SALTGRASS CONTENTS

The Spotter

The frozen winds blew over the soldier off the foothills of the Hindu Kush and across the Helmand plains, carrying dust and dead grass. Lt. Andrew Rankin of the 22nd Special Air Service checked his watch, and shifted the binoculars to run his eyes—left to right, right to left—over the tiny Afghan village below him. From his shallow dugout hidden near the crest of the hill, he could see its mosque at the center and lines of dirty mud huts stretching out like arteries.

Their information improved as the winter wore on. US money and local hunger saw to that. The hut under his surveillance was about 400 yards away—a Taliban safe house. It stood a little apart from the rest of the village, with just one other, in the shadow of the mosque wall. When the target made his appearance, Rankin would call it in. A Yank air strike would follow. If it wasn’t this op. that brought in the bomber, it would be soon. Just a matter of time.

Through his binoculars, Rankin watched an old man in the usual tunic and turban combo lead a donkey with flat saddlebags away from the village, heading southwest. A gust caught the tail of the man’s turban and he used his free hand to hold it on. The donkey slowed to a stop. Was it limping? The man moved back round beside the animal and tapped its right forelock. The man lifted its hoof for inspection. Taking a knife, he worked something loose and dropped the hoof. Then he folded the knife and patted the animal’s flank.

Rankin shuffled on his elbows to the right to get more comfortable as the man looked across the plain directly at Rankin’s position. He froze. Even prone, Rankin was higher, profile wise, than he would have liked, but it was too late now. His fatigues helped and so long as the man’s glance passed over him, not attracted by further movement, he reasoned, he should be fine.

The man remained still, staring. Through his binoculars, Rankin felt the man’s eyes connect with his own. It happened often enough on operations, he reminded himself, a civilian or sometimes even a target, happened to look, hard, at a covert surveillance position.

Sixty seconds passed. The man’s donkey moved about shifting its weight from hoof to hoof in the cold. Ninety seconds. Shit. The old bugger had spotted him, Rankin was sure of it. He ran through a list of his equipment in his head. He was diligent, his stuff was organized, ready to go, but he followed the procedure anyway.

The man reached to pick up the lead. Immediately, Rankin dropped down into the dugout and pulled his Bergen onto his back. One final check. Nothing left. Then he put his binoculars up over the lip of the dugout, looking on the road back to the village, his pack on, to see if the man was coming to investigate (less likely, but better for Rankin) or walking back to the village (not good). The going would be slow if the man came to investigate. He’d have to negotiate the narrow, dry gullies on the hillside.

Down on the plain, the man and his donkey moved on southwards, away from the village, just as slowly as before. Rankin breathed heavily. He kept his binoculars on the old man off and on for more than an hour, until he was out of sight over the ridge on the far southern edge of the plain.

In his PDA’s e-surveillance log, he wrote “male, 60s, + donkey cart southwest, 13:24. 14:46 out of sight,” his gloved hand gripping the pen against the tiny LC screen.

Rankin saw no other movement in the village, or the tracks about it, but that was normal. The locals were active in the spring and summer, getting the poppy crop in and off in the short wet growing season.

Rankin envied the locals right now, holed up in their huts out of the wind. The cold was getting to him. He wished he were cold-blooded, like Lizard.

To fight off the chill, Rankin stretched in his hole, beginning with his toes inside his combat boots. Centipede-like, he stretched the muscles up through his feet, and checked off the routine in his head: ankles, calves, quads, and gluts, then up his back. Fingers, biceps and finally his head, in a tiny circle, stretching his neck out from his body. It helped a little, but the stiffness would return soon enough.

At least he’d seen no snakes. He hated snakes and they were about. The Intel. briefing listed the hazardous indigenous fauna: the Persian adder, a red desert scorpion “and IEDs.” Some desk jockey at Intel thought he had a sense of humor.

Rankin noted “no snakes” in his log. Perhaps he just liked to use the PDA. Lizard had called him a geardo.

