Charlie

By John A. Wilson

I'll never forget the first time I saw Charlie. He just sort of appeared. One minute he was not there, the next minute he was. A shaft of bright sunlight slicing through the dense overhead foliage lit Charlie's face like a spotlight. His face was turned slightly away from me so that I had a few seconds to study Charlie before he would notice me.

So, this was the man whose very mention struck fear into so many of my colleagues. Charlie was a rather small man, olive skinned with a shock of coal black hair partially hidden under his hat. The shadow of his hat brim almost hid his dark piercing eyes. The lines of his face showed a man old for his years. Charlie was dressed all in black, his posture indicated that he was tense, alert. His narrow shoulders were slightly hunched; his right hand tightly clutched a small satchel.

Slowly his eyes began to turn toward me as if he could sense my eyes upon him. I could now see the grim set of his mouth beneath a pug nose and the determination in his slightly slanted eyes. Charlie's eyes locked onto mine and I felt a cold shaft in the pit of my stomach. I stepped slightly toward him and raised my right hand toward him. Charlie's eyes widened slightly in surprise as he realized that he had made a serious mistake. Charlie's left hand moved quickly to the satchel in his right hand, but my finger flexed on the trigger of my standard issue automatic, sending a .45 caliber slug into Charlie's chest before he could trigger the fuse on his satchel charge. The force of the round's impact lifted the small Southeast Asian off of his feet and the deadly two-pound charge of plastic explosive fell harmlessly a few feet from where Charlie now lay dead.

Suddenly a half dozen of my fellow Marines were at my side, their weapons ready. A movement to the right of our position caught the attention of one of the Marine riflemen and a brief, intense firefight broke out between and the Viet Cong patrol that had stumbled onto our position. As quickly as it had begun, the gunfire stopped as our adversary simply melted away into the jungle.

Cautiously I approached the VC that had fallen by my hand. I searched for some feeling as I looked at the face of the man I had just killed. I was very disturbed to find none at all. There was only the knowledge that had he located my position before I had seen him, he would have armed that satchel charge and lobbed it at me. I and maybe a couple of my comrades would be dead instead of him.

I became aware that my squad leader was now standing beside me. His hand clapped onto my shoulder. "Leave him there," he said. "They'll come back and get him. I'll report a confirmed kill for you." He looked at my face, "This your first one?"

I numbly nodded my head once as his hand grasped my arm. "Let's get out of here before a few dozen of his friends show up."

I turned away from the first "Victor Charlie" that I had ever seen up close and walked away; still dumbfounded at my lack of feeling for the human being that had lost his life to my bullet. The feelings did eventually come, and they stayed for a long, long time.