13th Valley

by John M. Del Vecchio

  “What the fuck are you doin?” Someone grabbed Cherry. “Where the fuck you been?” It was Silvers. “Get up. Get up there. Get up there. What the fuck’s wrong with you?”

  Silvers grabbed Cherry, spun him uphill and pushed him. Numbnuts jumped up about to protest but Silvers was already at the head of the little column. Numbnuts ran a few furious steps to catch up. Cherry was vibrating with rage at the injustice of Silvers’ accusing him. He stepped more lightly than he had ever stepped. Rain or no rain, he was a good soldier and he wasn’t going to take the rap for Numbnuts’ fuck-up. Cherry stepped where Silvers stepped except smoother, quieter. As they approached the summit LZ the slope leveled and they slowed. All of a sudden the howl and roar of the wind was engulfed in three successive explosions BOOM!BOOM!BOOM! and a fusillade of firing.

  Cherry and Silvers dropped. The firing was 30 meters away. Silvers rose and crept quickly cautiously forward. Cherry, McCarthy and Numbnuts followed. Jax, Lairds and Denhardt were all firing their 16s and Marko the 60 as Brunak fed. They sprayed fire across the entire LZ.

  “Over there,” Denhardt yelled. “Out there,” he screamed. Silvers reached him. “There’s gooks over there. I seen em.” He continued firing. Silvers tossed a grenade and fired. Cherry squeezed off a burst on full automatic. Then everything became quiet. There had been no return fire.

  They paused. The team huddled together to discuss what to do next. The rain was still coming down hard and making noise in the canopy. The NVA could be maneuvering up to their sides, around behind them, maybe even in front of them. “We blew it, Man,” Marko said. “We gotta go back.”

  “Call the CP,” Jax said. “Tell em we done blowed our position. Ef anybody out here, they know right where we at.”

  They all agreed. No one, including Silvers, wanted to remain. They had fired too much at too little.

  Silvers grabbed the hook. “Quiet Rover Four, this is Rover Two Two. Over,” Silvers called. At the CP El Paso answered and passed the hook to the L-T. “We’re comin back in,” Silvers informed Brooks. Brooks asked questions. He listened. He thought it would be more dangerous for the team to move than to stay and rearrange themselves. Silvers argued for returning. Brooks denied his request again. Their conversation ended there.

  “Let’s go,” Silvers said. And without permission the ambush team backed out of its position behind the blown trees, returned to the trail and descended toward the ravine. Very quietly they descended in column, all of them very alert now, holding the rucksacks to their front in an unbroken chain.

  Egan and Thomaston had crawled away from the CP meeting and had dragged themselves through the mud to a guard/ sleeping position at the side of a foot-thick tree. It could not have been more uncomfortable. Because of the slope, they slid into each other, pressed each other against the tree. On top of all else, where the tree’s roots spread, rising from the ground like an inverted fan, the tiny cavities and recesses were filled with spider webs. Egan felt wretched. Finally he got up, moved up the hill several meters, found a thin tree trunk and tied himself to it. He settled back wrapped in a poncho liner and poncho and closed his eyes. Stephanie came to him immediately. Like magic she eased the discomfort and anguish. She floated into the jungle and the rain ceased, the wind became a gentle breeze.

  After that October afternoon in New York Daniel Egan lost contact with Stephanie. He called a few times without receiving an answer and finally found the phone disconnected. It must have been at least a month between calls and in those months he found a new Daniel, a man sexually attractive to women. All this time, he thought, I thought you had to be something special to get a girl. I thought they had to love you. In the course of a semester Daniel moved from naive small town boy to campus stud. He kept score, laughing about it with his football friends, and flaunting his prowess at fraternity parties. He fell in love a dozen times and forgot a dozen names. And he found he hated it. Something was missing.

  On a cold snowy night in February Daniel was in bed with Little Fannie, a fraternity sweetheart. They had just made love or at least balled. He had just come. He was still atop her, still in her, semi-flaccid. For this, he had said to himself, for this I didn’t pull it for two days. He lay there thinking. Then he rolled off. “Fannie,” he said. “Ah, I got a big exam tomorrow. I got to study.” She said go ahead and pulled the blanket tightly about herself. “Ya can’t stay while I’m studying,” he said.

  “You got to be kidding,” she had said. In the end he threw her out. After she left he lay alone for a long time. Then he rose, went to his desk and wrote a note to Stephanie.

