Thanh explained how much good could be done with twenty bags of cement, so I set about getting it. I tried the U.S. Army-Navy base at Dong Tam but found that cement was seldom used for construction. I finally learned that most cement was distributed through the Agency for International Development (AID), an arm of the U.S. State Department, and placed directly into the hands of the province chiefs for community projects. Mine was a community project, so I made a courtesy call on the province chief.

The Dinh Toung province chief was an ARVN colonel who lived in palatial splendor in the largest residence in My Tho. I worked my way through his staff until I found myself sitting outside his office, and then I waited patiently for two hours before being escorted in to see him. In less than two minutes he heard my case, refused me, told me to mind my own business, then dispatched me by the back door. I had no recourse for appeal, but the little pedagogue had angered me. I refused to give up. Through other channels, I managed to acquire five bags of cement from Pacific Architects and Engineers in exchange for several homemade Viet Cong flags, which I decorated with a little duck blood to increase their value.

While I was on my humanitarian mission, Hurst was on a venture of his own. He met an American nurse, a hospital advisor from the AID at the civilian hospital in My Tho. We cleaned ourselves up as well as we could and drove our old jeep to Edna’s apartment, which was comfortable compared with our austere living arrangements at Binh Duc. Situated in an old French colonial hotel, it sparkled with marble floors, large shuttered windows, and genuine furniture. Edna actually served wine with dinner while she told us about two little orphans, Oanh and Kim, whom she was thinking of adopting. Hurst invited her to bring them out to Binh Duc for a visit. I didn’t understand why they would want to go there, but I kept my mouth shut. Maybe Hurst, a bachelor, was interested in Edna, or maybe not.

Midway through dinner Edna was talking about the orphans. “They’re so special. When I get the papers… .”

She froze in mid-sentence; her eyes opened wider. “Was that what I think it was?”

I hadn’t heard it before, but then I did. “Mortars. Sounds like one-twenties.” We could clearly hear plunking as the rounds popped from the 120mm mortar tubes outside town.

“Got a bunker?” asked Bobby. “We only have half a minute.”

“No!” Edna’s face was pale.

“Under the table,” Bobby ordered.

We crawled under the table, lying flat on the cool marble floor.

My mental clock told me we had a few more seconds before impact. I scrambled back out. “Anyone want your wine?” I asked as I grabbed my wineglass. Without waiting for a reply, I handed the other two glasses under the table, before sliding underneath.

We listened as the large mortars exploded in the city environs.

“I wonder if I could help them hit the province chief’s house?” I wondered out loud. No one else fully appreciated my meaning or sincerity.

The attack ruined our pleasant evening. When the mortars ceased, we rushed back to Binh Duc to find the battalion preparing to move out on foot. For the rest of the month, we moved out of the compound every night to occupy security positions around the city. The one night we stayed at home the Viet Cong knew it. At 3:00 a.m. twenty-four 82mm mortars pounded us and we raced into our dilapidated bunker for safety. From our vantage point inside, we could inspect our own sandbag architecture and see the deficiencies. Flashes of exploding mortar rounds illuminated our faces through the gaps and holes in the sandbags, and the timbers shook around us. Sand trickled onto our heads and sifted down the backs of our shirts. Soon it was over, but we found several duds in the dirt road the next morning. We needed no further prompting to improve our protection.

As inexperienced as I was, I pondered our trip to the Double Y, and the activity we had witnessed there. Pieces of that puzzle were missing. I wondered what our intelligence officers concluded about the intentions of the Viet Cong in making elaborate preparations in a remote area and then departing.

When a storm approaches, sometimes I can feel it in my bones. I felt a storm now coming from the direction of the Double Y. We had been warned and we were in the interval between an alarm and a storm. I could not shake the feeling and soon we felt the cold breeze in our faces.

Never before has America been so puzzled about a war effort. In no other conflict … has the dichotomy of decision between military and political considerations been so painfully evident.