Out here men and women were about to buy their way into India using
their lives as collateral.
The day that became routine was the day Rodgers vowed to hang up his
uniform.
Stepping briskly, proudly, Rodgers made his way toward the shadow of the
plane and the sharp, bright salutes of his waiting team.
CHAPTER FOUR.
Kargu, Kashmir Wednesday, 4:11 p. m.
Apu Kumar sat on the old, puffy featherbed that had once been used by
his grandmother. He looked out at the four bare walls of his small
bedroom. They had not always been bare. There used to be framed pictures
of his late wife and his daughter and son-in-law, and a mirror. But
their houseguests had removed them. Glass could be used as a weapon.
The bed was tucked in a corner of the room he shared with his
twenty-two-year-old granddaughter Nanda. At the moment the young woman
was outside cleaning the chicken coop. When she was finished she would
shower in the small stall behind the house and then return to the room.
She would unfold a small card table, set it beside her grandfather's
bed, and pull over a wooden chair. The bedroom door would be kept ajar
and their vegetarian meals would be served to them in small wooden
bowls. Then Apu and Nanda would listen to the radio, play chess, read,
meditate, and pray. They would pray for enlightenment and also for
Nanda's mother and father, both of whom died in the roaring hell that
was unleashed on Kargil just four years ago. Sometime around ten or
eleven they would go to sleep. With any luck Apu would make it through
the night. Sudden noises tended to wake him instantly and bring back the
planes and the weeks of endless bombing raids.
In the morning, the Kargil-born farmer was permitted to go out and look
after his chickens. One of his houseguests always went with him to make
sure he did not try to leave.
Apu's truck was still parked beside the coop. Even though the Pakistanis
had taken the keys Apu could easily splice the ignition wires and drive
off. Of course, he would only do that if his granddaughter Nanda were
with him. Which was why they were never allowed outside together.
The slender, silver-haired man would feed the chickens, talk to them,
and look after any eggs they had left. Then he was taken back to the
room. In the late afternoon it was Nanda's turn to go out to do the more
difficult work of cleaning the coop. Though Apu could do it, their
guests insisted that Nanda go. It helped keep the headstrong young woman
tired. When they had enough eggs to bring to market one of their
houseguests always went to Srinagar for them. And they always gave the
money to Apu. The Pakistanis were not here for financial profit. Though
Apu tried hard to eavesdrop, he was still not sure why they were here.
They did not do much except talk.
For five months, ever since the five Pakistanis arrived in the middle of
the night, the physical life of the sixty-three year-old farmer had been
defined by this routine. Though daily visits to the coop had been the
extent of the Kumars' physical life, Apu had retained his wits, his
spirit, and most importantly his dignity. He had done that by devoting
himself to reading and meditating on his deep Hindu beliefs. He did that
for himself and also to show his Islamic captors that his faith and
resolve were as powerful as theirs.
Apu reached behind him. He raised his pillow a little higher. It was
lumpy with age, having been through three generations of Kumars. A smile
played on his grizzled, leathery face. The down had suffered enough.
Perhaps the duck would find contentment in another incarnation.
The smile faded quickly. That was sacrilegious. It was something his
granddaughter might have said. He should know better. Maybe the months
of incarceration were affecting his reason. He looked around.
Nanda slept in a sleeping bag on the other side of the room. There were
times when Apu would wake in the small hours of the night and hear her
breathing. He enjoyed that.
If nothing else their captivity had allowed them to get to know each
other better. Even though her nontraditional religious views bothered
him, he was glad to know what they were. One could not fight the enemy
without knowing his face.
There were two other rooms in the small stone house. The door to the
living room was open. The Pakistanis stayed there during the day. At
night they moved to the room that used to be his. All save the one who
took the watch. One of them was always awake. They had to be. Not just
to make sure Apu and Nanda stayed inside the house but to watch for
anyone who might approach the farm. Though no one lived close by, Indian
army patrols occasionally came through these low-lying hills.
When this group of Pakistanis first arrived they had promised their
unwilling hosts that they would stay no more than six months. And if Apu
and Nanda did what they were told they would not be harmed after that
time. Apu was not sure he believed the four men and one woman but he was
willing to give them the time they asked for. After all, what choice did
he have?
