Starlight

by Scott Ely

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  Starlight

  A Novel

  Scott Ely

  To Carol

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  About the Author

  CHAPTER

  1

  JACKSON WATCHED THE CHOPPER float in to land on the pad, the ship shimmering before his eyes in the heat waves, the rotors kicking up a cloud of red dust. Then the ship flew off, the pilot hugging the mountaintop to avoid exposing himself to fire from the NVA who owned the gorge below and the mountains into Laos. Tom Light walked out of the slowly settling dust cloud and stopped, turning in a slow circle as he looked over the firebase.

  “Goddamn, why did he have to come here?” Jackson muttered, spitting to clear the taste of the red dust from his mouth. “The bad shit is on us now.”

  “Better stay clear of Light,” Major Hale said.

  “Nothing but fucking trouble where he goes,” Jackson said.

  “Goddammit, he won’t stay here. Not at my firebase. He’s going out in the bush.”

  Not unless Tom Light feels like going, Jackson thought. Hale liked to make threats he did not have the power to carry out. The men laughed at him behind his back.

  Light was still on the pad, looking up at the sky like he was expecting the chopper to return. Jackson hooked his hands through his shoulder straps to ease the weight of the heavy radio he wore on his back and waited.

  Jackson had heard all the stories. Light had at first been treated as an ordinary soldier, but the troops who went out with him had all died. Only Light survived a long list of ambushes: the Ia Drang Valley, Dak To, the Mang Yang Pass. Finally no one would go out with him, and the army made him a solitary sniper.

  Three hundred days left. Now that bastard’s here. I’ll never be short, Jackson thought.

  Light walked off the pad. His hair was clipped almost boot-camp short, and he was dressed in cut-off fatigues and an army-issue wool sweater. His legs were covered with jungle sores. Instead of boots he wore a pair of sandals made out of rubber tires.

  His skin was unusually white, too white for a man who spent all his time under the tropical sun. Perhaps he had contracted a fungus during the rains, but that was hard to tell.

  Light stood before them, cradling in a poncho what Jackson thought must be a rifle.

  “What the fuck place is this?” Light asked in a tired voice.

  “Desolation Row,” Hale said.

  “I’m supposed to be on R&R in Vung Tau,” Light said to Hale. “Pilot who dropped me off said I could catch a chopper out here. Where is it?”

  Jackson wondered what R&R was like for a man who walked the jungle alone for months at a time. Hale said Light lived off the land, ate snake jerky.

  Hale took a step closer to Light and said, “Didn’t they tell you at Two Corps?”

  “They didn’t tell me a fucking thing at Pleiku,” Light replied in a slow, indifferent voice. “Got on a chopper at Pleiku. Thought we were headed for Vung Tau. I got my seven kills. They owe me.”

  “Orders say you come here,” Hale said, talking fast like he always did when he got excited.

  “Young trooper, will your radio reach Pleiku?” Light asked, turning to look at Jackson.

  Jackson felt uncomfortable with Light’s eyes on him. He shook his head and looked out across the green folds of the range the Montagnards called the Truong Son, the Long Mountains, into Laos. The mountains, most of them scarred with brown patches from napalm strikes, ran down the spine of Vietnam, some spurs running into the sea a hundred miles away.

  Light continued, “We’re up high. It’ll reach.”

  “No way,” Jackson said.

  “It ain’t that far,” Light said.

  Jackson looked over Light’s shoulder at the green mountains.

  Nothing out there, Jackson thought. A few abandoned Montagnard villages, the people relocated near Pleiku in planned villages built by the Americans. No roads. Just jungle and NVA. Not companies, divisions. The firebase had just one understrength battalion of two companies. Even fire support from the big 175-millimeter guns at Firebase Mary Lou ten miles away would not save them if the NVA attacked in strength. Only the threat of B-52 arclight strikes kept the NVA divisions in their sanctuaries in Laos.

