Matterhorn Page 53

  He passed the large gap in the barbed wire and kept going. The bunker was only fifty meters above him now. He kept waiting for the bullet that would end the run and would let him rest. He almost wanted that bullet so he wouldn’t have to continue with the awful responsibility of living. But he ran. He zigzagged. He twisted. His breath came in painful gasps. He saw a shallow hole just above the bunker and to its right. He prayed. He pictured himself striving for it, saw himself from above, small and puny on the vast terrible hillside, his legs churning. The hole loomed large above him. He hit the hole and rolled, catching a glimpse of movement from the corner of his eye. He twisted around, bringing his M-16 to bear at the same time, and was on the point of pulling the trigger, knowing he was doomed. Then the movement solidified into a person wearing a bloody head bandage. It was Cortell—with three new kids. They had followed him.

  Mellas came to his feet, releasing the spoon on the grenade he’d been carrying. He rushed toward the door of the bunker, praying that Jacobs would have the sense to stop firing as he closed in on it. Mellas reached the door and ran past the bunker, throwing the grenade inside. He rolled to the right as Cortell came running after him, dropping in a grenade of his own. The two grenades went off almost simultaneously.

  Mellas rolled to his feet. He looked behind him in bewilderment—and then with joy. Jackson was running toward him. Behind Jackson was another fire team. To their right, another group was charging the machine-gun bunker while it still received the new gunner’s disciplined fire. The whole platoon was swarming up the hill after him. Far off on the right flank of the assault, Mellas saw Second Platoon scrambling to keep up, Goodwin running in front, waving them forward.

  Mellas’s heart surged with wonder.

  Bullets were now flying uphill from the Marines and downhill from the NVA. They were so thick that at one point Mellas heard two bullets collide and then ricochet with a singing buzz parallel to the crossing fire. The air was filled with roaring and screaming. Then farther down the slope Mellas saw, looking like rag dolls, those who hadn’t survived or wouldn’t survive. Some twitched fitfully. Two were crawling toward the defilade. The others lay still, in awkward positions.

  Three minutes had passed since the opening shot.

  From Helicopter Hill it looked like a textbook assault. In fact, it was. Blakely was pacing up and down in excitement. Simpson, his eyes pressed to his binoculars, was clenching his jaw so tightly that his neck muscles stood out in cords.

  Mellas was running hard to his right, shouting as he went, trying to get his platoon to move toward Goodwin’s. The fight had disintegrated into the mad actions of individuals. Noise, smoke, confusion, and fear prevailed. Mellas rounded a slight knob and saw Goodwin about 100 meters away, running parallel to the hill with the radio receiver in his hand, his radio operator scrambling after him to keep the cord slack.

  Jackson handed Mellas the receiver. “It’s Scar, sir.”

  Mellas could barely make out what Goodwin was saying, because of the noise and Goodwin’s wild panting. “There’s a gun—edge of the LZ—fucking us up good, Jack.” There was more machine-gun fire. Mellas saw Goodwin go down and then get up. “Got to get the motherfucker—with grenades,” Goodwin shouted. “Don’t move toward it.”

  Just as Goodwin was speaking, Mellas saw Robertson pop up from a shell hole and disappear across the lip of the LZ. He was amazed to see Robertson so high above the rest of them. Goodwin was moving upward beneath the lip of the LZ with five others, carrying two grenades each. They couldn’t see Robertson; they had no idea he was there. Mellas reached for the receiver. Just as he started to shout, “Goddamn it, Scar, I’ve got a man up there,” Goodwin sprinted forward, away from his radio. The five Marines followed in a rush.

  Robertson popped up, running across the LZ toward the same bunker Goodwin’s group was after, in full view of everyone except them. Robertson reached the bunker’s top just as twelve hand grenades came sailing over the lip of the hill. He tried to stop short, his arms flailing in the air. He threw his own grenade away and tried to sprint to safety. The grenades began going off in a sustained explosion, obscuring him.

  Mellas, still holding the handset, shut his eyes. The smoke cleared slightly. The machine-gun opened up again. Mellas heard Goodwin cursing over the radio.

  Then Robertson appeared again. All alone, inside the ring of enemy fighting holes, exposed, he ran back to the machine-gun bunker. He dropped in two grenades, then stood calmly taking a third from his suspenders. He pulled the pin and tossed it in. Just then, fire and smoke erupted from the bunker beneath him. He sank to his knees, twisting slightly, and fell out of sight.