  Now in the vacuum of darkness, on that empty fetid hillside morass where he had tied himself, her image warming his enslaved soul solidified and she spoke the soliloquy of her reply, a reply which did not arrive until early June.

  Dear Daniel,

  I’ll bet you’re wondering what’s happened to me. Things have happened quickly and have been very complicated but I’ll try to explain as best I can.

  The last time we talked I told you I didn’t know where I was going. I had to leave NYC, so, I went home. I’m skipping around. I’ve been having trouble with my step-father because he thinks what I did was a terrible sin. I’ll get to that. One night, shortly after I moved back in, he and mother were arguing about my being here and I overheard and went downstairs to tell him to leave mother alone and that I would leave. Before I knew it I was telling him how he had never shown me any love. The idea that he had failed as a father and that therefore had contributed to my sin surprised him. He’s always been such a success at everything.

  Anyway, I’m married, getting divorced, and I’ve had an abortion. Actually, you’re not going to believe this, but I had two. I’ve been through quite a lot since I last saw you. The first abortion didn’t work. I don’t know if you know anything about them. They certainly are not fun. I became very ill after my second D & C which is a scraping of the uterus. I only got out of the hospital yesterday. When I get up and around I’m planning to get a job and save some money so I can go to school. I want to work with children. I have definitely decided not to go into art.

  As far as the divorce is concerned that will be happening very soon. Not a definite date now but soon. As soon as possible. I hesitate to write you, Daniel, because I’ve been so sick and because I really don’t know if it is the right thing to do. I respect you so much and I don’t want you to get involved in anything ugly. This is really hard for me to put into words but it is how I feel. I wasn’t going to write then I started thinking about how much I wanted to hear more from you and that you would know yourself just how much to get involved. I don’t understand exactly how I feel. The whole time I was living with my husband I couldn’t stand it and I thought of you constantly. I wanted to call you so badly. Daniel, please write. Write me a long letter. You’re such a wonderful writer, so precise and beautiful with words.

  Please don’t be afraid of my feelings. I’ll never press you. Could you send me a sketch too? I know someday you’ll be a superb architect. It’s very late but I don’t want this letter to end. It’s almost like I’m talking to you. I guess I should get to bed.

  Love,

  Stephanie

  Two Fridays after the letter arrived, Daniel left school. He hitchhiked to her, arrived on her doorstep at three Saturday morning and allowed the long sleepless night to torture him in an attempt to atone for his lapse. “I brought you something,” he smiled when she opened the door six hours later.

  “Daniel,” she screamed with glee. She rushed to him and they embraced and held each other tightly and then her mother was there saying hello and making them breakfast.

  Saturday was beautiful. She took him to a lake and they hiked to the secluded far shore. Stephanie had never been lovelier. The air remained crisp all day, the sunshine warm and clean.

  “Daniel,” she said. God, he thought, how much I love to hear you say my name. “Why are you so quiet? Talk to me. I’ve told you all about my past eight mon
ths and you’ve told me nothing.”

  He wanted to speak but he couldn’t. How could he confess to her that he had been on a fuckathon. He looked into those beautiful eyes and he thought of himself and he felt like dirt.

  “I love your sketch,” Stephanie said. She kissed him then raised her sweater and exposed her breasts and gently pulled Daniel’s face to her.

  Egan lying tied to a tree on the wet jungle hillside rolled to his side and pushed the poncho liner up higher about his neck. He felt pleasantly warm. The image before him shifted. There were two lovers alone and in darkness. He recognized himself. “I’ve designed some of the world’s most wonderful homes in my head,” his image said.

  She laughed. “I’ve painted some of the greatest pictures in my mind.”

  They both laughed. Then they stopped and were silent and they shared a sorrow. What if I never really design them? he shuddered. What if they are not the most wonderful when they are on paper? She too shuddered, then breaking their silence Stephanie said, “Please. Let’s go someplace.”

  “Yes,” Daniel said. “Let’s go.”

  “Where?”

  “Nowhere. Let’s just go.” They rose and stood for a dizzy moment and looked at each other. Stephanie sat back down. “Get up,” Daniel pleaded gently. “We will go … somewhere.”

  “Where?” Stephanie cried. “You’re going to go back to school or to a job. Leaving me again.”

  In the cold jungle the memory now agitated Egan. Perhaps he had been too close to it then. Perhaps he could understand it better now, from this distance in time and space. Much of what Daniel Egan remembered of Stephanie was not her at all but was only him when he was with her. Perhaps I wasn’t sensitive enough to perceive more than just me, he thought. I never asked her how she felt or what she thought. I didn’t really know her. She is not really here at all, he thought. The wind blew colder. He wanted to know her so much more.

