All Those Vanished Engines (28 page)

I had to turn in a complete circle to see it all. But I was also imagining what lay behind the hill, the people those ramparts housed and protected, not just here but all over the world. Two hundred miles south, in Richmond, a boy and his mother crouched together in the scary dark.

“I fought with your grandfather when I was just a boy,” said the commander. “That was on Katahdin Ridge in 1963. That was the first time I saw her.” He motioned back down the road toward Loch Raven. I put the binoculars to my eyes, and I could see the black flags.

“Her?”

“Her.”

I knew whom he meant. “What took you so long, anyway?” he asked. I might have tried to answer, if there was time, because I didn't hear even the smallest kind of reproach in his voice, but just simple curiosity. I myself was curious. What had I been doing all these years when there was work to be done? Others had started as children. There were kids among us now.

I was distracted from my excuses by the sight of them building up a bonfire of old two by fours and plywood shards, while the rest of us stood around warming our hands. I heard laughter and conversation. People passed around bottles of liquor. They smoked cigarettes or joints. A woman uncovered a basket of corn muffins. A man had a bag of oranges, which he passed around. I could detect no sense of urgency, even though the eastern wind made the fire roar while lightning licked the edges of the plain. The crack of thunder was like distant guns.

“Here they come,” said the commander.