by Don McQuinn
Taylor felt his throat tighten even as he willed calmness into his voice. “Yes, sir, Colonel. I still have my pride. Sir.”
The full face broke into the same bright smile it wore when Taylor entered the room. “I can see you do. Thought you would. A man without pride’s a waste. A soldier without it’s a menace. I’m pleased I didn’t misjudge you.” He laughed out loud. “That’s good for my ego.”
He stood up, moving past Taylor toward a small bathroom. “I’m hungry,” he said over his shoulder. “Let me get a quick shower and I’ll buy you a steak. Have another drink. If you use the last of the ice, be sure you fill the tray with water. We wouldn’t want to find ourselves out of ice when we come back.” He closed the door behind him, then opened it again to stick his head out.
“Life’s hell in the combat zone, ain’t it?” His laughter rang until the rush of the shower obscured it.
Chapter 3
Taylor poured himself another drink, replacing the ice tray.
“I don’t suppose you want to elaborate on anything,” he said dryly, cocking his head at the bathroom door.
Harker’s grin was eloquent.
“I thought so.” He’d merely accepted Harker as another Lieutenant before, but now he looked at him.
He’d seen the same bland face with its clear blue eyes and thick, fair hair a million times in catalogs or twinkling a smile ten feet wide on highway billboards. It was an apple-pie-and-mother face. The floppy tropical uniform effectively disguised the six-foot body inside it, but if the rest measured up to the arms, he’d be strong as a bull. The muscle on top of his forearm was a long wedge that bunched with every move. Rolled-up sleeves constricted his biceps. The knuckles and outer edges of the palms were calloused and hardened, a contradiction of the ingenuous face.
“I’ve been studying you,” Taylor said. “How long have you been working at karate?”
Harker responded with pleased shyness. “I got started in college, about five years ago. I got some good instruction at Fort Benning and when I was sent to Japan I was lucky enough to get in a really great class.”
“Get much opportunity to work out around here?”
“The Colonel insists on it.”
Taylor looked questioning and Harker continued. “He says if the Army can spare a man for traffic safety lectures, moral guidance, and VD movies, it can spare him long enough to practice his trade.”
Laughter bubbled from Taylor in spite of himself. He waved to dismiss any offense.
“Jesus, do you memorize everything he says? You’ve even got the voice pattern down.”
The younger man’s expression intensified, with the odd effect of making him look even more boyish. “I do admire him. He’s a helluva soldier. He doesn’t belong in this rear area mess. He’s a leader.”
Taylor made no comment and Harker continued almost defensively. “I’m no brown-nose, Major. I’ve met so few men like him I just consider myself lucky to serve with him, that’s all.”
“I can understand,” Taylor said. “You stay in this business long enough, you’ll find out it’s a constant race to escape the horse’s asses and find the real soldiers.”
Not caring to continue the course of the conversation, Taylor pointedly turned his attention to the room.
It looked like a seedy motel straining toward oblivion. The paint, whatever its original color, had long since altered to a tan-white. Great patches of plaster had ruptured outward and for some reason they were faintly darker than the surrounding areas, like pimples not quite ready to come to a head. The single window, in the wall directly opposite the door, was completely boarded over save for the cut-out left open to receive the wearily buzzing air-conditioner. The Colonel’s desk squatted directly in front of the machine, flanked by a wooden clothes closet to the left and the bed to the right. The room had obviously been occupied by a football fan at one time—the four closet doors each wore a Dallas Cowboy decal, discolored with age and starting to peel.
Winter had made some decorative additions of his own. Three Thai temple rubbings hung framed on the right wall, one a warrior in a chariot, flourishing his bow. The others were of female musicians, dreamy-eyed and languorous, sleek and proud-breasted. The bedspread was no more than a length of Thai silk, its bold colors violently opposed to the relentless doughy texture of the room. The remaining furnishings were the three rattan chairs, the refrigerator, the coffee table, and a scabrous dresser. An olive-drab towel was spread across the latter, providing a padded surface for glasses, bottles, a wallet, and a shoulder holster enfolding a .38 revolver.
