Cracker!: The Best Dog in Vietnam

  He jerked at her leash. The sarge had told them that you could never, ever teach a dog not to alert to animals. But you had to discourage it anyway. He thought again of the farmer who’d shot his dog, but he pushed the thought out of his mind.

  “No! Search!” Rick said.

  Rick felt annoyed. Cracker had improved since he’d met her, but every so often she surprised him by taking off after a squirrel or a bird. Rick rearranged the rucksack on his back. It weighed fifty-five pounds, less than he would carry most days in Nam, but it already felt heavy. Swamp water and sweat drenched his clothes. Sweat dripped into his eyes. He already wanted to take off his steel pot—or helmet—but if he did, a piece of shrapnel might hit him. Of course, since this was just training, there was no shrapnel. But Rick resisted the urge to take off his helmet. He needed to get used to it, and he knew U-Haul would yell at him if he took it off.

  Cracker gazed longingly at the bird again but felt the chain jerk on her neck. She’d killed a bird once while she and Willie were out in a forest. She knew it was a “bird” because Willie had taught her that word. She would never forget killing the bird because it was so much fun. But she could feel Rick’s annoyance. She sniffed at the air. There was something … a smell Rick had taught her about. The scent seemed stronger to the left.

  Cracker waded through the swamp, thinking of only one thing now: the smell to the left. She pulled Rick out of the swamp and walked directly into the smell. It was everywhere, flooding into her nose. And she heard the faint, whistling rhythm of someone breathing. She pricked up her ears. She could also smell the breath coming from whomever was breathing.

  “Whatcha got, girl?” Rick said urgently.

  She felt the hair on her back stand up. “Grrrr,” she answered him. Ouch! Rick had yanked the harness.

  “Quiet,” he whispered.

  She charged suddenly, and a man jumped from a thick bush and ran off. She lunged after him, ripping at his pants. Rick called, “Stay! Stay!” Cracker reluctantly stopped.

  “Good girl!” Rick said. Cracker felt his face rubbing all over hers. “Good girl!” he said again. She rubbed her face back against his. She felt satisfied all over.

  Then she lifted her head sharply. She still heard something. She turned back to where the man had run from and stood straight up. From far away, she heard a sound Rick had taught her to listen for: the sound of wind passing around a wire pulled tight. She faintly smelled gunpowder.

  She looked up at Rick, questioning him, and he looked at the loud man, who nodded. Rick said, “Search, girl.”

  She knew exactly where the sound was coming from, so she pulled Rick more than she knew he liked. But she didn’t pull so much that he reprimanded her. She was getting to know him really well. The forest grew denser, the smell dispersed, but the sound was unmistakable. As soon as she was sure what it was, and where, she sat down and stared toward the source of the sound.

  Rick said, “Whatcha got, girl?”

  She looked at him, then turned back to the sound. Couldn’t he hear it?

  Rick repeated, “What you got, girl?”

  He stepped around her and cautiously moved forward, scanning up and down to make sure he didn’t miss anything. Cracker followed him and pawed him once.

  Rick knew he’d tripped the wire almost before he actually tripped it. Later he wondered how he’d known beforehand. Unfortunately, he didn’t know in time to stop. The booby trap exploded, though of course it wasn’t real gunpowder. Rick wanted to kick himself. And it was all his fault. Cracker had given a strong alert, and he’d moved past her because he hadn’t seen anything.

  The instructor moved up beside him. “You know what the soldiers fighting in Vietnam would call that, Private?”

  “I don’t know, Sergeant.”

  “A BK,” the instructor said.

  During three months of basic, three months of AIT, and now dog-handling school, Rick had learned a lot of the slang that the guys used in Vietnam. It was supposedly like a whole new language. But he hadn’t heard “BK” yet. “What’s a BK?” he asked dejectedly.

  “That stands for ‘below-the-knee amputation.’” The instructor turned to the rest of the squad. “All right, who’s up next?”

  The next team moved forward. Rick, Cracker, and the others lagged about sixty yards behind so as not to interfere with whatever the point dog was smelling. “Point” meant in front. One of the dog teams’ primary jobs in country would be to walk point in front of all the other soldiers. This was one of the most dangerous jobs in Vietnam, because it meant that if there was a booby trap, you would come upon it first.

