Chickenhawk Page 12

  This was not to be. It was decided by someone or other that we would stay out at Lima with the grunts.

  It was the second time we had done this. As with the last time, there was no warning. No one had sleeping gear, or even a decent selection of C rations.

  Half a battalion, thirty-two helicopters, landed at Lima. We brought a load of grunts with us, and they jumped off to join their fellows as soon as we landed. They formed a perimeter around this now valuable patch of Vietnam. Thirty-two hated helicopters and their crews sat in the middle of VC-land waiting for the mortars to come in. Why did we do this? Why park here, seven minutes from the safety of the Golf Course?

  “Well, Bob, if we had to get here early tomorrow morning, which we do, what would we do if the pass was socked in?” Farris answered. He stood next to his cargo deck sorting through his C-ration case, looking for something.

  “Fly over the pass and circle back,” I said.

  “Well, see, that’s a maybe.” Farris’s square jaw was set for a thoughtful reply. “If the weather isn’t too bad, we could; but if it was bad, we couldn’t. If we couldn‘t, we couldn’t be here until the fog burned off.” His brow wrinkled as he paused, pulling his graying crewcut forward. “That would delay the mission, and some people might die because of it.”

  He stopped talking. He had found a box of C rations that hadn’t been robbed of the coffee packet. He smiled like he was seeing an old friend. We were always short of coffee packets because we stole them from the boxes when we had to laager for any length of time. He looked at me. “So, do you understand now?”

  “Yes, I can understand that.” I shook my head as Farris offered me a can of cookies. “What I can’t understand, though, is why we don’t plan ahead. Why is it always a surprise that we’re going to have to stay out overnight?” Farris listened while he levered the folding P-38 can opener supplied with each meal around the can of cookies. He pried up the olive drab can lid to expose three big shortening cookies, which he again offered to me. I waved them away.

  “Well,” he answered. “That’s pretty complicated, why we don’t plan ahead.” He dumped the cookies out of the can, back into the C-ration case, and blew out the crumbs inside the tin. Then he bent down and scraped the can across the ground to collect some sand. When it was half full, he tapped the can on the cargo deck to level it. “Sometimes we know we’re going to stay overnight, and sometimes we don’t.” He bent down to the ground and stretched out his arm, can of sand in hand, underneath the belly of the Huey. For a few seconds all I could see of him was his legs as he pushed the can up to the fuel-drain valve. Soaking the sand with jet fuel, he pulled himself back up, carrying his fueled stove. “When we do know that we will be staying out like this before we leave for a mission, we plan for it.” He sat the stove on the ground. “When we don’t know we will be staying out like this, we don’t.” He reached back into the C-ration case and found another can of cookies. He opened the can with a few deft twists of the P-38. “This”—his brown eyes scanned the busy scene around him as if for the first time—“this is an example of one of those times we didn’t plan ahead.”

  “Isn’t it true that we could get mortared out here and lose most of our aircraft?” I was determined to get a logical explanation.

  He had punched some triangular holes just beneath the top edge of the tin-can stove. This would let the flame burn when he placed the can of water on top. When he judged that all was in order, he placed the stove and tin of water on the ground about ten feet from the Huey and lighted the fire. A dark-orange flame swirled out of the can, cooling to sooty smoke. He looked up from his hunkered-down position next to his creation and said, “Yes.” Grabbing the tin of water by the folded-back lid, he gently lowered it to the stove. He kept it slightly offset, to let the flame rush up one side of the tin. Small bubbles formed almost immediately on the side where the flame danced.

  “So how can they possibly justify our sitting out here like this?” I asked. “If we lost the ships out here, it would set us back for weeks or months. Being a little late in the morning, if it came to that, seems a lot less risky.”

  The water boiled. He picked the can off the flame, using a small piece of cardboard to protect his fingers from the hot lid. Placing the can carefully on the ground, he tore the top inch off the foil packet of instant coffee and dumped the granules into the water. The brown granules dissolved, and the smell wafted past my nose. “You’re right,” he said.

  “So, why are we here?” I asked, perplexed.

