"when can you come here?"

"Don't hold your breath," Jack said. "As soon as I find out something I'll call you back."

"But you are going to be there a while?"

"Honey, I don't know. I feel like a shuttlecock."

"As soon as you know anything, you call me."

"If I ever get close to a phone again, I'll call anyway," Jack said.

"You want to say it again?"

"I don't think that's possible under the circumstances."

"Well, we now know who feels strongest about who, don't "

"Deposit one dollar and thirty cents for an additional three minutes please."

"don't have it," Jack said.

"love you, Jack," Marjorie said.

The line went dead.

He hung up the phone and replayed the sound of her voice in his ears for a moment, and then picked up his duffel bag and went looking for the coffee shop. He ordered a cup of coffee and donut, and then saw a newspaper in a rack by the cash register. The word CONGO in a headline halfway down the page caught his eye and he got up and bought the paper.

TITLE: full headline was: UN'S U THANT REPORTS AMERICANS IN CONGO CONSIDERED REBEL HOSTAGES.

"Twenty minutes later Jack was so deep in thought that he did not see the man in camouflage fatigues approaching- until he slid into a chair at the table.

"Portet?"

"Yeah."

"Finish your coffee," the man said. And only then did Jack look up, he wore the bars of a captain on his collar points. He looked at him. "I didn't see the bars," he said.

"No sweat," the Captain said. He put out his hand. "My name is Stacey." Jack shook his hand. "What's going on? Am I allowed to ask?"

"First you finish your coffee," Captain Stacey said. "And then you put this on and we walk out of here and get in my truck." He pushed a green beret across the table.

"What the hell is that? I'm not a Green Beret!"

"The first and great commandment around here, Portet, is that you do what you're told. Then you can ask questions." Jack looked at him and saw that he was serious. He shrugged and put the green beret on.

"Very good," Captain Stacey said. "And to complete my response to your interrogatory, PFC Portet, after we get in my truck, we will drive to the boonies where my associates and I are making plans to get your stepmother and stepsister back where they belong." Jack looked at him and saw that the Captain was dead serious about that, too.

"Really?" he asked.

Captain Stacey nodded.

xx Leopoldville, Democratic Republic of the Congo .. September 1964 FM US EMBASSY LEOPOLDVILLE DEM REPCONGO TO SECSTATE WASH DC LEOPOLDVILLE SITUATION UPDATE AS OF 2400 ZULU 5 SEPPTEMBER 1964 SOURCE RATING ONE PAREN 1 PAREN REPORTS CONSOLGEN STANLEYVILLE AND STAFF REMAIN CONFINED MILITARY PRISON CAMP KETELE ST ANLEYVILLE. SUBJECTED TO MENTAL AND PHYSICAL ABUSE. SOURCE BELIEVES THEIR LIVES ARE IN DANGER BUT HAS NO REPEAT NO EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT.

IE SOURCE REPORTS NO REPEAT NO EVIDENCE OF CHICOM SUPPLY OF OLENGA EXCEPT POSSIBILITY SMALL ARMS AND R.CL. ALL UNTRACEABLE.

SOURCE REPORTS THAT AT 0900 5 SEPTEMBER STANLEYVILLE TIME, AT CEREMONIES AT LUMUMBA MONUMENT, OLENGA PROCLAIMED QUOTE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CONGO UNQUOTE WITH CHRISTOPHE GBENYE AS PRESIDENT AND ..... . EMILE SOUMILAUT AS MINISTER OF DEFENSE. SOURCE BELIEVES POWER REMAINS WITH OLENGA.

AMABASSADOR CONCURS.

