The wire is cut. The dog goes first.
Sergeant Wade Gresham handles the dog. That's the whole of his job, and nobody in the platoon quite believes it's a job. Banner is a black Labrador on a British harness older than the newest man in the team — trained never to bark, trained to follow a scent line, and trained, most importantly, to tell his handler when he has nothing.
The Army wants a weapon. What Gresham has is an animal that is honest with him, and an outpost full of men who need an answer whether or not one exists.
The trail is good for one morning. Then the country begins taking it away: civilian traffic, a rubber plantation, a decoy laid and covered by somebody who knew exactly how a dog is worked. Then the monsoon arrives, a creek comes up, and the scent line goes downstream with it.
Banner casts, casts again, and sits down. Nothing here.
A man who wanted to be certain would push the dog. In the heat of the second day, with the weather closing, Gresham takes the harness off his dog under fire and does not explain himself.
He is right. It costs him the trail, and it costs him his team's belief, and he does not get to have both.
War Dogs, Book 1.
