“These men” — the woman gestured at the other young men in the room — “they stood with my cousin; they would not shoot the prisoners either. They know what is right. The officer pointed his gun at my cousin, accused him of treason. The men pointed their guns at the officer. And someone fired.”
Chuck shuddered. If they had been caught fleeing with Ajax, would the same scene have unfolded? Would it be Billy or Double O lying on a bench somewhere, disowned by his country?
“The officer was shot, dead. My cousin was shot too,” said the woman. “The prisoners escaped, and these men fled. They carried my cousin here only yesterday. And now you have come here too, running. We are a village now for those who are running away.”
“We aren’t running away,” Billy corrected her. “We’re running to somewhere. There’s a difference.”
“Yes,” said the woman. “But, like my cousin, you have left your army for what you think is right.”
“It is right,” said Chuck, more certain than ever.
“Yes.” The woman nodded, but it wasn’t clear if she was agreeing, or simply ending the conversation. She went back to the men, presumably giving them the bad news about her cousin. Then she took the map from them and they pointed to it and talked some more.
“See?” said Chuck. “They’re helping.”
“But they’re VC,” said Billy. “The enemy. Just because they deserted their side, doesn’t make them not VC. I mean, we’re still American, right?”
“So what?” said Chuck. “VC, Charlie, ARVN, communist, socialist, US Army, who cares? They’re all just names for the same thing. Just people. And right now, we’re just people trying to do a good thing for a dog who needs it. We’re not here to fight them. We’re here for Ajax.”
“Yeah,” said Billy. “Because Ajax saved us from people just like them who were trying to kill us.”
“We were trying to kill them too,” said Chuck. “It’s war. The only one innocent in all this is Ajax.”
“They cannot be certain,” the woman said, returning with the map. “But the place you are seeking may be here.” She jabbed her finger at a point on the map, about another full day’s hike away. “There is much fighting in the hills along the way. You must be careful.”
“We’ll do our best,” said Chuck. “Thank you.” He folded the map and put it in his pocket. He nodded his thanks to the men sitting along the wall, knowing they had been, until recently, his enemy.
“If you would like to eat with us,” said the woman, “you are welcome to stay longer. We do not have much, but what we have, we will share.”
“No, thank you,” Chuck told her. “You’ve done more than enough. I’m sorry we couldn’t do more for you.”
She joined her palms together and bowed her head. Then she turned to sit beside her cousin and hold his hand as his breathing slowed and his heartbeat faded.
Chuck stepped outside. Billy and Double O rushed across the courtyard to pick up their weapons, which remained exactly where they had been left.
Doc Malloy stood next to Chuck and looked down at Ajax and the boy. They had both worn themselves out playing. Ajax was still tied around the pillar, but he’d curled up beside it to sleep. The boy slept too, curled up with Ajax, using the big dog as a pillow. One of Ajax’s paws rested across the boy’s chest, like a hug.
“I guess there are two innocents in all this,” said Doc.
“But we can only save one of them,” Chuck said. “Let’s move out.”
He stepped over to Ajax and squatted down to untie him. The dog sighed as he woke up and stretched out all four of his legs. As he stretched, the boy awoke with a yawn. He looked up at Chuck and smirked. Chuck smirked back at him.
“Sorry, little guy. Playtime’s over,” he told the kid, who he knew couldn’t understand a word he said. Ajax stood and nudged the boy with his nose, knocking him sideways. “Playtime’s over for you too, Ajax.” Chuck laughed and pulled the dog away from his new friend.
Ajax whined.
“I think your dog likes our village very much,” the woman said, standing in the doorway. Her cheeks were puffy and her eyes damp, like she had just been crying.
“I guess so,” said Chuck. Chuck looked over his shoulder to Billy and Double O, wiping down their rifles, and Doc Malloy, reorganizing his medical kit. “I suppose we can let them play for a few more minutes.”