  Mellas knew he was dead.

  “Robertson got the bunker, Scar. I watched it go up,” he radioed.

  Goodwin immediately started moving his platoon forward.

  Then, from Helicopter Hill, Mellas became aware of a faint sound of cheering. The cheering filled Mellas with white-hot rage. He turned to look behind him. Marines were firing at bunkers, trying to maneuver up on them from the sides. The North Vietnamese were obviously finished but still kept firing at the Marines from holes on the lip of the LZ.

  Mellas’s fury gave him the cunning of an animal. He forgot everything that had happened before this moment. He knew only that he wanted to kill. He didn’t care who or what he killed.

  He shouted at Hamilton over the radio. “Goddamn it, get fucking moving. These bastards are going to start running off this hill and I fucking want them. Move! Move! Move! I want these fucking gooks killed. You hear me? Over.”

  “Aye aye, sir,” Hamilton’s voice crackled back. Hamilton was gasping for breath.

  Mellas headed for the open holes above the covered bunkers. He knew that now the work would be dirty and methodical. There would be no more cheering. It occurred to him how much the NVA must hate them, not to get up and run.

  Jacobs joined Mellas and Jackson. His face was streaked with black powder, mud, and sweat. His Instamatic dangled against his flak jacket.

  Mellas was directing fire teams and individuals, watching as position after position was destroyed. He moved cautiously, in quick rushes, with long waits in between. Jackson and Jacobs followed his every move.

  Suddenly a man rose from a hole above them and threw a grenade.

  Mellas was transfixed by the sight. The small black object seemed to hang suspended in the air above him.

  “Grenade! Chi-comm!” Jackson yelled. Mellas saw the grenade explode. Two small objects hurtled past his head, one on each side. Then the world went black as the explosion enveloped him. It slammed him backward, nearly pulling his head from his neck. He sank to the ground, giving in to the blackness; the sounds of the firing and confusion whirled away from him. Dying was a huge relief. For the first time, he felt safe.

  Jackson crawled forward to reach Mellas and called for Doc Fredrickson. Mellas’s face was covered with blood, powder burns, and bits of solder. Jackson shouted again, but Fredrickson was out of hearing, moving among the bodies left behind in the initial wild run up the hillside. Jackson started shaking Mellas. “Sir, sir. You OK?” He kept looking around for help. The radio was yammering in his ear, but now he or Jacobs, not Mellas, had to make the decisions.

  Jacobs crawled up to Jackson.

  “J-Jesus. I-is he all right?”

  Jackson was still shaking Mellas and saying, “Sir. Sir.” He turned to Jacobs. “I don’t know. I think he’s dead. Fuck.”

  Jacobs cursed.

  “It’s your fucking platoon now, Jake. What we going to do?”

  Jacobs had no idea. A burst of rifle fire sent bullets snapping above his head. He saw Fredrickson running to another body far below. Then the NVA soldier in the hole above them popped up again and threw another grenade.

  “Chi-comm!” Jacobs shouted. He and Jackson grabbed Mellas by the legs and tore down the hillside, dragging him facedown. As they ran down the hill the grenade followed them inexorably, moving with gravity, as if linked to them. Jackson finally figured it out and shouted, “Stop!
” He and Jacobs dug their heels in. They buried themselves against the inert Mellas and the deadly canister bounced on past them. It exploded about half a second later, just below them. Neither of them was hurt.

  Jacobs turned Mellas over, faceup. He tore open both of Mellas’s flak jackets and put an ear to his chest. “I can’t hear fuck. God damn it.” Then Jacobs pulled off Mellas’s helmet, took his canteen out, and poured grape Kool-Aid all over Mellas’s face, washing some of the mess away. He kept shaking the canteen, emptying the remaining drops on Mellas’s eyes, which were shut tight with black powder, solder, blood, and dirt.

