(from The White Elephant of Attapeu)
Benny slipped into a tiger trap while we marched a thin, jungle footpath, the ground giving way beneath him and sharpened bamboos coming up through his chest, arms, legs; bamboos smeared in human shit. He lay there for a long time, blood bubbling from his mouth and wounds, eyes opening, closing, mute with horror and disbelief. His blue eyes caught mine, didn’t look away.
Ozark laughed, “Dumb bastard.”
Sarge climbed into the hole, emptied Benny’s pockets, climbed out reeking. We sat there and waited for him to die. He was our Lieutenant, a good man. He was older, smarter, clearer than the rest of us—had been some kind of hero in Korea. I liked him. Now, all of his hardness gone, silver hair streaked with shit. The elegant spider, impersonal hunter, writhing, pinned clumsily like a grade school biology experiment.
“Someone kill him,” I said.
“Why don’t you do it?” Sarge said.
“I can’t.”
“Well I ain’t doing it. I ain’t killing a superior officer.”
“I’ll do it,” Ozark said.
“No,” Sarge said. “That’s an order.”
“Then give him some morphine,” I said.
“I ain’t wasting it on no lost cause. When your dick gets blown off, you’ll thank me.”
The Agent watched, silent, shaking his head.
It took ten minutes for Benny to stop moving. When we were sure he was dead, we climbed into the hole to pull him off the spikes. We couldn’t: stuck fast with the suction of blood. Sarge broke our strict radio silence, called headquarters.
“Hotel Quebec, this is Whiskey Echo. Do you copy?”
Whiskey Echo, Hotel Quebec.
“Hotel Quebec, our lieutenant has been K.I.A. Request dust-off.”
Headquarters asked for coordinates, and when Sarge gave them, they said, Negative, Whiskey Echo. It’s hot and hairy. Leave him where he lies. I repeat, leave him where he lies.
Sarge put down the mouthpiece and smiled.
“Well boys,” he said. “It’s my show now. Let’s go hunting on the Ho Chi Minh Trail.”
Copyright © 2010 by Daniel Shawn Otis