If these are Colonel’s quarters, thought Taylor, the rest of us must live in toilets.
“What’s your job?” he asked Harker.
The Lieutenant blinked before answering. The simple gesture seemed to actuate a switch that made his face a plastic mask.
“We keep tabs on as many known VC as we can find,” he said.
“Sounds fascinating.” Taylor made the sarcasm heavy.
Harker’s chin jutted. “We think we do a little good. It’s not always easy and it’s not always fun but we feel like we make a contribution.”
Neither had noticed the shower was silent and now Winter stepped back into the room.
“A pretty speech, young tiger,” he boomed. “Clarity and brevity. Soldierly modesty. Idealistic, but not maudlin.” He advanced on Harker as he spoke, one hand securing the wrap-around towel. When he reached the younger man he clapped the free hand on his shoulder. Drops of water sprayed onto the open-weave material where they spread rapidly.
Winter faced Taylor. “Speaking purely socially, this has to be the dullest bastard in Vietnam.” He shook the shoulder and the grinning head bobbed loosely. “Operationally, however, he’s as warped as a Chinese smuggler. I swear he has two channels in that pea-like brain.” He dropped his hand and walked to the closet, pulling out his uniform. “One channel works in cadence, causing him to pour forth military cliches like swine before pearls. I’m told if he makes love within fifteen minutes of removing his uniform he hums martial airs during the ensuing entire performance.”
He grunted as he pulled on a boot and continued his commentary while lacing it.
“Give him a mission, though, and he changes channels. You can practically hear the click.”
Taylor thought back to the effect of the blink of Harker’s eyes.
Winter’s voice shifted to an excellent imitation of W. C. Fields. “Without even stepping into a phone booth he becomes Horrible Harker, right before your eyes. VC have been known to swear allegiance to Mary Poppins at the mere mention of his name.”
He rose and ushered his guests into the hall. Both were laughing as he swung in between them, swaggering and enjoying himself.
Harker stepped ahead, holding open the door to the outside, and Taylor was impressed again by the almost physical impact of the moist heat. In addition, the belching traffic outside the BOQ compound offended his ears. He glanced irritably in that direction and Winter smiled sourly.
“Get used to it,” he said. “If you don’t, the noise of this city’ll drive you nuts in a month. Do what we do, deep breathing exercises. Get enough of this filth in your lungs and the rest of your senses shut down.”
“You know, it’s funny,” Harker said, “the one thing I never thought about in connection with Nam was pollution. I mean, you think of humidity and muddy rivers, not rivers that’re open sewers and air blue with exhaust smoke.”
“I guess we’re pretty much to blame for the air,” Taylor said. “You can hear those damned trucks blowing and bellowing even in the Colonel’s room.”
“Maybe so,” Harker said angrily, “but we didn’t fill the rivers with junk and those greasy goddam cyclos aren’t our fault.”
Taylor smiled. “I didn’t mean to step on your nerves.”
Harker flashed his own sheepish smile. “I know—sorry ‘bout that. It seems like anything that goes wrong is our fault. Snapping back at people gets to be a reflex.
”
“ ‘People?’ Who else is there, but us?”
“The whole fucking world,” Winter spat, then laughed, a harsh bark like nothing Taylor had heard from him before. “Major Taylor, you’re at MACV. Welcome to the world’s only war under glass. There’s a different gaggle of bastards out here to tell us what we’re doing wrong every other day. I don’t see how the Generals stand it. If you could hear some of the inane idiots they have to deal with—respectfully, yet—” He stopped. “The hell with it. Let’s get some dinner.”
They turned a corner of the building and he pushed open a screen door. Immediately inside he opened another door to the right.
A gush of noise poured out, a susurration of voices carried on cold air like the draft at the very surface of a mountain stream. The decorative colors of the room revealed to Taylor’s astounded eyes were predominantly red and black. Candles gleamed on small tables, complementing discreet indirect lighting. A U-shaped bar protruded from the wall on the right and customers stood three deep. The waitresses were Vietnamese in black skirts, white blouses, and red vests. Dwarfed by even the smallest Americans, they seemed to flit from place to place like small, brilliant birds. Their voices pierced the dominant baritone and alto murmuration, high-pitched tonal Vietnamese trilling counterpoint. When they dealt with a customer, he enjoyed their complete attention, but as soon as that contact was broken they shouted and laughed among themselves as if they were alone.