  Farris stirred in sugar and coffee creamer from their packets. Standing up, he held a piping-hot cup of coffee in his hands. He took a careful sip, breathing in sharply as he did. “I don’t know.” He smiled at me. Noticing the surprised look on my face, he said, “Here”—he held the coffee toward me—“Want a sip?”

  The sun was setting behind the pass. I left Farris sipping his coffee and went looking for Resler.

  I stopped back by my ship, where Leese was busy heating up his meal. Our case of C’s was nearly empty except for some single cans of scrambled eggs, utensil packs, two or three minipacks of cigarettes, and about fifteen P-38 can openers. No complete meals. Leese was hunkered down talking WWII next to the Huey with his buddy, the ex-Luftwaffe pilot, Gotler. I told him I’d see him later, and left.

  Gary had a much better selection of food—half a case of unopened, individual meals—so I had dinner with him.

  “Let’s see. We’ve got beef with noodles, beef stew, spaghetti with meatballs, boned chicken, or scrambled eggs,” Gary said as he sorted through the box on the cargo deck.

  “Boned chicken,” I said.

  “Right.”

  We sat eating as the last glow of light faded behind the pass. Mosquitoes began to gather, and Gary and I rolled our sleeves down to protect our arms. It was hot and muggy in the valley and it looked like rain.

  We talked of war. I told him about how Leese had got out of the LZ with twelve grunts on board. He told me about taking a round through his canopy. “One minute, I’m flying along okay, and then the next split second a hole appears in the Plexiglas, right in front of my face.” He stopped to point at his palm, as though it were the windshield. “No sound; it just suddenly appeared. For a second I didn’t know if this was the last thing I was seeing or what. I felt like an asshole, but I asked Nate to tell me if he saw any blood coming from my face or anything. When he said no, I knew I was still alive. I know one thing now, for sure: If I do get hit in the head, I’ll never know it. It’s very quick.”

  Nate’s face suddenly flashed into existence as he lit his pipe. He had walked up to us from somewhere out of the darkness. He squatted beside us and puffed loudly on his pipe. It smelled good. I made another mental note to quit smoking cigarettes and take up pipes. Without realizing it, I was smoking three and four packs a day.

  His pipe bowl hissed. His sharp, triangular face with its small, serious mouth glowed periodically as he puffed. When the glow died down, his features disappeared and only the top of his hat and shoulders showed in the cloudy moonlight.

  He continued to puff, not speaking. His presence had quieted Gary and me. His greater experience as a helicopter pilot somewhat intimidated us. An original member of the old 11th Air Assault, he had been shot down once.

  “Gary tell you about the round we took today?” he finally said.

  “Yeah, that was close,” I said.

  “Yes, it was. And they say things are going to get worse.”

  “They” again. “How do they know that?” I asked.

  “Wendall read it in a book. Street Without Joy.” Fucking Wendall again. “The guy who wrote it knows how the VC worked against the French. He says the Cav’ll get it good when we move farther north.” He puffed again, but the glow had burned down below the top crust of tobacco and there was only a hissing sound in the darkness.

  “How does he say we’ll get it?” Gary asked. I could hear him crumpling the trash from the dinner he had just finished. He
snapped each plastic utensil.

  “He says that when we get farther north, the landing zones are only big enough for one or two ships at a time. The Cong dig a hole in the LZ and cover it with brush. Then they leave one or two men hiding there during our prestrikes. They stay concealed in the hole during the strikes and get us as we come, with machine-gun fire up through the cockpit,” Nate said calmly.

  He seemed to have received special training somewhere that allowed him to live with such possibilities without a trace of fear. He even had a book to back his theories. He offered no solution to this trap, so I pushed for one.

  “So, what can we do about it? How can we avoid the trap?”

  “Nothing, except to keep your eyes out for a suspicious pile of brush in the LZ,” he said, as if it were just one more critical maneuver we rank amateurs had yet to learn, as though the old salts already watched for those suspicious piles of brush.

  I thought about the LZs, trying to remember the bushes. I remembered the confusion, the crackling door guns, the smell of gunpowder, the yells of the grunts, the radios going crazy. But bushes? Bushes were the furthest thing from my mind. How was I ever going to learn all this? What lesson would I miss that would cause my death?

