Free The Odd Angry Shot by William Nagle Page B

shoulders. A droplet of sweat falls from the nose of the sobbing figure between us.
    â€˜WHAT’S got four legs and flies?’ asks Harry, cleaning the grey skin from between his toes.
    I watch the cleaning ritual. Harry does this every day. Toe jam is the backbone of the Task Force I think.
    Ah, slimy toe jam…the Queen has toe jam too.
    â€˜Don’t you ever wash your feet?’ my mother says.
    I am three again.
    The crease created by the squeezing of the knee joint in Harry’s hairy leg reminds me of female genitalia. Sniff a little, you bitch. I can smell your eagerness… Smell me, eh? I know what I’ll do when I come home. You’ll beg for me. Moan, eh? I’ll blow right into your ‘middle-class trimmed party by the swimming pool and your brother studying law’ womanhood.
    â€˜I don’t know,’ I reply.
    â€˜Two lesbians,’ smiles Harry. Back to the toe jam.
    â€˜I THINK I’ve got piles,’ says Rogers, arising from the mound of newspapers that litters the floor beside his stretcher.
    â€˜Poofters get piles,’ says Bung.
    â€˜How?’ asks Rogers.
    I am amazed at his innocence. How can a man whose life is centred on death be so innocent?
    We are the arbiters. We are more powerful than God. We decide. Like clockwork in school: Check magazine. Sight, pull trigger. Head explodes. One more to the score for the Regiment’s honour. Remember the German kids at school? What’s the point? Two months to go.
    â€˜Because they root each other,’ says Bung, his words punctuated by the snap as the metal top on the bourbon bottle separates.
    THE land rover bounces along the road like a green-painted, four-wheel ball.
    Harry’s face is supported by his cigarette.
    â€˜Shit, look! A nog on a bike,’ yells Rogers excitedly, waving his arms.
    â€˜Where? Where?’ asks Bung, standing up and swaying against the roll of the vehicle.
    â€˜Up in front,’ says Harry, lifting his foot slightly and easing the pressure on the metal accelerator.
    Rogers takes a matchbox from his shirt pocket and climbs over the low wall that separates the driving compartment from the tray of the vehicle.
    â€˜Wait until we’re about two feet from him,’ says Harry as the land rover draws closer to the hunched, pedalling figure with the two containers balancing on the long pole that bounces with every depression of the rider’s feet on the pedals. We draw up alongside the cyclist.
    â€˜Now,’ says Harry. Rogers lobs the burning match container into the rear container which immediately bursts into flame. At the same time, Bung leans far out over the side of the vehicle and swings his rifle, knocking the pole and sending the cyclist spinning down the embankment at the side of the road into the mud that waits like discoloured porridge. Harry stops the land rover and we peer at the mud-caked figure lying in the black slime.
    â€˜Flamer,’ yells Rogers, grinning.
    â€˜Ho Chi Minh’s a cunt,’ calls Bung to the dismantled figure.
    We drive on knowing full well that we have just struck another blow for the cause of world communism…
    Who cares?
    THE frail, grey-haired, anyone-at-home’s-mother-could-look-like-her figure pounds fists into Harry’s shirt front, raising small puffs of dust.
    The search and clear mission is now two days old. My nose is bleeding from the heat of the afternoon sun. I lean on the muzzle of my rifle and watch the spectacle with impartial interest.
    â€˜I think she wants to fuck you, Harry,’ laughs Rogers, spitting and licking his lips at the same time.
    Harry raises a restraining, severe, don’t-come-any-closer hand and pushes the old woman back toward the open-fronted shack that has served as her home for the past sixty years.
    I jerk my rifle up and cradle it in the crook of my arm swinging the grey-blue steel finger of the barrel into line with the sobbing, screaming, ragged