War Baby (9 page)

It was said that a combat spiral in a Huey could pull your brains out through your anus. Webb gasped as the chopper corkscrewed down, the wind rushing through the open doors, the door gunner firing wild bursts from his M-60. Ravines and green razorback ridges spun giddyingly across Webb’s vision through the gunner’s door. Fat blobs of red rose from the 50-calibre anti-aircraft guns, floating lazily towards them as if someone were lobbing beer cans at them from the trees, then seemed to accelerate and whip-crack past them.

The Huey bounced as it hit the ground. They didn’t wait for it to settle, throwing themselves clear and staggering to their feet to weave through the storm of dust and debris, crouching low to avoid the rotor tips.

A mortar round thudded into the dirt not thirty yards away. Webb slipped and fell on his face. He wondered for a moment if he had been hit. Then someone grabbed him and dragged him towards a trench. He toppled in and lay on his back, winded.

A giant in tiger stripe camous crouched over him.

‘Is it our reinforcements?’ someone said.

‘Hell, no,’ the giant said. ‘This is just some honky muthafucka with a press badge.’

* * *

The Central Highlands of Vietnam even scared the Special Forces. At noon the sun barely made it through the canopy of the giant hardwoods, the jungle a furnace netherworld of shadows and silence and contrary mists. It was a place from the imagination of Conan Doyle, and was inhabited by the Montagnards, a strange and silent people who had become allies of the Americans and South Vietnamese by default. The northerners hated them.

Que Trang itself was a shambles of rusting barbed wire and rotting sandbags. The base had the look of a long siege; there were gaps in the perimeters where sappers had cut a way through, before the gunners had cut them down. Their bodies still lay there, rotting in the sun. The ground was littered with spent shell casings, rusting ration cans, sodden pages from Stars and Stripes and blood-stained combat dressings. It had rained the night before, turning the red laterite into an ochre porridge.

The fort was manned by Montagnard mercenaries, under the command of a handful of American Special Forces and Vietnamese paratroopers. The Americans themselves had the look of men taken way too far. They looked and acted like zombies.

Everywhere there was the smell of death and rancid sweat.

Ryan and Webb picked their way along the red mud pathways, past the wreckage of the barracks. Most of the hooches inside the compound had been destroyed by mortar and rocket fire; those few that remained were littered with shell holes. They finally found the headquarters, a bunker near the centre of the compound, the roof lined with rotting sandbags.

A lieutenant gave them thick, bitter coffee laced with Jack Daniels and two bennies. He assigned them racks in a bunker near the perimeter and handed them each an M-16 and three M-26 fragmentation grenades.

‘The enemy’s right out there,’ he said, ‘in those trees.’

‘The enemy?’ Ryan said. ‘You mean Newsweek?’

The lieutenant gave him a frigid smile. ‘Cute,’ he said. He nodded towards the mountains. ‘There’s maybe three battalions of NVA sitting in those hills. Sure as God made little green apples they are going to come didley-boppin’ through that wire sometime early this morning. Fact is, we’re going to need all the help we can get.’ The lieutenant pointed to the M-16s. ‘You know how to use those mothers?’

‘I know how to use one,’ Webb told him. ‘But I’m not going to.’

‘Why not, son?’

Son. The lieutenant was probably only a year older than Webb. ‘Because I’m a journalist, not a soldier.’

‘That’s up to you, I guess. It’s your funeral.’

Webb and Ryan ate their C-rations in the bunker and watched the sun sink over the Highlands. Around them, the Special Forces guys were getting ready for another night fight, smearing blacking under their eyes, clicking banana clips into their weapons and tucking grenades into the pockets of their camous. They threw sidelong glances at the Montagnards, wondering if they could trust them to hold their line, if they would still be there on the berm in the morning.

Every few minutes a mortar round thudded into the camp. Night fell quickly. The air grew damp, and chill. Webb shivered inside his poncho. Fear crept through the lines, tangible, like a gas.

