“It wasn’t always like this,” Gina said, looking around and seeing wreckage from strafed and sunken boats floating in the water and their detritus lining the shore. “Watch where you put your feet.”
Even though for the most part she was enjoying Admiral Tanaka’s company, Gina was anxious to leave it. She declined his suggestion to stop for ice cream, saying she had things that needed to be done before tonight’s show. They parted ways at the Rizal Monument with a handshake.
She mused all the way home.
It should have been Ray walking with her today, but he was languishing in some prison camp, a best-case scenario. She put her hand over her heart, where long ago on Bataan a seed of hate for anything Japanese had been planted. She felt it still there, hankering to germinate, threatening her tightly held order of all things life preserving.
Be very careful, Gina.
She looked around, thinking she’d heard Father Morgan’s voice. Don’t let hate for the Japanese strip your life of vitality. Use that energy for the greater good. She had followed his teachings . . . but at what expense? Her husband’s? Had her noble intentions turned on her in a twisted way? Had one man blurred the beliefs she had so tightly crafted and held? Was she losing her direction?
After the night’s show and closing up Pearl Blue, Gina lingered in the shower, then slipped on her favorite nightgown, the material washed to gossamer softness. In bed, she lay in the dark, and when sleep didn’t come, she reached for the pillow that should have been Ray’s. Pressing it to her face, she prayed for the scent of him, but the pillow smelled only of Ivory soap. She hugged it against her breast as if it were his beloved body, and in time her aspect softened, her breathing slowed, her guard weakened, and rational thoughts faded away, allowing her to dream without filters of a pleasant day with a pleasant man who loved his family and country as greatly as she did hers.
Chapter 26
TRIXIE
I mull over my latest predicament. What is it I crave more—my last cigarette or the bowl of watery soup it will purchase?
—Ray Thorpe, Cabanatuan prison camp, October 1942–January 1944
When Gina opened Pearl Blue’s cashbox, it was so stuffed with Japanese-issued pesos that newly released hundred-peso bills fell to the floor. She scooped them up. Worthless junk. The Mickey Mouse money was choking the economy. She counted the income, then divvied out sums she needed to pay rent, utilities, and salaries for her staff; noted the amounts in a ledger; and placed the money in envelopes that she would hand deliver. Not recorded were generous donations sent to Davy that she backed out of her income, making Pearl Blue’s bottom line look close to breakeven.
So intent on her work, she was startled when a young woman appeared at her office door. Gina hastily closed her ledger and cashbox. “How did you get in here?”
“I sorry. I not mean to scare you. A man named Julio let me in.”
Julio, of course. Pearl Blue was like a second home to him, and he often came in early, using the quiet time to compose his music.
In a glance, Gina evaluated the small-statured person, who was wearing white shorts, a flowered blouse, a floppy hat, and boots. When she removed the hat, her beautifully textured skin attested to a Chinese ancestor, and notably, one eye was brown and the other green. She didn’t look dangerous, but who knew these days? “What can I do for you?”
“My auntie Clara said it safe to come to you. My name is Trixie. Maybe you know me as Elf.”
“Trixie, yes, of course. It’s safe to come to me.” It wasn’t unusual for runners for the underground dressed as deliverymen or workmen to arrive at Pearl Blue to give or receive information. Gina knew many by sight and others by code names. She motioned to a chair. “Please sit.”
Trixie clutched a bag that she kept on her lap. “I come to Manila to visit my cousin and bring a gift for her new baby. I have good news for you. Her husband’s father—his name is Angelo—owns a house outside Cabanatuan City. The prisoners from the camp pass by on their way to work in the forest. My cousin say Angelo gives the prisoners bananas and peanuts when he can get them. I will talk to him when I return to Cabanatuan. Yes? Maybe we can help him.”
“That’s definitely a yes. We’ll provide him with whatever he needs. How does he get around the guards?”
“I ask my cousin that too. She say some of the guards away from the prison camp are better. They want to keep the prisoners healthy so they can work, so they allow them to take extra food when it there. I figure when we get set up, we pass notes and money like on the farm.” Her smile revealed beautiful teeth.
