Matterhorn_ A Novel of the Vietnam War Part 53

'Why not, Jack?' Goodwin asked.

'The government would never give us a license to blow up half the customers.'

There was a moment's silence. Then Murphy raised his gla.s.s. 'Here's to the Bunker,' he said. His head jerked up toward the raised gla.s.s.

'And all the customers,' Hawke said.

There was another silence while they toyed with their gla.s.ses. 'Ah, f.u.c.k you guys,' Murphy said. 'You don't know a good time when you have one.'

'Typical f.u.c.king lifer, Murphy,' Mellas said. 'Every s.h.i.+tty thing's a good time for you guys. That's why the government will always get you to do its s.h.i.+tty jobs for it.' Mellas tossed back the rest of his drink and put the gla.s.s on the table. 'You're f.u.c.king fools.'

Everyone was quiet. McCarthy was clearly suppressing a smile. He caught Hawke's eye and then looked toward Murphy. Mellas didn't pick up on the fact that he was sailing in treacherous waters.

'Someone's got to do the s.h.i.+tty jobs, Mel,' Murphy said, wrapping his hands around his empty gla.s.s.

'Well, I've done all the s.h.i.+tty jobs they'll ever get me doing. I'm getting the f.u.c.k out. f.u.c.k you and and your government, if you're dumb enough to stay in.' your government, if you're dumb enough to stay in.'

'How in the h.e.l.l do you expect the f.u.c.king Marine Corps to ever get its s.h.i.+t together if you chickens.h.i.+t a.s.sholes f.u.c.k off and leave it because you figure you can make more money someplace else?'

'Suck out, Murph. All the f.u.c.king money in the world wouldn't keep my a.s.s in the Crotch.'

'So why are you leaving?'

'I f.u.c.king hate it, that's why,' Mellas said. 'I'm sick of the f.u.c.king lies and covering the lies with blood.'

'I'll drink to that,' McCarthy said, and belched.

'That's no f.u.c.king answer,' Murphy said. His beefy arms rested in pools of spilt bourbon. The others were sitting back in their chairs, silly grins on their faces, watching Mellas and Murphy pair off, the hare and the bear. 'You guys take off and leave it to the liars and the a.s.slickers and the troops get f.u.c.ked over worse. You're just chickens.h.i.+t to stand up in public with a G.o.dd.a.m.ned short haircut because you're afraid you'll never get laid.'

Instead of accepting that the gibe hurt because it was true, Mellas lost his temper. 'You stand the f.u.c.k up,' he said, rising from his chair. His fists were clenched.

McCarthy pulled him down by the back of his utility jacket. 'Jesus, Mellas, Murphy will kill you. Just because he hit a f.u.c.king sore spot doesn't mean you have to become a human sacrifice over it.'

'Murphy's right,' Hawke said. 'Since you been in the Corps, Mellas, how many women you dated that have gone to college and aren't southern?'

'f.u.c.k all, that's how many,' McCarthy answered for him.

'Right,' Hawke said. 'You go up to D.C. and there's all sorts of college girls working for all sorts of government offices, but you're there in your short f.u.c.king haircut and you're a n.i.g.g.e.r in Georgetown if ever there was one.'

'Thank you, Theodore J. Hawke,' Mellas said. 'Another pea-green philosopher.' He thought of Karen Elsked and felt empty.

Hawke leaned back in his chair. 'You think I'm lying? In six months, you two'-he was pointing at Mellas and McCarthy-'six months after you're out of the Corps, if you get out of this place alive, you'll be G.o.dd.a.m.ned long-haired commie intellectuals telling everybody how f.u.c.ked up the war is and how you knew all along. And you know what? You'll be lying. Lying so you can get ahead in their world. You'll be wearing your hair down to your a.s.s, smoking dope, and marching and protesting and wearing f.u.c.king beads and sandals just like the rest of them. And you'll be doing it for no other reason than to make the girls like you.'