SOURCE INSISTS FOLLOWING BE RELAYED VERBATIM SPECIFIED ADDRESSEE WASHINGTON QUOTE IN VIEW APPARENT INABILITY FURNISH US MILITARY ASSISTANCE RESPECTFULLY REQUEST DISPATCH PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEERS TEACH PUBLIC SANITATION AS PROTOCOL OFFICERS DID NOT BOTHER TO WASH BLOOD FROM MASSACRE OF HUNDREDS FROM LUMUMBA MONUMENT PRIOR PROCLAMATION OF PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CONGO THUS CREATING UNHEALTHY ENVIRONMENTFLIES MAGGOTS ETCETERA ENDQUOTE SAMESOURCE UNDENIABLY SHOWING SIGNS OF STRESS DUE TO LENGTH AND NATURE OF ASSIGNMENT. REPLACEMENT IMPOSSIBLE AT THIS TIME. SUGGEST ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF SAMESOURCE MESSAGE INDICATING RECEIPT AT HIGHEST ECHELON.

PANNELL Y DEPUTY CHIEF OF MISSION.

URGENT FROM WHITE HOUSE WASHINGTON TO US EMBASSY LEOPOLDVILLE DEMREP CONGO PERSONAL ATTENTION US AMBASSADOR REFERENCE YOUR 5 SEPTEMBER STANLEYVILLE UPDATE BY DIRECTION OF THE PRESIDENT RELAY FOLLOWING FIRST OPPORTUNITY QUOTE TEX STUDYING YOUR PEACECORPS SUGGESTION REGARDS SMALL JEWISH SOLDIER UNQUOTE FELTER COLONEL GSC USA COUNSELOR TO THE PRESIDENT.

(Two) The U.S. Army Special Warfare Center Fort Bragg, North Carolina 0745 Hours 12 September 1964 "General Hanrahan's quarters."

"Mrs. Hanrahan?"

"Yes, it is."

"Mrs. Hanrahan, this is Marjorie Bellmon. Bob Bellmon's daughter?"

"Oh, yes. Hello, Marjorie. It's nice to hear your voice. How's your family?"

"Just fine, thank you. Is General Hanrahan there? Could I speak to him, please?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, Marjorie, he's not. Is there anything I can do?

Can I give him a message?"

"No, ma'am," Marjorie said, and then: "Daddy asked me to give him something personally while I was here."

"Oh, you're here?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"I expect him for lunch," Patricia Hanrahan said.

"Why don't you come over here and have lunch with us? I'm sure-he'd love to see you, too."

"I would love to, but I'm just leaving. Is there any way-"

"He's at the office," Patricia Hanrahan said. "I'd send you over there, but I don't think he'll have, time to see you."

"Well, then, I'll just drop it by your quarters before I leave. Thank you, ma'am."

"Marjorie-" Patricia Hanrahan said, but by then Marjorie had hung up.

Marjorie left the pay station in the lobby of the Main Officer's Dub and went out and got in the Jaguar. Since I have already proven how skilled a liar and how devious a human being I am, I might as well see just how far I can go before I get stopped.

She drove to Smoke Bomb Hill and parked Jack's Jaguar outside the headquarters building of the U.S. Army Center for Special Warfare in a space reserved for official visitors.

Then she walked to the door. It was locked. She knocked on it. A sergeant first class, obviously the duty NCO, opened the door a crack. He looked at her-approvingly, she decided-and then at the red Jaguar in the parking lot.

"Ma'am, we're closed for the weekend," he said.

"I'm here to see General Hanrahan."

"Ma'am. . ."

"Mrs. Hanrahan said that when he takes a break, you're to tell mm I'm here. My name is Bellmon."

He looked at her dubiously but finally concluded that as devious as the bastards might be, he didn't think the Russians could be clever enough to send a well-stacked broad like this one, driving a red Jaguar, to penetrate the headquarters of the Center for Special Warfare.

"I don't know how long he's going to be in there," the Sergeant said as he opened the door for her.

"Thank you," Marjorie said.

She had to wait twenty minutes, during which the Sergeant offered her a cup of coffee and a doughnut. And she gratefully accepted; the last thing she'd had to eat was at three, when she'd stopped for gas.

She chatted with the Sergeant and told him the truth, but not me whole truth. She told him that she was an Army brat, and that her father was stationed at Fort Rucker.

