Going After Cacciato

They board the Andros, a converted freighter, for the three-day journey to Athens. The trip passes pleasantly, like a vacation. Sarkin takes responsibility for Lieutenant Corson, and his health improves under her care. She urges him to resume a leadership role.

When they near the dock, however, it’s swarmed with policemen looking for them, pulling all the men aside and opening luggage. Stink urges them to think of a plan, but everyone else is resigned to their fate. Paul thinks that Stink is “a scrapper. Tough and unquitting” (258).

Stink strips down to his underwear, ties his boots around his neck, and—holding his wallet and pocketknife and pinching his nose—jumps into the water without making a splash. Paul can see the slight wake of a swimmer as the boat docks until it too disappears.

Doc, Oscar and Buff had given Stink an English-Vietnamese dictionary as a birthday present. Stink would scream at the villagers in broken Vietnamese, trying to get them to move and lie down, but the villagers wouldn’t understand. So he would enforce his message with his gun, feeling triumphant when the villagers did what he wanted.

Since the soldiers don’t understand the language, they don’t understand the Vietnamese people’s emotions or know who to trust.