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  Cortell laughed. “Sit down here, m’ man. You ain’t got phase two of my sermon yet.”

  Williams sat down. “Speak, Reverend.”

  “We ain’t Negroes any more.”

  “You were when I was in high school and that was only last spring.”

  “We ain’t Negroes any more. We blacks.”

  Williams only half-suppressed a smile, knowing Cortell would see he was amused. “So if we were whites last spring are we supposed to be called Blancos or Caucasios or something now?”

  “Get back.”

  “No, really. I mean, what did you folks used to be called?”

  “Niggers,” Cortell said, opening his eyes wide.

  “Not that. Fuck you. I know that’s an insult. You know what I mean. I mean what did you folks called yourselves.”

  “Don’t give me any ‘you folks’ stuff either. You talkin’ to one man here.”

  “OK, then. What did blacks used to call yourselves?”

  Cortell thought a moment. “Well, Negro a lot, actually. The Reverend King called us that. But he dead. It seem too close to nigger now, or nigra.” His mind raced through an image of southern aristocracy and then any possible connective root between the words genteel and gentile, which he quickly dismissed. His mind was always doing that to him. “Negro doesn’t have that, you know, pride thing.” He held up the bolt of his M-16, trying to catch the last of the light on it to see if he’d missed anything. “Sometimes we called ourselves people of color.”

  “People of color. Never heard that one.”

  “Yeah, but you from Idaho.”

  Williams gave Cortell the finger and went back to wiping down the barrel of his own M-16 with another oiled patch.

  “Anyway,” Cortell went on, “we blacks now. Ever’one be some color. Even white is a color.” Now it was Cortell’s turn to let Williams know he was suppressing a smile. “But it be a pretty dull go-nowhere do-nothin’-for-you insipid color.”

  “Whoa, Cortell. In-sip-id.”

  “What, you think I’m some dumb cotton chopper with no vocabulary just because I talk like I live in Mississippi?”

  Williams smiled at him. “People of color,” he said. “Pee-oh-cee.” He paused, then said, “Poc.” He waited just a moment, then, “Poc, poc.” It had the sound of a coffee percolator just starting to boil.

  Cortell shook his head, smiling at the foolishness.

  Williams was suddenly on his feet again. “Poc, poc, poc.” His head was thrown back and now the sound was like a chicken squawking in a barnyard. “Poc poc pocpocpoc.” He was walking half-crouched, his neck poking forward, hands tucked under his armpits with his elbows out. “Poc, poc, poc, poc.” He crowed and strutted. Heads turned from up and down the line and then turned back to what they were doing.

  Cortell hung his head, trying very hard not to laugh. “You do that shit ’round some of the other brothers they wring you chicken neck.”

  “Poc.” Williams sat down. “Poc, poc.”

  “I know you a dumb Blanco from Idaho so I don’t have to kill you,” Cortell said, “but you make fun of somethin’ serious and do some that poc poc stuff in front of the wrong brothers and you be in some serious shit.”

  “Serious shit?” Williams said. “Serious shit?” He raised his arms and indicated everything around him. “This is serious shit. Everything else is horseshit.”

  They resumed assembling their rifles. It had never occurred to Cortell, until now, that friendship, not just getting along with someone, was possible. It had never occurred to him that friendship was not possible, either. It had just never been there as a thought at all. Williams had simply been a fact, like the jungle or the rain. He started to muse on this. How could something occur to him that had never been in his mind before? It had to have been there before—otherwise, it wouldn’t have popped up—but it must have been hiding someplace. Where was that someplace in the mind where all that stuff hid? Was that what people meant when they said “the mind of God”? But then, that meant God’s mind was inside him someplace—and Cortell got a little scared at where his head was taking him. He’d have to get someplace quiet, the way he always did when these kinds of questions scared him, and talk with Jesus about it. Maybe he could go talk with the battalion chaplain someday when they got out of the bush. He wondered if the new lieutenant knew the answer. Someone said he’d been to college, and they had to teach them something about God there, didn’t they? Then he started wondering who they were.

  “Or maybe chickenshit,” Cortell replied to Williams. As usual, the time lapse between someone’s last words and his own reply had been filled with all these thoughts, but they came so fast that the person he was talking with wouldn’t even notice a pause. Cortell assumed it happened like that to everyone.

