The Hill

by Leonard B. Scott

Genres: Action & Adventure; Historical Fiction; War & Military

Synopsis

Many good men would die, or survive forever scarred, in the fight for Hill 875

Ty is the grunt. The point man for his platoon with the uncanny instincts to see, hear, and smell out the hidden enemy. Jason is the favored one. The football hero picked for officer candidate school who determinedly leads his men into a slaughter ground from which most of them will never return.

Ty and Jason, Oklahoma brothers so different in character yet so close to soul, will reunite in the Battle of Dak To and in the harrowing battle for Hill 875—an insignificant piece of ground that will set stranger to kill stranger for no reason at all, and brother to save brother for the one reason that matters.

“An action-adventure novel at that genre’s best.”—Publishers Weekly

Release date: July 20, 2011

Publisher: Ballantine Books

Print pages: 352

Sample

1
 
16 August, 1965, Meyers, Oklahoma
 
Jason Johnson pushed open the door of the John Deere store and stepped out into the dry Oklahoma heat. The stagnant, hot air smelled of baking dust. He strolled down the sizzling sidewalk, passing the stores and people he knew he would soon be missing. Meyers wasn’t much to look at, but it was his hometown. He knew all of the store owners and their families, right down to the names of their dogs. The center of town comprised only two blocks of stores and a stoplight, but it was a place big in heart, where everybody cared about everybody and nothing could stay secret for very long.
 
“Hiya, Jay.”
 
Jason smiled and turned around, recognizing the unmistakable gravelly voice.
 
Coach Lambert walked out of the drugstore and extended his hand toward him. Buzz Lambert was a town legend. He had a real talent for organizing scrawny farmers’ sons into winning football teams for Meyers High School. He was getting on in years now, but the fire was still in his eyes. “Jay, I wanted ta wish ya the best before ya left for college. I’m headin’ upstate for a few weeks and won’t be seein’ ya before ya go.”
 
Jason shook his hand warmly. Buzz was responsible for getting him the football scholarship to Central State College. “Thanks, Coach. You made it all happen.”
 
Buzz looked the 190-pounder over from head to foot. “Ya been pumping the weights this summer. How much ya put on, ten pounds?”
 
Jason dipped his head shyly. “Yeah, Coach, I think I’m ready for them.” His face came up with a grin. “Wait till you see Ty. We worked out together. He put at least an inch on his chest, and he’s even faster than last year.”
 
“Did ya work on his damn temper? Your stepbrother could be an all-stater if he wasn’t so damn hard-headed. He can’t be gettin’ thrown out of four games for fightin’ like he did last year, or he’ll be out of the running.”
 
Jason smiled and put his arm around his coach. “That’s why you’re the best. You’ll work it out of him.”
 
“Ty is the best damn natural hitter I’ve ever seen. He loves knocking people on their ass. He won’t have ya throwing passes to him, so it ain’t gonna be the same on offense, but on defense he’ll make it. I’ve already contacted Oklahoma State and Central to come and take a look at him. Hell, he might even be joining you next year.” Buzz wiped sweat from his forehead and put out his hand again. “Jay, ya take care of ya’self and watch out for Coach Duggin. He’s been at Central for eight years now, and I hear he’s turned into a real bastard. Just do what he says, no matter what. The first year is always the toughest.”
 
“I’ll make it, Coach. I was taught by the best.”
 
Buzz thumped him on the back. “Me and Meyers will be countin’ on ya.”
 
Jimbo Akers shook his head in disgust at the old man and his hound dog sitting on the porch. Cecil Waters, standing beside Jimbo, wasn’t going to give up so easily. He put his hands on his flabby hips. “Look, old man, we’ve been hired by the government for the eradication. You can’t stop us from our job!”
 
George Many Moons rocked in his chair, not looking at the two red-faced men. He raised a gnarled hand and pointed toward the front gate. “Y’all ain’t nothin’ but bounty hunters. Git off my land.”
 
“Come on, Cecil,” Akers said, turning around to leave. “We’re wastin’ our time with this old bastard. We’ll talk to the county game warden.”
 
Cecil pointed a fat finger at the silver-haired Indian. “You should listen to your son-in-law and take the money.”
 
Many Moons kept his stoic expression and continued rocking. The two men strode through the gate toward a bright red pickup. In seconds the Chevy was speeding down the dirt road.
 
Many Moons smiled and began to get up, but suddenly froze. In the distance he saw the long-awaited vision. It was time. The Chosen Warrior was coming for him at last.
 
