DEPLOYMENT VIETNAM -Part 1, Page 4

  Dan pulled the grader off the road onto a grader-sized flat in the sand that he had made a couple days before so he could get the grader off the road and out of the way of any military traffic which might stop to visit or to grab a drink and something to eat.

  Sitting on her zories so she wouldn’t get her white pants dirty, was the young woman he had watched walking down the road a week ago. She was by herself and only about three feet from where he had stopped the grader’s front tire. On the sand next to her was her basket which appeared much like what the girls were carrying except for a small bundle about the size of a softball wrapped in a banana leaf with a narrow red silk ribbon tied to hold it together.

  As Dan looked down at her while giving the grader’s engine a chance to cool down a bit met her brown eyes. Again he saw how soft and doe-like they were and surely didn’t miss the soft smile that crept across her lips then lit up her whole face. The blush of her embarrassment seemed to flash up the exposed sides of her neck and although she turned her eyes down, the fingers of her right hand came away her basket to wiggle in a friendly little wave. He saw that her neatly filed fingernails were longer than the average female villager’s and were clean as were her hands with no sign of grime or betel nut stains on them. She washes her hands and keeps her nails clean. More so than the other girls.

  Dan couldn’t help but smile in return when he jumped down from the grader’s high deck on the same side of the grader as she was sitting. He walked towards her on his way to get a drink and C-ration pecan roll. When he attempted to meet her eyes, her smile deepened, and when she turned her eyes to meet his they were shiny in a smile and if possible, her red blush deepened as he drew closer.

  “Hi.” Dan spoke softly.

  Softer still she answered, “Hi yourself.” She replied with an American phrase in perfect English that had no sound of a Vietnamese accent.

  He stopped in surprise. He couldn’t take his eyes off of her as he stood for several seconds before giving a small shake of his head and resuming his walk towards the waiting ice water and his pecan roll. When he got to the trailer and reached for the C-ration can he saw that she was still watching him. When she realized that he was returning her gaze, the red stain of blush flashed back up her neck as she dropped her eyes hiding her face behind her non-la.

  While opening the can containing a C-ration pecan roll he looked to where the pretty young Vietnamese woman was still sitting patiently on her zories and watching the other girls as they were gathering up their baskets and getting ready to move to where they usually hung out at the Army Brigade gate a mile or so down the road.

  She doesn’t look as if she’s in any hurry to leave or go with them. Wonder what’s up and what that’s all about? She really doesn’t seem to be part of that group anyway. They’re mostly from Chu Lai and I only saw her with them last week yet they’ve been hanging out at Brigade headquarters off and on all winter.

  As the girls set off down the road Dave looked down at the open can he held. Shrugged his shoulders slowly and walked over to the young woman stopping to take a C-ration cup of ice water in his other hand.

  “Would you like this. It’s a kind of cake.” He said quietly and offered her the roll.

  She looked up in surprise.

  “Davis, you going to be here a few?” Ryder hollered from the far side of the weps. “I’m going to get one of those security troops hanging around the bridge to come down and give us some security. The trucks will be hauling you some fill in a while. The chief said you would know where they were to start dumping? Some where north by the haul road?” Ryder asked.

  “Yeah. Just this side of the haul road. We want to start repairing the shoulders and widening the sub-grade a bit.”

  As he spoke, Dan felt the can of pecan roll leave his hand. Taken from him gently.

  “Thank you. It’s a pecan roll. I’ve never had one before.” She spoke softly and very quietly. And again in perfect English.

  “Water?” He offered her realizing that she had stood up and was standing next to him. Her head barely reached his shoulder. She was trying to get the roll out of the can which he knew was no easy task. With a paper cup around the cake its total size was larger than the size of the can opened with a P-38 C-ration can opener, so it took a bit of manipulation to extract it in one piece.

  “Here. You take the water and I’ll get that out of the can for you.”

  Leaning against the grader’s front tire he turned the can upside down and when the roll started out caught it with his finger tips and tugged and twisted it the rest of the way out into his hand tearing its paper cup it was in as he did it.

  A soft snicker came from her and he felt her arm cross next to him when she set the empty water can on top of the tire he was leaning on.

  “You’ve been practicing taking rolls from their cans.” She said in her quiet voice with a gentle smile. Thank you.”

  “What is that in your basket, wrapped in the banana leaf?”

  He could see that she was becoming embarrassed again and was going back to where she had left her zories and basket sitting on the sand dune. She sat again on her zories and carefully started to eat the sweet pecan roll.

  Thinking she was ignoring him in her embarrassment, he asked “Would you like more water?”

  “Yes please. The roll is a bit dry.” As she answered, she maintained eye contact with him for a few seconds before speaking again. “It’s my lunch. What you call sticky rice. See.” She picked up the object of their conversation and pulled back on corner of the bright green leaf revealing a lump of what Dan thought might be brown rice.

  “It is gao ne’p Vietnamese rice. Not polished like American rice. A bit brown which is the inside of the hulls.” She answered his unasked question.

  Handing her a freshly filled C-ration can of ice water from the water cooler, he asked “What’s your name? I can’t just holler ‘Hey you’ whenever I see you.”