And then a door opened down a corridor and the Sergeant jumped up from his desk. "Wait here, please, ma'am," he said and went down the corridor.

A minute later General Red Hanrahan appeared in fatigues.

"Here she is, Sir," the Sergeant announced.

"Hello, Marjorie," General Hanrahan said. "What's going on?"

"I want to see Jack Portet," Marjorie said. "I'm sorry to bother you, General, but I was over at 7th Group, and they said they never heard of him." General Hanrahan did not reply.

"I know he's here," Marjorie said firmly.

"Sergeant," General, Hanrahan said after a moment, "would you go in there and ask Sergeant Portet to come out here, please?"

Sergeant Portet?

Jack appeared a minute later. He was in fatigues and jump boots, and there were sergeant's chevrons on the sleeve.

"This young lady wishes to see you, Sergeant," General Hanrahan said. "I've been wondering how she knew you were here." Jack looked at General Hanrahan and then at Marjorie.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked.

"I wanted to be with you," Marjorie said simply.

"Marjorie, does your father know Jack is here?" General Hanrahan asked.

"No, sir."

"Does he know you're here?"

"No, sir."

"How did you get here?" Jack asked.

"I drove your car," Marjorie said.

"Sergeant," General Hanrahan said to the noncom on duty, "you and I will walk down the corridor for exactly five minutes, following which Miss Bellmon is going to go over to my quarters. . . . You will telephone Mrs. Hanrahan and tell her she's coming and say that I asked her to entertain Miss Bellmon until I get there. Until Sergeant Portet and I get there."

"Yes, Sir," the duty NCO said.

They walked away. Jack and Marjorie heard General Hanrahan say one more thing to the Sergeant: "Never get in the way of true love, Sergeant. It's that irresistible force you're always hearing about." Then Jack put his arms around her.

(Three) Quarters #5 Fort Bragg, North Carolina 12 September 1964 Patricia Hanrahan was upset and annoyed when Marjorie told her what had really happened, but she couldn't stay that way. She bad known Marjorie since she was a little girl, and she was touched by Marjorie's determination to be with her boyfriend, come hell or high water.

And after Marjorie delivered a long litany of the virtues and all-around charm of Jack Portet, she was interested to see him for herself. General Hanrahan and Sergeant Portet arrived at half past eleven.

"I have a little speech to make," Red Hanrahan said, "following which you can feed us. Whatever direction the conversation takes, it will not get into the subject of what Jack is doing here. Or that he's even here at all."

"All right," Patricia Hanrahan said.

"1 understand," Marjorie said.

Hanrahan looked at Jack appraisingly. "You're bigger than me, he said. "But I think you're about the size of Son Number One. Would you like to get out of the fatigues and into blue jeans?"

"Yes, Sir," Jack said.

"Come on, then. And then we'll have a beer. I think we've earned it." Patricia Hanrahan served lunch in the kitchen, hamburgers, which the men cooked themselves, and french fried potatoes which Marjorie peeled and sliced and then fried.

"When did you make sergeant?" Marjorie asked. "Or is that a question I'm not supposed to ask?"

"I'll answer it anyway," General Hanrahan said. "He's working with some of my men. Unless he wore a green beret he would stick out like a sore thumb. And since fully qualified Green Berets are all at least sergeants, I told him to put on sergeant's snipes, too." Jack looked at Marjorie and shrugged. "I am still a poor but proud PFC." There was a quick knock at the kitchen door and a tall, chic woman stepped into the kitchen.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said. "I didn't know you had a guest, Pmieia. I didn't see a car."

Jack thought she had an accent.

"Don't be silly, Jane," Patricia Hanrahan said. "Come in and say hello to Marjorie Bellmon... you know Marjorie, don't you?"

"You are Barbara's daughter?" the woman said. Barbara came out Bar-Bar-Vh, and Jack was now convinced the woman was French.

"Yes, ma'am."

"I don't know you, but when your little brother was here with the cadets last summer, we had him to supper. You are here with your mama?"