  Rick’s dejection turned his legs to lead. He’d let Cracker down and he’d let himself down. Cracker sniffed at him, as if trying to smell his feelings. “Good girl,” he whispered, and she felt happy because he said that, but also kind of sad because she could tell he felt sad.

  Seven

  THE REST OF THE DAY DRAGGED. ONE BY ONE THE other teams took their turns at point. Only Cody and Bruno performed perfectly. Rick had hoped to get another turn, but the squad barely had time to get through everybody. And he was exhausted anyway.

  After eight hours of humping the fields, the men settled in a grassy area as far away as possible from the swamps. Still, Cracker could smell the swampland everywhere. At first she’d liked the smell of decaying leaves, but now her nose felt full of it. She could hear mosquitoes buzzing everywhere. Every so often one of the men would clap at the air and cry out in triumph.

  “Get used to mosquitoes,” said the sarge. “You’re going to meet a lot of them in your future.”

  Rick took out the army-issue insect repellent that the men kept under a strap around their helmets.

  “What’re you doing, soldier?” said the sarge.

  Now what?

  The sarge said, “We’re in enemy territory. No bug juice.”

  “But, Sarge …,” said Rick. He felt that righteous indignation rise inside himself.

  “Charlie can smell it. Charlie can smell almost as good as your dog. Charlie is quieter than a cat. Charlie is more audacious than a monkey. Charlie will smell that bug juice in half a second if you use it.”

  Rick wondered vaguely what “audacious” meant. “Charlie” was what soldiers in country called the Vietcong. It was short for “Victor Charles.” In the army every letter of the alphabet had a word assigned to it, so radio operators could make sure no mistakes were made while they talked to one another. “A” was “alpha,” “B” was “bravo,” “C” was “Charles,” or “Charlie,” and so on.

  “Then what’s the point of giving it to us?” Rick asked.

  “Are you mouthing off, soldier?”

  Rick could see that U-Haul was about to explode. “No, Sergeant, I’m trying to learn,” Rick said. “I appreciate your superior knowledge on all matters, Sergeant.” Tact and diplomacy, dammit.

  “That’s the right attitude, mister. Malaria’s a problem over there. For the information of you know-nothings, malaria is carried by mosquitoes. You can use bug juice around camp but not out in the forward areas.”

  Rick wanted to ask, Why wear us down before we even get to Vietnam? He considered sneaking bug juice on his face. But if he got caught, he might even get written up again. He squished a mosquito on his arm, saw the blood gush out of it.

  He tried not to think about it. Instead, he stuck his fingers into Cracker’s coat and felt her for ticks. Then he ran his fingers backward through her hair, then forward. Then he brushed her hair. Cracker had already shed her inner coat. German shepherds had two coats, but the inner one, which was mostly down, shed every summer or in hot weather. Cracker’s eyes shone as Rick brushed her.

  She relaxed as his fingers moved back and forth. Good Rick. Good boy. When Rick tried to stop brushing her, she pawed him for more. She liked his sweaty smell. She liked the way he brushed her. She liked the food he gave her. She liked being outside. She pushed up close to him. She liked being outside near his smell with him
brushing her.

  Tristie walked over to sniff at her. They touched noses, and then Tristie returned to Twenty-Twenty.

  As he brushed Cracker, Rick calculated. Several of the handlers had made multiple mistakes today. He’d made only one—not that he cared about a trophy or anything. He figured the time would come when even Bruno and Cody would make a mistake while Rick and Cracker would not. He lit a cigarette from the one he was already smoking. For some reason, he always savored the first drag of a cigarette the most. Theoretically, if you couldn’t use bug juice, you couldn’t smoke a cigarette, but since U-Haul chain-smoked a combination of cigars and cigarettes, that rule went down the drain.

  The men began opening their C rations. Rick blew smoke into the air as he listened to some guys talk about the Atlanta Braves and the Falcons. He saw Cody eyeing everybody’s C rats, probably thinking up deals to strike. Rick had pulled ham ’n’ chokers, which everybody except Cody agreed was the worst C rat available. The “chokers” were lima beans—that is, the nastiest vegetable Mother Nature had ever invented. Cody said, “Trade you for my meatballs?”

