Peril in the Pines Ch. 01

Jan looked up into my eyes. "Jack, ask me the question so I can say yes. Ask me right now, right in front of Mom. Let's not dance around it any more. Let me hear the words."

"Jan, I love you more than I thought I could ever love anybody. It goes deeper than any feeling I've ever had. I can't even think about living the rest of my life without you. I only hope I can live up to your standards, and you set the bar pretty high. You're the most wonderful girl I've ever met. Please, will you marry me?"

"Just try to stop me! Of course I will, and yes, we'll be wonderful together. I love you so much that I know I could never love anyone else, and I can't wait to be Mrs. Jack Olson."

MEDALS? WHAT MEDALS?

I was sitting in the Sheriff's visitor's chair, across the desk from where he sat in a well-used swivel chair. "I asked you to come in today to clarify a few points about your military service. How long were you on active duty?"

"Five years. I went in shortly after high school, just after my nineteenth birthday."

"Why did you enlist?"

"The answer isn't simple, so please let me explain the whole thing. After graduation I looked around at the world I'd been turned loose into, and I kept up with the news and analysis of events. I could see that things weren't going all that well in Afghanistan and Iraq. I tried to see the war from everybody's point of view but I finally realized that I'd never understand it all, so I just focused on what it meant to this country. I had no doubt that it was important or we wouldn't be fighting over there. I could see that we were doing a lot of good there, even if the results weren't perfect. I'd been trying to decide what I wanted to do with my life, and I didn't want to waste it flipping hamburgers. I wanted to do something that would make a difference. Some day when I'm on my deathbed I want to look back and see that I stood for something, that I did what I could to make the world a better place, even if it my contribution was tiny. I saw the military as the best way to do that.

"I still feel the same way now. If I had those years to live over again, I'd do the same thing. It was good experience, I learned a lot, matured a lot. I saved the lives of a few good people and took the lives of a few bad people. I tried to share everything I learned with my squad, and asked them to do the same, and I was proud of what we all did together. We had the best squad in the whole battalion."

"Why didn't you mention the medals you'd been awarded? I had to find out about them from the Army."

"Let's get real. I was a squad leader. I tried to set a good example for my guys. They all performed very well, and did what I'd taught them to do. I didn't see my actions as being at all unusual. I tried to take care of business. We got into some tough spots, but that was all the enemy's doing, not ours. My job was to get us out of them, and I did. I received some decorations and I have them all in a box at home. Maybe some day I'll make a little plaque to display them on. Maybe I'll show them to my kids, or my grandkids.

"Here's the way I look at all this. I did what had to be done, when it had to be done, just as well as I could do it. That was my job. The medals came later. The lives I saved were more important than all the medals in the world. Those medals didn't save the lives, I did. Read about Alvin York or Audie Murphy. They did what I did only a hundred times more, never dreaming they'd get medals for it. So that's why I didn't think they were important enough to mention.

"I'd really like to get a job in your outfit. But if I do I don't want to be regarded as some heroic figure here at home, when the things I did were thousands of miles from here, in another world with other people and other rules. Remember Ira Hayes, the Indian in the Marine Corps who stepped up to help some guys put up a flag on Mount Suribachi? Joe Rosenthal snapped a picture of them for Life magazine, and the Defense Department dragged Ira home to parade him at war bond rallies as a hero. He couldn't figure out why they were making a fuss over him, when others had done so much more, and so many of them died doing it. Eventually it drove him to the bottle and then to his death. I don't want that to happen to me."

The Sheriff looked at me and nodded. "I understand," was all he said about it.

While he was quiet I thought I'd try him with a question. "Sheriff, you must know everybody for miles around here. What can you tell me about Mr. Miller, the father of Jan, the girl who was with me in the woods?"

"Marty was a great guy. I knew him when we were just growing up. He worked as an auto mechanic and he was very good at what he did. I remember taking a new car to him one time with a problem and he said he'd rather not tackle it because it involved a system that was brand new that model year and he hadn't studied it yet. In other words, he had the integrity to turn down a job that he thought he might not handle well. In the automobile business around here he was a legend. He took care of all of our patrol cars, and I had a tough time finding another mechanic who could work to Marty's standards after he died."

"Thanks. That helps me to see what Mrs. Miller was talking about. She worshiped the ground he walked on. In fact she still does."

"Yes, Marilyn. She's a great person, too. I suppose it's none of my business, but I can tell you that with those two for parents, their daughter must be very special. My boys were impressed with how well she handled herself out there, with no experience at all in life or death situations. If you and she are serious, I'd say you're a lucky man."