Sand in the Wind Read Online Free PDF Page B

up and told them Tony might be over at 106’s. “You mean we’ve got to go all the way back to the other end of the hill?” Chalice asked.
    “No, he meant the guns on the point. Those were 105’s.”
    They followed the road to its end at the very edge of the hill. A large tower stood between two low bunkers with 106-millimeter guns mounted on top of them. The soldier in the tower was looking across the valley through a small telescope. Hamilton called up to him, “Have you seen Tony 5?”
    “Yeah. He left for chow ten minutes ago.”
    “That’s fucking great,” Hamilton mumbled as he started to leave.
    Chalice continued to stare across the valley. “Wait a minute. Let me get a good look at this.”
    “Sure.    .   .   . Hey, you wanna go up in the tower?”
    “Yeah.”
    When they reached the top, Hamilton told the lookout that Chalice was new, so they both started pointing things out to him. Chalice could see the entire An Hoa Valley, and no more. Dark green mountains defined the horizon on all sides. The road to An Hoa touched the base of Hill 65 at an angle. It paralleled a broad, smooth river. Both river and road ran the length of the valley. A half mile from the base of the hill, the orange road bisected a cluster of thatched roofed huts — the village. An isolated part of the village lay within the hollow of the kidney-shaped base of the hill. The cool, dark green color of the shade trees interspersed among the hootches stood out against the light green glare emanating from the surrounding rice paddies. At the far edge of the village, the river forked and the right branch passed under a large wooden bridge. The road was just as wide on the other side of the bridge, but the few buildings that lined it appeared deserted. Almost all the land on the near side of the river was either covered with huts or squared off into rice paddies. The far side was also squared off, but much of the land lay fallow and orange bomb craters dotted the entire area. Hamilton pointed towards it. “See that? That’s the Arizona Territory.”
    Hamilton led Chalice back up the road. When they reached the center of the hill, he turned off into a maze of plywood buildings that sloped down its side. A long line of Marines ran along the valley side of the largest building. The air around it smelled of food and garbage. Payne stood in the middle of the line, talking in a loud voice to some men in back of him. As Hamilton and Chalice approached from his rear, he happened to glance back and spot them. “Hamilton, over here.” They walked towards him, and Payne asked, “Professor, how you doing?”
    “All right.”
    Payne started to say something else, but Hamilton interrupted him by addressing the dark, broad-shouldered Marine in back of Payne. “It’s about time we caught up with you. We’ve been following you all over the fucking hill. I got a new man for your fire team.” He turned his head back towards Chalice. “Professor, Tony 5; Tony 5, Professor.”
    As they shook hands, Tony 5 said indifferently, “Glad to have you in Alpha Squad.” He turned away immediately and began talking to Hamilton.
    Payne tried for a while to regain his audience, but finally turned to Chalice. Backing up, he motioned for him to get in line. Chalice looked at the long line in back of them and hesitated. Not catching this, Payne motioned again. Chalice saw that nobody was paying much attention, so he stepped into the line. Payne looked him over as if he were seeing him for the first time. “You’re lucky to be in Alpha, you know?”
    “What do you mean?”
    Payne glanced around before whispering, “We’ve only got one nigger.” Chalice made no reply and Payne added, “You may not hate ’em now, but you will after you’ve been here awhile. Look up there.” He pointed to the front of the line. “Those cocksuckers are too good to wait like everybody else.”
    A few yards from the mess hall door, the line diffused into a large group of