The old man blinked and his eyes began to moisten. His eyes had betrayed him. The shimmering heatwaves distorted the approaching horse and rider’s image. The red powdered dust disturbed by the Appaloosa’s slow gait swirled upward as if the horse were approaching in a vermillion cloud. It wasn’t the vision Many Moons had been waiting for, but he was not disappointed. The bare-chested rider was his own blood. Many Moons felt pride and sadness. The years were passing by too quickly. It seemed like only yesterday that his grandson had been a small boy and had had to climb a fence to mount Sa Tonkee. The young man riding the old gelding was no longer a boy. Raven-haired and broad-shouldered, he looked like a warrior ready for the hunt. His body was lean, exposing rippling muscles and bulging veins that ran up his arm and across his shoulders like thick chords. His Indian blood was evident in his black hair, brown skin, and high cheekbones. But there the influence stopped. He had his father’s square jaw and deep-clefted chin and his mother’s brown eyes. John Nance would have been proud of him.
 
Ty Nance swung off the saddle and tossed the reins over the fence. He bent over to pet his grandfather’s old, nearly blind coon dog, Rowdy, and looked up the road where the dust of the red pickup was just settling. “Who was that, Granddad? They sure were in a hurry to leave.”
 
Many Moons motioned for a beer from the rusted Coca-Cola icebox across the porch. “Bounty hunters. They want ta hunt coyotes on our land.”
 
Ty took a Coors and a Dr Pepper from the ice water and opened them with a bottle opener hanging from the side of the icebox. “Screw ’em. The coyotes don’t bother anything except rabbits, and we got too many of them.” He handed the old man the beer and sat down on the wooden porch.
 
Many Moons shook his head. “They talked to your stepdad and he told ’em they could hunt. They was gonna give me ten dollars for the ones they kilt.”
 
“He can’t do that! This is your land. If they paid a hundred dollars it wouldn’t make any difference.”
 
Many Moons felt pride at the anger in the boy’s eyes. Ty understood. Red Hill was a final sanctuary, the last of the lands that used to be. It was a haven for trees and animals, the only place for miles around unspoiled by man’s greedy hands and machines.
 
“Don’t worry none. I told ’em it weren’t for Duane to say if they could hunt on my land. I told ’em ta git.”
 
Ty gave his grandfather a reassuring nod. “I’ll watch out for ’em.”
 
Many Moons weakly raised his beer as if in a toast. “The Coon Dog and me gonna protect our hill together.”
 
Ty smiled as he lifted his bottle and took a drink. His grandfather had called him “Coon Dog” since he was five, after he’d gone on his first coon hunt. He didn’t remember the hunt, but Many Moons had told him he’d cried most of the night, wanting to run with the dogs.
 
Ty took another drink and motioned with the bottle down the road.
 
“The big split paw was in your watermelons again. I checked the field and found some half-eaten melons with his tracks all around.”
 
Many Moons’s brown, wrinkled face seem to sadden as he gazed down the dusty road. “The old cuss is gettin’ along in years, like Rowdy and me. He can’t hunt anymore. He eats them melons to live out the summer.” The old man’s voice trailed off as he lowered his head and stared at his hands. He knew he was like his dog and the old coyote—he wouldn’t live to see the winter.
 
Ty sensed his grandfather’s depression. The old man’s worn, faded overalls were stained from dribbled chewing tobacco. He was looking weaker than Ty had ever seen him.
 
He stood up. “Come on, Granddad, let’s go up to the meadow. We’ll visit the family, then see the sunset.”
 
Many Moons lifted his head, brightening. “It’d be good to see our place again … Come on, Dawg.” He took Ty’s hand and pulled himself up.
 
Ty held his grandfather’s arm to support him as they walked around the shack and followed a path that wound its way through the majestic trees and up the hill. Rowdy followed as they walked the five hundred or so yards out onto a small, grassy field, which covered the hilltop. In the center of the field were three headstones, and near them, a log bench Ty had made a few years before. Ty stopped between the first two markers and squatted down to pull out a few weeds. Beneath the red soil was his grandmother, his uncle Richard, and the father he had hardly known. Sergeant John Nance had been killed in Korea in 1952, leaving behind his five-year-old son. Next to his father was Corporal Richard Many Moons, George’s own son, who died in Italy during World War II. The three resting souls, and the stories his grandfather told about them, were part of this hill Ty loved.
 
Standing over Richard’s grave, Many Moons stole a glance at Ty. The young man was like Richard in so many ways that he often thought of the boy as his lost son.
 
The old man’s eyes shifted to the middle grave, and he knelt down to pull out a milkweed by his wife’s headstone. Mea, his daughter and Ty’s mother, was his wife’s favorite. He had often thought how proud his wife would have been of Mea when the telegram had come with the news about John. Mea had found love again and had gotten married again ten years ago to Duane Johnson, a widower like herself. His boy, Jason, was a year older than Ty. Duane was good to Mea, but for some reason he’d never taken to Ty.