Though he would not mind if the authorities came and shot them dead. As
long as he did not cause harm to befall them it would not affect his
future in this life or the next.
The shame of it was that as people they would all get along fine. But
politics and religion had stirred things up. That was the story of this
entire region from the time Apu had been a young man. Neighbors were
neighbors until outsiders turned them into enemies.
There was one small window in the room but the shutters had been nailed
closed. The only light came from a small lamp on the nightstand. The
glow illuminated a small, old, leather bound copy of the Upanishads.
Those were the mystical writings of Apu's faith. The Upanishads
comprised the final section of the Veda, the Hindu holy scriptures.
Apu turned his mind back to the text. He was reading the earliest of the
Upanishads, the sections of verse that addressed the doctrine of
Brahman, the universal self or soul.
The goal of Hinduism, like other Eastern religions, was nirvana, the
eventual freedom from the cycle of rebirth and the pain brought about by
one's own actions or karma. This could only be accomplished by following
spiritual yoga, which led to a union with God. Apu was determined to
pursue that goal. though actually achieving it was a dream. He was also
devoted to the study of the post-Vedic Puranas, which address the
structure of' life in an individual and social sense and also take the
reader through the repeating cycle of creation and end of the universe
as represented by the divine trinity of Brahma, the creator; Vishnu, the
preserver; and Shiva, the destroyer. He had had a hard life, as befitted
his farmer caste. But he had to believe that it was just a blink in the
cosmic cycle. Otherwise, there would be nothing to work toward, no
ultimate end.
Nanda was different. She put more trust in the poet-saints who wrote
religious songs and epics.
The literature was essential to Hinduism but
she responded to the outpourings of men more than the doctrines they
were describing. Nanda had always liked heroes who spoke their minds.
That had been her mother's nature as well. To say what she believed.
To fight. To resist.
That was what had helped cost Apu his daughter and sonin-law.
When the Pakistani invaders first arrived, the two sheep farmers made
Molotov cocktails for the hastily organized resistance fighters. After
two weeks both Savitri and her husband, Manjay, were caught transporting
them inside bags of wool. The bags were ignited with the couple bound in
the cab of their truck. The next day Apu and Nanda found their bodies in
the blackened ruins. To Nanda they were martyrs.
To Apu they had been reckless. To Apu's ailing wife, Pad, they were the
final blow to a frail body. She died eight days later.
"All human errors are impatience," it was written. If only Savitri and
Manjay had asked, Apu would have told them to wait. Time brings balance.
The Indian military eventually pushed most of the Pakistanis out. There
was no reason for his children to have acted violently. They hurt others
and added that burden to their spiritual inventory.
Tears began to fill his eyes. It was all such a waste.
Though, strangely, it made him cherish Nanda all the more.
She was the only part of his wife and daughter that he had left.
There was a sudden commotion in the other room. Apu shut his book and
set it on the rickety night table. He slid into his slippers and quietly
crossed the wooden floor. He peeked out the door. Four of the Pakistanis
were all there.
The houseguests were working on something, arms and heads moving over
something between them. The backs of three of the men were toward him so
he could not see what they were doing. Only the woman was facing him.
She was a slender, very swarthy woman with short black hair and a
frowning, intense look. The others called her Sharab but Apu did not
know if that was her real name.
Sharab waved a gun at him.
"Go back!" she ordered.
Apu lingered a moment longer. His houseguests had never done anything
like this before that he was aware of. They came and went and they
talked. Occasionally they looked at maps. Something was happening. He
edged forward a little more. There appeared to be a burlap sack on the
floor between the men. One of the men was crouching beside it. He
appeared to be working on something inside the bag.
"Get back!" the woman yelled again.
There was a tension in her voice that Apu had never heard before. He did
as he was told.
Apu kicked off his slippers and lay back on the bed. As he did he heard
the front door open. It was Nanda and presumably the fifth Pakistani. He
could tell by how loud the door creaked. The young woman always opened
it boldly, as if she wanted to hit whoever might be standing behind it.
Apu smiled. He always looked forward to seeing his granddaughter. Even
if she had only been gone an hour or two.
This time. however, things were different. He did not hear her
footsteps. Instead he heard quiet talking. Apu held his breath and tried
to hear what was being said. But his heart was beating louder than usual
and he could not hear. Quietly, he raised himself from the bed and eased
toward the door.