  After a while Williams said, “So, I mean, about growing up to someplace. Or someone. I don’t know. I mean, you got somebody in mind? Martin Luther King or Cassius Clay or somebody?”

  Cortell looked up at the darkening clouds. “Nope. I got Jesus. He’s my to.”

  “Yeah, but Jesus is white.”

  “Nope. He be a brown Jew. God got it just right.”

  While working on the bunkers, Mellas caught glimpses of Simpson and Blakely, but neither of them ever came down to the lines so it was impossible to meet them without appearing obvious. Midway through the next day the storm slacked off to the usual drizzle, and at lunch break Mellas tried another path.

  When he reached the top of the hill, some artillerymen were grunting one of the heavy 105-millimeter howitzers into the center of a new gun pit. All the trees were gone. The top of the hill was stacked with cannons, crates, and machinery. Matterhorn looked like an aircraft carrier in a jungle sea.

  Mellas spotted the cluster of radio antennae above the new battalion combat operations bunker and ducked down through the small opening. Two hissing Coleman lanterns lighted the gloomy interior; the air was warm and smelled of their fuel. A lieutenant was moving markers on a map. The lieutenant frowned. Mellas quickly identified himself as an officer. “Hi,” he said. “Lieutenant Mellas, Bravo One.” He put on his nicest smile.

  The watch officer brightened. “Bif Stevens, arty liaison, Twenty-Second Marines.” He held out his hand and Mellas took it, noticing how soft and clean it was. They chatted, Mellas asking intelligent questions, Stevens responding, apparently glad to see that at least one of the grunts actually cared about what he did for them. Mellas thought about asking, as his own private joke, if Stevens had any booze, just to make it look as if that was the real reason for showing interest, but he decided against it. He kind of liked the guy.

  “Are there many guys like Fitch?” Mellas eventually asked. “I mean, lieutenants running companies?”

  “Not a lot,” Stevens answered. “Maybe one to a battalion for the line companies. Some mustangs for headquarters and supply companies. It’s all luck.”

  “How’s that?”

  “You know. Right place at the right time. Being the company executive officer when the CO gets killed or transferred. That sort of thing.”

  “You think Hawke will get Bravo when Fitch goes?”

  “Like I said, it’s timing—and if he’s crazy enough to want to stay in the bush. He’s overdue now for the rear. Policy is to get as many lieutenants exposed to combat as possible. They’ll rotate Hawke someplace soon as we get some. Same policy for captains. Of course we’re short of captains.”

  “Yeah, they all got killed when they were lieutenants,” Mellas quipped.

  Mellas stored Stevens’s information about transfer and command policy in the part of his mind that dealt with power. This was as automatic for him as it would be for a farmer to store the morning’s weather report and the smell of the air, and then to harvest a week early and beat the unseasonable rains.

  Two men pushed through the blanket over the entrance, spilling light and cold air inside. One was neat and good looking, even handsome, and wore the gold leaves of a major. The other was small, wizened, and tough, his face both young and old, marked by lines and the strain of a body that had seen extreme use and maybe too much alc
ohol. Silver leaves gleamed from a neatly starched collar. Mellas felt excited. It was Lieutenant Colonel Simpson, Big John Six.

  Simpson gave Mellas a puzzled look. Major Blakely, on the other hand, returned Mellas’s smile. “Who do we have here, Stevens?” he asked.

  “Lieutenant Mellas from Bravo Company, sir,” Stevens replied.

  “Ahhh. One of our new tigers. I’m Major Blakely, the battalion Three. Meet Lieutenant Colonel Simpson, our commanding officer.” Blakely shook Mellas’s hand. Mellas felt dirty and unkempt.

  Simpson reached out a small hand. His grip was surprisingly strong. He grunted. “Welcome aboard, Mellas. You an oh-three?” he asked, referring to the military occupational specialty, or MOS, for infantry.

  “Yes sir,” Mellas replied, laughing. “Looks like you’re stuck with me a lot longer than ninety days.”

  “Good,” Simpson said with a grunt, satisfied. “You a regular?”

  “No sir, not yet.” Mellas paused, giving a “young man at a crossroads” look. “I’m thinking about it, but I’m also thinking about law school.”