  The world again became black for Mellas. He felt the cool stickiness and smelled the sweet grape odor of the Kool-Aid. Then there was the sound of firing and screaming all around him in the darkness. He felt, rather than heard, someone shouting and pulling at his flak jackets and helmet. He tried to move. He couldn’t. He tried to open his eyes and finally managed to open one. He saw gray light. The nightmare was continuing. He could not wake up. He wanted to return to oblivion. There were sounds of voices shouting, heard as if underwater. He again came back to the gray light. He knew that he had something to do with or for those voices. He became aware of Jackson lying on top of him, shielding him from fire. He realized that the grenade had been faulty, splitting in two down its soldered seam instead of shattering into deadly pieces. He became aware that Jacobs was shouting over the radio, lying on his back next to him and Jackson, staring upward at the sky, probably talking with Fitch. “Ah, f-fuck, Skipper, I think he’s Coors. G-grenade. Right in the face. No c-corpsman. What do I do now? Over.”

  “Will you get off me?” Mellas said quietly to Jackson. “I can’t fucking move.”

  Jackson rolled off, tangling the handset cord around Mellas’s neck, so that the handset was nearly pulled from Jake’s hand. This forced Jake to look at Mellas.

  Jake saw Mellas open one eye. “J-jesus fuck, Lieutenant,” he said in relief. “I thought I was g-going to have to take the platoon.”

  “Thanks,” Mellas said. “It’s nice to know you’d miss me.” Mellas’s face felt raw, as if there were no skin on it. He couldn’t open his right eye. He assumed he’d lost it.

  He noticed the purple liquid on his hand as he tried to wipe his eyes clean. “I told you I hate fucking Bugs Bunny Grape,” he said.

  Jackson was looking up the hill. His eyes opened wide. “Oh, fuck,” he whispered. “Chi-comm!” A third grenade came bounding down the hill. Jackson and Jacobs pulled Mellas with them, tripping over each other. They hit the dirt as the grenade exploded. A sudden concussion hit them. There was a puff of dirty smoke, and then the smell.

  They started to scramble back up toward the hole. Jackson pulled out a grenade and flipped it in a hook shot, arching it over the edge of the lip in front of the hole. It exploded.

  They waited a moment. Mellas’s head finally cleared.

  Again a deadly black canister came sailing over the lip in reply, and the three of them scrambled for safety. Jacobs started parallel to the hill but slipped. He clawed at the steep slope to try to stop his downward momentum. The grenade was sliding down the hill with him. Jacobs cried out in frustration and terror. His fingers raked the muddy clay; his boots churned against the embankment. His eyes grew wide. “I can’t f-fucking st-stop!” he cried.

  The grenade went off. Mellas and Jackson both turned their faces to the earth. When they turned around again, half of Jacobs’s neck was laid open by the shrapnel. They ran down the hill, grabbed him by his shirt and web belt, and dragged him sideways to a tiny depression in the ground, hoping it would give them shelter. Blood was spurting from Jacobs’s throat. He was trying to stop it with his hands. Mellas pushed them aside and put his own hand into the long narrow hole, feeling the warm throbbing of the blood, the tiny bubbles of air escaping from Jacobs’s lungs. Jacobs could make no sound. Only his eyes could express the terror of that last moment.

  Mellas cried out and shoved his filthy fist hard against the severed carotid artery, trying to stanch the blood. Then the light went from Jacobs’s eyes and the terror vanished. Mellas rolled away from him. He looked at Jackson in bewilderment and anguish. Blood dripped from his hand. “Jake? Jake?” he said, questioning, accusing, grieving.

  Another chi-comm rolled down the hill. They threw themselves to the ground, and the grenade exploded. They were still alive, for no particular reason. Jackson went yelling up the hill, the heavy radio, seemingly forgotten, on his back. He had a grenade in his right hand and a rifle in the left. Mellas, with sudden clarity, saw the solution. One of them should not duck. He ran to Jackson’s left. Jackson hurled the grenade with a moaned curse, then hit the dirt, waiting for it to explode. Mellas did not hit the dirt. He kept running. The grenade went off. Mellas felt invulnerable to it. As the smoke cleared, Mellas threw himself to the ground just at the edge of the lip. A young North Vietnamese soldier pushed his head out of the hole. There was another kid with him, but that one was slumped, inert, against the back wall of the hole. The young NVA soldier pulled another grenade. He cocked his arm back to throw it. Then he saw Mellas’s bloodied, blackened face and the rifle pointed squarely at him.

