yards. After the war, he just disappeared.”
Junior handed a white bag back to Gracie. She had ordered a Big Mac, fries, and milk. Mother never let her eat fast food.
Jacko said back to her: “Where’s your grandpa been living?”
Gracie thought that if she told the truth, maybe they’d turn around and drive to Taos, which would be better than wherever they were going now. And she knew Ben wasn’t at the cabin anyway.
“Taos.”
“The hell’s he doing in Taos?”
“He makes furniture-rocking chairs, tables, desks. They’re awesome. Movie stars buy his stuff.”
Jacko thought that was funny. “Green Beret making rocking chairs for movie stars.”
“Like who?” Junior asked.
Gracie didn’t answer him. Instead, she said, “Let’s go to Taos. I’ll take you to his cabin.”
Jacko snorted. “I think I’ll wait for him to come to me.”
“Scared, huh? You know, you guys ought to pull over and let me out before he catches up with you.”
“Shut up, you little whore!”
Gracie wasn’t sure what that word meant, but she was pretty sure it wasn’t a compliment. Before she could defend herself, Junior did.
“Don’t call her that! She ain’t no whore!”
Junior was giving Jacko a real mean face, like Ronnie down the street that day she had beaten him up.
“She started it! Tell her to shut up! You want a woman in your life, that’s what you get-a fuckin’ mouth won’t stop!”
Gracie removed her lunch from the bag and began singing: “Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be morons…”
Jacko pointed a French fry back at her and said, “See? See what I mean?”
Gracie pulled the milk out of the bag and saw her picture on the carton under MISSING CHILD.
The off-road tires gripped the dirt-and-rock trail and the V-8 engine muscled the Land Rover up the steep incline while the plush leather seats cushioned the occupants as they bounced about, albeit less than one would expect due to the electronic air suspension system. For your off-roading needs, no other SUV measured up to a Range Rover product. John’s Range Rover back home was a sporty red job with four-wheel-drive, a neat feature even though the thought of actually taking a $75,000 vehicle off road had never entered John Brice’s mind. So when they crested the hill, John exhaled with great relief and his white-knuckled hands released their death grip on the steering wheel as he braked the Land Rover to a stop in front of a small cabin.
It was almost noon on the seventh day Gracie was gone.
A dog was on Ben before he had de-Rovered. Ben knelt and petted the dog; the beast licked his face like an ice cream cone. “How ya doin’, Buddy?” If a dog can cry, Buddy was. Ben stood and walked inside the cabin. Man’s best friend then greeted John, slobbering all over his jeans and Nike cross-trainers.
“Get away from me, you freaking mutt!”
John was not comfortable around dogs; he had had a dog for a while as a boy, but the dang beast had bit him every chance it could. Fido finally abandoned his attack on John when it spotted some kind of rat creature and gave chase into the brush bordering the cabin. John dehosed his jeans and checked out Ben’s cabin; it was smaller than the four-car garage at Six Magnolia Lane, but it was a neat log home just the same.
On both sides of the steps leading up to the porch were gardens; little sprigs stuck up out of uniform rows of black dirt. The porch floor was built of wood planks. Cacti in colorful pots, odd-shaped rocks, and painted wood carvings of coyotes and horses lined the porch rail. John followed the porch around the cabin and gazed out on the brown terrain that stretched to the distant mountains whose white tops were a stark contrast against the deep blue sky. As far as he could see, there was not another human being, not another house, not another anything. This was not an exclusive gated community constructed to keep the masses out. This was not a master-planned subdivision with an active homeowners’ association. This was not a place you came to for social engineering. This was where you came to leave the rest of the world behind.
On the west side of the porch were two wooden rocking chairs; one was half-sized with GRACIE carved in the seat back. John sat in her chair and imagined Ben and Gracie sitting there and talking, and he wondered what she had said about her father. He sighed. He should have come with her, as she had always begged him to, and sat in a rocker with JOHN carved into the seat back and talked to his father. But he had always been so brain-damaged about the past-a father not there to protect Little Johnny Brice from the bullies-and so focused on the future-an IPO that would make John R. Brice’s life perfect-that he had never found the reason or the time to forgive or forget.
He hoped Gracie had forgiven her father.
He stood and walked around back. Behind the cabin were a vegetable garden and a smaller structure accessible via a stone path. The door creaked as John entered Ben’s workshop; unfinished furniture and tools occupied the floor and walls. A rocking chair caught John’s eye. He ran his hands along the graceful wood armrests and down the curved back. He sat in the chair and leaned his head back. John had assumed the least about his father, that his woodwork would be crude creations, not works of art like this chair. Just as he had assumed a drunk would live like a drunk, sloppy and dirty. But the cabin and grounds and this workshop were meticulously maintained, as if Ben had a Sylvia Milanevic on the payroll.