The Far Reaches

by Homer Hickam

  Hearing Josh’s comment, Sister Mary Kathleen came near and said, “I have seem them build one, and, faith, they are all atwitter, with gangs of men come round to offer advice and lend a hand and drink kava. ’Tis a grand social occasion, it is.”

  “I’m sure you were all agog at the sight, Sister,” Josh replied, suddenly in a foul mood. He was irritated that the nun had interrupted him while he was trying to educate Bosun O’Neal, and he also resented her for kidnapping him. “Tell me again why you’re taking me to the Far Reaches,” he demanded.

  She sat beside Nango, who smiled affectionately at her. “As I explained, sor, I need a big man to convince the Japanese on Ruka island to surrender.”

  “Did Colonel Burr understand this idiocy to be the case?”

  “Faith, I’m not certain what he understood! All I know is that he seemed to have something against ye, though he never said what it was.”

  Josh replied, “I guess his latest reason is because I tried to kill him, though it was only with a little shovel. Now, Sister, here’s what I have to say. Turn this outrigger around and take me back to Tarawa. You have shanghaied me, which is against international law. Otherwise, I shall see you stood up in a proper court and sent to prison.”

  The nun produced a faint smile. “That I cannot do, Captain. Nango, all my fella boys, are anxious to return home and toot sweet”

  “You should be careful using that expression, ma’am,” Josh growled. “It reminds me too much of Montague Burr. Now, do you have a plan for survival when we reach the Far Reaches? Or shall we simply turn ourselves in to the Japanese and lay our heads on the chopping block?”

  Sister Mary Kathleen knew she was being baited and remained calm. “I had hoped for enough Americans to simply march ashore on Ruka and make Colonel Yoshu surrender. Since I only have you, Bosun O’Neal, and three marines, a different approach is required. I think we will first go to Burubu, some thirty miles west of Ruka. There is a village there that will take us in. Then I will send one of my fella boys to Ruka, and under the cover of darkness, he will tack a message on Colonel Yoshu’s door. It will tell him the Americans have taken Tarawa and also inform him that you, an American official, are in the islands to negotiate his surrender. If he agrees, he will lower the flag in front of his headquarters. My fella boy can bring us his answer. What do you think?”

  “I think his more likely reaction will be to track me down and cut out my liver.”

  “Colonel Yoshu isn’t like other Japanese. At heart, he is a coward.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I was his prisoner for over a year. So were me fella boys. We escaped together.”

  Josh absorbed that information. “Well, Sister,” he said, “your plan has more holes in it than Swiss cheese. Let’s look at things another way. Maybe the best course is to do nothing.”

  “Nothing is not a course at all,” she pointed out.

  Josh shrugged, which hurt his ribs, and he visibly winced. “In this case, I think it is. Now that we’ve taken Tarawa, the Far Reaches will be within range of our bombers. My guess is Colonel Yoshu will be ordered to evacuate. All you have to do is wait until he leaves, which shouldn’t be all that long.”

  “But if he leaves …” she began, then pressed her lips together, sealing a thought.

  “Yes?”

  “I was hoping … “ But then she looked away and said nothing.

  Josh pondered the nun for a long second, then said, “Sister, I can’t figure you out.” He turned to Ready. “Did I just hear Sister say there are three marines with us?”

  “Three marines, yes, sir.”

  “You should have informed me, Bosun. I’m surprised at your inattention to detail.”

  “I guess I had other things on my mind.”

  Josh allowed a sigh, then turned to the nun. “You’re dismissed, ma’am. The bosun and I have military affairs to discuss. I’ll let you know if I need to talk to you further.”

  “I will not be shooed away with a wave of yer big hand, Captain,” Sister replied. “I lead this expedition, after all.”

  “I thought pride was a big sin in your religion,” Josh teased.

  “Clearly, ’tisn’t in yers,” she snapped before rising and going forward, her habit billowing in the breeze, to lean on the stem and glare at the sea.

  “God save me from all women,” Josh muttered, then wished for just a sip of Mount Gay rum, as he always did when he’d been rattled by a female.

  “That was disrespectful, sir,” Ready said. “The way you talked to the sister.”

  “Stop taking her side, Bosun. That’s an order.”

  “She saved my life, Captain. Yours, too.”

