She saw Vietnamese women moving through the rice paddies or walking in the tall grass, wearing their flowing ao dais and conical straw hats, carrying babies and toddlers as they worked beneath the hot sun.
They drove upward onto a mountain and, at last, came to a village tucked on a small, flat plain cut into the lush hillside. Neat gardens were carefully fenced and homes built of bamboo stood on stilts. In this remote village, the people lived as their ancestors had—hunting with crossbows and rice-farming.
The village appeared to have been built around a beautiful, but decaying, stone building, a relic of Vietnam’s contentious French-occupation past. The villagers—mostly small, hunched-over old men and women with thin necks and narrow wrists, their teeth blackened by constant chewing of betel seeds—came out from their huts to stand in front of the deuce and a half in a straight line, their hands clasped, their heads bowed respectfully.
Ethel started to rise.
“Be careful,” one of the armed infantrymen said. “The VC are everywhere. They plant bombs on kids and old women. They could be in the bush.”
Frankie looked around. Bombs … on kids? How would you know? How could you tell these people from the Viet Cong, whose hidden bombs had blown up so many soldiers? How did you know who was an enemy and who was an ally?
She took a hard look at the line of villagers, in their flimsy black clothes, noticing there were no young people, male or female; only the very old and the young children. Were there swords hidden in sleeves, guns tucked in waistbands?
“Come on, guys,” Barb said. “No use worrying.”
“Let’s get to work,” Captain Smith said. The medical team jumped down from the truck.
Frankie was the last to step down into the red dirt. How were you supposed to protect yourself from invisible enemies?
Captain Smith moved in close, patted her arm. “You’re a good nurse, Frankie. Go show them.”
She nodded as he walked toward an elderly man, who was no taller than a ten-year-old American boy, with dark skin and black teeth. He smiled at the medical team; deep lines crinkled his face. He drew them toward him with a crooked finger, then turned and led them up into the broken-down French villa. The stone walls were riddled with bullet holes; in several rooms the walls had crumbled. Woven grasslike mats lay on the floor. A fire glowed in a large fireplace. In it, a black pot bubbled and popped, sending a rich scent of spices into the dank room.
The old man picked up a large earthenware jug and held it up to Captain Smith. He said something that sounded like,“Bac-si, Ca mon,” in a rickety voice. He took a long drink and handed the jug to the doctor.
He wasn’t going to drink it, was he? What was it?
“It means ‘thank you, Doctors,’ I think,” Barb said. She was the second to take the jug after the doctor, and drank deeply, then handed the jug to Frankie, who took it slowly.
She eyed the crockery lip and slowly lifted it to her mouth. She took a small sip, surprised to find that it tasted sweet and sharp, a kind of wine.
The old man smiled at her, nodding, said something in his language.
Frankie smiled back uncertainly, took another sip.
After the welcoming ritual, the team set up stations to help the villagers. Everything was communicated by hand signals. None of the villagers spoke a word of English. The medical team set up a makeshift clinic with a portable exam table in a bare hut with a thatched roof; another table was set up outside with a tub full of soapy water for scrubbing lice out of children’s hair and washing sores on their skin. Flies landed on everything, on hair, on lips, on hands. The driver of the truck handed out candy to the children, who gathered around him, clamoring for more.
For the next several hours, Frankie administered to the villagers in the living area of the old villa. The villagers, young and old, waited patiently to be seen for a variety of ailments. Frankie dispensed worming pills, antacids, aspirin, laxatives, and malaria tablets. She checked teeth and looked in ear canals and listened to heartbeats. She was nearly at the end of her line of villagers when a small boy, not more than five, sneaked in to stand beside her. He wore a short-sleeved shirt and shorts, and had dirty feet and unevenly cut black hair that he’d plastered back from his face with red mud. He didn’t speak or tug on her sleeve; neither did he leave her side.
“What do you need, little one?” she asked when the last in her line of patients had been treated.
He smiled up at her in a way that melted her heart.
She lifted him up into her arms. He wrapped his arms and legs around her and gazed at her questioningly, said something in his language.