Better Times Than These (27 page)

From this perspective, the scene of battle was vastly different from what it was to the men on the ground. An enormous cloud of black smoke drifted over the tops of the tallest trees, and below this, huge chunks of jungle had been blown open and were still smoldering. From other spots beneath the trees, wisps of white smoke drifted skyward, indicating the various points of contact. Several single-engine spotter planes swooped up and down, occasionally tossing out canisters of red or green smoke which streamed downward and mixed with the rest into an incongruous Technicolor melange above the jungle.

Not being able to experience the sounds, it was impossible from this height to know the fury of the battle below, except through the intermittent yammering over the radio. What
was
obvious, Patch saw, was that his ball-point-pen formation had now assumed the shape of a large horseshoe. More ominously, from the outline of the horseshoe it was apparent that what they had encountered was a full-fledged line of resistance and not just some idle skirmishers. The tactical problem was imposing. How deep, for instance, did the line of resistance go? How wide was it? How well fortified? Artillery and the Air Force could do only so much—after all, they had been blasting this place night and day for the past few weeks, and look what good it had done. Somebody was alive and kicking down there.

Still, Patch thought, it really wasn’t much different from the situation with the Plains Indians a hundred years before. What counted here was punishment, the same as it had taken incredible punishment to drive the Plains Indians back to their reservations. The secret was not to get dry-gulched in the process.

Crump’s squad was the first to reach the bunkers where the North Vietnamese had been. The last twenty-five yards had been thoroughly cleared of underbrush, and some of the trees had even been chopped down and used in the fortifications. Exactly who had first started the shooting was not certain, but it was plain to everyone that if they had advanced into this cleared space the casualties would have been far greater than they already were. As it was, three men, including Lieutenant Donovan, had been killed and seven wounded, and one man in the Weapons Platoon had broken his wrist running into a tree during the confusion.

The North Vietnamese bunkers stretched in a zigzag line in both directions far into the jungle. They were remarkably elaborate affairs, dug out of reddish clay and mud and packed down on top with logs and branches. Some of them emptied into man-sized tunnels, and here and there was a piece of crude furniture for sitting or eating. Two bodies were found, both in the same bunker, evidently victims of a lucky shot from a blooker-gun grenade. There was also evidence that others had been hurt or killed. Blood stained the ground in several places, and there were markings in the bare earth suggesting that men had been dragged away.

The two bodies were pulled from the bunker and laid on the soft earth. Most of the company had reached the bunker line by now, and a crowd gathered to look at them. Both were torn up rather badly from their chests upward, and someone volunteered that because of the lack of bleeding they had probably died instantly. Neither appeared to be over twenty years old, and they were scrawny and emaciated. But in the green-brown uniforms of North Vietnamese regulars they seemed far more dangerous, even in death, than the sorry spectacle of the dead VC the men had seen after the village attack.

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

T
he 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 on 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.