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There had been other casualties. A Sea Knight landed on a sandbar. Collinson helped Stobie down the bank, rambling on about nothing to keep him out of shock, even though he couldn’t hear his own words for the continuing ringing. A body lay in the sand, wrapped in a poncho, face covered.

The Sea Knight pulled up before the NVA could adjust their mortar tube, and the company got moving again single file atop a paddy dike. The grunts were spaced at twenty-five-yard intervals in case of another mortaring. There was a tree line to their right and an NVA was hunkered in it with an RPG launcher. He must have had plenty of ammunition because he started screaming off shells at individual Marines. He didn’t hit anybody, but the grunts began running hard down the dike, not even wasting time to fire back, as fireballs sailed between them in line and exploded in the next paddy.

A brushy knoll sat like an island in the middle of the field, where the Marines flopped amid the concealing shrubbery. An opening through a hedgerow led them back onto the dike and they got moving again, one man at a time sprinting out. Collinson got up to the opening when a grunt lying there said something. Collinson’s ears were still ringing, so he bent down to hear the man—just as an RPG whooshed over them. It exploded harmlessly in the paddy, but Collinson mumbled, “Aw, Jesus!” as he dashed onto the dike.

That had been the last shot. The column returned to a walk.

Fox Company stopped in a tree line that elements of Echo Company had secured; it was approximately where the platoon had been surrounded the day before. Sniper fire kept everyone’s heads down, but this time they did not pull back. Collinson was nestled low in the bushes when several grunts moved past. They said they had seen two NVA on their flank and had fragged their spider hole; they showed off a pair of 1942 Westinghouse Rangefinder binoculars and a Soviet infrared sight for an RPG launcher.

Echo 2/7 was stalled.

Fox 2/7 was stalled.

With Colonel Codispoti on the radio demanding they reach the rendezvous coordinates regardless of casualties, Golf 2/7 was thrown into the attack. Previously, when Fox moved out, Golf had humped into the 2/7 CP to provide security; there they had received a resupply of C rations and oranges, plus mail and ammunition. When word came to advance, they left the CP site with two platoons in the lead, followed by Colonel Lugger and his staff, with the third platoon sewing up the rear.

It was 1600.

Lieutenant Page’s platoon had the lead. Corporal Skaggs’s squad was in front. The Italian kid was again on point. It was the third time Marines had tried to move west on the trail and there was much bitching in Golf Company that the NVA must have it preregistered. They did, because Golf was two hundred meters out of the CP and Lugger himself was fifty meters out when the first mortar round landed only yards from the point man. He disappeared into the paddy below the road.

The rounds started jolting down the trail, and Corporal Skaggs bolted for a tree line almost a hundred feet away. His squad huddled in a ravine in the trees, but the NVA lobbed a few rounds after them. One Marine took serious wounds in his chest and face. Many more had shrapnel wounds. Almost no one had been wearing his helmet or flak jacket; because of the continuing heat wave, command had given them the option not to.

Lugger ordered them back as he called for air and arty.

The platoon began staggering back, carrying their wounded, keeping low along a paddy dike. The mortars followed them. One round landed near a group of men, inflicting more casualties. The retreat became chaotic.

They finally made it back into the tree line secured by Lieutenant Pickett’s platoon and Lieutenant Larrison’s CP. Larrison was on the horn and, within five minutes, artillery was slamming in. The arty fired for thirty minutes and was followed by air strikes. But in those first five minutes, the NVA managed to walk a few good-bye rounds into