Matterhorn (28 page)

“It gets goddamned hot in those stupid squad bays, and those kids loved it. I told the colonel that all Hanford needed was
an off-the-record chewing out. Instead they busted him. He’s got four kids. All he was doing was looking out for the troops.
You know what I told you that day you picked me up from the hospital.”

“Yes, I know. That you’d always take the side of the bush Marine.” She sighed. “Mikey, of course you’re right, but on that
very same day, in my father’s 1939 Chevy—I was driving because your leg still wouldn’t work from Okinawa—I told you that there
might be times that you could
be a little more circumspect. You can do a lot more good for your bush Marines as a colonel than as a captain.”

He took a quick God-help-me look at the ceiling. “Hanford did the right thing the wrong way. No harm, no foul.”

“The harm, Michael, was telling the colonel that if he ever got his fat ass out of his air-conditioned office he’d understand
what Hanford was trying to do.”

Mulvaney tightened his lips and folded his arms across the chest.

“Don’t you get stubborn with me, Michael Mulvaney. You were wrong to do it. Can’t you think of your own family, your own kids,
for once?”

“That’s unfair.”

She breathed, softened. “Yes, it was.” She reached out to touch his arm. “But Mikey, please, you’ve got to hold your temper.”
His temper had been an issue ever since he’d gotten back from the Pacific. She moved her hand back to the baby. “Do you want
to know what else Dorothy told me?”

“I can’t wait.”

“She is doing us a favor, Mikey, for God’s sake.”

Mulvaney sat down on the tarp-covered couch and looked up at her. “Go ahead. All ready on the firing line.”

She sat down beside him, scrunching sideways, her tight skirt riding up to show the welt of her stocking, something that always
distracted Mulvaney. She tugged, unsuccessfully, at the skirt with her right hand, trying to keep James on her shoulder with
her left and Mulvaney on task. She solved both problems by putting the baby and the apron across her lap. She pointed a finger
at him, eyes merry. “You are always horny.”

“So? I’m on the firing line anyway. Shoot me.”

“Later.” She smiled down at the baby and said in a quiet singsong, “Daddy wants to make you a little sister.” Then she looked
up at Mulvaney, her large green eyes suddenly serious. “Dorothy says that they all think you’re …” She hesitated.

“Go on.”

“That you’re some kind of a throwback to World War II. The word is that Mulvaney will never get out of the jungle, but he’s
good in a fight.”

“That’s bad?”

“Oh, Mikey, don’t be deliberately dense. You know as well as I do that it’s the planners that get ahead, not the fighters.”

“And the politicians.”

“Yes!” She stamped one black pump on the floor and rose to her feet. Putting the baby back on her shoulder, she walked quickly
into their bedroom where the crib was next to the bed, her two-inch heels punctuating every step.

He had watched the way her tight wool skirt beautifully molded her rear end.

The briefing room swam back into consciousness, a layer above the memory of his home and his wife. God, how he missed her
now. He saw everyone waiting for him to say something.

He knew Blakely was right. With promising reports coming in from Bravo Company, it would look foolish not to follow through.
“But where in hell am I supposed to get the men to follow up on your fucking reports?” he asked. He was uncomfortably aware
that his strangled anger at Blakely and the ARVNs made his voice sound petty and whining.

Blakely thought quickly. “Why not let Bravo Company sweep the area and move up to 1609 on foot, sir.”

Mulvaney looked at the map. It looked like a little over twenty kilometers as the crow flies, but the small squares were almost
completely brown with the thick mass of twenty-meter contour intervals. They could barely fit next to each other and still
be distinguishable. He remembered parts of Korea that looked like this, and he shuddered—there hadn’t been any jungle there.
“What’s their condition?” he asked Simpson. “They’ve been out in the bush a long time, if I remember.”

“Top-notch, sir. They could be there in four days.”

If Simpson said four days, then it would probably take eight. “Food? Power sources for the radios? Ammo? With this Cam Lo
op, you know I’m short on birds for resupply.”

“No problem, sir,” Simpson replied, enjoying the chance to show the other battalion commanders how ready his battalion was.

Blakely paled and swallowed. He hadn’t bothered to tell Simspon that Bravo had given half its food to Delta almost a week
ago to cover the error of pushing Delta off inadequately supplied.