The radio in the bunker was tuned to the Armed Forces radio network.

And for all you guys and girls at the 17 th Evac, especially Mo in the Orderly Room, here’s one from the fabulous Rolling Stones.

‘Why did you say you wouldn’t use that?’ Ryan said, pointing to the M-16 at Webb’s side.

‘We’re not here to fight. If we start carrying guns then we become targets.’

‘Oh sure, Charles is really hung up about shooting war correspondents by mistake.’

‘It’s professional ethics. I haven’t used a weapon yet. I don’t intend to start now.’

‘I’ll give you an example of professional ethics, mate. In ’68 I was with an ARVN platoon in the Delta and we were being overrun. One soldier died right there next to me and when I looked up there was Charles running towards me with an AK. I was faced with an ethical dilemma then. The dilemma was: do I want to die right now? The answer, funnily enough, was no. So I picked up the dead bloke’s M-16 and started shooting.’

‘Did you kill him?’

‘I never stuck around to find out. But I know I hit him because his head came off.’

I see a red door and I want to paint it black . . .

Webb shook his head. ‘I don’t believe in killing.’

‘Then why the fuck are you here?’

‘Because I don’t believe in killing.’

Ryan shook his head. ‘You amaze me sometimes, Spider.’

The moon rose, fat and yellow over the jagged trunk of a splintered tree. Webb watched an illumination flare drop over the perimeter. He scraped the last of the cold ham stew from the can, listened to the rats scratching on the bunker floor. Ryan lit a cigarette, offered one to Webb. Webb didn’t usually smoke, apart from the occasional opium pipe, but he made an exception. Clean lungs don’t count for much if you’re full of holes.

‘Croz’ll be spitting chips he missed this,’ Ryan said.

‘Sure. He’s back in Da Nang, he’s filed his story, and he’s eating T-bone steak and drinking chilled beer. Poor bastard.’

‘But we’ve got the dateline. He hasn’t.’

Webb drew on the cigarette.

‘You scared, Spider?’

‘Of course I fucking am. What kind of person would not be scared in this situation?’

‘Just that... it’s okay, you know.’

‘I know it’s okay.’ He had never got to love the fear, not like Ryan did. He just got through it, for the sake of the story, because someone had to do it.

The lieutenant, doing his rounds of the perimeter, swore at them for breaking the blackout and dropped the canvas flap of the bunker shut. They lay back on their bunks in the darkness, fully clothed. The only light was the burning orange tips of their cigarettes and the small, green glow from the radio valves.

If you’re going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair.

‘About Odile …’ Ryan said.

‘I don’t want to talk about it.’

‘Are you in love with her, Spider?’

‘No.’

‘She reckons you are.’

‘I can’t help what she thinks.’

‘I don’t know what there was between the two of you but ... I promised I’d look after her. She’s my problem now, not yours.’

‘Sure.’

‘I didn’t know she had a kid, mate. That changes everything. It’s just that... I’m not the marrying kind. I couldn’t imagine spending my life making love to one woman. You might as well put me in bloody prison.’

‘Then why the blue blazing fuck did you persuade her to leave the convent, you prick?’

‘Don’t hold back, mate. Say what you mean.’

‘Why did you?’

The tobacco crackled in the dark. ‘I really thought this was different. But then, after a while, it... it turned out to be just the same. I got bored, I suppose.’

‘Jesus, Ryan. It’s not like there’s a shortage of women in this country. You had to prove a point, didn’t you? How many points did you give yourself for screwing a nun?’

‘I know what I am. I don’t need you to preach to me.’

Webb felt something sting the soft, tender flesh on the inside of his thigh. A leech had found its way there from the ooze around his ankles. He swung his legs up on to the bunk and closed his eyes. He waited for his other senses to kick in; he heard the soft pop of another illumination round.

‘Did you sleep with her, Spider?’

‘No.’