Winter moved through the crowd with the certainty of the well-established citizen on home ground. A quick handshake for one man, a smile for one too distant to grasp, a conspiratorial whisper for yet a third. He left a clear trail of smiles and nods behind him.
The bar was well stocked. Taylor remembered back to Chu Lai, where a bottle of Tiger beer was a treasure, illegal because the word was that the VC had poisoned it. This created considerable apprehension but no lack of business for the children who packed the stuff up to the Marine positions.
Winter ordered martinis, paying for them himself while assuring Harker and Taylor he’d collect from them in the future. When Harker asked a question about a proposed trip to Long Binh, Taylor took the opportunity to inspect the crowd.
It was a mixture of uniforms, races, and most surprising, sexes. The only Oriental women were the waitresses and cashier. American women far outnumbered them. They were dressed in civilian clothes, the blotch-on-blotch camouflage of tiger suits, or Army fatigues. Regardless of apparel, they each had an entourage of males.
Winter broke off his conversation with Harker to watch Taylor with amusement.
“It’s something, isn’t it?” he asked rhetorically. “This place is busy all the time. But wait ‘til you see some of the places in the city. They threw out the French, but they remembered the cooking.” He paused. “I wonder if anyone will say even that much about us when we’re gone.”
In his own mind, Taylor was wondering how many French troops had sat at tables like this, watching the crowd, trying to adjust to the idea that in this room, right now, the war was ugly gossip. Maybe none. The French never created the elaborate compounds of the Americans that divorced them from the environment.
Their waitress materialized, greeting Winter with obvious pleasure, acknowledging the other two men with a short nod.
“Ahhh, Miss Oanh,” Winter beamed. “The prettiest girl in Vietnam.”
She blushed and turned her head. Typically, she hid her laughter behind the menu.
Winter said, “Miss Oanh, this is Major Taylor. He just arrived today.”
She favored him with a measured portion of a charming smile. “Your first time come Vietnam?”
“Second time,” he said. “Before, I was in Chu Lai.”
She looked blank and Taylor sat dumb.
Winter said, “Up north, in I Corps. Major Taylor is a Marine.”
Her face twisted as she tried to understand. “I know I Corps, but not other thing you say.”
Winter said something that sounded like Tooey Kong Look Chin and Miss Oanh’s expression went through several rapid alterations, eventually settling on alert neutrality. She pointed at Taylor, repeating Winter’s phrase, questioning.
Taylor looked helplessly to Winter, who said, “That’s Vietnamese for their Marine Corps.”
Taylor turned back to the woman. “That’s what I am. Whatever he said.”
“They kill many VC.” She said it the same way she might say the salad had lettuce in it, yet somehow conveyed more than conversational intensity. Taylor couldn’t tell if he’d been challenged or identified.
“We fight the VC. Yes, many die. We fight North Vietnamese, too. Maybe North Vietnamese go home, no more war.”
Relaxation softened Miss Oanh’s entire stance. “Be good for war stop. Too much people die. I hope you kill many-many VC. VC kill my father, one brother.”
“I hope we can even the score for you. I’m sorry.”
She turned to Winter again, who spoke rapidly in Vietnamese. She listened intently, then touched Taylor’s shoulder.
“I understand now ‘even score.’ More important you be careful.” Her eyes probed his for an instant, but when she returned her attention to Winter, she was laughing.
“Better you order or boss give me bad time.”
Winter ordered, checking with Taylor only to ask how he preferred his steak and choice of salad dressing.
As soon as Miss Oanh was gone, Taylor said, “I hope they’re not all that good looking. There’s enough distraction around here.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Winter said. “Not many are as pretty as she is, and she’s not available. I think every GI to hit Saigon’s tried to get into her knickers. You can kid around with her, but that’s it.”