'f.u.c.k off, Hawke,' McCarthy said.

'I won't f.u.c.k off.' Hawke leaned back into the table. 'You'll both be afraid to go back to the world and tell all those a.s.sholes that you were good f.u.c.king Marines. Oh, you weren't Marine legends. You weren't even the best. But you were good. And you'll try to tell everyone how bad you were and how sorry you are so you won't have to explain how it really is. How good it can feel to do something so bad.'

'You're f.u.c.king drunk,' McCarthy said, 'but I'll drink to that.' He did, draining his gla.s.s and then smacking it down on the table. 'I f.u.c.king volunteered.'

'Didn't we all?' Mellas said. He stood and raised his gla.s.s, nearly falling in the process. 'Here's to the f.u.c.king volunteers.' Everyone solemnly stood. Hawke was weaving uncertainly. Murphy and Goodwin were leaning against each other. They touched gla.s.ses and drank. Then Mellas turned and looked directly at Hawke. He held his empty gla.s.s in front of his face and, looking over it at Hawke with his good eye, quietly said, 'Bravo has died. Bravo is risen. Bravo will fight again.' Then he raised the gla.s.s above his head. 'Mea culpa,' he added.

Hawke's eyes focused for a moment and he solemnly made the sign of the cross. 'Absolution,' he said, somewhat slurred. His eyes became unfocused again. Mellas smiled his thanks, and he and Hawke clinked gla.s.ses. Mellas looked for a moment at his empty gla.s.s and then let it drop to the floor. It broke. He took a full gla.s.s and held it above his head while he made a complete turn. Then he dipped his thumb and two fingers into the whiskey and began to anoint those around him with solemn ceremonial movements of his wrist, chanting, 'Dulce et decorum est pro patria mor-r-i. Dulce et decorum est pro patria mor-r-i.'

Hawke knelt down and stuck his tongue out. McCarthy solemnly placed a piece of cracker on it. He picked up a whiskey gla.s.s with both hands and began to pour the contents slowly on Hawke's head. The whiskey dripped down Hawke's face. Then McCarthy made the sign of the cross over Hawke's head and chanted, 'In the name of the colonel and the Three and a do-nothing Con-n-gress.'

Hawke knelt there with his tongue out, catching the amber liquid as it dribbled down his face. McCarthy then held up his fingers in a V-the peace sign-and turned slowly around, his arm raised high over his head. He intoned to the now silent crowd, 'Peace. My peace I give you.' Then, with his thumb and two adjoining fingers together, high above his head, he turned a complete circle, saying, 'Deliver us from every evil and grant us peace in our day.' After that he took the empty gla.s.s, looked at it for a moment, and shattered it against the wall. Hawke threw himself over backward and lay on the floor, spread-eagled, staring drunkenly at the ceiling.

'Hey, Jack,' Goodwin said, 'this party's getting too f.u.c.king religious.'

In Ca.s.sidy's room they pa.s.sed around some beers. They felt the closeness that arises from sharing, as in pa.s.sing a peace pipe. Hawke talked about his number-one squaw. She'd written him a letter saying that she had a new boyfriend and that she couldn't go on writing to him, because she was opposed to what he was doing. The five of them drank to her continued good health and moral fiber. Mellas could tell that Hawke was hurt badly, but Hawke didn't let on and drank with everyone else, mocking the end of the relations.h.i.+p.

Eventually the beers were finished and Goodwin, Murphy, and McCarthy wandered out to get two hours of sleep before pus.h.i.+ng off on the operation. Hawke and Mellas were left alone. Mellas was bone-weary and his head was spinning. He wanted to sleep but knew this was their last night together before their new formal relations.h.i.+p added a layer of complication. Tomorrow Hawke would be the skipper and Mellas the executive officer.

They fiddled with the empty beer cans in an embarra.s.sed silence. Finally Mellas gently tossed his empty beer can at Hawke and said, 'You scared about going back to the bush?'

