Pulled out of the bunker also were two slightly damaged Russian-made AK-47 automatic rifles, the first Bravo Company had seen, although they had heard stories enough about this weapon for it to be almost legendary. There was some grumbling disappointment that the rifles were not the older SKS semiautomatic variety, which, because they were not full-automatic, could be taken back to the States as souvenirs or traded to the Air Force for other loot.
Sporadic firing continued from the far right where Charlie Company was positioned, but it appeared the North Vietnamese had pulled out of here lock, stock and barrel. Patch’s new instructions were to hole up here for the night, and Bravo Company began combing the bunkers like derelicts, taking anything they might be able to use or trade at a later time. Only Crump remained aloof from this, sitting quietly atop a mound of dirt, cradling his blooker and wondering how the banana-cat was faring with the men from Engineers company.
Kahn made his way down the line of bunkers, followed by Trunk, Bateson and Hepplewhite, the Company Clerk, stopping occasionally to check dispositions and see that a proper perimeter had been set up. When he arrived at Third Platoon’s position, Sergeant Dreyfuss rose from the ground, where he had been eating a C-ration tin of peaches. He drained the delicious nectar from the can, which immediately made him thirsty again. Their canteens were dry already. Kahn asked about Donovan.
“He’s over there, sir,” Dreyfuss said, nodding toward a bamboo thicket. “Lieutenant Sharkey came over here a few minutes ago. He’s there now.”
They walked down the slope of the bunkers and shoved their way through the brush toward Donovan’s body. Someone had covered it with a poncho. Two men, haggard and bleary-eyed, sat on a log next to the corpse. One of them stared off into the jungle, and neither made a move to rise or acknowledge Kahn’s presence, and no one in the party suggested that they should. Sharkey was standing five or six feet away in the clearing, his eyes fixed on the body. His face was pale, and he was biting his upper lip with his lower teeth, which had not been damaged in the boxing match.
“Any sign of that stretcher and stuff?” Dreyfuss asked. One of the two enlisted men on the log shook his head.
“I guess he never knew what hit him, sir,” Dreyfuss said. “I sent back for the stretcher. It ought to have been here by now. We have to send back for some water, too—we’re nearly dry,” he said awkwardly.
Trunk had been watching the other man seated on the log. Finally he squatted down in front of him.
“Hey, Miter,” Trunk said softly, “you all right?” Spudhead did not look up.
“Hey, Miter,” Trunk said. He tugged at Spudhead’s fatigue collar. “I’m talking to you.”
Slowly, Spudhead raised his grimy face and looked at Trunk.
“I said, are you all right?”
Spudhead looked drained and bewildered.
“The lieutenant . . .” he mumbled. “He was the only officer I . . . I . . . and now . . . he’s . . . dead.” He seemed on the verge of tears.
“Okay, let’s go,” Kahn said. Trunk rose up, and Sergeant Dreyfuss turned to go.
“I’m sorry, Shark,” Kahn said, but Sharkey did not say anything, and he remained there long after Kahn had gone.
DiGeorgio had been struggling back through the jungle for half an hour with instructions to bring back some water. When at last he emerged into the sunlight, it was like walking out of a darkened room. The only good thing was that because of the trails they had hacked out earlier, it had been easier than going in. DiGeorgio was looking for the water point, but what he saw in front of him startled him.
Two large tents had been erected at the edge of the jungle. Nearby, a helicopter with a large red cross painted on its side waited silently, its blades drooping like fronds of a wilted plant. Several mud-splattered tanks and half a dozen personnel carriers baked in the late-afternoon sun. Beyond the helicopter, several hundred men in combat dress sat on the grass or milled around. All of this looked as if it had been here for weeks.
In one of the tents, men were working feverishly over other men lying on tables. Outside this tent were perhaps a dozen other men, most of them sitting or lying on stretchers, shading their eyes from the sun. Some were smoking cigarettes. All had white gauze compresses on some part of their bodies, and some had more than one gauze compress. Some of the compresses were soaked with bright red blood. DiGeorgio had to walk by them to find the water point. A few men moaned audibly, but most simply stared blankly. Some carried on conversations with others. Stretcher bearers periodically moved someone from the tent and loaded him aboard the helicopter. Medics moved here and there among the men outside the tent, methodically examining them and attaching paper tags to their fatigue blouses, not unlike the paper sales tags on large appliances.