  Josh snorted, which hurt his ribs again. He put his hand on them, which made them hurt all the more. Bruised ribs were a terrible nuisance. “She shanghaied me, that’s what she did,” he said after the pain subsided. “Some women think they can presume control over the affairs of men, but that’s not the way the world is set up, Bosun, not by a long shot, and thank God for it. That little Irish nun needs to be set back a pace, in my opinion. And didn’t I tell you to bring me those marines?”

  “You did, sir.”

  “Well?”

  “I was waiting for you to finish your pissing and moaning.” He waited a disrespectful second before adding, “Sir.”

  Josh glared at Ready, then said tightly, “I’m finished. Now get me those leathernecks, son. And toot sweet, you hear?”

  24

  Toot sweet, as quickly as possible, the captains moved their outriggers alongside, and the marines were transferred aboard Nango’s boat. Although Garcia wore his utilities, proper for reporting, Tucker and Sampson brazenly wore lava-lavas, though they still had on their combat boots. Josh made no comment on their dress but asked the marines to tell him their outfits, which they did, and their experiences on Tarawa, which caused them to hem and haw just a bit before Tucker told it, only exaggerating a little.

  “That Major Reed was surely a hero,” Josh replied with some astonishment after Tucker finished describing how the officer called in naval artillery on what was apparently a Japanese admiral. “He might have won us the battle right there. What became of him?”

  “I dunno, sir,” Tucker said while Ready hid his blush and looked off into the distance. “He just kind of disappeared. Likely got killed.”

  Then Tucker told how they’d been grabbed by the gunny and all that transpired until Sister Mary Kathleen had rescued them, just in the nick of time. “We’re surely glad to be off them pohunky islands,” he said, to wrap up his tale.

  Josh said, “Tucker, I do believe you’re a Hatteras boy. Am I right?”

  “Yes, sir. And I know you’re the Killakeet Keeper’s son. My daddy is a fisherman, of course. Works mostly on the Cathy Dove, which is a right fine shad boat.”

  “I know her,” Josh acknowledged. “A bit weak in the braces but otherwise a fine sailer.”

  “That would be her, for sartain.”

  “Well, you boys did a swell job, and I know the Corps is justly proud of you.

  “Mostly, they probably wonder where we are,” Garcia piped up. “Where are we, sir?”

  “We’re northeast of Tarawa, though how far out I don’t know, and I doubt these fella boys know, either. They don’t navigate like white men, wondering about miles and such. They use the stars and the sun to keep going in generally the right direction, figuring sooner or later they’ll get where they’re headed, which in this case is an island group known as the Forridges. Some call them the Far Reaches, and justly so. They ain’t on normal trading routes. I guess you could say they’re on the far end of nowhere.”

  “But why are we going there, sir?” Tucker asked. “Shouldn’t we go back to Tarawa?”

  “Indeed we should. But that little nun there on the bow pretending not to be listening has kidnapped us.”

  The three marines stared at Sister Mary Kathleen. “How come?” Sampson demanded.

 
Josh considered an answer, dismissed one that was sarcastic, then said, “She has a good reason, I suppose. The Japanese have occupied Ruka, which is the capital of those islands. She wants us to make them surrender.”

  “Surrender? That don’t make sense. If they’re anything like those bastards on Tarawa, giving up ain’t in their nature.”

  “Indeed,” Josh said, nodding agreement.

  “Are we deserters?” Sampson asked. “When they call the roll and we don’t answer, they’re going to think we’re deserters, ain’t they?”

  “Maybe. But as long as you stay with me and do exactly what I tell you when I tell you to do it, they likely won’t hang you.”

  The marines looked at each other, and Tucker spoke for all. “But you’re Coast Guard, ain’t you, sir? Marines don’t usually take orders from the toy boat navy, beg pardon, sir.”

  “Didn’t you take orders from Bosun O’Neal?”

  “That was different. We knew him.”

  “Well, now you know me. Take my orders or I’ll toss you overboard and let the sharks have you.”

  The marines gave Josh’s eloquent argument some thought, noticed his big ham hands and bulging arm muscles, and then said, nearly in unison, “Happy to be aboard, sir!”

  “Good. To celebrate your joining the toy boat navy, you’re all promoted one rank.”