Despite the cold and the occasional snake, Rankin didn’t mind the job. He looked over the new stripe on his sleeve. His promotion meant little even in the SAS. It meant he’d stayed alive. Not many spotters lasted as long. Maybe he’d been at it too long, so long that spotters were now called “forward field reconnaissance.’’ Whatever, as the Yanks would say.

Rankin shifted the focus of his binoculars: an old man had appeared out of the hut under watch, and was looking along the street towards the village. Intel did not have much on the hut’s inhabitants. They were apparently unrelated to the target but “sympathetic to the Taliban,” providing shelter to insurgents on the move.

The old codger, a boy of about 10 and a little skinny stray were all Rankin had seen about the hut in the 26 hours he’d been in place. Rankin was pissed off with the old man as he gave the kid a hiding whenever he caught him feeding the dog.

Pissed off or not, Rankin’s instructions were clear. Collateral damage, within limits, was acceptable. “One adult, male and one child, male,” as he’d noted the day before in his PDA, would not be enough to get the politicians involved. The bombing would go ahead if the target appeared.

Rankin usually didn’t give a rat’s arse for what he saw. That was one of the reasons he’d survived. That and the Special Ops training. The brass hats knew men deep in unfriendly territory with nothing to do but watch might be tempted to meddle, albeit invisibly, to pass the time.

“You will not play God, gentlemen. Be indifferent or be killed.”

That wanker at Special Ops liked the sound of his own voice. He probably gave the same speech over and over, for every set of squaddies going for selection.

“You will be invisible. Like a breeze. Only terminal,” he’d say.

“Sir? Like my farts, sir?” Lizard took to responding. He didn’t care. And he still badged, eventually.

Rankin checked his watch again. Right on time, the boy appeared on the street, running, unhampered by his tunic to his knees over skinny trousers. He was home from the only school, at the mosque. He kept up a cracking pace. Rankin was the same. He’d get home in half the time it took him to walk to school. He remembered the kids in South London as skinnier. Was that possible?

He watched the boy greet the old man at the hut. The man handed him something to eat and the boy sat, his back against the hut wall in the sun, and chewed.

When the man disappeared, the kid was up, and did a lap of the hut in double time. Lizard would have liked this kid. He had a soft spot for all of ‘em, his pockets full of gobstoppers and gumballs whenever he was off the base.

As the boy reappeared, so did the rotten dog, out from under a piece of corrugated iron leaning against the other hut, about 20 yards away. Rankin had seen no one in or around it in the time that he’d been there. The dust-brown dog covered the ground between the two huts in no time, all skinny legs and tale, more monkey than anything. With a quick glance back at his own hut, the boy held out the bread to the dog.

Rankin wished he didn’t have to watch the man bearing down on the boy. For an old man, he packed a punch: he knocked the boy over with one clout. Even from 400 yards, Rankin could see the trickle of blood run down the boy’s cheek from a cut above his eye.

Furlough. That’s where Rankin could be, instead of eating dust in the middle of nowhere, watching this shit. He wasn’t sure why he had turned down the R&R, other than that he didn’t feel much like relaxing. With Lizard not yet in the ground.

And there was the work-through bonus, small as it was. It was really danger money: the regiment was flush with newbies. Rankin had opted to take this surveillance op. so he was stuck with only one. It was safer that being with a mass of the FNGs, the fucking new guys, who were liable to get their teams killed, like firemen who set fire to
themselves.

A crow landed about two yards from Rankin, and moved cautiously in an arc round him. In Bosnia, Rankin had seen crows try to pick the eyes out of wounded men. He slid his right hand into that side pocket of his pants and felt for his slingshot. Keeping his movement slow and slight, he withdrew it then grabbed a pebble. He landed it right next to the crow: he did not aim to hit it but to move it on. No sudden movements. Don’t make them. Don’t cause them.