  Mellas watched the young man’s face change from determination to horror to resignation. Still Mellas did not pull the trigger. “Just don’t throw the fucking thing,” he whispered, knowing the young North Vietnamese soldier could not hear or understand him. “Just don’t throw the fucking thing and I won’t shoot. Just give up.” But Mellas saw hatred fill the young man’s face. That hatred had kept him in his hole, fighting, beyond any possible hope of survival. And even now, Mellas thought, the kid must have guessed that if he didn’t throw the grenade Mellas wasn’t going to shoot. But he threw the grenade anyway, his lips curling back from his teeth.

  Fuck you, then, Mellas thought bitterly as the grenade sailed toward him. He pulled the trigger and the M-16 responded on full automatic. The bullets ripped through the kid’s chest and face, blowing the backs of his lungs and brain out. Mellas put his head down on top of his rifle and moaned, “I told you not to throw it, you fucking asshole.” The grenade exploded, scattering shrapnel all along Mellas’s left side. He was still wearing two flak jackets, so only his buttocks and legs took the jagged metal.

  Jackson found him there, still lying on top of his rifle, a few seconds later.

  “You all right, Lieutenant?”

  Mellas nodded. He painfully rose to a half crouch, using his rifle to push himself up. Marines were gathering beneath the lip of the landing zone. All that remained to be dealt with were a few isolated holes on top, where small groups of North Vietnamese had taken cover.

  “They’re running!” he heard someone shout. “They’re fucking running!”

  At last.

  His eye felt as if a nail were being hammered into it. His legs were burning. He limped up to the two dead North Vietnamese soldiers who had been throwing grenades at them. They looked about fifteen or sixteen years old. He poked one with his rifle and there was a movement, a twitch. He pulled the trigger, forgetting that he still had his M-16 on automatic, and fired three bullets through the kid’s head before he could stop.

  His rage was gone, and in its place was an inert, sick weariness. Mellas now knew, with utter certainty, that the North Vietnamese would never quit. They would continue the war until they were annihilated, and he did not have the will to do what that would require. He stood there, looking at the waste.

  Below the west ridge, Hamilton’s work was just beginning. “They’re coming off the hill,” he shouted. “Goddamn it, hurry. Let’s go!” He and Mole emerged from the jungle onto the defoliated ridge. They threw themselves down, and the rest of the squad scrambled to join them. Hamilton was pointing excitedly at a small group of figures who were trotting in an orderly fashion off Matterhorn. Mole set the bipod of the gun down on the earth. His A gunner crawled next to him holding the long belt of bright copper bullets away from the feeder assembly. Mole began to fire. Two of the figures went down. The others scattered.

  “We’re
getting some, Lieutenant,” Hamilton said happily over the radio. He saw a small hillock just in front of them. He tapped Mole on the shoulder. It would be a perfect place to command the entire finger. He stood up and ran, the radio on his back. Mole started after him.

  A rocket-propelled grenade slashed violently out of the jungle where the NVA had taken cover. It exploded in front of Hamilton, killing him instantly.

  Mole shouted Hamilton’s name. He tossed his gun to his A gunner, grabbed Hamilton’s body, and dragged it back to their original safe position. The rest of the squad followed him. Mole wasn’t about to get his ass killed because some fucker went bloodthirsty on them.

  The fight for the LZ moved into its final phase. The south and east slopes were covered with Marines methodically killing anything that moved. Fitch and the CP group were walking up the south slope. Hawke and Connolly, who had captured the NVA machine gun, were covering the exposed northern slope, firing at the retreating enemy with careful short bursts. Three groups of NVA, unable to escape, had set up positions in the old Golf Battery artillery pits. One of the groups had a machine gun that was keeping the Marines at bay, covering the top of the hill with its fire.

  Mellas radioed Hawke. “I’m sending a baseball team around to the north to get behind that fucking gun. You’ll see character Charlie with a bandage on his head instead of a helmet. Don’t shoot his ass. Over.” Mellas looked up at Cortell, who was nodding, his filthy bandage unraveling slightly.

  “You tell him to pop some smoke when he gets there so we don’t shoot him. Over,” Hawke returned.

  Mellas relayed the message, and Cortell nodded again. Mellas pulled his last smoke grenade from his belt suspender and gave it to Cortell.

  There was a sudden explosion nearby. The three of them flinched. There was yelling in Spanish. Amarillo had thrown two grenades into a bunker just below them and was now crawling rapidly inside. There was a brief spatter of shots from his .45. Everyone waited anxiously, watching the entrance of the bunker.