Gina had known that Trixie was young, but not this young. Sixteen maybe. And pretty. She should be in school learning reading, math, and history, not selling peanuts on a prison farm where the guards were known to be cruel. “Could you work with Angelo? It might be a safer job for you.”
“No, I stay at the farm. We doing good work there, and I avoid the guards. My dad worked for Mitsubishi, and I went to school in Tokyo. When I hear the guards say they go in one direction, I go in the other. I dress in rags like a beggar lady and work slow. They think my mind slow, but I fool them.” She flashed her brilliant smile again and opened her bag. “I have something important to give you.”
She unwove a strand of hemp with a hairpin, revealing a hidden pocket that held a letter that had been folded up small. She held it out to Gina and giggled. “We did it.” Her eyes could not have shone brighter if she had been holding the Holy Grail. “It from Pastor Nelson. He goes by Lightfoot. He a prisoner at Cabanatuan.”
A note from inside the Cabanatuan camp. It was what she’d been hoping for, and Gina’s face flushed with excitement. “How did you get this?”
“Like we planned. Father Morgan wrote a letter and addressed it to Pastor Nelson. He wrote that he could smuggle money and letters into the camp, but he needed a contact, someone who came outside on a work detail. He wrote that the peanut vendor with one brown eye and one green eye could be trusted. That is me. I put the letter and fifty pesos in a bag of peanuts and passed it to one of my regular customers. Then I waited, very nervous. I opened my eyes wide to everyone.” She grinned and bugged out her eyes.
Gina chuckled at the antics, but she felt concern. “My dear. Do you know the danger you’re in? Has your aunt Clara explained the risks you’re taking and what the consequences could be?”
“Yes, ma’am. Auntie Clara try to stop me, but I do this for my uncle, Auntie Clara’s husband, who was killed by Jap soldiers for no reason at all, and for my best friend, Rosamie, who was raped and killed in a most brutal way. I do this for all the girls in the Japanese workhouses. No one will stop me as long as I’m free.”
Gina felt her face skew, and she swallowed hard.
Trixie continued. “Two days ago, a prisoner called Eugene gave me this letter wrapped in a peso bill. It is for Father Morgan. He is out of town and will not be back until tomorrow. I have to leave Manila this morning. You give it to him, please?” She gave Gina the letter.
Gina could hardly believe what she held in her hand, the first wedge into the prison camp. “Yes, the minute he returns.” Gina opened the cashbox and handed Trixie a handful of pesos in small denominations. “To put in your bags of peanuts.”
“Or to buy cigarettes. We hide them in the fields under the green bean plants. They as good as money inside the camp.” Trixie placed the pesos in the secret pocket of her hemp bag and took a minute to weave it closed. She chuckled. “It is a game, you know, and I not as stupid as those Jap guards think. I must go now to catch my train.”
When Trixie left, Gina dialed Franca’s number. “A little elf just left my office. She’s barely out of her childhood. What the hell are we doing? Anyway, game’s on.”
After the initial contact had been made with a prisoner inside Cabanatuan, a pipeline developed that carried small amounts of information and money in and out of the camp. Father Morgan suggested that the prisoners write notes to trusted coworkers and friends asking for th
eir support. One day, when she was at Malate Church, he handed a letter to Gina.
To Willie. I’m pleading for your help. Nothing could have prepared me for the horrors of this camp. There is no escape except death, and each minute I’m here, I feel closer to it. There are angels working on my behalf, soliciting money so I can buy food. Please be generous when they come calling, my friend. Every peso buys me one extra day. I live only for liberation. Red
When she handed the letter back, Father Morgan said, “Unfortunately, I couldn’t find Willie.”
“What are you going to do with this letter?”
“Burn it with the others that can’t be delivered.”
“Father, let me reply to them.”
“I can’t let you do that.” Father Morgan folded the missive and put it in his pocket. “There’s sadness and ugliness in these letters.”
“Yes, but there is also hope for a reconnection. It makes me sad to think of these men waiting for an answer to a letter that will never come. I’ll write and say hello and that we know they are there—and that we love them.”
