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Show Flying - 5 would far rather drive himself, not trusting at these speeds and on these roads the wayward impulses of an eighteen-year old private, but rank has its duties, noblesse obliges him to be driven and hide his fear as best he can. They're traveling at almost seventy miles an hour now, because they have to catch up with the convoy before its next rest stop. They roll through Brady at just about the magic time of morning when the teen-age girls in short skirts and tight sweaters crowd the summer streets on their way to vacation delights. The girls look at John Henry rolling sedately through town bearing his burden of rank, John Henry in fatigues and stiff cap. John Henry imprisoned against his will for more than two years yet. A few girls wave and one whistles. John Henry blushes; the lieutenant reads an ordnance map; the sergeant sleeps on. The jeep carries its weight of past sin and present military order toward the faraway west down US 87, on the far side of Brady, Texas. At ten o'clock, still rolling fast, they reach the town of Eden. By then all three are sweating and thirsty and suffering from the terrible heat. The convoy is still somewhere ahead, beginning its ten o'clock rest stop. Through Eden, watched by sun-blasted old men sitting in front of drugstores, they proceed slowly. The old men spit tobacco juice in the dust. If there are any young girls in Eden, they're not in sight. |
