"Can't we do anything?" the kid asked. "We can go down there and help them out."
Cole shook his head. "Look at this ground. Steep and rocky. It would take us too long to get down there. Even then, there are an awful lot of the enemy and not enough of us."
"We've got to do something," the kid said urgently as the rate of fire increased below. Already, a couple of the Americans were down. Someone ran out and started dragging them toward cover.
Cole grunted, considering their options. "They're about a quarter of a mile away."
The kid was quiet a moment, then said, "That's about four football fields."
"Yeah? I call it half a second."
"Huh?"
"That's about how long it will take my bullet to get there. If whatever I'm aimin' at moves before then, there's a good chance that I'll miss."
The kid was staring at him. "Nobody can shoot that far, can they?"
"We'll see," said Cole, who wasn't one for bragging.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Take those binoculars and call me any targets you see. Once I get on scope, it's a right narrow field of view. And keep your eyes peeled. Pomeroy and the others are right behind us, so they've got our back, but for all we know this hillside could be crawlin' with the enemy."
He made a few adjustments to the telescopic sight on his Springfield rifle. He had picked it up at the end of the bitter Chosin Reservoir retreat and held onto it ever since. So far, Lieutenant Ballard hadn't taken it away from him, although that remained to be seen. The Springfield was essentially the same rifle that Cole had used in the last war. He knew it well, just the way a man might know every curve on the body of an old lover.
He put the rifle across a rock that he had padded with a rag. It made a damn near perfect bench rest, solid as the hill itself. Cole got comfortable behind it, spreading out his feet, locking his elbows into the ground, pressing his belly into the rock.
He fit the stock into the pocket created by his shoulder, then welded his cheek to the stock. Instantly, he smelled gun oil, gunpowder, and finely machined steel — three of the best smells on earth, in Cole's humble opinion. He put his gray eye to the scope until the scene in the valley below sprang closer. He shut out everything else.
As Cole's breathing slower, nearly stopped, he touched the pad of his right index finger to the trigger.
"Kid?" he exhaled.
"Machine gunners are setting up," he said. "Once they open fire—"
"Where?"
The kid told him and Cole found the target, a crew of two men getting a Degtyaryov light machine gun set up on its tripod. The Degtyaryov was a cruel bastard, cheaply made by the Soviets, with a circular magazine, jammed full of rounds, that sat atop the barrel. That weapon alone would literally cut the American defenders to pieces. The enemy soldiers were setting up behind a rock that gave them plenty of cover. Cole could barely see their heads and shoulders. Wasn't much of a target.
The kid was watching through the binoculars. "Nobody can hit that," he said. "Maybe if we head down there and get closer—"
Cole's crosshairs touched the helmet of the soldier on the right, the sight picture unwavering, thanks to the solid rock on which the rifle rested. His finger took up the last fraction of tension on the trigger.
The rifle fired.
At Cole's shoulder, the kid made a sound of surprise, eyes still glued to the binoculars. "You did it! I don't believe it."
Cole ran the bolt and loaded another round. Visible through the scope, the second machine gunner seemed to have frozen, surprised that his partner was now dead on the ground. He must have wondered where the shot had come from. Cole didn't let him wonder for long.
At this range, the round was still traveling at nearly 2000 feet per second and hitting with 1400 foot-pounds of energy — more than half a ton of whomp ass.
When another two men moved to man the machine gun, Cole shot them, too.
Cole pulled himself away from the rifle long enough to look back and see Pomeroy approaching with the rest of the squad. They took up positions on the ridge and began to pour fire down at the enemy troops. It was a long way for them to shoot and hit anything, but he reckoned that even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then.
"That officer there," the kid whispered, as if the Chinese soldiers far below could hear him. Cole himself could barely hear the kid over the ringing in his ears. After all, each detonation of a .30–06 round smacked his eardrum like a thunderclap. He was developing a permanent ringing. "He's organizing things."
"Got him," Cole said.
He could see that the officer was trying to set up an attack on the outnumbered Americans down there. The Chinese favored swarm tactics, throwing everything they had at a section of the enemy line in hopes of overwhelming it — never mind how many soldiers they themselves lost in the process. One thing about the Chinese and North Koreans was that they never thought twice about getting their own men killed.
Still, the enemy tactics were just a bit more complex. At the same time that the swarm attack was happening, a smaller force typically tried to flank the defenders in the confusion and wreak havoc in the rear by attacking supply vehicles or even hospital tents. The little squad down below had neither, but that didn't mean some of the attackers wouldn't try to get in behind them.
Cole put his sights on the Chinese officer and fired. The man flung out his arms and died as dramatically as some two-bit actor in a war movie.
Barely pausing, Cole fired again and again. Now, instead of being pinned down, the squad below was on the attack, slamming into the now-disorganized Chinese ranks. The enemy began to scatter before the onslaught. Cole reloaded and fired, adding as much chaos as possible to the enemy's situation.
While the enemy troops below hadn't figured out the location of the sniper, someone else had. A couple of bright flashes appeared on the gloomy hillside in the distance, followed by the telltale whistle of artillery shells. The Chinese gunners hidden in the hills must have spotted Cole and his squad on the ridge.
"Cole!" the kid shouted. "Time to go!"
The kid started to get up, but Cole reached up and yanked him off his feet just as the first shell hit a tree no more than a hundred feet away. Whirling fragments of metal and jagged splinters of pine filled the air like a sudden squall of rain. The second shell hit the hillside and showered them all with rock and dirt.
"Go!" Cole shouted, leaping up and screaming at the squad. Miraculously, none of them had been hit. They didn't need to be told twice, but scrambled off the crest of the ridge. Two more shells hit, just short of where the men had been positioned only moments ago. Before the Chinese battery could fire again, the squad was on the other side of the ridge, out of sight.
"All in a day's work," said Pomeroy, who was limping after the sprint off the hilltop. Most of the time he hid it, but it was clear that his feet still hurt him. "Guess we showed them."
Cole thought about the officer he had seen die through the rifle scope. In the last war, at first, he had kept count of how many enemy soldiers he had killed. Then, he had stopped. Enemy or not, a man's soul was not a trophy to be tallied.
"Let's move out," he said, raising his voice so that the whole squad could hear. He had a surprisingly high-pitched, twangy voice. It was easy to imagine him suddenly breaking into a Rebel Yell. "Go on now! We best get back before dark. Keep your distance and keep your eyes open — there's no telling how many other Chinese squads might be out here. I hope to hell that we ain't gone and woke up the dragon."
Leading the way, rifle at the ready, he moved silently into the dense scrub trees and seemed to disappear into the gray underbrush.
Chapter Two