  “High-paid fucking clerks,” Simpson said. “Pussies, too.” He walked over to the map and started asking Stevens about the disposition of Alpha and Charlie companies in the valley to the north.

  “The Marine Corps needs lawyers, too,” Blakely said.

  “I know, sir. But for me there’s only one reason to stay in the Marine Corps—to lead men. That’s why I’m an oh-three.” Mellas noted that Blakely wore a Naval Academy ring and Simpson wore no ring. “Of course, most of my friends from Princeton are going to law school,” he added, knowing Blakely would pick up on it.

  “Jesus Christ,” Simpson said with a snort, “how’d we ever let someone with a fucking communist education into the Marine Corps?” Blakely and Mellas both gave the expected laugh, as did Stevens.

  “Well, sir,” Mellas said, “you know how low standards have slipped since you joined.”

  “Jesus, don’t I,” Simpson said.

  Mellas knew he’d connected. He also knew that this moment was the perfect time to leave, but he wasn’t through. He turned to Blakely. “I don’t know how law school could compare with having a platoon. Being a platoon commander has to be the greatest experience of my life. I suppose only running a company could have it beat.” Blakely nodded. Mellas could see that he was anxious to be with the colonel. “I was really lucky to get Lieutenant Hawke’s old platoon. He’s one of the best. We’ll really miss him when he gets out of the bush.”

  Blakely raised his eyebrows. “He due out soon?”

  “Overdue. And is he ready.” Mellas laughed. “He’s been in the bush nearly ten months. It’s a pisser, though, losing all the experience so new lieutenants like myself can pick it up. It’s hard on the men.” Mellas paused, then brightened. “You must snap up guys like Hawke as soon as you can.”

  Blakely smiled smugly. “We manage to hang on to our good ones.” He and Mellas were dancing, but as far as they were concerned it was just chatting. Like most good dancers, they made it look easy.

  At the three-day deadline the bunkers were only half finished. Because the battery now offered a much more tempting target to the NVA, the security patrols had to be pushed out farther from the hill, and so they took much more time and effort to complete. The Marines would return, already exhausted, to start blasting trees into logs with C-4 and hacking at the logs with their K-bars. Unremitting physical effort combined with the monsoon rains, the mud, and the ceaseless hammering of the artillery battery left them nearly in a stupor.

  But they kept at it, digging their fighting holes deeper into the root-bound clay. The bunker roofs had to be raised high enough above the fighting holes so a man could stand on a ledge and fire above the hole’s parapet. The roofs had to be set on supporting walls formed from sandbags filled with clay. These walls, and their new exits and entrances, were eventually several feet high on the downhill side and barely aboveground on the uphill side.

  The defensive lines grew more distinguishable. No longer were they made up of holes that blended in with the earth and the mass of torn limbs and brush. The holes had been transformed into naked, angular structures, stark against the denuded hillside, looking like sturdy little boxes poking out from the slope.

  Mellas worked hard like the rest of them, learning from Jancowitz the subtleties of bunker construction. Don’t use rocks, because they splinter into deadly shards. Dig pits and shelves to keep feet and ass free of standing water. Interlace hard material with soft to absorb blast energy. Soon Mellas was not only helping with the hacking and hauling but enjoying the intricate planning of the total defense. He carefully walked the ground from the jungle upward, finding how the lay of the land channeled attackers into natural avenues of approach. Then he set the bunkers so that the avenues of approach would be filled with machine-gun bullets. Pegs were carefully driven into the ground so that the swing of the machine-gun barrel would be limited and the fire would be directed into the avenue of approach even in total darkness. More barbed wire came in by chopper, and the exhausting, hand-bloodying work of stretching it tautly below the bunkers continued.

  Hawke and Fitch both recognized a natural defensive engineer in Mellas and soon had him coming with them whenever they toured the perimeter. Solving the intricacies of setting bunkers so that each bunker was defended by at least two others was an exercise in iterative geometry that came naturally to Mellas. Move one bunker, and all the bunkers around it had to be moved. Getting it right before the bunker was built was the trick, because if one fire team finished a bunker without considering all those around it, a critical weakness could be created in the interlocking system. Mainly because of Hawke’s natural feel for the probable pattern of assault and Mellas’s ability to figure out placement, only three half-finished bunkers proved to be misplaced and had to be destroyed and rebuilt just a few feet from their previous positions, to the exasperation of those who had built them.