'Why you think I'm f.u.c.king drunk?'

They were silent a moment.

'I'm glad you got the company, Ted. It would have been a disaster if I'd have gotten it.'

Hawke smiled and shook his head. 'Mellas, you dumb s.h.i.+t, you didn't have a chance of getting it. You're still a boot motherf.u.c.ker.'

Mellas smiled and nodded his head in agreement. 'Yeah, but it still would have been a disaster.'

'f.u.c.k, Mellas. You'll make first lieutenant in another month or so, then a few months after that you'll be short and all you'll want to do is go home. So that's when they'll offer it to you, when you won't want it any more. But there won't be any better alternative, so you'll take it on. And you'll be the best alternative.'

Mellas laughed, pleased and embarra.s.sed at the praise. 'Anyway, it'll be a pleasure to work with you. In fact, I'd seriously think about opening up that f.u.c.king bar with you if we make it back to the world.' He laughed briefly through his nose. 'The Bunker. I'd let all the vets watch the customers through one-way mirrors.'

Hawke leaned back and smiled at the roof of the tent. Then he sat up, suddenly sober. 'It's a f.u.c.king fantasy, Mellas. At least for eighteen years.'

'What do you mean?'

'I went regular.'

'No.'

'Yeah,' Hawke said. He tried to sound lighthearted. 'Wrapping myself in Marine Corps scarlet and gold.'

Mellas said nothing.

Hawke fumbled for the right words, looking at his crumpled beer can rather than at Mellas. 'You know. s.h.i.+t. I don't know what the f.u.c.k I'd do once I got back to the world. You're different. You'll go to f.u.c.king law school or something and walk right on up to the top. Me? s.h.i.+t. There's good people here. Mulvaney. Coates. Ca.s.sidy. Even Stevens. He tries.' He looked up at Mellas. 'Good guys. Good officers.'

'If I hadn't thrown my f.u.c.king beer can at you I'd toast you.' Mellas lay back on the rack and stared at the folds of the tent above him, watching the play of shadows from the single candle. 'Murphy's right. The troops get f.u.c.ked even worse if the good guys don't stay in.'

Mellas thought in silence about the old Bravo Company, now gone, scattered to hospitals in j.a.pan or the Philippines, or in rubberized body bags on commercial airliners heading across the Pacific toward home.

'Tell me something, Hawke,' Mellas said, not looking at him but just watching the shadows on the ceiling. 'Before you become Bravo Six'-he couldn't resist adding a small bite-'and a regular'-Hawke flipped him the bird-'why did the colonel send us up the f.u.c.king hill the second time?' Mellas's voice started to tremble. It caught him by surprise. 'The gooks weren't running. Delta Company could have done it.'

Hawke took some time before he answered. 'Because you volunteered. He'd cut the order for the a.s.sault but at the last minute he told Fitch that he'd switch in Delta if Fitch didn't want to do the job.'

Mellas sat up. The tears that had started to form when he began talking about the a.s.sault were shut off, but his throat constricted. 'What?'

'Simpson told Fitch he had two choices: get the company's pride back for abandoning Matterhorn, which is why there had to be another a.s.sault, or be a yellow-livered dog and let Delta Company clean up Bravo's mess.' He paused. 'And all that entails. You know how small the Marine Corps is.'

'If I'd known Fitch volunteered, I'd have wanted to kill him, too,' Mellas said quietly, almost musingly.

'And if you'd been faced with the same choice, you'd have volunteered just like Fitch,' Hawke said.

'I know it,' Mellas answered.

'You still feel like killing Simpson?'

'Naw. You know I went crazy up there. He was just doing his job.' Mellas lay back on the cot. 'I just wish he'd do it sober.' He laughed and Hawke joined in. Then they lapsed into silence.