Rankin hoped his FNG, literally on ice above the snowline a mile back up in the foothills behind him, was following the same procedure. Only a newbie would have fallen for the shite Rankin spun him about “the full view from the high ground.” Their CO would be spitting chips when they got to back to base and he found out they’d split up. But right now, Rankin felt safer with the FNG some distance from him.

Lizard wouldn’t even eat at the same table as FNGs. He was a lowlife, no question. But he was smart. Rankin had thought it weird then, that Lizard went for the SAS—where your chances of survival are much lower—over the regular forces.

“It’s all part of the plan.” Lizard had said, flicking a yoyo backwards and forwards, annoyingly close to Rankin’s face. “Private Security. That’s where the money is. But Angelina Jolie’s not going to hire some ground pounder who’s humped a pack for 10 years. She wants pizzazz, man. Paratroopers, Special Forces, Navy bloody SEALs. And maybe a Limey accent. That’ll be me.”

Rankin had laughed, hard.

“You need a plan, Stan.” Lizard had said. “Carpe diem, my friend. That means fish or cut bait.”

They’d both laughed.

Lizard had joined up voluntarily at 17, his ticket off the breadline in Manchester’s Moss Side. Rankin, on the other hand, had joined the Army the old-fashioned way. He was up on assault charges at 18 (his first as an adult) after a pub fight. The judge in South London made clear Rankin could do time, or he could join Her Majesty’s Armed Forces. Twelve years later, Rankin was an old man in the regiment. The old man, now.

Maybe he should have a plan. Steal Lizard’s. God knows, he didn’t need it now. What was left of him after the IED was on a transport, on its way to his Mum and three little sisters in Sheffield. Poor bloody Lizard. He would have been pissed off it wasn’t something glamorous. A suicide bomber, or a sniper. Something exceptional. Rankin was sorry too. Lizard was the closest thing to family Rankin had.

Back at the hut, Rankin saw the boy look again for the dog. Leave it alone, he willed him. The boy was a tenacious little bugger. But that would cost him a lot more beatings, before the Yanks dropped one of their crowd pleasers on him in the next month or so. Rankin had been beaten enough for two as a nipper. It pissed him off.

A noise on the hill below Rankin got his immediate attention. Animal. Two or four legged. He waited and was rewarded with another scuffling sound. Up out of the gully scrambled a goat, a mangy goat, skinny and grey in the winter dust. Bugger. There would a bloody shepherd, and depending on how close he was, Rankin would have few options if stumbled upon. He hoped it wasn’t a child.

A second goat appeared, in the same condition as the first and both climbed up the small hill, towards Rankin’s dugout. Piss off, you dumb bastards. Rankin pulled out his slingshot and landed a pebble on the nearer goat, now only about 10 yards from him. It started, like the dumb animal it was, and doubled back down the hill.

Its stupid companion stopped and watched, then came on up the gully.

Rankin landed a pebble on its skinny hide and it, too, headed away. Rankin waited, watching for more. He could hear them but they did not appear.

At about 16:00, the light on Rankin’s PDA began to flash, very faintly and he radio’d in.

“Zero-two-one-one. NTR. November tango romeo. Say again: November tango romeo. Copy?” Rankin said.

NTR: Nothing to report, AKA no towelheads ’round.

“Roger Zero-two-one-one. The word is bridesmaid. BRIDESMAID. Copy?” he heard.

Bridesmaid: no bonk and no marriage. Like much of his time in Afghanistan, this was a non-event. Rankin was instructed to withdraw. He would pull out after dark, the fading light giving him some cover, with more than enough time to pick up the FNG and hump back to the landing zone. Someone else would pull the trigger.

He hunched down deeper into the dugout to get out of the wind. Lizard called this waiting-to-die-time. You had the word to move out but were pinned down by light or movements in the village or wind conditions and just had to wait it out and hope you made it. He ran his eyes along the horizon again and settled in.

It occurred to Rankin, not for the first time, that he was an odd fish, even among the SAS freaks. Most of the Special Forces blokes got to love it, the Army life. Although they would never admit it, Lizard suspected many of ‘em got off on the killing. It’s why they’d rag each other stupid on an overt operation until every one of them had a kill. Lizard was not in that camp.

