Silver Stars (Front Lines 2)

Frangie vomits into a shallow depression, and a soldier solicitously shovels dirt over the mess as the sergeant hands her a hip flask.

“It’s some French brandy we liberated from an A-rab shop.”

Frangie has never before tasted any form of alcohol. Her church does not approve, not at all, and she has sat through many of Pastor M’Dale’s sermons on the subject of demon rum. But it would be rude not to accept, and she wants something more than water to wash away the vile taste of her own bile. Maybe it will stop the trembling in her hands. She takes a careful swig and gasps.

The brandy burns its way down her throat to form a small ball of liquid fire in her stomach. She’s a small person and inexperienced at drinking, so even this small draft is enough to spread a strange but comforting warmth out through her limbs.

“Thanks,” she says.

“You saved that boy’s life.”

She has no answer to that. She’s broken the prohibition against alcohol, but she’s not ready to abandon the humility she’s been taught. “It’s my job, I suppose,” Frangie says.

She walks away on legs shaking from the aftereffects of adrenaline and notices that the alcohol has done its job of pushing fear back just a little.

Just a little, but enough for now.

3

RAINY SCHULTERMAN—NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK, USA

“Sergeant Schulterman, sir.”

“At ease. Please take a seat, Sergeant; we are not very big on formality around here.”

Rainy removes her cover—her cap—and sits in a well-worn wooden chair, the kind with arms that come around and are too high for her to prop her elbows on comfortably. She places her hands flat, palms down, on her neatly ironed olive drab uniform slacks, keeps her mirror-polished shoes flat on the linoleum floor, and trains her eyes on the lieutenant colonel. Rainy is on leave in New York, having returned from a successful mission in North Africa.

Colonel Corelli is middle-aged, with steel-gray hair cut a bit too long, a pale face, and thoughtful brown eyes sunk deep beneath bushy brows. The brass on his uniform says colonel, but his look, his demeanor, says professor.

No sooner is she seated than there is a brief knock and they are joined by a very different sort of creature. He is a civilian in a passable dark-gray suit, starched white shirt, conservative tie, and expensive and properly shined—but not military-polished—shoes.

The colonel performs the introductions. “Sergeant Schulterman, Special Agent Bayswater, FBI.”

Rainy’s heart sinks. She knows immediately what this is about. The end of her career in the US Army may be only minutes away. Her expression turns from curious to deliberately blank.

“Agent Bayswater.”

“Sergeant Schulterman.”

They do not shake hands, and she does not rise from her seat.

She doesn’t like him. It’s a snap judgment, in part a reaction to what she expects he will be saying next. But beyond that, there’s something smug and condescending in the way he looks her up and down, like he’s trying to decide whether she’s a crook or a piece of meat. He has a bent nose, broken while boxing perhaps, and that prominent twist in his nose has given his mouth a permanent sneer.

“I don’t suppose you know why you’re here, Sergeant,” Colonel Corelli says.

“No, sir.”

“Oh, I bet she’s got some idea,” the FBI man says. “Don’t you, honey

?”

Colonel Corelli winces, the way refined people do when they hear someone being rude or unpleasant.

Rainy turns slightly toward Bayswater. “Sergeant. It’s Sergeant Schulterman.”

“Is that so? Well, Sergeant, you’re supposed to be a very bright girl, so I’m betting you have a pretty clear notion of why the FBI is here. Am I right? Or have I been misled and you’re not so bright after all?”

“When my superior officer informs me as to his reasons for bringing me here, then I will know,” Rainy says frostily. She places the emphasis on his reasons. She is a soldier, not a civilian, and she does not take orders from the FBI.