“Maybe she’s anti-American,” Taylor suggested lightly.
“God knows. I guess she’s too smart to get mixed up with some sonofabitch who’ll leave her with a kid when he rotates home to Momma.” A sly smile creased his face. “She’s determined about her virtue, too. Some stud Captain got all liquored up here one night and ambushed her over by the bicycle rack when she quit work.”
He leaned over the table, warming to his story. “I was on the rack, reading, just about to go to sleep, and I hear this scream—raised the hair all over my body. I grabbed my .38 and tore outside. I should’ve stood in bed—she needed help like Custer needed more Indians. I couldn’t have been more than thirty-seconds getting there, but by the time I made it, our Captain is on his face, her bike bent over his back, and she’s trying to kick his lungs out. I’m making the best time I can, running barefoot in the goddam gravel, and I was afraid she’d kill him before I could reach her. She’d ra’ar back and holler ‘You son bitch!’ and drive her little pointy-toed shoe into his guts like a knife. Every shot he’s going ‘Ugh!’ and puking like a geyser. I wrestled her off to one side—made my whole day—and calmed her down.”
“She wasn’t hurt?” Taylor asked.
“Only the bicycle. Someone convinced the Legal people she’d press no charges if she got a solatium that’d pay for one of those Lambretta putt-putts.”
Taylor said, “That’s a decent swap—a motorscooter for a bicycle.”
Winter’s smile turned brittle. “One of the few times one of the little people ever made a profit, Major.”
Before the silence could grow too heavy, she was back, bearing a tray loaded with their dinner. It appeared too heavy for her, but she dodged between the tables with a grace that was almost dancing. While she positioned the plates, Taylor asked, “Don’t you ever drop something in a crowd like this?”
She shook her head. “No can do. I drop tray, boss get very angry.” She grinned. “Anyhow, easy for Vietnamese girl. Get beaucoup practice carry many things in market, more people than this.” She put down the last plate, then paused as though considering. Suddenly she looked back at Taylor, pure mischief in her eyes.
“Oanh same-same VC. Americans big, move too slow. Before can touch me, I quick run past.
”
Taylor’s lips pulled into a tight line and she giggled and tapped him on the shoulder. “I joke you. You not angry with Oanh?”
“Very angry.” Taylor twisted his face into a ferocious scowl. Miss Oanh’s smile trembled. He went on, “Angry because you don’t understand. Look, I want to show you something. Give me your pen.”
“No have time,” she protested. “I got work.”
“Give me the pen. This’ll only take a minute.”
She extended it reluctantly. In swift lines Taylor sketched a large crane peering down a sword-like bill at a frog.
“The crane is large and slow, Miss Oanh, and the frog is small and quick. You never see the frog eat the crane.” He jabbed at the crouching frog with the pen, making a misshapen blot on its side. “The crane is patient. And, in time, always wins.”
She studied the sketch for a moment before looking at Winter. “This man work for you, Colonel?”
“Maybe.”
She nodded approval. “Good. You take care him, he hurt VC. He think like us.”
With no word or glance further, she resumed her dance through the crowd.
Winter smiled at her back.
Right you are, pretty Miss Oanh, he thought. More than either of you know. I need this stiff-necked bastard for just that reason.
The actual eating passed quickly and Winter led them back to his room for more Scotch. He stripped off his jacket and threw it on the bed, settling into his chair.
“I can use you,” he said bluntly.
“I’m flattered, Colonel—”
“Bullshit.” Winter jammed the word into Taylor’s response like a pole into spokes.
“No, I’m serious,” Taylor protested. “I’m proud of having done my job well. The thing is, in spite of the intelligence training, I’m an infantryman inside. If I can’t be where the action is, I’d just as soon sit at MACV and count days. I’ll be damned if I’ll get mixed up in some schmear where I bust my ass filling out 3x5 cards on Viet schoolteachers.”
The speech made no visible impression on Winter, who leaned forward with deliberation, carefully sipping from his drink before answering. “I’ve been wrong about people before. You may turn out to be worthless to me.”
