Shooter Galloway Read online

  “I suppose Mop has all kinds of guns out there.”

  “Oh, not so many different kinds, sheriff. I shot a ton or two of .22 Long Rifles. And we shot .38 Specials and some .357 Magnums. I suppose we shot more .45 ACP than anything else. There is a lot of cheap GI ammunition available, and shooting as much as we did, handloading got to be a full time task. We were glad for the old government stuff, I’ll tell you.”

  “Who was better, you or Mop?”

  Shooter laughed. “At first, Mop wiped my nose because I hadn’t ever done much with a pistol, but these days we are pretty equal. Lately, Uncle Mop has been wooing a lady up at one of the ski resorts, so I’ve been practicing more than he has, and I’m getting better.”

  Brunner pushed a little. “Whatever happened to your dad’s guns, Gabriel? He had quite a few some years before he died.”

  Gabriel felt his stomach knot a little, but he was ready.

  “They’re right here in our secret bunker, sheriff. I keep them cleaned and oiled, but I’ve been gone so much, I haven’t fired many of them since Dad died.”

  “You’ve got a secret bunker?”

  “Yep, even Dan Grouse doesn’t know. My mother is the only other person that knows about it, I think. In fact, I moved all of the stuff out into the woods before she got here right after Dad was killed.”

  Gabriel twisted a little in his chair. “It sounds strange to say that Dad was killed, sheriff. All of these years we’ve been saying ‘since he died.’

  “Anyway, Dad had some gold coins, and I figured my mother would try for them, and I couldn’t be sure what else she might claim. So, I hauled everything out and put it all back after she left.”

  Gabriel’s laughter was boyishly pleased. “She looked, but there was nothing to find.”

  “What has your dad got in there, Shooter? I can’t really remember Bob’s guns.”

  Gabriel hesitated for a long moment as if considering.

  “Seeing I’m going to be away for who knows how long, maybe it would be good if you knew where those guns and stuff are, sheriff. Just don’t let Emma or Gus know. That bunker is my Dad's and my secret, Ok?”

  Shooter opened the bunker, and Brunner said, “Wow.”

  “Kind of neat isn’t it, sheriff?”

  “Real neat, Shooter. Nobody’s likely to stumble over it. You got any of these insured?

  “Dad had them all listed with the insurance company. An old house like this could burn down tomorrow.”

  There were not a lot of guns for a rural county where some homes could display more than a hundred rifles, pistols, and shotguns, but those Bob had owned were nice.

  Rifles were racked muzzle down so that oil did not gather and harden in the receivers. Shotguns were stored the same. Pistols were positioned butts outward in racks that held the muzzles low.

  Shooter watched the sheriff play his game, and eventually, Brunner got to the .45 Colt.

  “You got any ammunition for this, Shooter?”

  “Yep, Dad was shooting some new stuff from out west that is getting real popular now.” Gabriel fumbled in a drawer and produced a box. “Black Hills ammo. Made in Rapid City, South Dakota. The best there is, Mop and I believe.”

  Brunner said, “I’d like to try some Black Hills. Is it hot?”

  “Not particularly, but it is very accurate, it expands like a flower, and it feeds perfectly.”

  “Got a place I could shoot this, unless you’d rather I not fire your dad’s guns?”

  “No, nothing like that, sheriff. I’ll join you for a few rounds. I don’t want to lose my edge.”

  The Galloway range behind the house had a dirt berm backstop. Gabriel said, “We do all of our shooting here.”

  They shot a full fifty round box of Black Hills, and Sonny Brunner discovered that he should not be on the same range with Shooter Galloway. He was embarrassed by his performance, and Gabriel was good. Really good, Brunner judged.

  Gabriel Galloway was gone to the Marine Corps for nearly a month before Sonny Brunner dug into the earth backstop and collected a large sampling of .45 caliber bullets. He restored the berm and took the bullets to his office for examination.

  Even casual comparison showed all of the bullets, even the oldest—most of which were GI hardball—came from the same pistol. None of them in any way matched the bullets taken from the wall behind Sam Elder.

  Brunner guessed he was growing horns on a doe. His speculations sounded reasonable, but nothing panned out. The idea of Gabriel on a deadly vendetta against the Elders was actually pretty far-fetched, but it had seemed possible.

  Sonny decided to hell with it. Gabriel Galloway was a nice young man, and now he was a Marine. What more could you want from a boy?

  The Marine

  Chapter 13

  1990

  The Northern Border of Saudi Arabia

  The Marines waited, as did Saddam Hussein’s massive army. When the order to attack came, the United States Marine Corps intended to stomp the Iraqi invaders and savagers of Kuwait into oblivion, much as they would a large cockroach infestation.

  The Marines held the coalition’s right flank. To their right the Persian Gulf glistened in the sun. To the left, the United States Army and assorted allies extended the line into the vast desert reaches. Somewhere, far out there in the west, American tanks mustered, and when the command was given, they would go through Saddam Hussein’s over-confident armor like a dose of Epsom salts.