‘So what was it all about, then?’

‘You wouldn’t understand.’

‘Try me.’

A mosquito whined around his head.

And this is Count Malaria here on AFVN reminding you to take your chloroquine phosphate pills ...

‘I couldn’t walk away and leave her like that, pretend I didn’t know her. Oh, just another gook having a bad time. I wanted to do something useful over here besides take pictures.’

Ryan was silent.

‘Now I’ve got a question for you,’ Webb said. ‘What are you going to do about her?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You don’t love her.’

‘I care for her.’

‘Why did you go back? If you’d left her with me you wouldn’t have had to worry any more, would you?’

‘I don’t need any bullshit from you. I’ll do the right thing, but I’ll do it my way.’

Webb put the grenades and the rifle under his cot, flicked on a pencil light, checking that the first aid kit and his cameras and notebooks were within easy reach. Then he flicked the light off again and they lay there in the dark listening to the terrible silence.

‘What happens if you get blown away tonight?’ Webb said, finally.

‘Then I won’t have to worry about it anymore, will I?’

‘This is not about
you
. It’s about her. And the baby.’

‘Yeah, well, life’s a lottery, mate. We all take our chances. Maybe it’s karma, like the Buddhists say.’

‘Jesus, you’re a cold bastard.’

‘Look, I’ll tell you something about me, Mister Too Fucking Good To Be True! Back home there was this creek. Big Moreton Bay Fig grew right next to it. Some older kids put a rope on one of the branches so they could swing across. My older brother dared me to join in. Thing was, I couldn’t swim, but I didn’t want any of the other kids to know I was scared, so I did it. Almost made it, too. Trouble was, the rope broke. The other kids laughed, they thought I was clowning around. I went under, it was like my chest was going to burst, I took this big mouthful of water and I started to black out. I thought I was going to die. As luck would have it, my brother pulled me out, and I woke up at home in my mum’s bed. When I realized I was still alive and heaven wasn’t a feather bed with jarrah corner posts, I remember thinking two things: one, I didn’t ever have to be scared again, because I’d already died and it wasn’t that hard. And two, I wasn’t going to let anyone persuade me to do anything I didn’t want to do ever again, no matter what they thought of me. So I’ll play this my way, all right?’

‘The only difference is, you were ten years old then. Every ten-year-old thinks the world was made just for them.’

‘Well, maybe they’re right.’

The silence was broken by the plop of a mortar round. Outgoing. A comforting sound, almost made you feel safe.

‘What would you have done about Odile if I hadn’t come back?’ Ryan asked him.

‘I don’t know.’

‘Yeah you do,’ Ryan said. ‘And I’ll tell you something else, maybe it’s a good job I did.’

‘I don’t give a damn about her, or about you. Do whatever the hell you want. Now go to sleep.’

It was two in the morning when the first 80-millimetre mortar rounds hit the camp. The noise and the concussion were like a physical blow. Webb was jolted awake and instinctively rolled off his cot on to the floor. He fumbled for his cameras and notebooks and slopped outside through the mud to the nearest firing bunker.

Illumination rounds were streaking down the skyline, magnesium brilliant, silhouetting the jungle; blue-green tracers floated towards them, orange ones arced out. Death was beautiful by night.

Another mortar round thudded in, very close. He heard someone screaming.

‘Ryan!’ Webb shouted.

‘Right here, mate,’ a voice said beside him.

Then silence. Webb stared across the perimeter, heard bamboo click in the wind, saw shadows flick through the mahogany trees. But there was no wind, and no moon to make shadows.

‘Here we go,’ Ryan said.

There was a series of explosions as NVA sappers took out the mines in the wire. Webb heard the distinctive popping sound of the NVA assault rifles, the answering bursts of Armalites; the stench of cordite drifted across the perimeter.

A parachute flare fell down the sky. Bodies hung on the blown wire. There was no moon and the clouds meant there would be no air support. They were on their own.