  Rick jumped at it. “Deal!” Spaghetti and meatballs was considered one of the primest of the prime C rations. Even with just the meatballs, Rick felt like he’d struck gold.

  Rick took out the empty can that they all carried as a stove to heat their meals. You placed Trioxin heat tabs inside and poked holes in the bottom to keep fumes from building up inside the can. The army issued these heat tabs, but supposedly, soldiers in country used C-4 explosive to heat their food. C-4 exploded only with heat and impact. A match caused the C-4 to heat up like the devil himself was cooking your food. Rick and some guys had tried it once during advanced infantry training. It was like putty, and you shaped it into a ball the size of a quarter, with a little point on top. Cooked your C rats in thirty seconds flat. Heated your coffee instantaneously.

  Sarge was enjoying a cigar, alternately puffing on it and smiling at it. Cody leaned toward Rick. “U-Haul almost wigged big-time when you questioned him about the bug juice. You better lie low.”

  “Yeah,” Rick said softly. “Thanks.”

  Rick took out the P-38 can opener he’d attached to his dog-tag chain to open C rations. Cody was saying to someone, “I’ll trade you four ciggies for your fruit salad.” Cody was the only man in the squad who didn’t smoke.

  Rick opened Cracker’s food first. He dumped it into his steel pot the way Sarge had told them to do. She gobbled the food, and then he poured in water from one of her canteens. Cracker waited for more food.

  Rick said, “No, girl. We travel light in the field. One meal a day.” She whimpered but lapped up some water before laying her head down, eyes turned sadly toward Rick. Aw, for crying out loud.

  “Hey, Sarge?” Rick wheedled. “Cracker’s twice as big as some of the dogs. Shouldn’t she get more food?”

  “One can per dog in the field,” the sergeant said. “How many times do I have to tell you guys?”

  Rick and Twenty-Twenty met eyes, and Twenty-Twenty slipped a bit of Tristie’s food to Cracker. Cracker swallowed it and felt it slide unchewed down her throat. She laid her paw over Rick’s ankle as he ate his own dinner, but just because she liked her paw there, not to ask him for anything. She never begged him while he was eating. He hated that more than anything. Willie had always handed her treats while he ate. Willie had always done whatever she wanted. A brief anxiety washed over her at the thought of Willie. But life was good here, too.

  The sun sank over the forest as the men ate and smoked. One of the guys who apparently thought he was going to kiss butt to a promotion squatted down near U-Haul. “We’re lucky to have your wisdom and experience, Sergeant. So what’s it like in Nam?” the guy asked.

  Sarge belched and cleared his throat before speaking. “Wetter than anything you’ve ever experienced,” he said. “Or so dry your tongue feels like paper, depending on the season. And hot, no matter what the season. When it rains, it rains for weeks. We had one guy drown on a hilltop that flooded during a monsoon rain. None of the birds could get to him because of the weather.” “Birds” were helicopters. “They found his body later on top of a dry hill. The doc said he’d drowned.”

  Rick contemplated that. Personally, he would have abandoned his gear and swam to safety.

  “Why didn’t he swim?” someone asked.

  “To where?” the sarge asked simply. “The whole countryside was flooded. And the guy was star of his swim team in high school.”

  Rick contemplated that.

  “Does the enemy use dogs?” another soldier asked.

  “Nah, but they put a bounty on both our dogs and our handlers. The rumor is that they pay anywhere from one thousand to twenty thousand U.S. dollars to anyone who brings them a dog’s tattooed ear.”

  Rick wondered whether that was true. One thousand or twenty, it was a lot of money for a dog’s ear.

  Rick lay on his back in the grass. Cracker stretched on her back and kicked her legs in the air. The shadows had grown long. The forest was peaceful.

  Twenty-Twenty was rolling his eyes around. One thing Rick had learned was that every man had a quirk, just as every dog did. Twenty-Twenty did weird eye exercises, Cody was always grinning, Jonesie walked in his sleep, and Petrocelli said “um” every other word. Rick didn’t know what his own quirk was. His righteous indignation? That wasn’t a quirk. Maybe generalists didn’t have quirks. “For all intensive purposes, I’m getting sleepy,” Twenty-Twenty said.

