Rogue Commander, Leo Maloney [classic books for 11 year olds TXT] 📗

Alex glanced at his nameplate and smiled back. “Sorry, Captain Ross, don’t think so. Actually, I’m looking for a friend of my dad’s.”

“And who’d that be?”

“Sheldon Margolis. General Sheldon Margolis. Ever heard of him?”

The captain laughed. “ ‘Give-em-hell Shel’? Sure. He’s probably chewed out everyone here at some point or another. Friend of your father? Wow. Good to know he actually has a friend.” Ross took another look at Alex’s wide-eyed expression and coed outfit and pointed off to the farthest corner of the convention hall. “Last I saw him, he was over at Northrup Grumman, probably buying some killer drones.”

“Great!” Alex said brightly. “Thanks!”

“Hey, want some coffee before you go over there? Long walk.”

“Can I swing back afterward?”

“You bet.” The captain grinned as Alex waved and took off. The last thing she wanted was a date with some army guy. She was probably a much better shot.

She quick-marched all the way over to Northrup, praying that the general hadn’t already moved on. On the way over, she shrugged off her clingy cardigan and slung it over one arm. Then she spotted the display, a sprawling presentation of aircraft models spread out over a carpet of fake grass. In the middle, a small cluster of officers from various branches were listening to a larger man holding court. He had steel-gray hair, a Roman nose, and a turned-down mouth. His ink-blue dress uniform gleamed with “fruit salad” and jump wings, and his black nameplate said “Margolis.”

Alex waited until the group of officers moved on to another display, leaving Margolis alone with a navy lieutenant dressed in light khakis and short sleeves. She took a breath and, hugging her notebook to her chest, made her approach.

“Excuse me. General Margolis?”

He turned from the navy lieutenant and looked down at her. “Yes, miss?”

“Hi,” she said, extending her hand. “I’m Alex Steenbeck, Ohio State.” She slipped the notebook away from her chest, exposing her dangling press pass.

“Good for you, Miss Steenbeck,” Margolis said without any warmth or further invitation, but he shook her hand.

“You’re press,” the navy lieutenant observed with all the pleasure of spotting a cockroach in his soup.

“Yes, sir,” said Alex.

Margolis cocked his head to the left. “Lieutenant Honesdale is our PAO down here.”

Alex nodded at him as well. “Yes, well, I spoke to the Pentagon public affairs officer, Gail, and she told me where to find you.”

“Oh she did, did she?” Margolis frowned. “I’ll have to have a word with her.”

Before Alex could rush to the woman’s defense, the lieutenant cut in. “What’s the issue?” he asked, as if every reporter was a problem, which, in his world, was usually the case.

“Well, as I explained to Gail, I’m a reporter for the college newspaper, The Mandible. We’re doing a story on the Eighteen X-Ray program.” Alex turned back to Margolis. “As I understand, General, you were integral in the start-up of that at Fort Bragg.”

Margolis’s reaction told Alex that her opening gambit was a winner. He clearly felt proud of it, and wanted to let the collegiate world know.

“I was indeed,” he told her, his stern expression softening an almost infinitesimal bit.

“The Mandible,” the lieutenant mused. “Funny name for a publication.”

“Go get some coffee, Honesdale,” Margolis said. “I think I can handle this one.”

“Roger, sir.” The lieutenant moved off, but Alex caught a glimpse of him taking out his cell. She hadn’t had the time to set up any backup for her cover, so she might not have much of a safety window. She opened her notebook and clicked a pen.

“Sir, so just a few questions, if you don’t mind?”

He smiled at her old-fashioned reporting tools, apparently pleased he wouldn’t have to speak into the butt end of a smartphone. “Shoot.” He backed up onto a high metal bar stool in front of a glass display case and sat, but he was still looking down at her.

“Okay, so, this is for our college seniors. Is the program still in effect? I mean are Special Forces still looking for young men with no prior military service?”

“I don’t run that program anymore, Ms. Steenbeck. But my understanding is yes. However, the quality of grads is on the downside for the last few years. It’s hard to lure them out of their ‘safe spaces’.”

Alex looked up at him. No smile or irony in his eyes. He wasn’t joking. “Is it all right if I quote you on that?”

“It’s the unvarnished truth, so why not?”

Alex glanced sideways, spotting Honesdale over by a refreshment stand. He was mixing his coffee with one hand and talking on his cell with the other. She scribbled head-down in her notebook.

“So, Sir. The program’s fallen off, you’d say.”

“It was hot and heavy in the few years after 9/11. Then some of those college kids started coming back in body bags, which happens to be the nature of warfare. But a lot of universities started bad-mouthing the idea. They’re mostly run now by leftist professors babysitting millennial brats.”

“Yes, I see,” said Alex as she continued writing, and then she took her shot. “I was talking to General Collins about some of this...”

“Say again?”

She looked up. Margolis’s thick gray eyebrows were turned down at the middle.

“General James Collins,” she said innocently. “I heard you know him.”

“I know him,” said Margolis, and he rose from the stool and stood up. “I know him very well. And he had nothing to do with Eighteen X-Ray, or anything else you should be interested in for a college newspaper.” He stared at her with a pair of lizard green eyes for a long moment. “What are you here for, Ms. Steenbeck?”

“Well, what I said, Sir. General Collins’s name came up in connection with yours, so I just figured I’d reach out to him too.”

Margolis’s expression turned dark as a thundercloud, and he reached out and gripped Alex’s arm. “What are you here for, young lady?”

She looked as his fingers and back at his scowling lips. “Just for a quote. It’s still a free press,