He looked down at Ajax. The dog looked back up at him, his tail wagging. As soon as their eyes met, Ajax sat and perked his ears. It was his way of asking for something, showing off what a good dog he could be.
“How can I say no to that face?” Chuck shook his head and let go of the leash. Ajax immediately bounded over to the boy again, knocking him down with a friendly whack of his paw, and in an instant the boy and the dog were rolling together in the mud, giggling and barking.
Chuck was amazed at how gentle Ajax could be. His mind flashed back to the image of his dog pulling that VC prisoner from the tunnel, a guy who could have been fighting with the men of this very village, and here was Ajax, at peace and at play just a few days later. It gave him hope. The world wasn’t such an ugly place after all, as long as a boy and a dog could play.
The other guys came over and stood beside Chuck, watching the wrestling match. Double O shook his head in disbelief, wondering why anyone would want to roll in the mud with a dog like that. Billy thought about his own dogs back home, how much he hoped he’d get to see them again. Doc’s thoughts were still back in the dim building, wondering if he’d done all he could for the wounded man, doubting himself.
Suddenly, Ajax stopped playing. He stood up straight and perked his ears. The boy still had his arm wrapped around Ajax’s neck and the dog lifted him right off the ground as he stood. Then Ajax growled, and the boy fell. He scurried backward on hands and feet like a crab.
“Don’t worry.” Chuck rushed for Ajax. He grabbed the leash as he explained to the woman. “He’s not attacking. He’s warning us.”
“About what?” said Billy.
“Shh,” Chuck snapped. “Someone’s coming.”
“More choppers?” asked Billy.
“I don’t hear choppers,” said Double O.
“Shh!” Chuck snapped again. “Listen.”
They stood silently in the muddy village square, listening, the soldiers, the dog, the boy, and the teacher.
“Trucks,” said the woman. “I hear trucks.”
They all heard it, the groan of truck engines pushing their way through the mud, heading toward the village.
“Americans?” asked Billy.
“I don’t think so,” said Doc.
Double O was the first to see the puff of black smoke from a struggling diesel engine rising from the trees. Then they all saw a jeep followed by a covered personnel carrier emerge from a narrow jungle road, bouncing along the muddy road that led through the rice paddies to the village.
“ARVN,” said Double O. “South Vietnamese Army.”
“At least they’re on our side,” said Billy.
“But they’re not on the side of those guys in that building,” said Chuck.
The soldiers looked at each other, none of them knowing what to do. The woman ran back into the building to warn the others.
“We gotta get out of here,” said Double O. “Whatever happens, it’s none of our concern. This is a problem between the Vietnamese. And we don’t want to be around when it goes down.”
“No time to get to the jungle,” said Chuck. “We’ve got to hide and wait it out.”
The men agreed. They looked back at the schoolhouse, which had gone as dark and quiet as when they’d first arrived in the village, and then they rushed out to take cover in one of the rice paddies.
As they left, Chuck glanced back and saw the boy’s face in the dark opening of the building. He was waving at Ajax. Then the woman pulled him away, and the village fell as silent as a grave.
The South Vietnamese soldiers of the ARVN rolled into the village with
a thunder of activity. A commander jumped from the jeep, holding a pistol. He started shouting as soon as his feet touched the ground, and soldiers poured from the back of the truck, their rifles in their arms. They scurried around, taking up positions in the courtyard.
Crouched down again in the muck of a flooded rice paddy, Chuck held Ajax low and stroked his ears to keep him quiet. Billy gripped his rifle close to his chest and closed his eyes, listening, while Doc sat next to him, looking up at the sky and trying to ignore the thought that, below the water, a horde of black leeches was surely sliming its way into his boots and up his pants legs to prey on his soft, pink skin.
Double O peeked over the top of the paddy, gazing through the tall elephant grass as the soldiers overran the village. He thought back to spying on Chuck and Doc, preparing to run their ridiculous covert operation to seize the ping-pong table. At least Chuck and Ajax were on his side this time. He couldn’t believe that had happened only a week ago.
