magazines. To the untrained eye he looked like all the other Marines, but he was one of two Navy hospital corpsmen assigned to 1st Platoon. As prime targets for snipers the corpsmen made a special effort to blend in, carrying their medical supplies in old demolition bags and occasionally trading their .45s for M16s, but the trip through any village, no matter how remote, would usually burst their bubble of invisibility when children would point and yell “bac-si,” the Vietnamese word for doctor. If a five-year-old could pick you out, how difficult could it be for a trained eye behind a rifle?
Doc Garver, just under six feet tall, had always been thin, but the diet of C rations combined with long hours and little sleep had pared his weight to less than 150. His fair skin seemed incapable of tanning, and ruptured sun blisters on his forearms gave him the appearance of a pox sufferer.
“Doc, the lieutenant says the command post is here. Doc Brede can stay with 1st Squad.”
Bronsky moved over near the lieutenant, and Doc Garver went to the shadows by the edge of the clearing. CPs tended to get crowded, and crowds tended to draw fire. Doc Garver’s survival strategy was to be where the bullets weren’t. He might have to go there after their arrival, but it was always wise to avoid the initial salvo.
Every few seconds a Marine came out of the jungle and crossed the stream. Each carried a bandolier of ammunition for the M60s, and some carried two hundred rounds, the linked cartridges strapping their chests like those on Mexican banditos in old westerns. One Marine hacked a branch from a tree with his machete and used it to haul new arrivals up the mucky incline. Lieutenant Diehl signaled one to wait, directing the others to break off to the left side of the clearing. The waiting man was a stocky lance corporal with a barrel chest. His face and arms were deep bronze, and his high cheekbones and broad nose framed piercingly clear eyes that could fix a man with a stare the way a mountain lion looked at its next meal. His strong chin supported a mouth often bordering on the edge of an intolerant sneer that seemed to warn people to choose their words wisely. His voice belied his forbidding countenance. The prepossessing lilt came out soft as velvet, but like his Apache forebears he was thrifty with words, and no one in the platoon could ever remember hearing him laugh.
Born into a warrior clan in the remote Cibecue community on the White Mountain Reservation in Arizona, his warrior ethic had led him to another warrior clan—the U.S. Marines. He had no interest in saving the Vietnamese from themselves or defeating communism or propping up the domino theory. His enlistment was the fulfillment of an ancient mandate. It was simply a matter of metallurgy: he was forging an Apache manhood, and the crucible was Vietnam.
“Chief. Go help Franklin set charges on those trees, and go easy on the C-4. I just want them down, not vaporized.”
The Chief looked out into the clearing.
“You hear me, Chief?”
“Yes, General,” the Chief said, lifting the demo bag and pulling the strap over his helmet.
“I’m not a damned general, Chief.”
The Chief started into the clearing. “And I’m not a chief, sir.”
Bronsky stifled a laugh but couldn’t suppress a smile. “I guess he’s the sensitive type, too, sir.”
The lieutenant checked his watch, a black-faced chronograph he’d picked up at the PX in Da Nang. “Tell him that burning the company shitters for a week could put a nice crust on that sensitivity.”
“Sir, pfcs don’t tell anybody anything; it’s our only perk. And Marines who want to stay healthy don’t tell the Chief anything he don’t wanna hear. I think the only reason he joined the Crotch and came to Vietnam is because he didn’t get the chance to kill cowboys in the Old West.” Bronsky watched the Chief kneel next to Franklin with a coil of det cord in one hand and a long, wide-bladed knife in the other that he used to cleave low branches. “Once when he was feeling talkative, he told me that if I ever saw him with paint on his face, I should run.”
It was the lieutenant’s turn to smile.
“He was serious, sir. That Indian is fuckin’ crazy.”
Sergeant Blackwell sent the last Marine who emerged from the jungle to a position on the left and returned to the lieutenant. “We expect to be here long, sir?”
Diehl glanced at his watch again. “We’ll be gone in less than ten minutes. Better get the 3rd Squad leader up here quick.”
The sergeant checked his own watch, mentally marking the spot where the minute hand would be when they were moving again. “Strader won’t like this.”
“That’s the great thing about the system we have in the Corps. He doesn’t have to like what I say, but he damned well has to do it.”
Along the left side of the LZ, 3rd Squad were shedding their heavy equipment. Bulky flak jackets with their layered fiberglass plates lay open so the air could dry sweat-soaked linings. Marines stripped to the waist moved in and out of the heavy brush. Cpl. Raymond Strader, the squad leader, moved among them. His pack was off, but he wore his flak jacket and helmet. A thirty-day countdown calendar drawn on one side of his camouflage helmet cover had most of the days scratched out. On the other side was a likeness of a miniature helmet dangling a pair of jungle boots that trod on the words “short timer.”
“Reach, how long you think we’ll be here?” one of 3rd Squad asked as he passed. Some of the platoon were given monikers that suited their jobs, personalities, skills, or even physical characteristics. Corporal Strader was “Reach” because, as the designated platoon sniper, he could reach out and touch the enemy wherever he could see them. Instead of the M16 that had been newly issued to the Marines in March, Strader still carried the old M14, chambered for the larger 7.62-mm NATO round. It was heavier, but he preferred the feel of a warm wooden stock to the hollow plastic of the M16, and unlike the 16, the 14 was reliable.
“Don’t get comfortable,” he answered. “Knowing the LT, we’ll be saddled up and moving before the supply chopper lifts off.”
One of the Marines had his pants down around his ankles while he pissed into the tangled root system of a huge strangler fig that completely obscured its host tree. “Hey, Reach. How short are you now?”
“Shorter than what you have in your hand, Tanner, and nothing’s shorter than that.”
“You wish you packed my gear.”
Strader pointed to the ground where the fig and the tree were locked in a struggle. “I’ll be back in the world before the piss on your boots dries.”
Strader was universally envied in the platoon. Not because of his experience or the responsibility he shouldered as a squad leader, but because he was coming to the end of his tour of duty. He was what everyone longed to be; he was short.
A Marine holding his M16 over his shoulder by the barrel like a baseball bat pushed through the brush. “Reach. Blackwell is looking for you.”
“I’m not hard to find, Burke. I’m right here in Vietnam.”
Burke turned back the way he came. “I think the lieutenant wants you most ricky-tick.”
Sergeant Blackwell shoved through the foliage from the clearing side, letting midmorning sunlight in to wash over the men of 3rd Squad. “Strader, Lieutenant Diehl wants you at the CP back where we crossed the creek.”
“I’m