Father Morgan removed the letter from his pocket. “Are you sure, my dear girl?”
“Yes, I’m very sure.”
It was more important than ever now to keep Pearl Blue a viable establishment, and a challenge was keeping the entertainment fresh. Gina and her staff had created a repertoire of songs and dances from which to select each week’s floor show. Thursday became a popular and profitable “Men Only” night when exotic dancers, who worked for a pittance and tips, were hired to tease those customers with a salacious nature. The extra income was marked to be funneled to the prisoners in Cabanatuan prison camp.
On Friday night, the crowd was slow to leave. Eddie closed the bar, and Gina turned on the room lights. A wolf-faced Japanese lieutenant, telling a story to his audience of hangers-on, caught Gina’s attention. She gathered napkins and tablecloths from nearby tables to be close enough to listen.
“At the old Chinese cemetery. Six. Naked and crying. Digging their own graves. Haw, haw, haw.” The lieutenant’s audience laughed along with him, but a dark affect came over Gina, and her fingers involuntarily wadded up a napkin.
“Got the big-nosed pigeon in my sight.” The lieutenant held up his arms as if aiming a rifle. “Took careful aim. Squeezed the trigger. Got him with one shot.” He moved his arms so Gina was in his fictitious aim. “Bang!”
Gina’s eyes practically popped out of her head. She winced and felt the blood drain from her face. But everyone’s gaze was focused on her, so she laughed along with the others. “Congratulations, Lieutenant. And who was the recipient of your well-aimed bullet?”
The lieutenant sat back in the chair, puffed up and basking in the limelight. “Some ROTC kid. His band of guerrillas was caught cutting our communication lines. We hunted them down like the dirty little rats they were.”
A toast with empty beer glasses completed the lieutenant’s moment of fame, and Gina wobbled away, trying not to be conspicuous. She passed by Arielle. “Finish closing up for me, please,” she murmured and then hurried to the backstage bathroom, where she retched up the day’s meals. How could she even pretend to be friendly with anyone of this cruel race?
Woozy, she retreated to her office. Hidden under a false bottom of a desk drawer were several copies of the Candor to give to Miguel to distribute to the guerrillas and also an envelope from Father Morgan that had been delivered just before showtime. She picked up a copy of the Candor to read and put it aside, then opened Father Morgan’s envelope. Inside were undeliverable letters from the men in Cabanatuan. She shuffled through the top few, noting their distinctively American handwriting. Upon hearing her office door opening, she turned, surprised she had neglected to lock it, always a habit before opening her secret drawer. She saw the wolf-faced lieutenant and quickly pushed the letters beneath a manila folder. She said in a voice as steady as she could muster, “Can I help you?”
“I need to piss. Where’s the benjo?”
“Up front,” she directed.
The lieutenant stepped inside her office and closed the door.
Gina felt her heart thump and her mouth go dry, and she surreptitiously pushed a button under the front lip of her desktop.
“Nice place you have. I hear you especially like Japanese officers.” He giggled and lunged for her, and Gina swiftly moved, causing the letters to scatter to the floor.
“Get out,” she hissed and wished she had a club in her hands.
The lieutenant chased her around the desk, his feet slipping on the strewn papers, and Gina prayed he didn’t recognize them for what they were. The door burst open, and Eddie barged into the office, swinging a baseball bat, with Arielle right behind wielding a fire extinguisher. Seeing the two of them, the lieutenant stopped his chase and put his hands up. “Sorry. I looking for benjo, and pretty lady invite me in.”
“Get out,” Gina gasped, and she reached out for Arielle, relieved the two had responded quickly to her call.
Eddie pushed the lieutenant out the door.
Arielle stayed with Gina. “A fire extinguisher?” Gina asked. They both snickered.
“It seemed like a good idea,” Arielle said. “I was going to aim at the creep’s face.” She looked the extinguisher over. “I’m not sure how it works, though.”