  “Put the whip on it and try,” Light continued. “Major, tell your radio man to call me a chopper.”

  “Hold it, Jackson,” Hale said. Then turning to Light, “I want you out in the bush now!”

  “Call Two Corps back,” said Light, his voice hard with anger. “Tell them they owe me a fucking R&R.”

  “Two of your kills were unconfirmed,” Hale said. “You know the rules.”

  Both men stopped talking and stood watching each other like two dogs getting ready to fight. Hale, the shorter man, stood stiff-legged, raising himself on the toes of his jungle boots as he tried to stare down Light.

  Although there were other radio telephone operators and communications specialists at the firebase, Jackson was Hale’s personal RTO. Hale had a fear of being left without communications. During an operation near Saigon, he had become separated from his RTO, and the colonel in charge of the brigade had given Hale a poor efficiency report. That had kept him from becoming colonel.

  “You’re going out,” Hale said.

  “I’m going to Vung Tau,” Light said.

  “Then walk. You’ll not ride a chopper out of my firebase. You’ll not sleep here.”

  “I’ll sleep on sheets in Vung Tau.”

  Hale hesitated, already beginning to back down.

  Jackson hoped Light would not end up sleeping in the Tactical Operation Center. In the TOC, Jackson slept on a cot just outside Hale’s cubicle. The men often asked Jackson if he was required to go to the latrine with the major. But he did not care what they said, for as long as he was Hale’s RTO he could spend most of his three hundred days left in country in the safety of the TOC, the deepest bunker at the firebase. Hale often bragged he planned to make colonel without having to step outside the wire.

  “I’m Two Corps here,” Hale finally said, talking fast. “This firebase is my own little piece of hell. You do what I say.”

  Light unwrapped the poncho from around the rifle, a .303 instead of the standard issue M-16. The gray fiberglass stock was chipped and cracked in places, the larger cracks repaired with yellowish epoxy, and on the top was mounted a long, black starlight scope, the tube at the big end at least six inches in diameter. The barrel had been painted with a grainy, gray paint to match the stock.

  This was the scope the Montagnards believed Light used to raise the dead, Jackson thought. But that was not surprising because the Yards believed that trees and rocks were inhabited by spirits. They sacrificed pigs to cure illnesses.

  “You go out there,” Light said, offering Hale the rifle.

  “You’re going to end up a stockade child, soldier!” Hale screamed, the veins standing out on his neck. “They’ll lock you in a connex at Long Bi
en Jail, and I’ll be a goddamn grandfather before they turn you loose! Get out there and hunt!”

  “After my R&R,” Light said.

  “Now!” Hale shouted. And then in a lower voice, “I’ll not have a mutiny over you like at Firebase Mary Lou.”

  “LBJ sounds OK by me,” Light said in a bored voice as if they were discussing the next place he would spend an R&R.

  “Soldier, don’t you start fucking with the way I run this firebase. Get out there and kill the enemy.”

  “Not a fucking chance,” Light said.

  “Your mail’s coming here now,” Hale said. “Already got a letter for you. Two Corps told me you like to get mail regular. You won’t get it staying here.”

  Light paused a moment and said, “I’ll go in the morning. I want the letter before I leave.”

  “You’ll have it,” Hale said.

  Then Light began to wrap up the rifle in the poncho. Hale stood and watched him.

  Jackson knew Hale could not afford a mutiny. Duty at the firebase was his last chance. Hale kept a set of stateside colonel’s insignia so he would be ready for the day when his promotion came through. Jackson sometimes had to polish the silver eagles.

  “Be out of this camp by morning,” Hale finally said, speaking slowly and clearly, emphasizing each word. “Don’t come back without confirmation. You can raise me on your walkie-talkie.”

  “Goddamn, Major,” Light said, “batteries go dead in a week. Heavy too. Threw the last one away.”

  “I want to log in bodies! I want to see them on this pad!” Hale yelled.