  Sampson perked up. “Thanks, sir. I could use the extra pay”

  “This kind of promotion don’t come with extra pay, son. You’ve got a brevet rank, which means it’s only good for as long as you’re with me.”

  Sampson frowned. “Well, hell, sir, why don’t you make me a general, then?”

  Josh smiled. “Let’s see how you do as a corporal first.”

  After the marines were transferred back to their respective outriggers, Josh thought things over some more, then asked the nun to join him. “Sister, I suppose I should know a few things. For instance, how many Japanese do you think are on Ruka?”

  “I believe about a hundred, Captain.”

  “A full company, then. How are they armed?”

  “Rifles and pistols. Some machine guns, I think.”

  “Boats?”

  “They have two vessels that look like your box-shaped landing craft, only bigger. I believe they called them daihatsu.”

  “They’re called barges, Sister. Used to transport their soldiers and supplies. Daihatsu is the company that manufactures them. By the way, how good is your Japanese?”

  “Fair, I would say. The fella boys know a few words as well. It is natural to learn the language of one’s captors.”

  Josh nodded. “All right, Sister. Thank you. Now, here is my decision. You have carried me off on a suicide mission, but I have decided not to participate. As soon as we get to the Far Reaches and let you and your fella boys off, I intend to take one of these outriggers, load up my marines and Bosun O’Neal, and head back to Tarawa.” When she opened her mouth to argue, he snapped, “That’s all, Sister!”

  Sister Mary Kathleen struggled with her temper, her face flushed with the effort, then said, with her eyes downcast, “As you wish, Captain.” She gathered her habit and climbed inside the hut on the stern.

  Ready started to protest, but Josh held up his finger. “Not a word, Bosun. She needed a dose of reality. Maybe you do, too, eh?”

  Inside the hut, Sister Mary Kathleen knelt before the statue of the Virgin and kissed the medal of her order and then sat down, cross-legged beneath the folds of her habit. Her lips pursed petulantly and she thought several dark thoughts about Captain Josh Thurlow in sequence; then she heard the man laugh his crude laugh. She poked her head outside and saw that he’d taken Nango’s seat and was controlling the sail, a great grin creasing what seemed to her now a mostly apelike face. Who does he think he is, this grand Josh Thurlow? she thought. Then she closed the hatch on her hut and shut her eyes tight against the bright light filtering through the bamboo lattice and begged forgiveness to Saint Monessa for allowing her anger to overcome her studied humility. She gave herself a penance, and it was to humble herself in some way to Captain Thurlow, even if he is a big, foolish gorilla, excuse me, Saint Monessa!

  Then she heard Nango call out something in an excited voice. She popped out to see what it was and saw that the mighty, great Captain Thurlow had handed the sheet back to Nango and was now on the bow, peering forward. Bosun O’Neal was with him, also staring intently. “What is it?” she demanded.

  “It’s the marine, Sampson,” Bosun O’Neal said. “He’s gotten himself eaten by a shark.”

  25

  It was a small tiger shark, Josh was fairly certain, probably a loner just out to see if he could find an easy meal. Through Josh’s mind ran the number of times he’d caught sharks off Killakeet. They had once been a cash catch on the island, the cannery processing vitamin A from their livers, but around 1932, synthetic vitamins began to be produced, and the demand for sharks collapsed. Afterward, they were considered trash fish that competed with the fishermen for their catch. But Josh had always respected them. He recalled a lemon shark he’d hooked down by Ocracoke Shoals. When he’d reeled it in close to the transom, it had suddenly gone berserk, frantically twisting and turning its body and rolling its baleful eyes toward Josh until finally he’d cut the line. With a single flick of its tail, the shark was gone, just vanished with scarcely a swirl of bubbles left behind. Sharks were powerful and wild and free and always hungry, and until they were dead, they were going to do whatever they wanted to do, which meant, when they weren’t making baby sharks, devouring anything edible they encountered.

  Sampson had been trailing his foot in the water. It seemed he had been hiding a puncture in the sole of his left foot. When it had gotten so swollen he had to take off his boot, he had been astonished at how awful the wound looked and felt. Thinking to clean it, he hung off the side of the outrigger and immersed his gory foot in the sea. Within seconds, the shark had come up and taken a bite out of it, removing several toes and shredding the flesh, leaving the metatarsals exposed.

  “Does it hurt much, Sampson?” Josh asked, as tenderly as he was able.