Gina picked up the papers off the floor, seeing the headline in the Candor: ROTC Kids Murdered. She handed the Candor to Arielle. “I laughed at a good kid for being brave, and now he’s dead. As if the world isn’t cruel enough, I added to his pain. He was just a kid!”
Arielle read the news. “You knew these guys?”
“Not well. Our paths crossed.” Gina rubbed both temples with her fingertips.
“You’re all worked up, Gina. Let me help.” She pointed to Gina’s office chair.
Gina leaned her head back, and Arielle massaged her temples in a slow rotating motion. “We all make mistakes. I slapped my baby sister once because she was crying. Does that make any sense?” She moved her fingers in tiny steps along Gina’s hairline to the center of her forehead and back again, her touch as light as a butterfly.
Arielle continued the downward movement to the front of Gina’s ears. She spoke softly. “Inhale through your nose. Fill your lungs. Now exhale slowly through your mouth. Repeat it if you want to. Take your time. Feel yourself sinking. Deeper.” She stayed quiet while Gina felt herself relaxing into a comfortable state.
“When you’re ready, picture your guilt as hundreds of bees, pesky bees around your face and in your hair, but with a movement of your finger, poof, they disappear.” Arielle gently pinched Gina’s ears between her thumbs and forefingers, moving from the lobes to the top. Gina saw the troublesome bees, hundreds of bees buzzing around her, and felt her index finger move ever so slightly. Poof. The bees were gone. Tightness around her mouth loosened, and her lips parted.
Arielle continued down Gina’s jawline while whispering, “Live in these few moments of blessed peace.” She pressed her thumbs into the base of Gina’s neck on either side of the spine and then moved with gentle pressure in tiny circles upward. Gina felt as if she were floating.
“Better?” Arielle lightly ruffled Gina’s hair to bring her back.
Gina took a long breath and let it out as a sigh, realizing how much she missed being touched. “Much better. You’re God’s gift to the demoralized. Where did you learn that?”
“From my mother. Before she married, she worked for a Chinese doctor. She learned about herbal medicines, massage, and acupuncture. And the importance of thinking positive. You need to sleep, Gina.”
“I’ll go upstairs in a couple minutes. I want to look through these letters first.”
Arielle left with a hug and a wave.
Gina yawned and then selected a letter addressed to her, it not unusual, some of the men corresponding with her regularly now. This one was written on the back of a food-can label and folded into quarters. It was hard to read, as many lette
rs were, pencils available to the men no more than nubs.
Miss Kitty. I heard you are looking for your husband Ray. I knew a Ray who mentioned a wife and little girl. He was tall, blue eyed, and blond. Nice guy. Engineering type. He might be your Ray. He left Cabanatuan about two months ago on a convoy that never returned. Rumor is the men are being shipped to Japan to work in the mines. I hope this news gives you some peace of mind. Whisper
Gina jumped up from her desk and trotted to the main dining room. “Arielle! Arielle!” she called, waving the note that carried the good news that Ray was alive and had been in Cabanatuan all along. However, Pearl Blue was empty. She went back to her office to reread the precious missive and savor the good news alone. Finding a pen and paper, she wrote,
Dear Whisper, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for letting me know that my husband is alive. I cannot express my joy. He is a good man, as I know you are too. There are signs that the war is winding down—the Japs cannot replace the ships and planes that are being destroyed in great numbers. Our PT boats are harassing Japanese convoys south of the Solomon Islands, and our marines now occupy New Georgia and New Guinea. It’s been reported that Emperor Hirohito has stated his country’s situation is now truly grave. Try to keep your spirits up. I’m looking forward to meeting you in person outside those prison gates. Forever grateful. Kitty.
Gina answered a few other letters. After putting them in a waterproof case, she placed it under a floorboard on the back porch to be picked up by an unknown runner and delivered to Clara and then smuggled into the prison camp.
Chapter 27
HARD DECISIONS
I’m sailing in rough waters. With each pitch and roll, I entertain thoughts of death’s comforts, but I am too much a coward to take my own life, so I endure.
—Ray Thorpe, Enoura Maru, China Sea, January 1944–February 1944
Along the Broken Bay Page 25