by Hill, David
My father’s voice stayed quiet. ‘That Swiss bloke, the one who represents the Japanese government, any sign of him?’
‘Dunno. A lot of our boys are saying if the Nips try anything more, then we’re ready for them. There are idiots on both sides, I tell you.’
Another couple of puffs from Dad. ‘Ito?’ My ears pricked up at the name.
‘Captain Ashton is talking to him. But there are so many stupid bloody hot-heads, Jack. I reckon some of the Japs want to go out in a blaze of glory. And Ito is a Nip, too, don’t forget. He’ll stick with them if it comes to real trouble.’
My dad sighed. The two of them began moving towards the house, Bruce going: ‘Thought you’d want to know, with the boys going out there. They’re good young blokes, Jack.’
I slipped inside, along to my room, and pretended to be reading.
Dad said nothing to me about it. I don’t know if he told Mum. I tried to read more of The Happy Return; it’s got a great sea battle. But I kept thinking of what I had heard. Can Ito stop what’s happening? Can anybody? I felt scared all evening. The good things of the past few days seem to have disappeared.
The BBC News says the Yanks have captured two more Pacific islands from the Japs. Wonder if Moana’s boyfriend was there? If only some sort of miracle would happen: the Japs realise they can’t win, and they surrender. If only.
WEDNESDAY, 24 FEBRUARY I didn’t write all that yesterday. We have begun our journals again in Room Six. ‘Sir?’ went Terry O’Donaghue as we started. ‘Sir, do you think the war will finish soon? The Japs and the Germans must know they’re losing.’
It was so much like what I’d been wishing that I wondered if Terry had been reading my mind. Mr White said, ‘Why don’t you write what you think, Terence? That will help formulate your thoughts.’
I wrote a lot. As usual, I felt better after I had done it.
Before that, when we got to school, I waited until Clarry had headed off to his Standard Four friends. ‘Remember we’ve got that lesson after school!’ he called to us, trying to look important.
Then I told Barry what Bruce had said yesterday. My best friend looked at me, then at the road outside. A truck with three men had just pulled up.
‘I wish we c-could go and see Ito,’ he went.
‘This weekend?’ I asked. Barry nodded. ‘But it’s a long t-time to wait.’
The men from the truck were starting to dig up the footpath. ‘What are they doing?’ Barry said.
‘Maybe it’s a new air-raid shelter?’ I suggested. ‘We can hide there if Miss Mutter throws things at us.’ Actually, we haven’t had any air-raid drills for ages. All the invasion scares have gone.
Not much water in the taps again at morning playtime. We were doing History when the monitor arrived and said that all classes had to line up outside for a special assembly.
We filed out. The camp, I thought. Something has happened at the camp. No, the Japs and Germans have decided to surrender.
Nothing like that. The pipe bringing water to the school had broken, the headmaster told us. Council workers were repairing it, but in the meantime there was no water for drinking or the toilets. So because of health reasons, school was stopping straightaway, and there would be no lessons tomorrow.
Everyone started talking at once. Some kids went ‘Hurray!’, until they saw Miss Mutter glaring at them. Our headmaster lifted his hand, and things went quiet again.
If anybody had no parents at home, they should tell their teacher, and arrangements would be made. If anybody needed to use the telephone, they should report to the office.
We were dismissed. Some kids started going ‘Hurray!’ again as soon as they were around the corner. Clarry appeared beside us. ‘How about our lesson? With Mrs Proctor?’
At the same moment, I heard Susan calling our names. ‘I’m going to phone Mum. Maybe she can come in early. Do you want to wait?’
Susan was back five minutes later. ‘Mum can come now. And it’s still alright for us to use the classroom.’
She hesitated. ‘Mum got a letter yesterday. It said she was a stinking Jap-lover, and she should be ashamed of herself.’
We blokes stared. Susan tried to smile. ‘There was no name on it. Mum said she isn’t worried, but I think it’s awful.’
We ate our lunches together. Susan and Margaret had girl-type sandwiches: square ones, with the edges all neat. We three boys had big chunks of bread. The jam had soaked through Clarry’s, and he showed off, pretending it was blood.