“What’s going on?” whispered Billy, who didn’t dare raise his head to look for himself.
“That teacher’s come out to talk to the commander,” Double O said, watching the woman, alone in the courtyard, speaking to the commander with her hands folded in front of her, looking down at her feet. She looked so small and weak, nothing like the fierce woman who could silence a room of men by raising her arm in the air. She was putting on a show for the soldiers.
Double O watched as the commander nodded like he was listening carefully, then pointed his pistol right at the woman. She gasped. The little boy came running from inside the building and clutched at the woman’s side.
“That boy must be her son,” said Double O.
The commander seemed to soften when he saw the boy. The men behind him shifted nervously with their rifles.
The commander spoke to the boy; he crouched down to the boy’s level and asked him questions. The boy shook his head in big side-to-side motions. Even from far away Double O could tell the boy was answering whatever had been asked with a lie. Little boys are rarely very good liars. The commander stood and rubbed the boy’s hair as he talked again to his mother.
Then he raised his pistol, putting it gently against the boy’s head, right in the spot where he’d just ruffled his hair.
The boy froze.
The woman dropped to her knees, pleading.
“Just give them up,” Double O whispered, willing the woman to give in, to protect her son. The woman wasn’t giving up, though.
The commander barked an order at his men and a small group stormed into the big building. Double O cringed, waiting to hear gunshots, the eruption of a firefight, but no shots came.
There was some shouting, and then a silence as heavy as Double O had ever heard, and then, one by one, the Vietcong from inside the building stepped outside with their hands up, prisoners of the young soldiers of the ARVN, their fellow countrymen.
How could they do this to their own?
Double O thought back to those images he’d seen on the news, of cops beating up protesters in Selma, Alabama; cops beating up protesters in Chicago; protesters turning into angry mobs in Watts and Detroit and the Bronx. Americans, all. He’d said it before, and now he realized how true it was: The Vietnamese and the Americans weren’t all that different. Both were capable of heroism, and both could just as easily become monsters.
The woman’s face crumpled as she watched the men being led out of the building and loaded onto the truck. Even her cousin’s now lifeless body was carried out and tossed like a sack of rice into the back.
The woman wept and pleaded with the commander, but he ignored her, keeping his gun steady as he shouted at his men. The engine of their jeep roared to life. The truck sputtered and idled. The women and children from inside the building huddled in the doorway, watching with blank faces. They did not look afraid. They looked, simply, exhausted.
The commander finally lowered his gun from the boy’s head, gave him a chillingly friendly smile, and walked back to the truck. The boy stood still as a statue.
The woman crawled after the commander on her knees through the mud, covering her clothes in filth, begging. Double O guessed she wanted her cousin’s body back. The commander continued to ignore her. She grabbed his pants leg, just as her boy had grabbed her pants leg when Ajax had barked at him.
The commander stopped.
He turned to the woman, and without hesitation, he slapped her across the face. She fell backward, and he stepped over her, walking briskly back to her son with his gun raised. The boy took two hesitant steps back as the commander pressed the gun to his head once more. He cocked the hammer of the pistol back, ready to fire. The woman screamed.
Double O felt something bump him to the side in the grass. He looked down and saw Ajax shoot like a rocket onto the mud path, racing to the village square, barking furiously. Chuck scrambled after him, trying to call him back without shouting. The commander turned to look at Ajax, an expression of confusion on his face, and then he pointed his gun away from the boy and at the dog.
“No!” Chuck yelled, but his own rifle was still hanging from his shoulder.
Before the commander could fire, before Double O even knew what he was doing, he’d pressed his rifle to his shoulder and aimed down the barrel at the commander’s chest.
The commander lifted his pistol higher, taking aim at the charging dog. Ajax leapt from the ground, launching himself like a missile at the commander, whose finger tensed on the trigger of his gun.
And then Double O stood tall in the grass with his rifle hot in his hands and he squeezed the trigger.