  Twenty-Twenty continued moving his eyes around and up and down, which he did every night. He claimed it was some kind of ancient Chinese method of keeping your eyes strong, but he looked like a nutcase. Rick called out, “Hey, man, you look like a nutcase!”

  Twenty-Twenty looked at him seriously. “For all intensive purposes, this is the best way to keep your eyes strong.”

  That was too much for Cody, who started laughing. “That doesn’t even make sense!” he said.

  Twenty-Twenty just wrinkled his brow. Rick chuckled. But Twenty-Twenty just lay back, took off his glasses, and laid his palms over his eyes to meditate or something. Tristie lay with her head on his stomach. Rick saw several of the dogs like that, and before long Cracker came over and set her head on his own belly.

  Rick lit the last of the four cigarettes that had come with his C rations. The moon was full. Under the moonlight Cody was winding his watch. It was a special gold watch his grandfather had given him. Rick didn’t own anything of value, but if he had, he certainly wouldn’t have brought it here. But Cody had been close to his grandfather and loved his watch.

  Rick tried to imagine a man drowning on a hilltop alone underneath the same peaceful moon now lighting up the sky. He could picture the whole scenario, but only as a movie. He couldn’t imagine it really happening. “Hey, Sarge?” he said. “That really a true story about the guy drowning on a hilltop?”

  U-Haul just laughed at him. “You got a lot to learn about whipping the world, Lanski. A whole lot.”

  Eight

  ONCE IT GOT FUN, TRAINING PASSED QUICKLY. One rainy day during formation, Cracker could feel uncertainty in the air. Her paws sank into the mud. Usually, Rick didn’t make her stand out in such hard rain for so long. She kept looking up at him waiting for him to take her away, but he didn’t move. He seemed funny today, not sad exactly and not scared. More like uncertain, like he didn’t know what was going to happen next. And he always knew what was going to happen. What happened tomorrow was just about exactly the same thing that had happened the day before. So what was there to be uncertain about? She looked up at him again. She was so wet, it was hard to see.

  It was the last day of class, and the twenty-four men of the 67th Infantry Platoon (Scout Dog) stood at attention with their dogs. Rain poured. Rick saw Sarge holding a couple of cheap trophies in his hands and felt a twinge of pride and anticipation. The last weeks of training had gone perfectly, as far as Rick was concerned. He and Cracker had not made a single
error.

  “This rain is nothing,” said the sergeant to the men. “Get used to it.” He said “This is nothing” whenever any hardship occurred. He held up the trophies, which were about the size of cans of beer. “Willis, trophy for first place. Butler, second.” Cody and Twenty-Twenty stepped forward to get their trophies as Rick felt his face grow hot. U-Haul looked at him. “Not a bad job …, Hanski.” So that was going to be Rick’s only trophy: getting his name pronounced correctly, for once.

  U-Haul didn’t talk long. The rain drenched his face and clothes as he addressed the platoon. Rick had never seen him so sober. The most memorable line of the day was some graffiti U-Haul quoted: “Join the army, meet interesting people, then kill ’em.” He said, “That’s what it all comes down to, men. See you in a month.”

  What did a trophy mean? Rick could’ve made one in his dad’s tool shop that looked twice as good as the ones Cody and Twenty-Twenty got. But he felt his confidence wane—he’d really wanted one of those trophies. His confidence returned as he packed his bag for home leave and thought of Cracker the whole time. His new closeness to Cracker made him feel that it was still possible to whip the world. It was just that maybe doing so was going to be a lot harder than he’d thought. How much harder was the important issue. He looked up and saw Cody standing beside him.

  “We’re gonna make it back safe,” Cody said. “You got a great dog.”

  “Get out of my head, you mind-readin’ freak.”

  Cody laughed. “You don’t need to be a freak to read your simple mind.” Then he added seriously, “We’re gonna make it, I know it.”

  Cody really was the most optimistic guy in the world. Rick pushed himself up and stuck out his hand. The two men shook. Cody started to walk away, and Rick called out, “Cody!”