Susan’s mother arrived in the big car. I wished some kids were there to see that she had come for us. She talked to our headmaster, who kept saying ‘Yes, Mrs Proctor … Of course, Mrs Proctor’, and we all went to Room Six.
It felt strange, just the six of us and no teacher. From her bag, Mrs Proctor took sheets of white paper and some tiny paint brushes. ‘Is there ink in your ink wells? Good.’
So I had my first Japanese writing lesson. I learned how to hold the brush straight up and down, with just the tips of my fingers (hard), and to draw the signs with only a few movements (harder). We all made blots. Clarry’s paper looked as though his ink well had exploded.
We learned the signs for being a boy (like a square head on legs), girl (I forget), and Mt Fuji (like a sailing ship coming at you). We laughed, and talked, and learned.
‘Well done,’ said Mrs Proctor. She hesitated, then: ‘You should take them home and show your parents, if you think they won’t mind.’ Barry and I glanced at each other, and I knew the same thought had hit us both.
We couldn’t talk about it, even when we three blokes were riding home, because Clarry was with us. ‘See you later on?’ I went to Barry. He understood straightaway, like I knew he would. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘Later on.’
Dad was back from a morning shift. He had seen other kids heading home, heard about school being closed, so he wasn’t surprised when I appeared.
‘Give us a hand with these bean-frames, son,’ he asked. As soon as we were both in the garden, he went, ‘Not the best of news from Bruce yesterday, was it?’
I didn’t know what to say.
‘You were listening, weren’t you?’ Dad asked. When I nodded, he half-grinned. ‘Thought so. It’s pretty tense out there just now, Ewen. Colonel Wallace got all the prisoners together again today; told them this nonsense about refusing work had better stop. They’re to provide full numbers for work parties tomorrow, or there’ll be punishment.’ My father’s face was grave. ‘You’ve been trying to do your bit, son, and you deserve to know. You like Ito, and he likes you.’ I glanced up, and Dad nodded. ‘But I want you to stay away until things have cooled off. For your own safety. When the colonel was lecturing the Japs today, none of them said a thing. But it felt … it feels like an explosion is going to happen.’
I felt proud that he trusted me, proud also of him. My dad is tough and straight, and he tries to do the best he can for people. No wonder Ito respects him.
‘OK?’ he said now. ‘Understand?’
‘Yeah. I understand.’
I wonder why I said it that way. Maybe I had made my mind up even then.
Before tea, I walked around to the Morrises. Clarry was still doing his exercises, walking up and down the path and steps without his braces, while his mother watched and smiled. ‘Alright, love,’ she went after a bit, ‘come here and I’ll give those legs a massage.’ She turned to Barry and me as she went in. ‘So what are you going to do with your free day tomorrow?’ We mumbled something.
By the time I went home, Barry and I had decided. We were going out to the camp, in spite of what Dad had said. We weren’t telling anyone. We were taking the Japanese writing we did today. (We weren’t showing it to anyone else.) Somehow we were going to see Ito; show him that we are trying to understand and respect his country and people. We’ll ask if he can tell the others that we’re not all enemies.
That word Mr White used this morning: formulate. It means to plan something. I guess we’re formulat
ing right now.
THURSDAY, 25 FEBRUARY Dad left before I was up. Good. I hadn’t actually lied to him, but I hadn’t spoken the whole truth, either.
I headed around to the Morrises’ after breakfast. I told Mum we were going for a bike ride. Barry and I decided last night that we’d say that. Once again, we weren’t actually lying, but …
The paper with Jap writing was in my shirt pocket. We have to see Ito. My father is right: something is building up at the camp, and it could explode anytime. The Japs are ashamed of being prisoners and not dying in battle; the guards are feeling they’re being sneered at and ignored by people who should be obeying them; the talk about little yellow sods who deserve what’s coming to them; the Japs’ extra shame because they’re losing the war — all these things are bubbling away together.
Maybe we can’t do anything, but we’re going to try; we’re going to show there can be respect between enemies. I know that’s how Barry and I both feel.