  “They’ll be here,” Light said.

  “They better. Jackson, take him to the ammo bunker. Then pick up his mail at the TOC. Get him a walkie-talkie. Stay with him. See he leaves before sunrise. If he’s still here, you’re going out with him. Give me the radio.”

  Hale walked off, puffs of red dust stirred by his boots, the radio slung over one shoulder. Soon the major would be in the TOC, protected by ten layers of packed sandbags from anything but a direct hit by a rocket.

  Jackson began to gasp for air. Ever since childhood fear had produced this choking feeling, causing him to suck in great gulps of air. “Fish on the bank! Fish on the bank!” his friends at home in Alabama always chanted when they saw him do it.

  “Calm down, young trooper,” Light said. “You got good duty here.”

  But Jackson could not calm down. His eyes filled with tears at the strain of trying to breathe. With Light in camp the firebase was sure to take heavy incoming, and men were sure to die, those near Light in the most danger. That was why the men had mutinied at Firebase Mary Lou.

  “I want to sleep,” Light said. “Where’s the bunker?”

  Jackson did not reply. Then he felt Light’s hand on his arm.

  “Nothing’s going to happen to you,” Light said. “Show me where I sleep.”

  Jackson began to breathe easier.

  “Over there,” said Jackson, pointing to the mound of sandbags.

  Jackson left Light at the ammo bunker and went to the TOC, returning with two cots, a walkie-talkie, and Light’s letter. Light helped him take the cots down into the bunker. Stacked to the ceiling were cases of ammo and frags. There were also mortar shells, the willie peter stored upright to prevent the white phosphorous from settling to one side and causing the shell to pinwheel when it was fired. Once, CS riot-gas shells had been stored in the bunker, and the shells had leaked. Jackson’s eyes watered slightly from the faint trace of gas that was left.

  “I’d be thankful if you’d read me my letter,” Light said, as they were unfolding the cots.

  “I—” Jackson began.

  Then it was happening again, the words refusing to come out. Jackson could hear nothing but the sound of air rushing into his lungs. He nodded his head.

  “Just like the army,” Light said, smiling for the first time since Jackson had met him. “Give a radio to a man who’s too scared to talk.”

  “I’m not scared,” Jackson said.

  “Don’t worry, you won’t die today,” Light continued. “Won’t die tomorrow. You’re safe with me.”

  “You don’t know that,” Jackson said.

  “I know it like I know a man I put this scope on is gonna die,” Light replied, tapping the poncho. “Now read me my letter.”

  Jackson read, “Dear Son, Brother Panky is so kind as to type this letter. He is praying for your safe return. Your mother’s heart is better. He is praying for her too.

  “The fishing has been good. I caught two hundred pounds of cats yesterday. Lost a new hoop net. Stolen, I think.

  “Your mother says to tell you Ellen’s new baby is fine. She is coming to see us soon.

  “Your mother hopes you will make this the last year. Come home safe. Keep the Sabbath when you can. Brother Panky is praying for you. Your Daddy.”

  Light sat down on the cot and smiled at Jackson.

  “Thanks, I’m going to sleep. You can write me a letter when I wake up,” Light said.

  Jackson went up and sat on the top step of the bunker. Light had said he would be safe, but he still would not have been surprised if the incoming had started falling.

  Yet no attack came, and by late afternoon he had begun to believe Light’s words. Quietly he went down the steps and in the semidarkness found Light asleep on a cot, the poncho-wrapped rifle by his side. The sniper smelled like the jungle, a scent of decaying leaves and damp earth. Jackson carefully walked close to Light and, crouching by the cot, touched the edge of Light’s sweater. He wanted to touch Tom Light’s arm or one of his bare legs but was afraid Light would awake.

  “How do you do it?” Jackson whispered. “You could tell me. I could learn.”

