Marine Sniper (12 page)

"Call the artillery, Burke."

Burke called the fire mission, instructing the battery to fire for effect.

"Let's go," Hathcock said.

Both men moved quickly up the ridge and began their trek around Dong Den to their rendezvous with the patrol that would take them back to the fire base and their helicopter ride home.

The two Marines walked up Hill 55 toward the operations tent.

"You two look like shit!" the stocky intelligence chief called out to the pair. Between laughs he said, "The word's out on you two-all the way up to General Walt. Pinning down those NVA like that. What were they, a Boy Scout troop?"

"Durn near, I suppose," Hathcock responded. "Their big mistake was walking smack down the middle of that valley. I was going to watch the other side of the river where mat opening runs between the hills at the big turn. I had that all staked out to catch a patrol crossing there.

"When these hamburgers come marching down the middle of the valley-on my side-just like a Saint Patrick's Day parade, I knew I had them. But one thing that I can't figure out is why didn't they move out at night. All they had to do was run out to the river and jump in. I couldn't have gotten more than a dozen of them like that. They kept going for those huts that sit on the east end of the bend, you know, just out of the trees where that ridge runs down into the valley.

"I let that woik in my favor when we had to pull out. We called in the fire mission and dropped over the ridge. We never saw what happened, but I know plenty of artillery dusted them at those huts, if the rounds were on target."

The gunny put his arm over Hathcock's shoulder and said, "Come on in my house. We'll debrief and I'll tell you about that artillery mission."

The three Marines sat down inside the tent. Hathcock took a cigarette from the gunny's pack, which lay open on the field desk, and lit up.

"What about that artillery."

The gunny chuckled and said, "You boys were real smart getting out before the H-Es* hit-all over that valley. You probably would have taken a few. When Lance Corporal Burke radioed for the fire mission and said 'fire for effect,' they did. Those cannon cockers opened every gun they had and hit every one of your on-call targets at both ends of the valley... and everything in between, too.

"By the time the shooting stopped and the sweep team got in there, that NVA company scattered over every mountain around that valley, and they may still be running. The sweep team picked up one prisoner. And nobody can make heads or tails of any kind of body count out there."

"What did the prisoner have to say?" Hathcock asked.

"Well, that company was close to being a troop of Boy Scouts. They had just finished training in the north when their captain-whom you killed right out of the gate-marched them south to join up with an NVA battalion that was supposed to be waiting for them on the north side of Elephant Valley.

"We had pretty well ground that particular battalion down to nothing in the past two weeks-they needed these guys bad. But not bad enough to come down and face whatever it was that had them pinned. They figured you controlled the high ground on the south side, and they didn't want to screw around with you guys. That NVA prisoner said that they had no idea what in hell they faced up on that hillside, but whatever it was, it was deadly."

Hathcock took a final draw off the cigarette and crushed it into the brass ash tray that sat on the corner of the gunny's desk. Exhaling a cloud of smoke, he smiled and then tucked his bush hat back on his head, stroking the white feather in its band.

The two Marines walked away from the buzzing command tent toward their hooches, where they would clean their gear, then themselves, and get some rest. Hathcock looked at Burke and rubbed his finger down the Marine's cheek where sweat had washed white streaks through the light and dark green camouflage greasepaint that both snipers had caked on their skin. Hathcock shook his head and then lazily drawled, "Come on, Burke, let's get cleaned up, your mascara has done run all over your face."

In the Beginning.

A STACK OP mail lay on Carlos Hathcock's field desk when he walked inside the 1st Marine Division Scout/Sniper School's hand-backed tent. Two letters were from Jo-one thick and one thin.

Hathcock looked at the postmarks and opened the letter that bore the oldest date first-the thick letter. As he unfolded the letter, a small clipping from the Raleigh News and Observer fell onto a copy of Leatherneck Magazine that lay on his desk.

Hathcock grunted as he read the bold print that led the story. A sharp knot tightened in his stomach as he laid the clipping aside and began to read the letter.

"Dear Carlos," the letter began, "they wrote about you in the newspaper. I don't quite understand, but I hope you can explain...

"Now every day I wonder what you are doing. I keep waiting for them to come up the sidewalk and tell me you're dead...

"I thought you were safe at the headquarters, teaching. Now I read that you go out alone, or with one other Marine, sniping in enemy territory. I want to know how you are. I want to know the truth."

Hathcock folded the fat letter and looked at the thin one that was postmarked the following day. It was two pages long and began, "I'm sorry that I was angry with you. I know that you don't need to be getting negative letters. I understand that you just didn't want me to worry..."

The letter also told about their son and what Jo hoped to do once her husband was home. It asked, "Have you decided about staying in the Marines?

Hathcock took a tablet of paper from the field desk's right-hand drawer and scrawled, "Dear Jo, I'm sorry. I didn't think telling you would make the waiting better for you. I didn't want you to worry.

"I know that I'm not invincible, but none of these hamburgers are smart enough to get me. I promise you that. Don't you worry about me...

"I have decided to quit the Marine Corps and settle down there in New Bern.

"I'll see you in a couple of weeks... Love, Carlos."

Gunnery Sgt. James D. Wilson, the noncommissioned officer in charge of the 1st Marine Division sniper school, walked in the hooch just as Hathcock licked the envelope's flap and pressed it closed.

"Letter home?"

"Yeah. I gotta bone to pick with that reporter who was up here a couple of months ago. You know, the one who interviewed me and Captain Land after Charlie put out the bounty on us?"

"Sure. What happened?" the gunny asked.

"You remember Captain Land tellin' that guy that the story he wrote was just for the Sea Tiger? That it was for in-country, only?"

"Yeah?"