Deep jay - Softcover

Eder, Rod

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0908884559 ISBN 13: 9780908884551

Publisher: Tandem, 1995

Synopsis

Deer Jay – a novel of Kiwi soldiers at war in Vietnam
by Rod Eder

Malarial mosquitoes! Scorpions! Drop-short barrages! This Platoon of Kiwi soldiers have many enemies. Less visible, but somewhere nearby, is the dreaded C32, the Chow Duoc Company. On the positive side is the four-day pass, featuring Tea and Crumpets. And they don’t mean tea and crumpets.
Well-reviewed on publication in 1995, this novel is now out of print. We are delighted to be able to give it a second life in cyberspace.
Oh, and Grunts in the field swear. The F word and others occur in the novel.*
*
Excerpt One
The regulations required the soldiers to dig in at every harbour. For an overnight stay, a simple shell-scrape was sufficient, a narrow grave just deep enough to hide a man below ground level, beneath the flight path of bullet and shrapnel.
Any soldier worth his salt will dig as soon as he is told to halt. Mad Mick needed no urging. His scrape was the first completed at any harbour, and the deepest. The regulations state that Stage One Entrenchment is a shell-scrape for a man to lie in prone, and Stage Two is a slit trench deep enough for a soldier to stand in, and continuing on through to Stage Four, which are bunkers roofed by at least two layers of sandbags and fitted with underground sleeping bays. Black Pete liked to remark that Lance-Corporal McKenzie’s scrape was Stage One and a half, and that when the medic’s teeth chattered you could hear an echo.
Mad Mick paid no heed to the corporal’s gibes. He dug a deep, neat, flat-bottomed scrape, installed his groundsheet and mosquito net, and actually slept in it. He was famous as the only soldier in the company who routinely slept in a scrape. People from other sections came by on sightseeing tours to observe the phenomenon. Mad Mick did not mind. When the platoon lay in ambush during the day, he would lie dozing or reading in his well-appointed shell-scrape. His ambition was to spend as much of his Tour as possible in subterranean mode.
A little rain had fallen early in the morning, then no more until the lunchtime halt, when he had covered himself with his unfolded shelter. In the afternoon his clothing had dried out steadily on the march, except for sweat, and by some miracle no rain had fallen. He revelled in the luxury of almost dry clothing and looked forward to a wonderful night of dry sleep.
But as he unfolded his entrenching tool, the light grew sombre and a low roar sounded far above in the treetops. The afternoon’s ration of rain had arrived, late but heavy as ever.
‘Fuck!’ whispered Mad Mick, this way and that dividing his swift mind. He heard the rattle of the drops seething down layer by layer through the leaves. It would be several minutes before the torrent reached the forest floor.
He could hide under his shelter, but the rain might fall for hours, and when it finished, the canopy would continue to drip. Besides, he needed his shell-scrape immediately. Stop marching; start digging.
Inspiration came at the last moment. He stripped naked rapidly, rammed the dry garments under his pack flap and spread the shelter over everything. He kept on only his boots that in any case were soaked from the day’s march, and because he dared not tread barefoot in the crawling infested jungle.
Then he began to dig, a tall, skinny young man, flourishing the tiny shovel like a toy as he bent to hack at roots. His sinewy frame gleamed fish-belly white in the gloom. Fat cool raindrops finally broke through the leaves and sluiced over him. To keep warm he worked faster.
Sergeant Steele stopped to stare. ‘Corporal McKenzie!’ he whispered. ‘What’s the meaning of this?’
Mad Mick spun round, startled. ‘Oh well, Sergeant, a good NCO always keeps his boots on,’ he explained.
Stainless Steele considered this. ‘Yeah. Fair enough. Carry on, son,’ he said.



Excerpt Two
Digger Dench lay prone on the floor, keeping very still. The silence was absolut

Edition details

• Publisher: Tandem
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0908884559
• ISBN 13: 9780908884551
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 248