  “Like it’s on fire, sir. But I can take the pain.”

  “Aye, sure, ’tis a given for a marine,” Sister Mary Kathleen said.

  Josh got down to cases. “It would have been better if the shark had bitten off more than it did. In any case, it did you a favor, because now we can see what you’ve been hiding. You have gangrene, son.”

  Sampson gulped. “Am I to lose my foot, Captain?”

  “No, my boy. If you are to live, we’ll have to take off your leg.”

  Sampson stared at Josh, then lay back. After a long second, he asked, “Sister, is the captain telling the truth?”

  “Aye, Sampson,” she answered. “’Tis true. Ye’ll die otherwise.”

  “My whole leg?”

  “I think a few inches below the knee will suffice.”

  “Isn’t there another way?”

  “Nay, Sampson. I’m sorry.”

  “How about just my foot?” he begged.

  She gave it some thought. “Maybe. ’Twould be risky. Better to cut too high than too low.”

  Josh barged in. “For God’s sake, stop coddling him, Sister! Now, look, Sampson. You brought this all on yourself. You let your foot fester in your boot, kept it to yourself, and it took a shark to call it to our attention. This ain’t up for a vote. We’re going to take off everything up to a couple inches below your knee and you’re going to lie there and take it like a marine. That’s an order.”

  “Oh, do be quiet, Captain Thurlow!” Sister Mary Kathleen snapped. “’Tis Sampson’s leg, not yers!” She touched the marine’s cheek. “Choose, me boy. Open your heart to God and He will tell ye what to do.”

  “I’m Jewish, Sister,” Sampson said.

  “God doesn’t care what ye are, lad. Choose!”

  Sampson nodded, then closed his eyes, his brow furrowed in thought. “Sampson,” Josh said, “I think
you and God should hurry up and decide, else we’ll lose the light.”

  “Will you do the cutting, Sister?” Sampson asked, opening his eyes.

  “I’ll do it,” Josh said.

  Sister Mary Kathleen raised her head as if to argue, then nodded her consent. She knew such surgery, considering the tools available, required more physical strength than she had.

  “Ready, let me see your K-bar,” Josh said. The bosun complied, and Josh considered its edge. “Nango? Do you have a whetstone on board? Sharpee? Whoosh! Whoosh!”

  Nango searched among the canoe’s various dilly bags until he produced a thoroughly worn whetstone. Josh handed him the knife. “Sharpen it up, Nango. Savvy? I need an edge like a razor. Then boil it good. Ten minutes at least with a hard boil. Sister, needle and thread, there’s surely some aboard. You have such for your habit? Very good. And Ready? I’ll want some sulfa powder from your medical kit, if you have any left.”

  “I used all I had on you, sir.”

  “How about morphine?” Josh demanded. “I’ll need two syrettes at least.”

  “Those I have, sir,” Ready replied.

  “So you’re really to do it, sir?” Sampson asked, gulping back his fear. “Ease your mind, son,” Josh said with a confident smile. “Back when you were a pup, I did the odd amputation of legs now and again on the Bering Sea Patrol, and nearly every one of my patients survived. Hell, somebody had to do it when the doc wasn’t around, and as the lowest-ranking officer, it fell to me. But I’m not going to lie to you, Sampson. I ain’t no New York surgeon. It may come out looking a little rough, but I promise to do my best.”

  “Then say me a prayer, Sister,” Sampson said. “Say me a big prayer.”

  She smiled at him. “I will say many prayers for ye, Sampson.”

  “Will you say one now, I mean out loud? I’d like to hear it.”

  After a bit of thinking, she nodded, and all on board lowered their heads, except Ready, who took the opportunity to push a syrette of morphine into Sampson’s shoulder. The sea and air murmured a quiet song syncopated by the steady rhythm of Nango polishing the edge of the K-bar blade as Sister Mary Kathleen prayed, “God of all things, great and small. Hear me prayer for your servant, Sampson. Though we sail through the tempest, even to the far reaches, keep our wits about us as we engage in this surgery. Let Captain Thurlow’s mind be clear, his hand strong. Let him do that which must be done with skill and care. And please give Corporal Sampson the strength and resilience of his youth and the courage of his assembly, the United States Marine Corps. Do these things, we ask, in thy Son’s name. Amen.”