Via Dolorosa(47)

“Prop you on the ground, angle your leg for the best shot. We could do it.”

“You can’t be a hero taking a hit in the ass like that, I wouldn’t think...”

“You want to take it in the upper thigh or down low on the shin?”

“I’m thinking…I’m thinking the thigh. Up high.”

“You’ll bleed a lot but you’ll walk again.”

“And it’s not as embarrassing as taking a slug in the cheek.”

“We might need a couple guys to hold you down, keep you steady.”

“Definitely upper thigh. Not too high, though.”

“Strong guys. You’d lose your nerve and we’d need strong guys to hold you down.”

“I wouldn’t lose my nerve,” Bowerman said.

“You think you’d want it to go all the way through or would you prefer to have it lodge in you?”

“Hmmm. That’s good. Good thinking, now. I don’t know.”

“Have it lodge in you,” Nick suggested. “Greater sympathy. Get the Medical Review Board to cough up some pity pay.”

“Fat chance.”

“Course,” he amended, “then you got some fresh-faced cherry digging into your leg with a piece of dull metal and some tweezers, hoping he doesn’t do more damage than the round in your leg’s already done. Hand vibrating like a goddamn seismograph needle, poor bastard sweating like a pregnant hostage...”

Bowerman snorted in agreement.

“Karuptka would do it,” Nick said casually.

“Shit,” said Bowerman. “Victor Karuptka would do it, all right.”

“Karuptka would love to do it.”

“Why? He got it in for me or something?”

“Christ, Bowser.”

“Yeah, I know. Forget it. Never mind.”

“Christ.”

“Anyway,” Bowerman said, “I don’t know if I could do it deliberately.”

“Take a shot in the leg?”

“I mean, I could deal with it if it, you know, if it happened. If it happened, you’d have no choice but to deal with it. But, I mean, I don’t think I could just, you know, just hunker down and take it. Knowing it’s coming, I mean. So, yeah—you’re probably right. I think I’d lose my nerve. Goddamn it.”

“Have you ever listened to yourself talk?”

“Why?”

“You’d shoot yourself for sure if you did.”

He heard Bowerman chuckle in the darkness.

“What is it?” he asked Bowerman. “What did you want to ask me?”

“I guess, well…I guess just your advice, Lieutenant.”

“I don’t know about that. I don’t think I’d be comfortable giving you advice, Bowser.”

“Why’s that?”

“Look at me, Bowerman. You see me lying out on the beach somewhere? You see beautiful women flocking around me? You see me getting up in the morning, dressing in a shirt and tie, kissing my wife goodbye and going off to the office? No. I’m here just like you. I’m here just like everyone else and just like you. What advice could I give?”

“You like it here?”

“What kind of stupid question is that?”

Bowerman was silent.

“Hell, Bowser, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. I was just thinking.”

“Go ahead. Ask me whatever you want.”

“It’s just…I mean, you have a girl back home, right?”

“I got someone.”

“Some of the other guys got a girl at home, too. Some guys, like Karuptka, they got a whole bunch of girls at home. Some got wives, even.”

“What is it, Bowerman? What do you need my advice about?”

“My girl, she’s pregnant. I just got a letter yesterday.”

“It happens.”

“Two months pregnant.”

“Oh.” Nick did not need to do the math in his head. “She wrote this to you in a letter?”

“My sister did. My sister wrote me. I hadn’t gotten a letter from Rebecca—that’s my girl’s name, Rebecca—I hadn’t gotten a letter from Rebecca in some time. I asked my sister about her, about why she stopped writing. She lives in our neighborhood so I figured my sister could, you know, could go and see her. I said I was worried because Rebecca had stopped writing. So my sister went to see her. But I guess maybe my sister didn’t want to tell me because I had to ask her in two separate letters before she finally answered me.”

Nick said nothing.

“I been doing some thinking, Lieutenant. I been doing some thinking, and I don’t think women are ever truly disgusted by anything,” Bowerman said. “We’re out here and we’re killing people. We don’t have the time to stop and think about all that right now, so we do it and it’s automatic. There’s no thinking about it right now, is what I mean. But I know me, Lieutenant, and I know I’ll think about some of the stuff I’ve done and some of the stuff I’ve seen here until the day I die. Once I get back, I mean. Once I get back and, you know, have the time to think about those things. I know that, Lieutenant. It’s automatic now and there’s no time for reflection. But it won’t always be that way. Women are different, though, I think. I mean, that’s what I been thinking since I got that letter. They should maybe be out here, not us. Women aren’t repulsed by anything. Repulsed—it’s a good word. They can do repulsive things and turn around and be perfectly happy and not ever for one second think about the horrible, repulsive things they done. They wipe it all clean and it’s that easy for them. Men can’t do that, though. I don’t think so, anyway. I’ve never met a man who could do that. Have you?”