The burst of gunfire seemed to slow down time.
The commander fell backward into the mud, his pistol still in his hand, his head bent at an impossible angle. Ajax landed in the mud beside him and sniffed curiously. Then he trotted over to the boy and licked his face.
No one else moved. It was like time had frozen for everyone but the dog.
Even Double O himself stood still, his gun barrel smoking. His eyebrows were lifted in surprise, like he hadn’t really expected to shoot.
The commander was dead.
His men looked from the dog to the American soldier standing in the tall grass by the rice paddy with puzzlement on their faces. Then one of the soldiers shouted and pointed at Double O, and the shocked silence gave way to chaos.
The people in the doorway of the low building screamed and shoved at one another to get back inside.
The woman pulled herself from the ground and ran to her son, sweeping him up in her arms and rushing him inside to safety.
Ajax barked.
The rest of the Vietnamese soldiers scrambled out of the truck again, rushing to take up defensive positions, and they fired madly at the rice paddies. Double O threw himself back down into the water below as bullets zipped overhead like angry fireflies.
“We stepped in it, now!” yelled Billy, with that same rush of excitement he’d felt during his first battle. “We’re in it, for sure!” He looked over at Double O, who was pulling himself out of the muck. “Nice shooting,” he added.
“Women, children, and dogs,” sighed Double O. “You mess with them, you mess with me. The warrior’s code.”
Billy nodded. He liked the sound of that. The warrior’s code. It made their whole adventure sound more honorable, instead of crazy. “Quixotic,” he said out loud, because it sounded like a word for a man who lived by a code.
Bullets sliced into the flooded field in front of them, kicking up geysers of filthy water. Chuck dared a glance over the tall grass. He saw Ajax alone in the square surrounded by soldiers whose smells he didn’t know, and flinching at the loud crack of gunfire. Ajax barked, and Chuck saw the Vietnamese soldiers notice him barking. The dog had saved the boy’s life, but now he was the one in danger.
Chuck stood in spite of the gunfire blazing through the brush, and he whistled. Ajax stopped barking, looked up at Chuck, and broke into a run back across the field of battle, weaving th
rough the gunfire, racing the bullets toward his master. Chuck rushed forward to meet him, ducking the sheets of machine-gun fire tearing up the grass around him.
“Chuck, get back here!” Doc yelled, but Chuck could think only of reaching his dog, of protecting him. When they met, Ajax dove straight into Chuck, knocking him back onto the mud, as bullets slammed in all around them. Chuck grabbed the dog in a tight hug and rolled, so that he was on top, so that his body was between his dog and danger.
Ajax struggled in Chuck’s arms, trying to get free. Chuck had to hold him down with both arms, his own rifle hanging uselessly over his shoulder. He started crawling back toward the cover of the rice paddy, low so that the soldiers couldn’t see exactly where he was in the high grass. He dragged Ajax beneath him. The dog whimpered with fear and confusion.
“It’ll be okay,” Chuck comforted him. “It’ll be over soon. It’ll all be — Ah!” He felt a sharp pain in his hip, and for a moment he thought he’d been bitten by a snake. Then he felt a quick series of punches on his back that knocked the wind right out of him and he knew that he had just been shot.
He gnashed his teeth together and tried to keep moving, but he couldn’t make himself go. His body wouldn’t obey. Ajax panted nervously beneath him.
“You okay?” Double O called from about twenty feet away. Between the watery ditch where he and Billy and Doc were dug in, there was just open space. If he tried to make it across, the soldiers in the village square would have a clear shot at him. He was pinned down. It was a pretty good excuse not to move.
“I’m okay!” Chuck whisper-shouted back, and gave Double O a thumbs up, even though he knew it was far from the truth. He couldn’t even lift his shooting arm. And the pain in his hip was extraordinary. He saw Doc looking at him nervously, but he turned his head away. He didn’t want Doc to see the fear in his face.
Strays Page 9
