During the week, the corporal was just another nameless grunt, doing his part to hold back the Warsaw Pact juggernaut that, in 1975, stood poised to crush the free half of Europe. In reality, Danley was a file clerk in the Quartermaster office at the huge U.S. Army base in Frankfurt, West Germany. The corporal's particular mission was to keep track of the various requests and demands from American officers for new light bulbs, garage door openers, and hedge clippers.

He was making the best of his two years in the service by enjoying the good beer, cheap hashish, and cheaper flesh, available in the city of two million. On Sundays, he wiped all his apathy and sins away by devoting an hour to the church. The small Catholic chapel was always packed for the 11:00 folk mass.