by Roger Herst
His second lieutenant handed Joel the GPS coordinates for the rendezvous point and said in a deferential tone, “I’m afraid, I’m going to have to check your rifle and your pockets, Dr. Fox. It’s essential that you don’t carry ammunition. We have some pretty high-strung trainees on the reservation and the last thing we need is for them to hear unauthorized shooting. No reflection on your ability to handle firearms. We just like to avoid problems before they arise.”
“That’s more than fair.” Joel replied, glancing at Gabby to confirm that no shots would be fired this afternoon. “We’re happy to observe base rules.”
“You’ll be pleased to hear that Sector K is teeming with deer this time of year. Last week, we received confirmed sightings for seven eight-point bucks. I think they prefer this area since we seldom train here with heavy weapons. A bit quieter, if you know what I mean.”
“We won’t disturb them,” Joel replied, placing his .9 mm lucky bullet in full view on the tabletop. “I hope you won’t mind me taking this. It’s a good luck charm with a long history. We won’t be carrying any sidearms, of course. Nothing to shoot it with.”
A staff sergeant scooped up Joel’s bullet and passed it over to the captain, who rolled it in his palm. “I suppose this can’t do any damage without a handgun,” he said, handing it back to the sergeant to return to Joel. “Could get a bit of rain this afternoon. Weather report calls for light showers before dusk.”
Gabby changed into fatigues and a camouflage cap, laughing softly at her reflection in the mirror as she adjusted her belt and cuffs. In her wildest fantasies she had never envisioned dressing up as a Marine. She returned to the briefing room, pausing to pose in the doorway and level her gaze at Joel. “One word about this in Washington and you’ll find yourself on my Kaddish list forever, “ she pronounced sternly. “I’ll read your name in the synagogue every week, along with the other dear departed, and use whatever clout I have upstairs, limited to though it might be, to consign you to a very special section of Hell.”
“You look scrumptious, Gabby,” he replied, apparently unfazed by her awful threats. He took her hand and guided her into the parking lot, where the second lieutenant and a corporal were waiting to inspect his 30/06. He opened the Bronco and filled the pockets of his fatigues with useful items—a Swiss Army knife, matches, mirror, a canteen, and a sandwich bag filled with what looked to Gabby like white mothballs. The two marines were soon satisfied that Joel carried no live rifle ammunition and escorted the couple to a trailhead.
Joel checked his mobile GPS and asked Gabby to stay close behind him. Since animals in the forest could hear an approaching danger long before it could be seen, Joel requested that she limit communication to hand signals. Feeling a little like she’d wondered onto a movie set, Gabby signaled “OK.”
Once his visitors had entered the woods, Captain Bartholomew greeted the second lieutenant with an upturned thumb and a wry expression. “Good looking lady, but she doesn’t seem too pleased to be on the post.”
“She looks fitter than most of the recruits we get here these days,” the lieutenant replied. “I wouldn’t mind being lost in the wilderness with her. Wonder what she sees in this Fox fellow. He hardly looks like the hunting type.”
“We’ll soon see how good he really is,” the captain remarked. “Sergeant, it’s time to notify Squads Epsilon and Psi. Tell them that they can move immediately into Sector K. Our two new visitors will soon link up with their friends in the sector. Under no condition are the squads to reveal their presence. I want the hunters to leave this post without ever knowing we’ve been tailing them. And be sure everybody understands that the hunters are armed but have no ammunition. Repeat, Sergeant, armed but without ammunition. I don’t want any shooting. You read me?”
“Piece of cake,” the sergeant replied.
“Don’t be so sure,” replied Bartholomew. “These NRA guys might be out of shape, but they were stalking game years before you earned your first stripe. They’ve got some tricks to teach us this afternoon. I want continuous radio contact between the squads. See to it.”
Periodically checking his GPS and comparing map coordinates, Joel pressed Gabby to move quickly along the forest trail, but she found the going more difficult than she’d anticipated. The path was covered with needles shed by the surrounding conifers, and partially obstructed by branches and fallen tree trunks. In the canopy overhead, black crows, self-appointed lookouts for other forest creatures, cawed vociferously in constant warning. Joel grimaced to indicate the obstacle they presented for quiet passage through the woods.