“What do you think, Major Blakely?” Mulvaney asked.

Blakely didn’t hesitate. “One Twenty-Four can do the job, sir. You know what they say about the impossible.”

“Yes,” Mulvaney said quietly, turning to look at the map. “It takes a little longer.” Sick, frostbitten Marines crowded into
his memory, struggling up frozen hills, their backs bent under mortars and ammunition, the wounded strapped on litters bound
to fenders and in the backs of jeeps and small trucks, clenching their teeth at each painful jolt. Then his mind contrasted
that image with one of thin, sore-ridden bodies with barely enough energy to fight the jungle, let alone fight the Japanese.
He forced his mind back to the brightly lit briefing room and the map in front of him. He figured it would be a fucking hump
at that. Still, he could live with it. They had ten days before 1609 had to be secured. That left Bravo two real days of wiggle
room. Something, however, nagged at him. It was like a lump beneath a sleeping bag that he couldn’t quite flatten. But with
that much ammo in that dump, and if he didn’t follow through on it as Blakely had suggested … He knew he had a reputation
for being too impetuous. In this new Marine Corps of careful staff work and covering your ass with paper, it just wasn’t the
same. His old friend Neitzel had blended right in with the new Corps; that was why Neitzel had a division and Mulvaney didn’t.
If they hit pay dirt, it couldn’t hurt his chances of becoming a general. He smiled, imagining his wife pinning on his stars.
“Oh, hell,” he growled at himself.

“Sir?” Major Adams responded.

“Nothing, Adams. OK, Simpson, you’re on. Don’t let me down.”

The frag order that appended their original order to destroy the supply dump reached Bravo Company one hour after the regimental
briefing broke up. It consisted of a series of checkpoints and times of arrival, nothing more, some in deep draws, others
high on ridges. The line of march took no heed of the wild terrain.

Hawke began the actuals meeting. “Gentlemen, I’d like to introduce you to our new leader, Captain Meriwether Lewis. My name
is Clark, but you can call me Wm for short. We won’t be skying out for a while.”

Fitch explained the frag order. “We’ve got about three hours of daylight left, so we might as well get a couple of hours humping.
Otherwise there’s no chance of making checkpoint Alpha.”

“Shit,” Mellas said. “We just dug in. That body stinks and my platoon’s out of food.”

“You ain’t the Lone Ranger, Mellas,” Hawke said, “but you might be Sacajawea. You still got point.”

Mellas gritted his teeth and took his map out of his pocket, but he had to smile at Hawke’s joke. “I don’t see any point in
it, that’s all,” he said. People groaned and Mellas felt better. “What about this funny-looking three-cornered hill for a
position for tonight?” he said. “We might make it before dark. Jesus, though, the river looks like it runs right through a
fucking canyon.”

They discussed it briefly and Fitch gave the go-ahead. He ordered the food redistributed but would allow anyone to keep one
C-ration can if he had one, mitigating any resentment on the part of those who had saved their rations. Most of the kids,
like Mellas, had already eaten all the food they had. The platoon sergeants collected everything that remained. The redistributed
food, now held in common, equaled about three-quarters of a can per person. Twenty minutes after redistributing the food,
the company wound out of the ammunition dump, Jacobs’s squad leading, Jackson’s struggling with Williams’s body.

They moved slowly northeastward, following a rushing stream, higher into the mountains, closer to the DMZ. The terrain grew
wildly beautiful, with steep jungle-covered peaks and rushing torrents of water from the monsoon rains. Occasionally, someone
would slip on a glassy, water-smoothed rock and his entire body would be covered in swift white water that immediately soaked
into his pack, wetting his poncho liner. Unable to regain his feet against the force of the stream because of all his heavy
gear, he would be pulled up by laughing companions. Those who got soaked, however, knew that they’d be fighting the cold
all that night, trying to use body heat to dry their clothes and poncho liners.

The trees grew larger and the forest darker as they gained altitude. At one point a large flat outcropping of rock opened
the jungle enough to afford them a view of their line of march. Directly in front of them was a dark, narrow valley filled
with clouds, which hung close to dark peaks of barren rock. The peaks guarded a narrow, twisting river. Each Marine who passed
that open viewpoint made some nervous gesture: tightening his equipment, pausing to spray repellent on a leech, whistling
aloud. The rain, which up to now had been falling in a misty drizzle from high clouds, suddenly intensified. It pounded the
earth, bringing a rush of cold air.