  Hussein had promised “The mother of all battles.” The Iraqi dictator could not imagine how vulnerable his ill-trained horde and worn out Russian armor would fare against American training and technology.

  In the meantime, all was not peaceful. Occasionally, artillery spoke from the Iraqi side and was immediately suppressed by Marine counter-battery fire. At night, Scud missiles fell well behind the lines, and on odd occasions, small arms fire from extremely long range peppered Marine positions.

  Someone had endured enough of it, and a Gunnery Sergeant from the First Battalion, Second Marines hurried along the staggered trenches and fighting holes that marked his battalion’s position.

  On the way he reeled in a Buck Sergeant squad leader.

  “Sergeant, I want your best fire team on the double.”

  “What’s the job, Gunny?”

  “Battalion is sending out a sniper team, and we will provide a fire team for security. Which one gets it?”

  The Buck Sergeant was fast. He hollered along the line. “Send Galloway and his team here, now.”

  The Gunny said, “This is for real. Don’t send me some eight-ball. I want your best.”

  “That’s Galloway, Gunny. How long will they be out?”

  “As long as it takes, Sergeant, but they could be back before dark. On the other hand, they might not come in until tomorrow.”

  Lance Corporal Galloway squatted close, and his men knelt behind him. The Gunnery Sergeant noted that they kept a five step interval between men without being reminded.

  The Gunny included the Buck Sergeant and Galloway when he spoke. “They’ve got some sort of sniper shooting from so far out his rounds are dropping straight down.

  “The bastard hasn’t hit anybody yet, but he’s got half the battalion ducking and dodging and walking all bent over. He’s shooting from so far away that nobody can locate him. My guess is that he shoots and moves, anyway.”

  “How far out is he, Gunny?” Lance Corporal Galloway’s voice was firm. He sought knowledge.

  The gunny said, “He’s got to be more than fifteen hundred yards or we would find him.”

  “Is he shooting a thirty caliber or something close to it?”

  “That’s what they’re guessing, Galloway. The bullets aren’t coming in like they should from a fifty or whatever the Iraqis use.”

  The Gunny sounded a little impatient. “He isn’t your target, Galloway. Your fire team will provide security for the snipers. We don’t want somebody crawling up on them while they’re concentrating on the Ira
qi shooter.”

  “Understood, Gunny, but if this skilled guy is shooting from fifteen hundred or more, he isn’t really expecting to hit someone. The range is way too long. You can’t hardly see a man that far away, but he might be hoping to lure somebody from our side into his range. He could even have an ambush team waiting closer in.”

  The Gunnery Sergeant’s interest was piqued.

  “Good thinking, Galloway. You bring that up to the snipers, just in case they haven’t thought of it, but you take care of your mission and your men, and you will have done your job.”

  “Got it, Gunny.”

  The sergeants watched L.Cpl. Galloway move his men away. The Gunny asked, “Why him, Sergeant?”

  “Well, I haven’t got anybody experienced, but Galloway is known for having shot two outlaws in Montana or somewhere, and he is the best I’ve got. His nickname is Shooter, and he can really handle an M16, Gunny.”

  “God, how old is he? Eighteen, maybe?”

  “I suppose, but he went to a military school. He has what we want, Gunnery Sergeant.”

  “Oohrah! Let’s hope so. I doubt they find anything, anyway. By the time they get out in front, that sniper will probably have stacked it in for the day.”

  Corporal Doane led the sniper team. His spotter was PFC Smith. Doane’s orientation was brief.

  “We’re going to creep and crawl out five hundred yards or more. We’ll go further if we need to. Smith and I will set up and see if we can spot this guy.

  “You ladies will stay so low you flatten your buttons. You watch left, right, and where we came from. We’ll take care of things ahead.”

  Before Galloway could comment, the sniper added, “Now this guy just might be laying a trap for anyone anxious enough to come out after him. He could be planning to shoot us himself, or he might have a company of men just laying back waiting. Either way, it’s our job to kill him and anyone with him, so that’s what we’ll do.”

  He turned to Shooter. “You keep your men looking, team leader, and don’t any of you poke a head up to see what’s out there. Stay low, damn it. Stay really low.”

  Their progress began swiftly but once beyond friendly positions slowed to an agonizing crawl. Occasionally, they encountered a higher lump in the flat terrain that allowed creeping, but most of the time they were on their bellies just scraping along.

  Shooter Galloway hoped to hell that all of the Marines looking out knew that a sniper team was out there. Friendly fire now and then got somebody. His unvoiced opinion was that the two-man sniper team would have been a lot less obvious without a four-man tail dragging behind, but it was not his call. Without the war officially on, people were being cautious, he supposed.