Thirty-five minutes later they took a short break and Joel scanned the area, listening for any sound. The crows had fallen silent as they stopped moving, but the quiet around them was suddenly interrupted by distant thuds from Marine artillery. Gabby didn’t need to look at her watch to know it was now 15:15 hours. She listened and, as Captain Bartholomew had said she would, she heard several salvos of six shots in quick succession. She wondered how the animals in the forest had reacted. Had she been a deer, she thought, she’d have been looking for somewhere to hide.
Twenty minutes later, Joel and Gabby arrived at the rendezvous, but Mel Samuelson, Dwaine Calloway, Steve Murray, and Carey Lawrence were not there. Joel signaled for her to wait. She squatted beside him. Above them, sparrows and cardinals fluttered through the forest thickness. A gray squirrel scampered around a scrub pine and snooped below decaying leaves for a late lunch. The wind whispered through the thick foliage. Joel placed the palm of his hand on the ground to feel for vibrations.
Gabby tried to stay as motionless and quiet as she could. She began to notice all of the life around her. Close to her right boot were a column of ants, a spider, and several beetles. A cricket-like insect chirped beside the desiccated bark of a fallen oak. With his index finger, Joel drew her attention to the movement of creatures in the trees—a woodland grouse, camouflaged by its plumage, on a high branch, and a pair of gray squirrels in a mating ritual. When she failed to understand an additional signal, he whispered close to her ear, “Red fox. Behind that hemlock. He’s probably after a mole or chipmunk.”
He took her hand and entwined his fingers through hers. What kind of man, she asked herself, takes such delight in nature and, at the same time, carries a rifle? Why even bring it if he had no intention of firing it? To her it seemed the weapon would hinder rather than enhance the connection he described so lyrically. It was a conundrum she could not resolve.
He seemed to sense her thoughts; he turned to her and gently, silently kissed her cheek. A moment later, their lips touched lightly—once, again just as lightly, then one last time before they separated. He reached up to the back of her neck and gently drew her head forward so that their foreheads touched. For a long moment, they paused immobile, scarcely breathing.
The thump, thump, thump of fresh artillery sounded closer to them. Joel pulled away suddenly, listening to what sounded like the growl of a helicopter in the southern sky. The presence of a chopper near Sector K puzzled him. Simultaneously, movement behind a small grove of sassafras trees caught his eye.
His back stiffened like that of a forest animal, wary of an approaching danger.
“Whitetail fawn,” he whispered, silently shifting his weight to stand. “The mother can’t be far away. Get up slowly. Mama isn’t aware of us yet. It’s time to move anyway. Looks like we’ve missed my friends. My guess is they’re out there somewhere making themselves as inconspicuous as possible. We probably won’t see them now, and, if we do our job right, they won’t see us.”
As Gabby began to move, the fawn poked a wary nose from a bushy spray of sassafras. As she rose to her feet, the mother emerged from the thicket, but immediately pulled back and plunged into the cover of the trees.
“Guess I spooked her,” Gabby whispered with embarrassment, as she started moving along the trail.
“That’s okay. It takes years to learn how to fool animals who have better ears and smell than we can
imagine. Let’s go on silent running again. From here on, we leave the trail and bushwhack into the woods. Watch how I put my feet down to minimize noise.”
Joel led her into a thicket of vines and saplings, planting his heel first before transferring weight to his toes. He stopped and pointed with the barrel of his rifle to indicate a pair of whitetail does followed by three young fawns. Joel signaled to Gabby and they crouched beside the fallen trunk of a giant elm to watch them. After only a few moments, she began to find the unfamiliar position uncomfortable, but was unwilling to make a sound by moving. She glanced at Joel, who seemed rock solid, steady, and completely motionless. Since his shoulder supported her position, she could feel his breath, yet his chest seemed absolutely still. The seconds passed slowly. A cramp in her injured gastrocnemius muscle seized her lower leg and began creeping toward her thigh. Since her leg was tucked under her, she could relieve the cramp only by standing, and this she was determined not to do. She bit her lip to hold the pain at bay. The entrance of a large buck, four points on both sides of his rack, into the thicket distracted her attention.