  Every hand in the company ran with pus from jungle rot. Bacteria invaded the cuts and open blisters. Old gloves—even gloves with holes in them—brought more cash than had been paid for them originally. Eventually, though, these transactions dwindled. Any gloves, with or without holes, became as precious as mail and no market price could be struck. Going out on patrol, which used to be a dreaded duty, became a longed-for holiday.

  It took six spirit-breaking days to finally complete the bunkers. No one celebrated. On the seventh day the kids rested by doubling the patrols. That evening, Fitch opened the actuals meeting with a terse announcement. “We’re heading into the valley at first light. The battery and the battalion CP group will start pulling out simultaneously. Charlie Company will be where they drop us and take the same choppers back here. They’ll provide security for battalion staff and the artillery during the shift. Then they’re all heading for the lowlands. Some big fucking operation around Cam Lo.”

  “We just finish the bunkers and they’re pulling everyone off?” Mellas grabbed a lone surviving plant and savagely uprooted it, flinging it down the hill. “Jesus Christ,” he hissed, his teeth clenched. “Just like that. We’re pulling out.” He had grown proud of the job they’d done—of himself, his platoon, all of them—in spite of the fact that it made them more vulnerable at night. Given enough ammunition, he felt they could hold off a regiment.

  “We and Delta flip-flop missions with Alpha and Charlie,” Fitch continued slowly. “Relsnik has it from a battalion radio operator that regiment gave Big John Six one last chance to prove he’s got lots of gooks out here. We’ve also got responsibility for blowing the ammo cache Charlie Company uncovered. They ran out of C-4.”

  “You mean we’re going out in the jungle just to look around?” Mellas asked. “A whole damned company?”

  “Two damned companies,” Hawke corrected.

  “Well, I’m not telling those guys down on the lines that we’re leaving after what they’ve been put through. You get the colonel or that goddamned Three down there to explain why we whipped their asses into the ground so we could pull out the second we built the
goddamned Rock of Gibraltar in the middle of goddamned nowhere.”

  “Look, Mellas,” Fitch said tightly, “simmer the fuck down. We leave at first light. You just get your platoon ready to move.”

  The rest of the actuals were silent. Kendall fiddled with his wedding ring and his wraparound yellow sunglasses. Goodwin, looking drawn and haggard, squatted on his heels toying with a stick. His constant clowning had been a source of relief during the construction. He had said nothing during the entire meeting.

  After the meeting, Mellas made his way slowly down the hill, wondering how he’d break the news that they’d built the bunkers for no purpose. It also surprised him, after all the days of looking into the valley, wondering what it was like down there, worrying about going, that now it was time to go, just like that. His entire world had been instantly transformed at the word of a man he barely knew. The platoon could be ready to go in half an hour. All they needed was to pack their food and ammunition. But he felt there should be more time, some ritual of getting ready, before they plunged into that dark valley.

  When Mellas reached his hooch, everyone was already there. It was obvious that everyone knew. Jackson, now leader of the Third Squad, had his pocket notebook out and his pen ready; he looked very serious. Bass had presented Jackson with the decision to make him acting squad leader in Janc’s absence and had given no alternatives, just telling Jackson he was it. This was the best they could do to alleviate the problem of Jackson’s worrying about reactions from the brothers. Connolly, the leader of the First Squad, was looking down at Mellas’s C-ration box, his legs apart and his hands on his hips. He kept spitting into the box, seemingly unconscious of what he was doing. Occasionally he would look out at the valley and curse; his Boston twang was just loud enough to be heard. “Fuckin’ A, man, the fuckin’ Crotch. There it is.” Then he’d spit into the box again, making Mellas cringe because he’d probably have to open one of the packets that Connolly had spat on. He said nothing, however, feeling this wasn’t the time. Jacobs, who had taken Second Squad from Fisher, was also staring into the fog below them. He turned to look at Mellas, his eyes flashing. “F-fucking bunkers. F-for nothing.” Then he turned again to the fog, saying nothing more. Mellas knew the company history as well as any of them. Bravo Company had never been on an op without at least three deaths.