And he didn’t fall in with the berserks either—the odd kind of squaddie who lost one mate too many and the locals paid. Even Lizard’s death didn’t change this for Rankin.

But this op. was getting to him. It pissed him off that he had to keep watching the old fart rough the kid up. Rankin’s father had a fondness for corporal punishment that went away only when Rankin was big enough to make it a fair fight.

From up here, the dog was the problem—the easiest way to fix the problem. Rankin tossed around options, risks, likelihood of success, conditions, environment. A missing dog would save the kid a few beatings. It had to appear normal to avoid raising questions in the village. He’d have to go in, kill it and then bring out the carcass. That should be OK. The dog looked pretty lean.

The light was starting to fade. He checked the village with his binoculars. The bloody goats had wandered back into town for the night, ten or twelve of them. Shepherd? Check. A kid of maybe 12, on their tail. Rankin was glad they’d not connected.

He took his climbing rope from his pack and laid it on the dirt next to him. He cut a length of about 4 feet. He took his first aid kit, a garbage bag, his webbing for carting stuff, an extra clip for the Browning, and his PRR—it would keep him in touch with the FNG up behind him if he got into trouble. He shoved his tactical beacon into a trouser pocket on the off chance he got out but did not make it back to his stuff, or to the exfil.

He went through the handful of MREs he had with him for the operation. He couldn’t see the chicken korma appealing to the dog and opted for the braised beef and gravy instead. That went into his Bergen along with the thermopack to heat it, a minipacket of two Krispie biscuits and a muesli bar. Maybe the dog would eat anything.

Rankin reblacked his face with camo-grease. He regretted that he didn’t have local gear to wear. A tunic and turban etc would be very handy now. Couldn’t be helped.

Rankin packed his remaining equipment and buried it under a light cover of gravel and dirt. He’d be back for it in under an hour, all going well. Carpe diem. Fish, bait and all that.

He watched the old man and the boy leave for the mosque. Within about ten minutes and as the sun began to dip behind him, he heard the first wave of chants rise up. He had about 40 minutes, tops, and he would need all of it.

Rankin pulled back over the rise of the hill, and crawled his way towards the village in one of the gullies lining the hillside like spiders’ legs. For once he was glad of the cold, sliding and scrambling over ice not mud. He stopped after 10 yards or so for a breather, to check the time, his progress and to look about for any movement. Nothing, just the wail of a cheap PA system, the village at prayer. He crawled on.

At about 15 yards from the boy’s hut, Rankin pulled up and sat, listening like a cat. He’d need to cover the ground to the neighboring hut and while it was almost dark, it was not pitch black, which he’d have preferred. He hoped this second hut was indeed deserted and was reasonably confident. It was more decrepit than its neighbor, a door hanging off its hinges. Rankin did one last check of the area—not a soul—and then sprinted across the open ground between his cover at the bottom of the gully and the hut.

He ducked under the corrugated iron lean-to and squatted, peering about to look for any movement, listening for any new sound. Nothing. He waited two minutes to check for any movement and then backed up against the door and pushed. The hinges protested, and Rankin swore under his breath. He should have thought to bring some camo-grease for them. He was slipping.

Inside, the hut was empty, apparently abandoned, the dirt floors unswept and the dust everywhere. So long as there were no snakes, he’d be fine. He checked under the only things in the room, a filthy carpet and a couple of homemade wooden crates. No dog. Bugger. He’d have to go to Plan B.

This was the tricky part. Rankin would crack open the thermopack with the beef and gravy MRE in it, and let the pack do its stuff. In 5 to 7 minutes, it should be hot, hopefully with enough good smells to attract a dog’s sensitive snout. Problem being of course that any local in close enough proximity might also be curious. He’d estimated the locals would be out of the mosque in about 15 minutes. So for the next 10, he was safer than, well, after that.