The NVA broke cover, the first through the wire staggered and fell under a hail of machine gun fire.

Someone was screaming: ‘Drop back! Drop back!’ The NVA must be inside the fort.

I don’t have to do this anymore, Webb told himself. Why do I keep doing this?

‘We’re being overrun,’ Ryan shouted at him. ‘Hope you’ve got your M-16, mate. Or are you still feeling ethical?’

Webb scrambled out of the bunker, crawling blindly through the mud. Flares and explosions lit the fort like strobe, warping judgment of time and distance. He fell head first into a slit trench.

The bunker’s only other occupant crouched on the floor, bloodied teeth set in a mess of raw mincemeat. The man had taken a round in the face. His M-16 was still cradled in his arms.

‘Ryan!’

‘I’m hit,’ he heard Ryan groan in the darkness. ‘I’m hit.’

Another flare illuminated the battlefield, almost directly overhead. Ryan was on his knees, a lone NVA soldier running towards him. A quick burst into the back of Ryan’s head and he would run on, looking for other targets.

Webb snatched the M-16 from the dead Montagnard, brought it to his shoulder.

The NVA looked very young, though Webb later decided that may just have been his imagination at work. His pith helmet was silhouetted against the dropping flare. He had on a khaki uniform. He stood over Ryan, ready to fire from the hip.

Webb hesitated. He wondered what Odile would do if Ryan did not come back to Saigon tomorrow morning.

His finger touched the trigger and he released the prescribed three rounds, the range no more than ten yards. The Vietnamese jerked like a puppet and fell dead.

‘Over here,’ Webb said.

He reached for Ryan’s hand, pulled him into the trench. A platoon of Strikers rushed past them to fill the gap in front of them. The battle washed over them, like the ebb of a tide, and they were suddenly behind the lines again, beached and safe.

* * *

It was raining; drifting smoke carried with it the reek of the dump fire. Ryan lay on a stretcher inside the sandbagged bunker, a large M painted on his forehead with grease pencil. Other casualties from the night lay outside, swathed in blood-soaked dressings, eyes glazed from morphine and shock.

Webb strained his ears for the sound of the medevac chopper.

He walked slowly back to the perimeter, to assure himself this awful thing was no dream. He found him lying face down near the trench, his back blown apart by the exit of the high-velocity bullets. A swarm of green metallic flies rose in a cloud as he approached.

He flipped the body with his foot. There were three small bullet wounds stitched across the chest, what a professional soldier would have called a neat job. Webb felt no pride, but no regret either.

He turned around, saw a Special Forces sergeant grinning at him. His face shone with a curious light. Combat gave a man license to go beyond the edge into madness, Ryan had told him once. If he forgot to come back, no one noticed until he went home.

The man laughed, undid his fly and urinated into the mouth of one of the corpses. He was still laughing as Webb walked away.

The first Hueys were coming down the valley, to take out the wounded.

Webb mentally composed his copy: dateline, 3 April, 1972.

‘Today I killed a man ...’

But a magazine feature was not a confessional. And what was there to confess? If he had not fired his weapon, he would have consigned a fellow correspondent to death. But he wasn’t proud of it either.

He went back to get his camera and captured the aftermath of Que Trang on three rolls of high-resolution color film, for the vicarious thrill of readers in London or Paris or Sydney. Death was like pornography, a cocktail of shame and vicarious thrill.

As he climbed aboard the medevac chopper, he turned around and saw that the Special Forces sergeant had followed him. His eyes burned under the poncho hood with messianic intensity. Webb tried to ignore him but he came over and grabbed his arm, got into his face. Webb could smell his breath, rank like a jackal’s. ‘Don’t you got nothin’ better to do with your life, man?’ he whispered.

He shoved him towards the chopper. As the Huey lifted from the ground he was still standing there.

‘I hope you die,’ he shouted after him. ‘You hear me? I hope you fucking die, man!’