His goodbye kiss with Mary Jo was as special as he could make it. She still didn’t know he was leaving for war, and he wasn’t sure himself; but he couldn’t get out of his head the times when he’d left for Vietnam. Each time they’d both had serious doubts about whether they would see each other again. When he’d gone as a “Wild Weasel,” the odds had been high that he’d be killed or captured, leaving her with two kids and rapidly receding support from her Air Force family.

This day, he knew, was another such moment of truth in their marriage.

A terrible moment, as always. “There’s no justice when you marry a military person,” he observes. “Words are useless. So you just embrace and kiss each other. The pilot’s anxious, nervous, and raring to go; and she’s jealous because of all that, yet she loves him anyway, just as he loves what he does. Tears are not permitted. He can’t cry because he’s never learned how, and she can’t because it hurts too much. Besides, there will be plenty of time later during the dreary loneliness she’ll endure. So it’s an ‘I Love You’ kiss, then he’s off to somewhere that he can’t even tell her, and she’s off to play the organ at the nine o’clock Protestant service. He climbs in the car with a prayer, ‘God give me time in Heaven to be a loving husband, because I sure as hell have been a shit to her on earth.’ ”

★ This is getting to be a habit, Horner thought when the C-21 disgorged him and Bill Rider at Andrews AFB.

Waiting in the distinguished visitor lounge was Lieutenant General John Yeosock, commander of the United States Third Army, which was the Central Command ground component, known as ARCENT. He, too, had the hunting dog look.

Yeosock was a soldier other soldiers referred to as “a piece of work.” He had an IQ of about 140 and a homely face; he was totally selfless and impossible not to like. His only vice was cigars, expensive ones that came in metal tubes. John and Betta Yeosock had been at the National War College with the Horners and the Powells, and they’d all remained friends afterward. Even today, Horner and Yeosock still call Colin Powell “Your Highness.”

Soon they went out to meet Schwarzkopf ’s assigned VC-135, a military version of a Boeing 707, from the 89th Airlift Wing. Then the three of them piled into a car and headed for the Pentagon. During the ride, Horner learned that confusion had already set in. Who was going to Saudi Arabia? What was the agenda? What authority did they have to negotiate agreements? They didn’t even know whose airplane they would take. As he listened to all this, Horner kept silent, but it seemed a little disorganized for a military operation.