'The funny thing is,' Mellas said, 'I still like Fitch. I'd have gone up the hill with him even if I knew.'

'Before or after you would have killed him?'

'Both.'

The two were again quiet. The alcohol blurred Mellas's vision and threatened to pull him into sleep. Then he surfaced again. 'He still volunteered us, the poor f.u.c.king b.a.s.t.a.r.d. He'll carry that a lot longer than a bad fitness report. And here I've been feeling bad because I enjoy killing people.'

Hawke laughed quietly. 'At least you're over the hump on that one. It's the people who don't know it who are dangerous. There's at least two hundred million of them back in the world. Boot camp doesn't make us killers. It's just a f.u.c.king finis.h.i.+ng school.' He gave a bitter laugh. 'I remember my ex-f.u.c.king squaw telling me it was inconceivable-that was her word, inconceivable inconceivable-that she could ever go to Vietnam like I did, no matter what the consequences. This was just before she went to Europe for her junior year and met her new boyfriend.'

With one hand Hawke crushed the beer can he was holding. He began to work the mangled can back and forth, twisting it, bending it. Mellas didn't say anything. 'None of them have ever met the mad monkey inside us,' Hawke added. 'But we have.'

'There it is,' Mellas said.

Hawke's voice became softer and softer. 'Maybe we could have an amus.e.m.e.nt park across the street with a ride called the Mad Monkey.' He lay across the cot, feet on the floor, eyes closed.

'You're about to crash, Jayhawk,' Mellas said gently.

'f.u.c.k if I am,' Hawke mumbled. 'I'm just resting my eyes.'

They both laughed at the old joke. Then Hawke's breathing became slow and regular.

'Hey,' Mellas said. 'Jayhawk.'

'Hmm.'

Mellas lifted Hawke's feet up on the cot, put a poncho liner over him, and blew out the candle. The tent was plunged into blackness. Mellas made his way through the rain and darkness to the Bravo Company supply tent and rolled up in his poncho liner. He fell asleep on the metal runway floor, listening to the wheezes and grunts of the sleeping strangers who would soon share his life so intimately.

Someone was shaking him awake.

'What the f.u.c.k is it?' he whispered, his head aching badly.

'It's me, China, sir.'

'G.o.dd.a.m.n, China, what the f.u.c.k do you want?' Mellas rolled over. His wounded eye was pounding even worse than his head. He wondered what he'd done with the patch, or whether he'd lost it someplace. Then he found it on top of his head.

'Lieutenant Mellas, you got to help. They's gonna be trouble tonight.'

'What do you mean?'

'I mean I think they's gonna to be someone killed,' China whispered.

Mellas heard a sc.r.a.ping sound outside the tent behind China. Then a match was struck and he saw Mole lighting a candle. Mole's face, like China's, was tense and worried.

Mellas said, 'Oh, f.u.c.k, I got to p.i.s.s. Give me a f.u.c.king second.' Mellas stood outside the flap of the tent and peed into the darkness and cold. When he returned, China and Mole were talking in low whispers. The others were sound asleep, except for the new lieutenant, who was staring at the three of them wide-eyed, but keeping out of things. Mellas led them outside.

'Now what the f.u.c.k's going on?' Mellas whispered. He was fully dressed, not having undressed when he had collapsed on the floor.

'It's Ca.s.sidy, sir,' China said. 'I think they gonna frag him tonight. I wanted to just throw a f.u.c.kin' fake in, you know, to make a statement, but they gonna waste him instead. They said a f.u.c.kin' pop won't get nothin' done.'

'But Ca.s.sidy's in f.u.c.king Quang Tri,' Mellas said. 'What the f.u.c.k can I do about that?'

'No, he's not, sir. He's come back. We saw the lights on in there tonight.'

China's words jerked Mellas's spine straight. 'Jesus Christ,' he whispered. 'The Jayhawk's in there.'

Mole, startled, looked at China. 'That's why we couldn't find him.'