He leaned closer, careful not to show himself. He listened.
He heard nothing.
Slowly, he nudged the door open. One of the men was there, looking out
the window. He was holding his silver handgun and smoking a cigarette.
The Pakistani glanced back at Apu.
"Go back in the room," the man said quietly.
"Where is my granddaughter?" Apu asked. He did not like this.
Something felt wrong.
"She left with the others," he said.
"Left? Where did they go?" Apu asked.
The man looked back out the window. He drew on his cigarette.
"They went to market," he replied.
CHAPTER FIVE.
Washington, D. C. Wednesday, 7:00 a. m.
Colonel Brett August had lost track of the number of times he had ridden
in the shaking, cavernous bellies of C-130 transports. But he remembered
this much. He had hated each and every one of those damn nights.
This particular Hercules was one of the newer variants, a long-range SAR
HC-130H designed for fuel economy. Colonel August had ridden in a number
of customized C-130s:
the C-130D with ski landing gear during an Arctic training mission, a
KC-130R tanker, a C-130F assault transport, and many others. The amazing
thing was that not one of those versions offered a comfortable ride. The
fuselages were stripped down to lighten the aircraft and give it as much
range as possible. That meant there was very little insulation against
cold and noise. And the four powerful turboprops were deafening as they
fought to lift the massive plane skyward.
The vibrations were so strong that the chain around Colonel August's dog
tags actually did a dance around his neck.
Comfort was also not in the original design-lexicon. The seats in this
particular aircraft were cushioned plastic buckets arranged side by side
along the fuselage walls. They had high, thick padded backrests and
headrests that were supposed to keep the passenger warm.
Theoretically that would work if the air itself did not become so cold.
There were no armrests and very little space between the chairs. Duffel
bags were stowed under the seats. The guys who designed these were
probably like the guys who drew up battle plans. It all looked great on
paper.
Not that Colonel August was complaining. He remembered a story his
father once told him about his own military days. Sid August was part of
the U. S. 101st Airborne Division, which was trapped by the 15th Panzer
Grenadier Division shortly before the Battle of the Bulge. The men had
only K rations to eat. Invented by an apparently sadistic physiologist
named Ancel Benjamin Keys, K rations were flat-tasting compressed
biscuits, a sliver of dry meat, sugar cubes, bouillon powder, chewing
gum, and compressed chocolate.
The chocolate was code-named D ration. Why chocolate needed a code name
no one knew but the men suspected the starving Germans would fight
harder knowing there was more than just dry meat and card boardlike
biscuits in the enemy foxholes.
The airmen ate the K rations sparingly while lying low.
After a few days the air force managed to night-drop several cases of C
rations and extra munitions to the soldiers. The C rations contained
dinner portions of meat and potatoes. But introducing real food to their
systems made the men so sick and flatulent that the noise and smell
actually gave their position away to a German patrol. The airmen were
forced to fight their way out. The story always made Brett August uneasy
with the idea of having too much comfort available to him.
Mike Rodgers was sitting to August's right. August smiled to himself.
Rodgers had a big, high-arched nose that had been broken four times<
br />
playing college basketball. Mike Rodgers did not know any way but
forward. They had just taken off and that nose was already hunkered into
a briefcase thick with folders. August had flown with Rodgers long
enough to know the drill. As soon as the pilot gave the okay to use
electronic devices, Rodgers would pull some of those folders out.
He would put them on his left knee and place his laptop on the right
knee. Then, as Rodgers finished with material, he would pass it to
August. About halfway over the Atlantic they would begin to talk openly
and candidly about what they had read. That was how they had discussed
everything for the forty-plus years they had known each other. More
often than not it was unnecessary to say anything.
Rodgers and August each knew what the other man was thinking.
Brett August and Mike Rodgers were childhood friends.
The boys met in Hartford, Connecticut, when they were six.
In addition to sharing a love of baseball they shared a passion for
airplanes. On weekends, the two young boys used to bicycle five miles
along Route 22 out to Bradley Field. They would just sit on an empty
field and watch the planes take off and land. They were old enough to
remember when prop planes gave way to the jet planes. Both of them used
to go wild whenever one of the new 707s roared overhead. Prop planes had
a familiar, reassuring hum. But those new babies--they made a boy's
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