“Something’s driving them in this direction,” Joel whispered.
“Your friends, perhaps?”
“Not unless they’ve lost their knack.”
“A bear maybe? Like the one we saw at the rifle range?”
“Not likely. My guess is more deer will be coming our way soon.”
The first drops of afternoon rain began to filter down through the trees onto their water resistant gear. Gabby wiped moisture from her cheeks. Suddenly, another buck, this one with a single point, came into sight.
Joel pointed back the way the buck had come, and turned his head very slowly so that his lips nearly touched her ear. “Did you hear radio sounds?” he whispered.
She shook her head negatively.
“Off and on. It’s very faint. Perhaps a hundred meters away. My friends don’t carry radios, so Marines must be operating where they shouldn’t be.”
A sharp crack in the woods to their right suddenly galvanized their attention. Joel stiffened, knowing that no animal was responsible. Since his comrades were rarely careless, this was confirmation. “We’re not alone,” he said under his breath. “These boys can be dangerous. They’ve got ammunition and we don’t.”
“Are they looking for us?” Gabby asked, momentarily alarmed.
“They already know we’re here. My guess is it’s just an exercise. We’re supposed to be stalking game, while they’re stalking us.”
A squawk box momentarily released the shushing sound of open airwaves, then immediately ceased. Joel turned to triangulate the position. It was closer than he’d anticipated, which meant they had only seconds to hide. He motioned to Gabby to roll over onto her side and squeeze her torso, arms, and legs into the narrow cavity at the base of the fallen elm. The moment she was tucked away, he removed a small dental mirror from his jacket pocket and immediately folded his body into what was left of the crevice—his rifle hidden beneath him in the damp space between the trunk and the ground. The crown of his head touched the crown of hers. He left his left hand free so that he could view the small clearing opposite them though the mirror.
As she lay sheltered from view by the fallen trunk, Gabby began to feel united with the forest for the first time. She felt her breath slow and the thud of her heartbeat, which she’d been afraid would somehow give them away, subside. She smiled at the absurdity of their situation. Here they were hiding for no reason—other than to prove they could—from a band of Marines who already knew they were here. It should have seemed silly to her; instead, she found herself energized and hyper aware of her surroundings. She resisted an urge to turn her head and scan the clearing.
The rain was heavier now. Water seeped along the collar of her jacket and trickled onto her neck.
Whispering voices suddenly fractured the silence.
“They have to be nearby,” a Southern voice said. “Christ, they tripped two goddamn motion detectors back there. Those sonavabitches are here somewhere.”
“Let Squad Psi do the honors, ” a second voice replied.
“We can’t return without making contact. These bastards can’t just disappear into thin air,” A third voice asserted.
“They’re here all right,” replied the Southern voice. “Right under our fucking noses and we’re missing them. Sooner or later they’ll trip another sensor.”
Gabby guessed the patrol was no more than twenty feet away but couldn’t confirm this without lifting her head. She wondered what Joel was thinking.
The whispering was suddenly replaced by the sound of footsteps pounding the forest floor nearby. Instinctively, Gabby tried to force her body more deeply into the cavity, as a boot missed her head by inches. She could hear a knee joint crack as its possessor lifted his leg to climb the elm trunk hiding her. Leaves crackled as he dropped down on the other side. A second set of feet followed the first, almost at the same spot. The second Marine jumped from the elm to the other side, landing with both feet simultaneously.
Joel allowed several long minutes to elapse before he broke the silence. “Close,” he whispered. When she lifted her head, she saw he was smiling broadly. “Damn close; my mirror was trained in the wrong direction, and I couldn’t see them.” He extracted himself from their hiding place and turned back to help her rise. Damp pine needles stuck to her fatigues.
When she was on her feet, he said, “You look adorable, Gabby. You’re the first woman who would come into the woods with me. You’re a trooper.”
