Paper Doll by Jim Shepard Page B

foot, with extra boxes of candy in his new unofficial role as morale officer. He was an earnest and gently funny man, who took his inability to predict the weather with any accuracy seriously, and they liked him. He seemed to genuinely wish he could fly with them, and to genuinely worry about them. He had instituted the tradition of the Living Safety Deposit Box with their crew and the crew of I Should Care , holding on to their valuables during a mission. Valuables turned out to the aircrews to mean only watches and letters, and Stormy had just come from I Should Care and had eight watches on his arm. The pilot and the navigator kept theirs. Bryant peeled his from his wrist, and handed it over. Snowberry did the same. They declined the Baby Ruths with thanks.
    They could hear other jeeps, and headlights illuminated parts of Seraphim and I Should Care and swept toward them. One of the jeeps hit a bump and the beams jerked upward and down, as though fencing with the darkness.
    â€œLewis borrowed Tuliese’s jeep,” Snowberry commented. He was eating peanut brittle from his flight rations. “More ammo.”
    The jeep roared up and jerked around with a rakish and dangerous tip. Lewis climbed out and started unloading boxes and loose belts of fifty-caliber ammunition.
    â€œYou’re going to kill somebody driving like that,” Cooper called from somewhere off in the darkness.
    â€œI’m paid to kill somebody,” Lewis said. The cooling jeep made ticking and shuddering sounds.
    â€œIs all that authorized, Lewis?” Stormy said, and Lewis told him to have sex with his mother.
    â€œBack there in the tail I just want me, my flak vest, the armor plate, and all these fifty-caliber gewgaws,” he said.
    They helped him ferry awkward and spiraling belts into the tail, and coiled them into every conceivable space, in and out of the storage boxes. When they had finished, Lewis gave them each an extra belt for their stations.
    â€œThere’s a reason you’re not supposed to do this, you know,” Snowberry said. “The tail’s gonna be so heavy we’re gonna end up leaving you behind.”
    â€œThat’s fine, too,” Lewis said. “One way or the other, I’ll get by.” He called to Tuliese and flipped the jeep keys in the crew chief’s general direction. They rang on the tarmac and Tuliese was left to hunt around in a crouch, moving in slow arcs like someone sweeping mines.
    They waited in a small group, squatting and sitting. The B-17’s around them were becoming clearer and the runways faintly luminous. Various figures moved about.
    â€œI’m going to write a war book someday, I think,” Bryant said. He thought again of his high school English teacher with her sketches of the Parthenon, and her assessment of him. His holster rode up the small of his back. “Only in this one no one’s going to get killed.”
    Neither Lewis nor Snowberry chose to respond. Stormy wished them well and left. Cooper and Gabriel paced by, gazing worriedly down the runway.
    Lewis shifted audibly on his pile of equipment. “You write a war book and no one gets killed,” he said. “I don’t know what you got, but it isn’t a war book.”
    Snowberry sang disconnected bits of a Crosby song to himself, his voice too low to carry.
    Piacenti was in the plane looking for something with a flashlight, like a prowler. He climbed out of the waist hatch and stood over them with his hands on his hips. “There’re bugs or something in the waist,” he reported. Mist drifted from his words. “Hornets.”
    â€œHornets,” Lewis said. “In England.” He sounded profoundly unhappy.
    â€œTell Bean,” Snowberry said. “He’s the bug man.”
    â€œCheck it out,” Bryant suggested softly. “See what they are.”
    â€œYour ass,” Piacenti said. “I’m not going in there.” He blew on