  “You expect to see me again?”

  “I will if you keep coming down this road. I’m going to be working out here for a few more months.

  So? What shall I call you besides? ‘Hey you’.”

  “Linh. If you really see me again. It means gentile spirit. My mother thought that I was very gentle when I was being born. Trying not to hurt her.”

  “I’m embarrassing you, sorry. I don’t mean to embarrass you. Linh? Right?”

  She answered so quietly Dan could barely hear her. “Yes. Linh is my first name.

  You are not embarrassing me. I am embarrassing myself. I am being too brazen. A Vietnamese woman should not be talking to a foreign man, any man, as I have tried to speak to you.

  Your last name on your name tag is Davis. Is that what your friends call you? I also need to know so I don’t have to holler ‘Hey you’ either.”

  “Linh? I like that. A very nice name and your English is very good even if I can barely hear you. Too good for village girl. Right?”

  “I don’t want to call you Davis. I know that is not what you like. So?” She laughed softly and kept a steady gaze in his eyes before speaking with no hurt or defensiveness in her voice. “I am not a village girl. I am a city woman.”

  “Whoa! I hear you and I did not mean to insult you. And as an excuse I have to admit that I’m ignorant of Vietnamese customs and what would be the correct way to speak to you.

  They call me Dave.”

  “That is just a shortened version of your last name. Is that what your family called you?

  And you don’t have to apologize to me. I didn’t mean to scold you. I also make mistakes when I talk to Americans as you do when you speak to me.

  “All right. my full name is Dan Lee Davis. My mother called me Dan and sometimes Danny. Most of my close friends also say Dan, but a few very close friends get away with calling me Dan Lee. Casual military friends use Dave.”

  “That is common in the Am
erican military to use a shortened version of a last name? Why?”

  “I think because it is on our name tags so it is easy to remember and read.”

  Dan heard the loaded truck coming closer on the road and knew he had to get back to work.

  “I have to go. I’ll see you later?” He asked her as he shoved a newly opened pecan roll into his mouth and climbed onto the grader.

  She answered just before Dan hit the diesel engine’s starter switch. Only very loudly now. “I’ll be here all afternoon and everyday this week.” She then waved a full hand wave and smiled brightly. She mouthed some words which were smothered by the roar of the big engine starting.

  That looked like ‘be careful’ but I can’t be sure. She is also embarrassing herself again. He thought when he saw the red of her almost perpetual blush cover her throat.

  Dan backed the grader onto the highway and waved to Linh and hollered one word. “LATER” before going down the road towards the waiting dump truck.

  Again she smiled and nodded a small careful nod and the fingers of her right hand waved their tiny goodbye.

  She is definitely educated. Maybe even a Stateside education. Her accent sounds almost like Southern California. That is kind of hard to believe here in the middle of nowhere in South Vietnam.

  When Dan pulled into his parking spot for lunch at the crew’s trailer he looked around but none of the Vietnamese girls were around. He had hoped in the back of his mind that Linh would be there.

  Guess she went down the road to Brigade headquarters with the others. None of them can make much money hanging around here with just three or four of us only here spastically.

  Never saw that kid before. Where did Ryder find him?

  Ryder had come back from the bridge and not only had brought a seaman from bridge security but had a Vietnamese boy of 8 or 9 years old following him around.

  “This is Honcho. He lives in the ville next to the bridge. We can use him for an interpreter. Speaks good English and has lived here all his life and knows everybody around here.”

  “Hey, sounds good to me, Dick. Just make sure that he stays away from the equipment when it’s running. I’d hate to see him get squashed under the duals of a dump truck.”

  “I think he’ll be fine. I was told by the builders that he’s been hanging around the bridge job ever since they started and hasn’t created any problems. His father is a village sub-chief or some such thing in the village this side of the bridge.”

  “Can we keep the security? It’s impossible for me to be running the grader and laterite pit and still watching our trailer.”

  “That’s okay, Dave. I’ll make sure somebody is always here if you’re too busy or too far away.”

  Nice clean kid. Good clothes and his hair is cut short and even. Clean teeth with a nice smile. Very different from a lot of the street urchins that are roaming around here. Wonder how they came up with that name for him?

  Dan filled his canteen cup with ice water and after taking a couple of swallows started to pick over some loose C-ration cans trying to find something that would appeal to him for lunch. He didn’t hear Dick Ryder come up beside him walking in the soft sand.

  “I saw your girl friend at the Brigade gate with the rest of the girls. She kept looking this way down the road. Maybe looking for you?”

  “Oh shit! I didn’t know you were here Dick.

  She is kind of cute don’t you think. But not hardly my girl friend. I’ve only said twenty words to her and I think she has only said half of that to me.” He answered as he picked up a can of hardtack biscuits with a fudge disk then continued browsing amongst the cans from previously opened C-ration boxes. He finally picked up a can of boned chicken to go with the biscuits before asking, “Where and who came up with the name Honcho for the little guy?”

  “His Vietnamese name is something like Hung Ho’ang. None of the bridge crew could say it or remember it so they started to call him Honcho. You know, the Japanese word for boss.” Ryder added unnecessarily.