For the first time in many minutes, the pain in her injured gastroc muscle eased. “Some war game,” she replied with a laugh. ”I was afraid a little critter would crawl inside my britches and I’d have to scratch.”
“If you’ve had enough, we’ll return immediately to Wilderness House. But if you’re game, we can have some fun with our warrior friends.”
“What did you have in mind?” she asked.
“One of those guys said we triggered a motion detector. They must have planted small battery operated sensors along the trail. If we return the way we came, we can probably spot one or two. I’ll plant some wet salt balls nearby and let deer trigger the sensors.”
“Why salt balls?” She remembered seeing him remove a bag of what looked like mothballs from the Bronco.
He produced the bag from an inner pocket. “I always travel with salt in the wilderness. It can extend survival by many days. But we’re not the only creatures who need it. Deer and other small mammals do too. Given the way the deer are moving through these woods, one or two will catch the scent and trigger the sensors. That should pull the patrol into the area and let us circle back to Wilderness House.”
Now she grinned. “That’s wonderfully absurd,” she said. “You’ve an unexpected flair as a trickster.”
Joel’s trick worked. Deer tripped electronic sensors, which in turn pulled Marine Squad Epsilon into a wild goose chase. Meanwhile, Joel and Gabby skirted around the warriors and cut back to Wilderness House through the thick underbrush. They made so much noise that wildlife stayed far away from them.
Dwaine, Steve, Mel, and Carey, from Joel’s club, were not as accommodating. When they discovered Marine Squad Psi on their tail, an angry altercation broke out. They were furious that the Marines had aimed loaded weapons at them—considering this both an extremely dangerous practice and a gross breach of hospitality. The Marines failed to appreciate such sensitivities. After all, they pointed out, Quantico was a training reservation and trainees almost always conducted their exercises with live ammunition.
At the late afternoon’s debriefing, Captain Clarence Bartholomew was furious with his men. How dare Marines let an amateur hunter outwit them with salt balls! No one was in the mood to laugh at his reprimand. “You goddamn jerks aren’t worth your weight in the stuff.”
On their way back to Washington, Joel and Gabby stopped in Mount Vernon for pizza that did not match its reputation. It was soggy and ove
r-salted. The Chianti accompanying it wasn’t much better. It didn’t matter. They passed an enjoyable evening rehashing details of their adventures–the meeting with Daryl Bender and tale of the hunters who became the hunted.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
FITZGERALD TENNIS CENTER
“The writing is on the wall,” said Dov Shellenberg as he donned his tallit in the synagogue robing room before Shabbat worship. It was a painful admission, Gabby knew; a breach in his usual veneer of unassailable self-confidence. In rabbinical school he had imagined a meteoric career, banking on steady promotions to bigger and more prestigious jobs and early financial independence. After two years at his first pulpit, he had believed that the Ohav Shalom Board of Directors would not only renew his contract, but reward his service with a generous increase in salary. Now it seemed more likely that they would fire him, and the prospect had shattered his confidence. He gathered his siddur and sermon notes, then turned toward Gabby who was fitting her tallit over a black clerical robe. “I’ve applied to become a White House Fellow next year,” he said in a low voice. “The White House will be contacting you for a recommendation. I think there’s an FBI security check involved.”
His words caught her by surprise; even in the worse moments of their relationship, she’d never imagined that he would leave the congregational rabbinate to pursue a different career. Yet, the idea made sense. His passion for politics and the governing process made him a natural to work in the White House. Several thoughts crossed her mind, though none seemed appropriate to voice. “Of course,” she said, selecting the least provocative, “I’ll give you a strong, well-deserved recommendation. But I’m sorry you feel that things haven’t worked out here, and I sincerely hope you’ll reconsider. I’ve done my best to keep you aboard. So there’s no misunderstanding between us, Dov, I’m going to repeat what I said earlier. I want you to be at Ohav Shalom on the pulpit with me. Further, I am not ducking responsibility for what’s happened. As Senior Rabbi, I accept the full blame.”