  His dream convoluted. The warmth vanished. The fragrance became the odor of jungle rot and dead men. The sky’s glow dimmed, became dark and ugly. A harsh glint chased Stephanie’s image from the screen of his mind. Egan was petrified. He was tied down, staked out, unable to react. The sapper squatted by his side. The silver machete was in his right hand. Egan tried to move. The rope restraints cut into his wrists, his ankles. He arched his back, lifted his belly. Moonlight sparkled upon the blade and in the sapper’s eyes as the dark foe raised the knife. The enemy cocked his wrist, aimed the blade for Egan’s eyes, began the downward killing stroke. Egan craned his neck to avoid the slashing blade. The blade touched … Egan bolted upright panting, paranoid. Rain streamed down his face. He grabbed his forehead, his nose, his cheeks. He tasted the stream to insure it was not blood.

  SIGNIFICANT ACTIVITIES

  THE FOLLOWING RESULTS OF OPERATIONS IN THE O’REILLY/BARNETT/JEROME AREA WERE REPORTED FOR THE 24-HOUR PERIOD ENDING 2359 16 AUGUST 70:

  AT 0950 HOURS, VICINITY YD 191298, RECON, CO E, 7/402 ENGAGED AN UNKNOWN SIZE ENEMY FORCE KILLING ONE NVA. CO B, 7/402 CONTINUED TO EXPLORE THE NVA HOSPLTAL COMPLEX THEY UNCOVERED 15 AUGUST. THE COMPLEX CONTAINED A TOTAL OF 18 BUNKERS SCATTERED OVER A SQUARE KILOMETER. SEVERAL OF THE BUNKERS WERE INTERCONNECTED BY A TUNNEL NETWORK CUT DEEPLY INTO THE MOUNTAINOUS TERRAIN. THIRTY-FOUR MEDICAL KITS AND 1100 POUNDS OF MEDICAL SUPPLIES WERE EVACUATED. A CACHE CONTAINING 100 NVA UNIFORMS AND 2400 POUNDS OF RICE WAS DESTROYED. IN AN EVIDENT INTENSIVE CARE INFIRMARY BUNKER A BODY WAS DISCOVERED ALONG WITH ONE VERY SERIOUSLY WOUNDED ENEMY SOLDIER. THE PRISONER WAS EVACUATED TO PHU BAI.

  AT YD 193273, THE 1ST BN, 3D REGT (ARVN) RECEIVED RPG AND SMALL ARMS FIRE FROM AN ESTIMATED ENEMY BATTALION SURROUNDING THEIR POSITION. THE ARVN ELEMENT RETURNED ORGANIC WEAPONS FIRE RESULTING IN 38 NVA KIA AND ONE POW CAPTURED. 13 ARVN SOLDIERS WERE WOUNDED IN THE ACTION.

  AT MIDDAY, FOUR KILOMETERS SOUTHWEST OF FIREBASE BARNETT, ONE US SOLDIER FROM CO A, 7/402 WAS KILLED BY A SNIPER. THE UNIT RETURNED FIRE WITH UNKNOWN RESULTS.

  CHAPTER 23

  17 AUGUST 1970

  Cherry had changed, had been changing. He had begun changing long before but now the alteration accelerated. He had changed from play-soldier to trainee, then from state-side soldier to REMF soldier and then to cherry soldier. They were changes which happened to him, not changes of him, changes which occurred because the army had moved him. Those changes were not great. On 17 August he changed greatly, he changed to just plain soldier.

  “We’re startin back,” Cherry radioed Quiet Rover. It was not yet first light. “We’re on our way back,” he lied.

  “Ah, roger that Two Two,” El Paso replied. At the CP El Paso was on radio watch again. He rolled and woke Brooks. “Ambush team comin back in.”

  “Uh! What time is it?”

  “Oh five-four-eight,” El Paso said.

  First light was approaching. Cahalan stirred beside El Paso. Above them Doc was going through his aid bag. The sky’s blackness softened. It was still raining. Brooks got up and relieved himself against a tree below their position.