He dropped his Bergen on the dirt floor, squatted beside it and pulled out the MRE and its thermopack, cracked the pack to activate it and pushed the MRE inside. He looked about the hut for something to stir with then thought better of it. He was peckish himself. No need to waste the whole bloody thing on the dog.

The MRE was starting to warm up and even now, smelled pretty good. Rankin sat crossed legged on the floor, put his Browning beside him for company and pulled an MRE spoon out. He tucked in, spoon in a gloved hand, enjoying the “Angus beef, gently marinated in 16 herbs and spices” (welcome to the New Army). His mouthful was interrupted by a sound behind him. Very slowly he put down his spoon and replaced it in his hand with his revolver.

Rankin twisted his head and body around towards the sound, his revolver leading the movement, his arm outstretched. Dog. His dog. Or more precisely, pup. It was very young, barely weaned. It shrank back, cowering, under the gun’s muzzle.

“Here, boy. It’s alright,” Rankin said softly and the pup looked up at him from the ground, his tail still. Rankin had read somewhere that a dog’s attitude to you was in its tail—left to right wags meant friendly; right to left, look out. Or was it the other way round? It didn’t seem to matter as the pup was sniffing the muzzle of the revolver. Rankin leaned out to grab him and the pup shrank back again.

He dropped a dollop of braised beef on the top of the muzzle of his revolver. He extended that to the pup. It sniffed and then bit. “Watch the Browning, buddy,” Rankin said. They played it out, Rankin offering some food, the pup reaching in to take it, but never close enough to grab him.

Rankin checked. Thirteen minutes left.

He took out his first aid kit. “You’ll love this,” he said. From the kit he extracted a morphine capsule, not your standard issue with the kit, but Lizard could get anything. He broke open the capsule and carefully removed one of its beads, which he crushed into a piece of beef. Then he nudged this across the floor towards the pup, with the nose of his revolver.

The pup darted in, gulped it down, and retreated out of arm’s reach. He had swallowed it whole. The morphine should not take long to take effect. This was a little dog, with an empty stomach. If it didn’t kill him, he’d be one happy puppy.

Rankin looked at his watch. He reached out, and tried to slip the climbing rope, lasso like round the pup’s neck. Startled, it pulled back.

Rankin tried again, with some beef on the ground by him. This time, he got the noose round the dog’s neck briefly but the pup shook it off.

Rankin was running out of time. He tried again to get the rope around the dog’s neck but it fell short. Damn. On the next attempt, the lasso stayed, sitting loosely around the dog’s neck and it did not try to shake it off. Rankin sat very still, surprised, until the pup’s haunches started to sag. It struggled to get upright but could not.

“Don’t die,” Rankin said and the pup lifted his head briefly as its torso followed its haunches to the floor.

Rankin waited. The pup’s eyes remained open and its body quivered as if it were cold. Which it probably bloody well was. Or dying. Hard to tell which. He wouldn’t know until he got the carcass out.

Eight minutes. Rankin pulled out the garbage bag and lifted the pup awkwardly into it. He left its head out, and tied the bag loosely at its neck. He levered the package into his webbing and pulled the webbing on. He must look like a bloody dog napper.

He sealed the MRE and it went into one of trouser leg pockets. With one last look around, he cracked open the door. Nothing but the strains of the mullah at the mosque. He ducked out of the door, cursing the aged hinge, and ran across the open ground to the bottom of the gully, the pup’s dead weight flopping on his back.

Just over six hours later, Rankin squatted at the landing zone, a sulky FNG on one side, on the other, the pup, anchored to Rankin with the piece of climbing rope. As the Black Hawk came in, the pup struggled, pulling at the rope against the noise and dust.

On board, a crewman handed Rankin a set of mike’d headphones.

“You didn’t strike me as a dog lover,” the crew chief said through the phones.

Rankin ignored him, sat back and clipped his harness in place. The pup whining at his feet, Rankin watched the ground spin by as the bird took them back to Helmand.

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