By the time they reached the three-cornered hill, Mellas had an intense headache because of his depleted blood sugar. His
body had been drained by onslaughts of adrenaline, hunger, and the constant sucking cold of wet clothing. Feeling like a sick
animal, he dragged himself along by will alone.

The hill rose impossibly high in the gloom.

Jacobs looked upward. “Who the f-fuck p-picked this?” Water from the stream at the base of the hill was dripping from his
trousers.

Mellas closed his eyes. “I did, asshole.”

The point man sighed, then started crawling up the slope, pushing his rifle in front of him, grabbing roots and rocks.

Partway up Mellas heard a commotion behind him. He turned to see Hippy looking helplessly up the hill as he slid backward,
his heavy machine gun held in front of his face. He started knocking into people behind him, who in turn starting to slide
and knock into others. The whole slow-motion scene came to a halt against a tree and everyone untangled himself, cursing Hippy.
They started upward again.

It took Mellas’s platoon an hour to reach the top while the rest of the company waited in the rushing river, freezing, exposed
to attack, as the light faded completely. Mellas, as the first officer in, was responsible for setting in the defense for
the company and guiding the Marines
into positions as they arrived. He thrashed his way through the dark jungle with a machete, outlining the perimeter. It was
all he could do to keep from falling to the forest floor, never to move again. Tangled growth slapped his face, tore at his
exposed skin, hid the terrain from his eyes. He kept trying to remember all the rules about placing his machine guns. His
E-tool, the small folding entrenching shovel attached to his pack, caught on a branch, and the sudden imbalance with the immense
weight of his pack almost pulled him over backward. He struck out at the limb, breaking it, hurting his hand and opening the
scab over a jungle-rot sore on his arm. In a frenzy, he took out his K-bar and hacked the bush to pieces. Afterward his face
felt hot and flushed but his back was damp and cold. His hands were swollen, and his fingers did not want to move. He pulled
down his trousers and shit watery feces that spattered on his bare legs and boots. He retched at the smell, unable to throw
up because his stomach was empty.

He headed back down the hill to guide his weary platoon in. It took the rest of the company an hour to get to the top because
First Platoon’s trail had turned into a mudslide. When Mellas finally was able to return to his own position, he found Hamilton
with the dry heaves from exhaustion and lack of food, retching painfully over the beginnings of a shallow hole.

Mellas watched him, realizing that he’d have to dig the entire hole himself. “Here, give me that,” Mellas said bitterly, taking
the small entrenching tool. “Why don’t you go see if you can rig our ponchos up for some sort of hooch?” he said more gently.

Hamilton tried to smile but began retching again. “I’ll be OK in a while, sir,” he gasped. “Don’t worry, I’ll help with the
hole.”

“Forget it,” Mellas said. He started digging. When Hamilton turned away, Mellas began silently crying, hacking at the damp
earth in impotent fury.

Fitch had said there would be a full moon that night, and indeed the monsoon clouds had lightened just enough to permit an
eerie glow above the trees when Mellas did his first hole-check. He found Hippy sitting
silently on the edge of his hole. His bare feet dangled into the darkness below him and his ragged bleached-out boots sat
next to the hole. “You’d better cover those boots, Hippy,” Mellas whispered. “I homed in on them like an airport beacon.”

“Thanks, sir,” Hippy replied. He took his boots and put them in the hole. “Just trying to let them air a little. Thought maybe
it’d keep the gooks away if they was downwind.”

Mellas laughed and sat down beside Hippy. “Anything going on?” he whispered.

“Here? You shitting me, Lieutenant?”

Mellas smiled. He kicked his boot out to adjust his position and hit Hippy’s foot. Hippy winced. “Hey. You got foot trouble,
Hippy?”

“Naw. Nothing serious, sir.”

“Let me see them.”

“It ain’t nothing, sir. Just some blisters.”

“Uh-huh,” Mellas replied. “Let’s see one, Hippy.”

Hippy drew his left foot up to the edge of the hole. Even in the ghostly light, Mellas could see that it was grotesquely swollen
and discolored. It repelled him. He took a deep breath. The other foot was no different. “The squid seen these?”