The water point was a collection of dozens of fifteen-gallon jerry cans, some standing and some lying on the ground. Distribution of the water was apparently being administered by a specialist fourth class who walked among the cans with a clipboard. When DiGeorgio attempted to take one of them, the specialist fourth class addressed him in a tone that sounded very much like the bark of a large dog.
“Hey, soldier, whatdaya think yer doin’?” he demanded.
“Getting some fucking water—what’s it look like I’m doing?” DiGeorgio retorted.
“Unh-uh—not till you check in with me. This water is strictly rationed,” the man declared authoritatively. “Who you with?”
“Bravo Company, Second Platoon,” DiGeorgio said, glaring fiercely. He suddenly felt like slugging the specialist fourth class, right in his big, fat gut. He hadn’t slugged anybody in years, because he was so small, and secondly, because despite all his bold talk he was really a coward; except now he didn’t feel like a coward anymore—at least, not back here by the aid station.
“Lemme see here a minute—Bravo Company, you said?” The man ran his finger down the clipboard.
“Damn straight that’s what I said,” DiGeorgio spat, stepping close to the man’s face. “You know, Bravo Company—the one that’s been doing the fucking fighting while you route-step bastards sit on the water so’s we all die of thirst.”
The specialist fourth class in charge of water did not answer but continued to check his clipboard while DiGeorgio stood in front of him, hands on his hips.
I will punch him, I think, DiGeorgio thought.
He was about ready to throw the punch when the man saved himself. “Okay, Bravo Company, only got four cans so far—you’re allowed eight. How many you taking?—One, right?”
“Screw you, Jack,” DiGeorgio said. He seized two of the huge cans by their handles and lurched back toward the jungle, half dragging them behind him.
“Okay, okay, wiseass,” the specialist fourth class called out, “but you get tired, don’t you go leaving one of them cans behind—there’s other people need water bad as you.”
DiGeorgio paid him no attention. He smiled a dark, wolfish grin as he struggled past the hospital tent where the wounded men were. A few of them looked up at him, because he was talking to himself and cursing loudly. He felt the new, savage abandon that all of them felt now. After all, what else could happen? The fact that he had been prepared to punch the man at the water point—even though he did not actually do it—was cause for a moment of inward celebration. In his own mind it was an act at least as bold as his participation in the firefight.
21
The counterattack against Bravo and Alpha companies came just about dusk and took them completely by surprise. As such things go, it wasn’t much of a counterattack, insofar as the North Vietnamese did not attempt to retake their lost positions, but contented themselves with directing a murderous fire from the jungle on the American soldiers, most of whom were sitting or standing or walking around on the bunkers when it began.
DiGeorgio, still seething over the water-can dispute at the aid station, had finally arrived back at the Company with the jerry cans. Several thirsty men had clustered around as he opened the top o
n one can, and other men with ready canteen cups were on their way over. The first burst of fire stitched a line of bullets into the legs of two of these men, who went down hollering, and then smacked a neat row of holes into the opened can, which did not budge but gently began to spill its contents onto the soft red earth, creating the effect of some bizarre fountain in an Art Nouveau display.
DiGeorgio leaped back in horror. His hand had been on the lid when the bullets hit. He tumbled backward down the far side of the bunkers, sliding and groveling to the bottom, frantically trying to unsling his rifle, which had become entangled around his shoulder.
People were shouting and scrambling pell-mell for a safe spot when the mortars began bursting in the trees above them. Everything was roaring and flashing in the dim remaining light. Dirt and debris flew all around them, and the air was filled with a thick, whooshing sound as though someone were swinging a large fiery broom around and around above their heads. The trees and earth shook. The jungle jumped and trembled as though it had gone mad with fright.