  They were moving almost straight out, and Shooter gave that some thought. If he had been doing it, he would angle across the front. An approach like that would take longer, but if they were detected, their destination would not be so obvious, and some zigzagging could increase the difficulty of getting on them with artillery or laying an ambush. That decision was also not his, so he scrabbled along with his men and the snipers.

  Corporal Doane found a spot he liked. A long swale paralleling the front led to a series of elevated humps, and Doane chose to set up between a pair where the heads of his team would not stick up like they were on sticks. Observer Smith crawled alongside his sniper and began placing his spotting scope.

  Shooter positioned his men so that other approaches were covered. He explained to each man how he could withdraw and how the fire team would reassemble at a protected spot Shooter had marked coming in. If necessary, they would defend from there.

  They were only five or six hundred yards beyond the Marines’ most forward observers. If they needed support it would come from mortars or artillery positioned further to the rear. In the meantime, they would dig in. When snipers shot, mortars sometimes answered, and the safest place when mortar rounds were falling was a deep hole—with a cover, if you could get one.

  Shooter found a spot and began his own hole. While digging, he watched and judged the actions of the snipers. This was actually his first chance to observe a sniper team in the field. He had seen snipers on Camp Lejeune’s new 1000 yard range, and he had met a few. So far, his requests to attend scout sniper school had been rejected. The Gulf War build up had come almost out of nowhere, and unit commanders had been unwilling to let anyone go anywhere.

  Galloway watched hungrily. He critically judged every move made by spotter or sniper. Galloway’s experience was from books on military sniping and the summers of pretending in Montana. If he had been asked, Galloway would have explained his critical evaluating as important because a sniper’s job was serious and deadly, and he hoped to be one of them someday.

  If examined more closely, Lance Corporal Gabriel Galloway judged everything critically. To Galloway’s mind, doing something right did not rate accolades. That was the way it was supposed to be. Doing it wrong or half-assed should be noted and corrected. Galloway’s intensity had earned him his meritorious promotion to Lance Corporal.

  Mostly, Shooter thought the snipers were doing it right. Their movements were planned, and they kept extremely low. They wasted no motions and spoke only when it was important.

  There were things that Galloway thought he would do different. For instance, the sniping hide Doane had chosen was not in shadow. Shooter could see a number of spots where a dune cast a small shadow that could have helped conceal the team.

  Then, there were the helmets. The standing order was that helmets were worn at all times, and the snipers were relying on the camouflaged helmet covers to disguise their heads. Shooter had heard Staff Sergeant Neil Morris talking about the importance of getting out from under a brain bucket when trying to remain unobserved. Shooter knew that during the Vietnam Conflict, the soft and shapeless boonie cap had been the snipers’ preferred cover. Why not here, Galloway wondered.

  The spotter was scanning with his twenty-power scope, but Corporal Doane was resting his eyes. That was good technique. Staring through a rifle’s ten-power telescopic sight for a lengthy period exhausted the eye. After a while, they would trade off, and Smith would rest while Doane searched for the enemy.

  Of course, they were listening, and twice Galloway heard a rifle fire from further out. Probably the Iraqi sniper, but the Marine snipers could not find him.

  Shooter judged his fire team’s digging and signaled them to quit. You could overdo the hole digging, and the team might move at any instant. If more than one sniper shot was fired, they almost certainly would displace to an alternate position lest the enemy drop something on them. A sniper could usually get away with a single shot and no visible movement. Sometimes, a second shot could be made, but firing a third time from a single position was courting big trouble.

  Corporal Doane had the spotting scope when he said, “Oh oh. I’ve got him.”

  Smith and Galloway snapped to attention. Shooter longed to peer across the open to discover what the Corporal had found, but that could not be. First, it was not his job. Second, he would see nothing. The Corporal was using a twenty power M49 scope on a tripod. Instead, he listened closely.

  Doane moved aside and began aligning his rifle. Smith slipped behind the spotting scope and asked, “What am I looking for?”

  “You will see his head. It’s dark and almost dead centered in the scope. Look just under that higher ridge. There’s a weed or something sort of marking the spot. It looked to me as if he was glassing with binoculars.”

  After a long moment, Smith said, “I see him. Yeah, he’s got glasses up to his eyes, I think. Whew, how far out is that, Corporal?”

  “Too damned far. He’s got to be nine hundred yards, maybe a little more. That’s a long way to hit a head.”

  “Well, at least his head isn’t moving. You going to try from here?”

  “Hell, Smith, I‘ve got to. There isn’t enough cover to conceal a mouse between him and us.”

  The sniper was silent for moments
judging the shot and getting himself set.

  Smith said, “He might have turned a little. I think he is looking away from us.”

  “Man, he looks like a dot through this scope. Is he still glassing?”

  “Yep, at least I think so. He isn’t exactly sticking up in the air, but you can take him, corporal.”

  “I haven’t any dope for this long a range. I never got to shoot this rifle over six hundred.” Doane sounded frustrated.