Q: When he first appeared and started getting, essentially, pretty rough, was the sergeant around at that time, or did he show up...
A: He was kind of beside of him. I think they were standing there.... Yeah, they were definitely standing there together. I don’t know if they walked in together, because I didn’t see them until they turned me around.
Q: Was there a lot of activity at that time? Were there people...
A: People were [fastened] everywhere. And the odd part of it was, there wasn’t anybody, wasn’t any of our regular people. These were all people that I’d never seen before. That’s why I got in so much trouble. I’d never seen these guys.
Q: These were not any of the guys that would ordinarily recognize you as somebody who would...
A: And they sure as hell didn’t want me there, you know that.
Q: When he says, “Get him out of there,” the redhead, did he make any threats to you himself? Did he say, “Don’t say anything about this, forget it...”
A: He said, just like that. He says, “Now listen, Mister, you don’t go back into town starting a bunch of damn rumors.” This guy swore as much as I do. Anyway, he said, “Don’t start a bunch of damn rumors, because nothing happened out here. There’s no plane crashes. Nothing’s happened. You don’t go in and start.” Then he told the MPs, “Get the son of a bitch out of here.”
That’s when I said, right then, I said, “Look, Mister, I’m a civilian, and you can’t do a damn thing to me, you go to hell.” That’s when he said, “Listen, Mister, somebody will be picking your bones out of the sand.”
Then the black sergeant said, “Sir, he would make good dog food,” or something like that. I remember the dog food.