‘Where are we going?’ Clarry asked as the three of us started down the path. Barry and I said nothing.
‘Where are we going?’ Clarry asked again.
Barry spun around, and snapped, ‘Shut up!’ His younger brother got such a shock that he did — for about five seconds. Then he started complaining.
We two older blokes stayed silent until we were around the corner from the Morrises’ house, Clarry’s trolley trundling along behind my bike. Then Barry said, ‘We’re going to the camp to see Ito.’
Clarry grinned. ‘Great.’ He didn’t seem to have the faintest idea that we might be doing something dangerous.
We didn’t say much as we rode. I hoped we didn’t meet anyone who might tell Dad. The day was hot and still. Thunderclouds lay over the Tararuas. Sweat slid down our faces.
No sign of anybody outside the high barbed wire. An older guard stood by the barrier, back to the road, gazing towards the prisoners’ compounds. Other figures in khaki uniforms with rifles and bayonets were marching along inside the perimeter fences.
The guard didn’t even see us until we stopped. ‘What are you kids doing here? Haven’t you got school?’
We told him about the water pipes. Then I swallowed and said, ‘We’re seeing Lieutenant Ito.’ Once again, it wasn’t completely a lie.
The guard frowned, and ran a finger down the page on his clip-board. ‘Nothing here about it.’
Barry shrugged. ‘M-Must have forgotten. It’s another lesson.’
The guard seemed to be only half-listening. He gazed towards the compounds again. ‘The officers are … Alright, report to the gate. Someone will deal with you.’ We said thanks, left our bikes, and headed off before he could change his mind.
The towers along the wire fence surrounding the military prisoners’ area were all manned. I saw a gun barrel pointing out. Nobody took any notice of us.
A single sentry was by the main gate. He was also watching the other khaki figures still moving into position a few fences away. We told him we were there to see Ito, and he jerked his head to go on.
Now that we were closer, we heard the murmur of voices from the military prisoners’ compound. Lots of voices: sounded like everyone was there. Somebody was speaking loudly in English, but we couldn’t make out the words.
We didn’t have any plan. I don’t think we’d expected to get this far. ‘C-Come on,’ Barry muttered, and started towards the hut where Ito usually taught us. Clarry and I followed; he was walking almost naturally without his braces. We all tried to look as though nothing was different.
The headquarters area seemed deserted. ‘We’ve got to find someone,’ I went. ‘Ask to see Ito.’ I remembered what Dad had told me, and I added: ‘Be careful.’ We came around the corner of a hut, and stopped.
Ahead of us, through three perimeter fences, stretched the middle of the military prisoners’ section. The Japs were there, everyone from that compound by the look of it, hundreds of them sitting or squatting in the big open space in front of their huts. Off to one side, behind more fences, the Nips from the civilian compound stood watching.
Armed guards — thirty, forty of them at least — ringed the seated prisoners, rifles held ready. Others stood on the hut roofs behind them. I glimpsed more gun barrels, all aimed down at the crowded group.
A square concrete slab about two feet high, the foundation for a building or something, rose in front of the Japs. Officers in khaki uniforms — I recognised Captain Ashton and Colonel Wallace — and several guards with guns stood there. I couldn’t see my dad.
The colonel was talking, and you could tell he was angry. Words reached us. ‘Work parties … obey … now.’ Captain Ashton translated as his commanding officer spoke. The prisoners had stopped murmuring; the only sound was the voices of the two New Zealand officers. Where was Ito?
We three kids were pressed against the hut corner, staring. Colonel Wallace spoke again. ‘One more time … work parties … or your officers … locked in cells.’
More translating from Captain Ashton. A murmur, a growl built among the seated Japs. Some of the guards twitched, moved their guns.
In the middle of the prisoners, a man stood. The other Jap officer. He began talking loudly, quickly, to Captain Ashton, stabbing a finger at him, shaking his head.
The captain said something to Colonel Wallace, started replying to the enemy officer. The Nip shook his head more violently, yelled, clenched his fists. Around him, other men were shouting as well.