Kahn was on the Artillery net, yelling into the radio handset. “They’re using rockets,” he screamed. Earlier he had radioed back preset firing coordinates, and while he wasn’t sure they were correct for what was going on now, it was clearly the place to start. At the other end of the line, a calm voice reassured him that fire would be on the way shortly. As the explosions from the rockets burst around them, Kahn lay as flat as he could possibly get against the soft earth. All his instincts told him to stay put and not move. Every fiber of his brain fought against his raising himself even a fraction of an inch or turning his head or even breathing heavily. It was as though he had become a part of the earth he was lying in.
A few feet away, Sergeant Trunk was burrowed into a little mound of dirt, facing in the opposite direction. Kahn heard him yelling something, but could not hear what it was for all the racket and confusion. The back of Trunk’s neck convulsed with each yell, and Kahn finally craned toward him to find out what he was saying. Suddenly, Trunk turned and shouted in Kahn’s face, “They ain’t firing, Lieutenant—we gotta return fire!” They stared at each other for a moment; then Trunk was on his hands and knees crawling off down the line toward the other men, still screaming through the boiling, smoking gloom.
Oh, Lord, Kahn pleaded. Oh, please God.
He was not a religious man. They hadn’t made him go to Temple after he was sixteen. And he had done bad things in his life. Some of them came to him now. Why should God help him? What had he done for God? Not a goddamn thing . . .
A huge explosion cracked behind him, and there was a fierce whirring sound in the air. Something hot stung the back of Kahn’s hand, and he recoiled from it. A thin stream of blood ran down his fingers, dripping into the dirt.
Oh, God, he thought again. I’m hit! And suddenly his mind was filled with the fat, chortling face of the helicopter pilot back at Bragg who had told them of the River Blindness. Ha, ha, very funny. Go down to the river and get your eyes shot out. His face felt numb. He pinched his cheeks. They were numb. Oh, God, I have got to do something! A kind of fear-anger swept over him, and he raised himself up on his knees. Oh, God, he thought, here goes.
“Are we going to take this?” Kahn bellowed.
Bateson, the radio operator, who was huddled beside him, looked up in astonishment. Kahn’s eyes were as wild as those of a panicked racehorse. “Get up and return fire,” he roared. He got to his feet in a half-crouch, bent over at the waist, still yelling at the top of his lungs, and took off down the line in the opposite way from the direction Trunk had gone. He came to a pile of white-faced men who had pressed themselves into the ground about ten yards away.
“Off your asses!” Kahn bellowed. “Get up there! Return fire!” He seized one of the men by the back of his flak jacket and pulled him upright. It was Carruthers, the giant black private. Bullets cracked around them. A look of utter horror crossed Carruthers’ face and he struggled to press himself back into the dirt.
“Get up there, I said!” Kahn raged. He kneed Carruthers in the buttocks and jerked him up again and screamed in his face, “Return fire, you sorry bastard!” The bullets above their heads continued to whizz and thunk into tree trunks. Carruthers’ eyes bugged out, but he slowly began to crawl to the top of the bunker. The two other men were watching with strained faces. Kahn glared ferociously at them and they too began to crawl up. Carruthers peeked over the top of the earth pile and stuck his rifle out and fired a burst into the jungle. The others did the same as Kahn stood, bent over, watching them. When he was satisfied, he took off again, followed by Bateson with the radio, who was crawling on his hands and knees. Why am I here? Kahn thought. Oh, God, why am I here?
Ten yards farther down he came across a lone dead man, shot through the throat. The dead man’s legs and buttocks were on top of the bunker, but his trunk and widespread arms lay on Kahn’s side of it. A large pool of blood had drained from the wound and settled at the bottom of the slope. Kahn grabbed the dead man’s arm and yanked him down out of the field of fire, and he rolled face down into the pool of his own blood. Kahn thought he recognized him as Spate, one of those involved in the rock fight on the beach, whose brother had been killed by a grenade in the Marines.
Oh, God, why am I here?
A searing flash and a gigantic cracking blast ahead in the jungle announced the arrival of the artillery.
“That’s it,” he yelled to Bateson. “Put me on!”
