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man, he’s ready to fall out. The man’s in ungood health.”
    Harold Murphy made a bitter hooting sound. “Turn back, then,” he said. “Right now, while it’s still possible.”
    Oscar pushed his sunglasses tight against his eyes. “We do what we do,” he said. “No use thinkin’, just do it.”
    He got up and went over to relieve Eddie.
    It took another half hour to cut through to the trail. They rested a time, concentrating on their fatigue, then again they began moving. The earth was damp now, springy with crushed ferns and mushrooms, ancient smells, and there was the dank hush that comes before a summer storm. The heat came in layers. It was a sucking heat, the sort that draws moisture out of living things, and they filed through it with the dull plodding motions of men who move because they must.
    Near dusk the trail began to widen. The trees thinned out, and the trail slipped down into a gully which, after a time, brought them to a wide, dark river.
    There they stopped.
    “Laos,” Doc said. He hitched up his pack and pointed to the far side of the river. “Over there, that’s Laos.”
    They gazed across at it. The same sheer jungle. Trees grew to the river’s edge, their roots snaking down the bank and into the slow water. Things were very still. The river was like a pond without currents. Dusk gave it a murky brown color.
    “No bridges,” the lieutenant finally said. He stood slightly apart from the others, blinking as if trying to decide on something. Then he sighed. “I guess that’s one good thing. No bridges to burn behind me.”
    They crossed the river.
    The lieutenant went first. He stepped into the slow water, paused a moment, then began wading. The others followed. It was easy. They waded across single file, holding their weapons high. The warm feeling of passage. They regrouped on the far side.
    “I don’t like it,” Harold Murphy whispered, but it was done.
       For six days they marched through jungle. Once they skirted a deserted village. Once they crossed a frayed and spindly rope bridge. Once, in the heat of early afternoon, they passed through an ancient tribal cemetery. But there were no breaks in the ongoing rain forest. And there were no signs of Cacciato.
    It was a routine. They would rise at daybreak and march untilmidafternoon, when the heat seemed to click on like a furnace. Then they would rest, spinning out the hot hours in petty conversation or sleep. Later, as the shadows appeared, they would resume the march until dusk. The fatigue played heavily on all of them. Mostly, though, it showed on the lieutenant. Partly it was his age, partly the dysentery. But it was something else, too.
    One afternoon as they were fording a shallow creek, the old man lost his balance and teetered and fell back. He sat there, watching the cold water rush past. He did not move. Slowly, like a pair of logs, his arms bobbed in the stream. He watched them. Then his pack slipped off, his rifle sank, and he floated.
    Doc and Eddie dragged him out.
    They propped him against the bank, dried him off, retrieved the M-16 and rucksack. The lieutenant’s eyes were open and his lips moved, but he did not speak.
    “Sick,” Doc whispered. “The old man’s had it.”
    They spent the night there. When the lieutenant was asleep, Oscar convened a meeting around the fire.
    “Democracy time,” Oscar said slowly. He removed his sunglasses, inspected them, put them on again. “Decision time. Do we go on with this shit or do we call it quits? That’s the question.”
    Stink flicked his eyebrows and grinned. “Speeches!”
    “Spit on speeches. We’re taking a vote, no bullshit.” Oscar’s face was hard. His sunglasses sparkled in the firelight. “Doc says the LT’s probably got a case of sunstroke … nothing serious, anyhow. No temperature, the dysentery’s clearing up. But he still ain’t exactly in wonderful shape. So we got to consider—”
    “Turn back,” Harold Murphy said. “That’s