  He seems like a good kid and his family have the nicest house in the village just above the bridge. His mother even has a Siamese cat that nobody has eaten yet. Honcho said that they can’t let it out of the house. If they do a neighbor will eat it. I saw the cat when they invited me in for tea this morning after I left here. House is really clean and neat even though it isn’t loaded with furniture, at least they have a wooden floor which is unusual around here.”

  “Doesn’t he go to school? I thought every village had a school and teacher.”

  “Seems the Viet Cong kidnapped the teacher the same night that they blew the bridge about 10 or 11 months ago. Honcho claims the teacher was VC and went willingly. His father won’t say either way.”

  Dan sat on the warm sand of the dune while eating his lunch watching the traffic on the road, mostly Vietnamese buses and trucks. Once in a while a farmer pushing a bicycle loaded with rice straw, or vegetables would go by, and the inevitable south bound truck load of rock would go speeding by .

  They drive like mad men. I wonder if they realize what would happen to them if they slam into the grader or a six by six? Doubt that they’re thinking that far ahead.

  SEVEN

  Going to be a great day. First week of April and the fourth straight day of sunshine. Dan thought while walking from the chow hall towards his hooch. The eastern sky was turning redder as the sun started to peek up over the far eastern horizon of the South China Sea and was a dark blue overhead with darker, almost black clouds tipped with dark gray where the sunlight had not fully reached yet.

  After drinking a canteen cup of coffee and carrying his second cup still full of ultra hot, ultra black Navy coffee he made a fast stop at his hooch to pickup his M14, cartridge belt, two extra ammo bandoliers full of 5 round clips and his flak jacket before going to the Alpha Company compound and muster.

  “The main topic of the day.” Master Chief Ellsworth, the Company Chief started out. “Commander Ross, who even you new boots know is the Battalion Commander, made an unannounced tour of the hooches yesterday. He is not happy with the condition of the various squad’s sandbag bunkers. He is under the impression that many are the original ones thrown up when the camp was built. And I and other people agree with him. Lots of them look exactly like that, they were thrown up and some have bags that are losing sand as well as some are just plain junk which I would not want to have to use to protect my life if we get hit with a mortar attack.

  Since we are getting a break in the weather the Commander decided that it is the time to do some bunker building. You squad leaders are in charge of your squad’s bunker and will see that it is brought up to battalion standards by 1700 on Saturday. That gives you four days to accomplish it.

  If you need bags or more sand stop by the company office and tell Petty Officer Ryan what your needs are and it will be delivered to your hooch.

  If you need or want time off from your regular duties tell your crew leader and he will see that you get the time off as well as having some other member of your squad to help you.

  Remember squad leaders, it is your responsibility to accomplish this. Though you don’t have to do the physical work.”

  After being dismissed from quarters, the yard in front of the company office as well as the office itself became a little chaotic.

  Dan caught Chief Thomas’s eye as the chief was getting into his jeep.

  “You want to take care of your’s this morning Dan? Take Kramer with you.

  No, Dan Lee! You can’t have Casey. I can do without a grader for the day, but I do need my Cat skinner.” He answered before Dan could say or ask anything. “Do you need a load of sand? If so I’ll have one of our dumps get it to you before they go out on the road.”

  “Don’t think so. The company didn’t get our dumps for the sand detail?”

  “No. Mr. Roberts said ‘never happen’. They have plenty that work in the canto
nment everyday and didn’t need ours and the Commander agreed with him.”

  “Thanks Tom. I’ll see ya when you get in tonight?”

  “Yeah I’ll stop by your hooch then.”

  On the way back to their hooch, EONCN Eddie Kramer and EON2 Dan Lee Davis picked up several sandbags apiece from a pallet full of bags sitting next to the company office. Dan knew that they would have to replace some torn and worn out ones and if they needed more to add height to their bunker walls.

  “What if we need more sand, Dan?”

  “There’s a pile left from where the security troops sandbagged the officer’s shower and built them a bunker aways behind our hooch. We’ll just take what we need from there.

  I want to make our’s a bit shorter in length than it is now.. In other words making it square not rectangular, but also taller. The existing sides aren’t that tall. Barely over my head even when I hunker down in it and I’m not especially tall.”

  “How about putting a sand bagged floor in it, Dan. Then if it rains we won’t be sitting in the mud. It just has some sand sprinkled on top of the laterite now.”

  “Yeah. that’s a good idea, Ed. We can do that easy enough since we’re going to build up the sidewalls and shorten two sides.”

  The sun was warm and so different from what the weather had been Dan decided that they would throughly enjoy this day of respite from the rainy, windy days on Highway 1. Working in their olive drab tee shirts the 2 Seabees ripped the bunker down to the the raw earth setting the reusable sand filled bags in one pile and doubling up some of the tore up, or worn out bags with new bags.

  By 1600 they were ready to put a final row of sandbags around the bunker’s perimeter to get the wall height that Dan wanted. Dave handed Ed Kramer a script dollar and asked him if he wanted to walk over to the EM club and get them some icy cold Cokes.