Kahn grabbed the handset. “Okay, okay, no corrections, shoot again.”
Seconds later, there were more thunderous explosions. The jungle lit up like a neon light. “Keep it coming,” he shrieked into the radio. The rounds continued in salvos of three, at intervals of about forty-five seconds. Finally Kahn pressed the transmit bar again. “Okay, hold it up,” he panted. A final salvo burst into the twilight. For a few moments, uncanny silence unfolded over the Boo Hoo Forest; then the first painful moans and some low cursing rose into the darkness.
At the same time Kahn’s company was being counterattacked by the North Vietnamese, Holden, Major Dunn and Captain Sonnebend, the new Brigade Public Information Officer, were sitting down to chow in the tiny officers’ mess tent at Firebase Meathead. They had driven down from Monkey Mountain that afternoon, Dunn to check his communications setup and Holden to escort Sonnebend closer to the action—a suggestion, if it could be called that, of General Butterworth’s.
Holden had brought Sonnebend in to introduce him to the general that morning, and after a brief talk, the general had declared that if Sonnebend was to be Brigade PIO, he ought to see some of the countryside.
“There’s a hell of an operation going on out there now—might be the biggest of the war,” the general had said. Then he had turned to Holden: “Frank, it might be a good idea if you went along too and introduced the captain around.” It seemed to Holden that the general was very cavalier about getting people into dangerous situations.
Sonnebend had been talking continuously since their arrival at Firebase Meathead, giving his theory of how the war should be fought, while Holden and Dunn sat silently across the table, chewing their food.
Holden didn’t like Sonnebend. The impression he formed during the ten-mile ride down from Monkey Mountain was that the new captain was fatuous, and thoroughly out of place in the military.
As their jeep bounded down the rutted jungle road, Sonnebend had been a nervous wreck. Once, when they slowed behind a deuce-and-a-half full of soldiers, Sonnebend had extended his hand, palm up, beneath Holden’s chin.
“Say, Holden, did you ever stick a pencil point in your hand?”
Holden looked and saw nothing. “Where is it, Captain?”
“There, just under the thumb,” Sonnebend said. “I tried to get most of it out, but I’ve heard you can get lead poisoning from pencils if you aren’t careful.”
Holden took a closer look. He couldn’t tell if the black dot was actually a piece of pencil point in the skin or just skin
made black when it had gone in.
“I wouldn’t worry about it, Captain,” he said politely. “It’ll probably work its way out by itself in a day or so. Doesn’t hurt, does it?”
Sonnebend seemed disappointed. “No, it doesn’t hurt, but I’m worried about the lead poisoning.”
Ahead, a truck growled in the mud.
“There are a lot of things you can get lead poisoning from around here, Captain, but I don’t think that’s one of them,” Holden said. He exchanged glances with Major Dunn, who was sitting in the front of the jeep.
“Why do you think we’ve stopped?” Sonnebend asked furtively. He had been staring down the road, which ran straight for a hundred yards or so, then dipped down and out of sight into a dark stretch of jungle. “You don’t think they’ve seen an ambush or anything down there . . .”
“Nothing to worry about, Captain,” Major Dunn said patiently. “I’ve been down this road before. We have a checkpoint at a little bridge just below that curve. All the fighting is way to the west of here.”
“Ah, yes,” Sonnebend said. “I was just wondering.” His face was covered with sweat, and there were dark stains under his armpits. Already the temperature was above 100 degrees. “I’m not feeling very well,” he said. “It must be the heat.”
The truckload of men ahead began to move again, and the driver put the jeep into gear. As they lurched forward, Captain Sonnebend resolutely fingered his holstered .45 and alternately looked at his palm. Holden leaned back in the low, uncomfortable canvas seat and closed his eyes. No wonder the Army is screwed up, he thought, with straphangers like this in charge of things. The hot sun baked through his closed eyelids, and his world became a swirl of black bugs moving against a brilliant yellow frame. Soon he indulged himself again and began thinking about Becky, and the pain returned, as it had many times each day, ever since her letter had arrived last week.