  Jackson felt an impulse to shake Light awake and speak directly to the sniper but was stopped by his fear of the man. Light knew how to stay alive. It was not luck. Tom Light had long ago left luck far behind and attained a state beyond any fear of death. From where Light stood, the struggle to escape the net of the war must have seemed futile and without purpose.

  As Jackson carefully stood up and left the bunker, he thought of going home. The commercial jet would lift off from Bien Hoa Airbase, and he would settle back against the soft seat, and as the cheers of the returning men died out, he would concentrate on watching a stewardess sashay down the aisle.

  CHAPTER

  2

  JACKSON SAW A GROUP of soldiers walking across the compound toward the bunker, most of them from the mortar squad. Leander, the squad leader, walked in front while the others hung back. This was the mutiny Hale had been so worried about.

  “Alabama, tell Light to come out,” Leander said.

  Jackson took several deep breaths and said, “He’s asleep.”

  The men laughed. Leander took off his green NVA pith helmet with the single bullet hole above the left ear and wiped the sweat from his face, the red dust looking white against his black skin.

  “Must be something wrong with the air,” Leander said. “Calm down, Alabama, ’fore you choke to death.”

  Leander’s audience laughed again. Jackson expected that from Leander who liked to run his mouth. More soldiers began to gather. Where was Hale?

  “Tell that motherfucker Light to get up here. Or maybe we oughta drop a frag in there,” Leander said.

  Jackson started down the steps, but stopped when he saw Light come out of the bunker with his rifle. Light climbed the steps slowly, yawning as he went, blinking at the glare. Then he stood to face Leander and the men, standing there like a man might stand waiting for a bus in a large city, relaxed, indifferent to what was going on around him.

  “We know you’re bad,” Leander said. “But you can’t fight us all. We want you gone before you bring down the shit on us. Go back where you come from.”

  Light cradled the rifle in his arms and said nothing.

  “You leave now,” Leander continued.

  The crowd murmured behind him.

  “Get the fuck
out of here!” a soldier yelled.

  Two soldiers came out of the crowd. One was very thin and the other stocky with red hair and freckles. The thin soldier pretended his M-16 was a guitar. He fingered imaginary frets on the barrel with one hand while the other hand jumped about over the magazine and receiver.

  The thin soldier sang, “Purple haze all around/Don’t know if I’m coming up or down.”

  Everyone laughed, even Light and Leander.

  “Fucking R&R’ll blow Light away,” someone yelled.

  They were Reynolds & Raymond, speed freaks. Leander had named them R&R. Raymond talked nonstop, but no one had ever heard Reynolds speak except to sing Jimi Hendrix lyrics. Perhaps his silence was his way of mourning the guitarist’s death. They had been attached to the mortar squad until Leander discovered they were always up on speed and refused to have them. Now they wandered about the firebase looking for something to steal so they could trade with the chopper crew chiefs for speed. The disappearance of C-rations, money, even a bore sight for the four-deuce mortars had been blamed on Reynolds & Raymond. Hale tolerated them because they were good fighters, fearless and crazy in battle.

  “Hey, it’s fucking Tom Light,” Raymond said.

  Reynolds played his M-16 behind his back.

  “Let me borrow that starlight scope,” Raymond said, reaching out to touch the scope.

  Light swung the barrel of the rifle on Raymond’s belly and said, “Get the fuck away from me.”

  “Go ahead, might as well shoot him now,” Leander said. “He’s as good as dead. We’ re all gonna get fucking wasted ’cause of you.”

  Reynolds & Raymond faded back into the crowd.

  “Frag him,” someone yelled.

  “Those that have tried are dead,” Light said in a calm voice.

  No one in the crowd moved. Jackson realized they were trying to make up their minds which one of them would risk opposing that rifle.

  Where was Hale? he thought.

  Then Jackson saw Hale running across the compound carrying the radio.

  “Goddamn, I told you there’d be trouble,” Hale said to Light.

  Light said, “I didn’t start it.”