The colonel turned to a group of guards. ‘Seize that man! Put him in the punishment cells!’
Clarry gasped as half a dozen khaki figures strode towards the ranks of prisoners. They had left their rifles behind. As they advanced, the Japs rose, shouting, shaking their fists, shoving the guards away as they tried to push through. One guard went reeling. Another flung punches at the figures blocking his way.
A piercing blast. On the concrete slab, Colonel Wallace had a whistle to his lips. He was calling orders; we couldn’t hear the words above the shouts and yells. All around the mass of prisoners, rifles were raised and aimed. The colonel called again, and the group of guards retreated. Two lemon-squeezer hats lay on the ground. A prisoner stamped furiously on one.
Silence began to spread across the Japanese, and I realised another figure was standing. Ito.
Clarry was right out in the open. I pulled him back to the corner of the hut, and we kept watching. Boots hurried past nearby, and more guards ran towards the military compound. They didn’t see us.
Ito was speaking to the Japs around him. They were all seated and silent again. He turned, gave a slight bow to Colonel Wallace and Captain Ashton, began talking carefully to them. His voice was too quiet to make out words, but you felt the calm returning.
The colonel interrupted him, flicked his hand in a ‘No’ gesture. ‘Work,’ he said again. ‘No argument … duty as … officer.’
Ito listened. When the New Zealand officer had finished translating, he shook his head just once, almost politely. He spread his hands towards the figures crouched all around him. Even without words, you could tell what he meant. These are my men. Men from my country. I remembered what he had said about loyalty.
Colonel Wallace pointed. ‘Arrest him!’
A bigger group of guards charged forward. The Japs rose to meet them, punching and yelling. From the hut roofs, other guards shouted, too. ‘Bloody shoot you! … Sit down!’ For thirty, forty seconds, khaki and blue figures struggled, kicked and struck at one another. A couple of stones flew through the air; I don’t know who threw them. A second whistle blast and the guards pulled back, panting, empty-handed. Ito still stood in the middle of his men.
He held up his hands, rapping out orders until the roar of noise slowly died down. He spoke again, in Japanese this time, to Captain Ashton, fast and intense. The captain talked quickly to Colonel Wallace.
Another figure in khaki ran past our hut, stopped to stare at us, then hurried on towards the other compound. All three of us were out in th
e open now, staring at what was happening.
The colonel shook his head. Captain Ashton started to speak again, urgently, but the commanding officer ignored him.
‘For the last time: tell your men to report for work now, or I will shoot to wound you. Do you understand?’
He drew his pistol from its holster. Clarry cried out, his voice lost in another swelling growl from the prisoners. Guards’ voices yelled once more. ‘Shut up! Bloody yellow sods!’
Ito stood, still and calm. I remembered his words. ‘Be strong … Never fear death.’ I started to call out to him, too.
He saw us. Or heard us. I’m not sure. But his eyes moved to where the three of us stood, beyond the ranks of wire fences. He raised one hand, gave us the slightest of bows. I believe he half-smiled at us. Then he turned towards the colonel, and shook his head once more.
Colonel Wallace lifted his revolver. The Japs started rising to their feet again, shouting and lifting their fists. Some tore their shirts open, jabbed fingers at their chests like they’d done that other time. The civilian prisoners were yelling, too. Rifles rose; guards called out.
A single shot. Was it the colonel? I couldn’t tell. Our sensei staggered, seemed to clutch at his arm. Then he disappeared as the madness began.
The military prisoners surged towards the concrete slab where the New Zealand officers stood. More stones arced through the air. One hit Captain Ashton, who doubled over, holding his ribs and half-falling. The colonel bawled orders, but nothing could be heard above the din.
A second shot, and a prisoner fell. A third shot. Bursts of them suddenly, from everywhere — the concrete slab, the hut roofs, the watch-towers. Not just rifles: machine-guns and tommy-guns, splitting the air with their noise.
All across the open ground, prisoners screamed and fell. Some lay still, some twitched and twisted on the ground. Some huddled, arms over their heads. Others still charged or staggered towards the guards. More shots, and down they went.