  “There’s a lot to look for,” I said, hoping someone would tell me not to worry about the bushes, that there was a trick to it.

  “Yep,” agreed Resler, “remember that giant bow and arrow, Bob?”

  “Yes.” I lit a cigarette from my third pack. “Tell Nate about it.”

  “Bob was in another ship, but we both saw it. We were about ready to land when a gunship pilot said he saw something suspicious.”

  “Was this last month?” Nate interrupted.

  “Yes. When you told me about the bushes, I remembered that I didn’t see what this gunship pilot was talking about. He finally made it clear when he asked us if we saw a wire or string going across the LZ. When he said that, I saw something, too.” I could see Gary grinning as the moon shone briefly between some clouds. “The guy said, ‘Watch this,’ and dove toward the clearing while we circled. He fired a rocket into the middle of the clearing, and the blast broke the string. Suddenly a big pole, a sapling, shot across the clearing like a giant arrow. Whoosh! I couldn’t believe it!” Gary and I laughed, but Nate just puffed away on his pipe.

  He stood up suddenly, tapped the pipe on the heel of his hand, and stuffed it into his breast pocket, letting the bowl hang over the top. “Well, you guys are going to have to develop your observational abilities to match those of that gunship pilot if you want to make it through this war.” With this gem of friendly advice, calculated to increase our feelings of inadequacy, he turned to leave. “Good night.” He dissolved into the night to visit other friends.

  I was getting the trash from my meal together when Gary said, “You know, there’s something about that guy that makes me nervous. Do you think it’s the pipe? My father never trusted anyone who smoked a pipe.”

  It rained all night. Four of us lay crammed into the Huey trying to sleep. The sliding doors were open to give us ventilation. I lay on my stomach on the deck, using my rolled-up fatigue shirt as a pillow, facing out the open door. Leese lay on his back on the other side with his fatigue jacket covering his chest and face. Reacher tossed and turned on the nylon sling bench at our feet. The gunner was half sitting, half lying against the aft bulkhead in the pocket behind his machine gun. His head was bent hard forward, forcing his chin into his chest. One would think that Reacher had the best bed. Not so. The bench was designed to hold four sets of buttocks, not a reclining body. Aluminum bars that would normally pass between sitting people forced themselves against the bones of anyone unlucky enough to have to sleep there. There was no alternative. The rain kept us inside because we had no tents.

  I couldn’t sleep. The air was heavy and dank. It rained only enough to keep the air saturated, not cool. Occasionally a drop would splash against the deck next to my face and spawn smaller drops that landed on my nose. I moved closer to the open doorway, hoping that the rain would scare away the mosquitoes. The GI bug repellant I had borrowed from Reacher worked well for a few minutes, but faded quickly.

  “Hey, Reacher,” I whispered, “you awake?”

  “Uh-huh.” His dreary voice barely contained the anguish of the battle he was losing with the bench.

  “Let me have some more of your mosquito repellant.”

  “Uh-huh.” He sat up in the moonlight and handed me the plastic bottle from his breast pocket and lay back down with a sigh.

  There was barely enough for one application. I put a few drops on my palms and rubbed my hands together. I wiped my face. If I could keep them away from my face, I could get to sleep. I rubbed the excess on my hair and arms and looked over at Leese. He was lying under his shirt, asleep. In the partly cloudy moonlight, I checked my watch: 0200. I held the bottle near Reacher and said, “Here.” Silently he reached up and took it.

  When I put my head back down, I heard gunfire in the distance. It lasted only a minute and stopped. Probably a nervous grunt. Of course, it could be the beginning of an attack. I imagined how our position looked from above. The thirty-two dark shapes of our helicopters sat on the lighter-colored ground. On our perimeter, some grunts hid in their pup tents trying to sleep while others stared into the gray foliage watching. From my imaginary viewpoint, I couldn’t decide which would be worse, a wave of VC swarming in on us or a mortar attack.