  “We’re at the blue feature,” Cherry radioed in a fictitious progress report fifteen minutes after his first call. All the soldiers at the CP were up, folding ponchos, cleaning weapons, brushing teeth. The guards were up too. They had humped to the NDP in lights which meant they had not brought food. Some of them bitched about being hungry. Doc Johnson passed amongst them handing each man a Monday Pill, a large, orange quinine anti-malaria tablet. Everyone swallowed one. The Monday Pill was very seldom discarded. It was a big bright orange pill, it looked important, and it marked the passing of another week. That gave it ritual significance.

  At 0625 Cherry radioed the CP again to give his position and determine theirs. They were very close. In fact they were less than fifty meters from 1st Plt.

  After the ambush squad had blown its cover by engaging suspected enemy movement on the LZ, they had backed off Hill 636 and, in the dark, had wormed back down to the ravine. “Fuck the L-T,” Silvers had said. “We aint stayin here. That’d be suicide.” They all agreed. At the ravine they crossed the stream, discussed setting up but decided to move up. Silvers had followed the trail down but he had not known where to go up. He had simply set a compass course and stumbled in one general direction mumbling to himself the entire time, “God don’t let the gooks be here. God don’t let the gooks be here.” Quite by accident they had found a small indentation in the hill, which was partially protected from the elements and in the dark appeared very defensible. They had devised a guard/ radio watch schedule—two awake, seven asleep—and, exhausted from the day’s work, had slept. Every two hours the guards changed. Every hour the CP called for a situation report. For Cherry, for all of 1st Sqd except Silvers who bore the responsibility of their move, it had been the best night of sleep since stand-down.

  The ambush team stood up and marched in silently.

  Whiteboy, Egan and Thomaston greeted them. “What’d you guys fire up?” Egan asked.

  “Gooks,” Lairds laughed.

  “Let’s go over it,” Thomaston said. He pumped them with questions, received vague answers about movement and asked them if they would like to return for a first light check, “Which you shoulda done before you left.”

  “Augh, Man,” Silvers groaned, “we just humped back.”

  “I’ll go,” Egan volunteered. “Who wants to tricky-trot up there with me?”

  In lights the recon element, Egan, Whiteboy, Moneski and his gun team and Hoover with the radio, moved very quickly. They were to the LZ and back in forty minutes.

  “Hey,” Egan laughed when they returned. “Hey Silvers. Here’s your gook. Here’s the gook you got last night.” On the end of his rifle Egan had an American fatigue shirt that had been blown to hell. Half the platoon clustered close to see. They were all laughing.

  Whiteboy guffawed. “Yer squad finally got a body count.” Whiteboy threw the shirt up into a tree. “It was just a dang-a-lin lahk that,” he laughed.

  “Ah, that don’t prove nothin,” Num
bnuts protested. Everyone laughed at him.

  Egan grabbed the shirt and tossed it at Silvers playfully. “Here’s your gook, Leon.”

  They were uncharacteristically loud. Cherry laughed along with them all, not saying a word.

  1st Plt and the company CP retraced their steps across the ridge, into the ravine and up, and rendezvoused with 2d and 3d Plts. The unit’s field force now stood at eighty-three, down from ninety on the morning of 16 August if the PIOs and correspondent and the dog team and Ridgefield were included: eighty-three men with the mission of descending into the Khe Ta Laou to assault the suspected Headquarters of the 7th NVA Front, eighty-three soldiers assigned to search out and destroy a suspected, long occupied, extensively developed and heavily defended supply base and staging area.

  The company moved in column down a finger toward the valley. 2d Plt led followed by the CP and then 3d. 1st Plt hung back as rear security. The column moved quickly at first; then, as the point element hit thicker and thicker vegetation, the column barely edged forward. The terrain became steeper. Standing was exhausting. Rucks dug deeply into shoulders. The straps pulled at shoulder skin made resistant by the continuing rain. The skin distorted from the pressure and felt as if it were ripping. Arms became weary from holding weapons, from grasping small trees for handholds to keep from sliding, from pushing and lifting bodies and rucks back up after they had fallen. The point pulled his machete and selectively sliced a trail. Behind point one hundred and sixty-six boots mulched the cuttings into the mud and sections of the trail became slides. Alpha came to a series of cliffs. 1st Plt sent forward the ropes Egan had used at the tunnel. The point rigged them for rappeling and the column descended.

  From the top of the first cliff Cherry glared down at the valley. It was the closest he had come. He, all the boonierats, had been looking at it for four days, glimpsing it through breaks in the vegetation, through a waxing and waning fog shroud. Cherry glared down upon it. Beneath the fog there would be a different world. Over he went, rappeled.