Mellas started running. He could think only of getting Hawke out of Ca.s.sidy's rack. He felt sick and wanted to throw up but kept running.

Mole flew past Mellas, his longer legs moving even more swiftly, sprinting with everything he had to reach Hawke. China, who was stockier, came behind. All three were filled with a dread that pushed them like a hand on their backs, racing with them, as the low ground fog swirled beneath their running feet.

The explosion ripped through the air and sent Mellas ahead even faster, running as he had never run before, but burdened by despair.

Dark shadows flitted away from the tent. Mellas rushed through the entrance just behind Mole. He could see nothing inside. He smelled the sickening, burning odor of TNT. Mellas stumbled over to the rack where he had laid Hawke. The grenade had gone off directly beneath him. Pieces of mattress ticking still hung in the air. What remained of the torn mattress was sticky with blood. He tried to feel where the bleeding was coming from, running his hands over the limp body. 'Get a light!' he screamed. 'Get a f.u.c.king light!' Hawke was lying facedown. Mellas located Hawke's head and felt his neck for a pulse. There was nothing. He felt beneath his body for his chest and encountered only warm pulp. He'd been laying facedown when the grenade went off beneath him.

Mellas heard footsteps outside, and then a flashlight shone in through the door. The light shone on Hawke's face. His eyes were open. He must have heard the grenade clunk to the floor just before it exploded.

China was trembling in the doorway of the tent with the flashlight. Mole was talking to him quietly, his arm over China's shoulder. They both looked at Mellas, terrified.

Mellas began to shake. Unable to control the shaking, he squatted on his haunches, steadying himself on Hawke's rack, looking at Hawke's open eyes. There was no Hawke behind them.

'Bye, Jayhawk,' he said, and closed the eyes.

He stood and looked at Mole and China. He wanted to beat them senseless, cut their tongues out, for keeping quiet until it was too late. He wanted to scream accusations of murder and send them to prison. At the same time he knew that nothing would be gained but more bitterness. Justice in the midst of war was a sc.r.a.p of paper in the wind. If he implicated Henry, he would drag in China and Mole, and he didn't want to do that. Their only sin was the one he'd committed too often himself, not speaking up. Besides, he liked them, and the company couldn't afford to lose its two best machine gunners. He was suddenly aware that he was thinking like the company commander. He had 200 Marines to take care of. Everyone could deal with his own conscience. Mellas truly no longer cared about justice or punishment-at least, he no longer cared about the kind the courts stood for. Revenge would heal nothing. Revenge had no past. It only started things. It only created more waste, more loss, and he knew that the waste and loss of this night could never be redeemed. There was no filling the holes of death. The emptiness might be filled up by other things over the years-new friends, children, new tasks-but the holes would remain.

Mellas saw Hawke's tin-can cup hanging on his belt suspender over the back of a chair. He unhooked the cup and stuffed it into one of his own pockets. 'You two had better get out of here,' he said quietly to Mole and China as he walked out past them.

Mellas stayed around for the inevitable hullabaloo. Bravo Company, to a man, stonewalled, as did he. All he knew was that he'd been asleep when the grenade went off. Any investigators would have to find their way to Henry on their own. If they didn't, so be it. If they did, there'd be insufficient evidence to bring about a trial, much less a conviction. Moreover, there was a war to fight, and no one would benefit from a long and time-consuming murder investigation.

When the hullabaloo died down, Mellas walked alone to the edge of the deserted landing strip and lay down in the mud. He cried until he could cry no more. Then he just lay there, empty, alone beneath the slowly graying sky.

Goodwin finally found him and helped him up. They walked to the COC bunker, where Blakely informed them that Mellas would be the new company commander until a captain arrived. If Mellas did a good job, maybe he'd get a company of his own later-maybe even Bravo Company. His first task, however, once Eiger was secured, would be to help the S-1 write up the investigation of the accidental death.