  A mosquito bit me on the neck and brought me back to my damp aluminum deck and the drizzle. Goddamn their vicious little bug brains. I decided to think about hating mosquitoes. I hoped my thoughts would broadcast hatred and loathing enough to scare them away. I thought of torturing mosquitoes for a while, pulling out wings, squeezing heads, ripping off legs, and they stopped biting! They actually flew away. Had I made a great discovery? Would this stop our having to take malaria pills? Just hating mosquitoes intensely kept them away? But what would happen when I fell asleep? Would they come back? They would. Probably with reinforcements, too. The thing to do, I reasoned, was to call a meeting, a rally, and concentrate on hating mosquitoes, en masse, all at once. We could corral them into one big mass of frightened bugs. I saw myself reaching into that mass and grabbing a big handful and squeezing. Their screams of horror and cries for mercy only brought a smile to my face. I reached for another handful.

  I smelled coffee. Leese was up. I sat up to see where he was. Reacher was gone too. My watch said 0530. I blinked for a minute while my brain tried to join me in getting awake. My face itched. My hands itched. The mosquitoes had won.

  Leese squatted on the ground on his side of the Huey, boiling water. Beyond him, I could see the camp coming alive. Little orange fires flickered, and gray shapes moved among the dull-green helicopters in the morning haze.

  I rolled out on my side, walked around to join Leese, and in a few minutes I had my own coffee brewing. By 0700 we had all eaten, had coffee and cigarettes, pre-flighted the helicopters, and were ready to get the hell out of there. Three hours later, the crews were still hanging around their Hueys, sacking out if they could, or staring bleary-eyed at nothing, like me.

  Farris and Shaker called us together for a briefing.

  The action in Happy Valley had disappeared. The VC had slipped away in the night. The fifty-calibers had stopped firing, too. If they had been destroyed, there was no evidence on the ground according to the grunts. Action was postponed until another day.

  Leese and I, along with seven other ships, were to spend the day flying ass-and-trash (people and equipment) around the division. The rest of the gaggle were going home to dig more ditches and haul more stumps.

  It was all good news to me. I hoped the VC kept right on going to wherever they were going. And I would rather do anything than chop at stumps that were bigger across than a small crowd.

  It was almost dark enough to use the landing light when we finished resupplying the patrols. I hovered over the uneven ground of row three looking f
or an empty pad to park. I passed some spots marked for another company. They had begun painting unit numbers on pieces of PSP at the head of each slot. When I found an empty spot belonging to us, it was half a mile from our company area.

  Leese had called operations on the way in, and they sent a small truck to pick us up. We were the last ship in the company to get back, according to the driver.

  It was well past sunset, but a soft glow still drifted in the west. The cool light glistened off the mud-slick road. The four of us sat under the canvas covering in the back of the truck, watching the Hueys pass by as the truck la bored through the mud.

  When the truck stopped in front of operations, we got out and said good-bye to Reacher and the gunner as they took the two machine guns from our ship back to the armory tent. Leese and I went to the operations tent to drop off the dash-twelve page from the log book. Operations used that page to record the hours flown by the pilots, crew, and aircraft.

  “Welcome back, late ones,” said Captain Owens snidely. “We’re not late,” said Leese. “It took this long to finish.”

  “Just kidding, Ron,” Owens said without a smile.

  Leese handed the operations officer our dash-twelve. “I guess I’m just tired.”

  “We’ll both feel a lot better after some hot chow,” I said.

  “Ah,” Owens said. “The mess tent closed an hour ago.” He looked uneasy.

  “Did the cook save us something?” Leese asked.

  “Have to check with him,” said Owens lamely. He had forgotten to tell the cook to save some food for us, but he did not offer an apology. We glared. If only he would admit that he’d made a mistake, but he was learning to be defensive. In a unit of assault pilots, he and his partner, Mr. White, were the only two pilots not flying combat missions.

  The next morning, we got a particularly depressing sample of how poorly our intelligence-gathering system worked. Leese and I flew the last ship in a formation of sixteen slicks. The whole battalion was in the air, loaded with troops to surround a company of VC who, according to our intelligence branch, were on their way across Happy Valley to Bong Son Valley, on the coast.