No Surrender Soldier

by Christine Kohler

  The next day a distant relative flew in from Japan to visit him.

  “Your mother is dead,” he said.

  Seto showed no emotion. He already knew. Had she not visited him in his cave?

  *

  Saturday, Daphne’s nana dropped her off in our driveway. Missus DeLeon made it clear, “Only for one hour, while I’m at Ladies’ Altar Service. And do not go in his house while his parents are not home.” She wagged her finger at Daphne at that part of her lecture. Daphne looked very sober at her nana and said, “Yes, ma’am,” so I knew no breaking the lion’s rules. Or else I’d never be trusted to take Daphne on a real date when I could drive next year.

  We took Bobo for a walk in the boonies so I could show Daphne where I found the straggler. Plastic yellow tape still outlined the area around Seto’s underground cave entrance.

  “Not much action today, eh?” I asked a different policeman guarding the area.

  “Nah. All the snoopy reporters went that-a-way looking for some old soldiers’ bones.” The policemen nodded upstream toward the falls.

  “Did you know he was the one who found Seto?” Daphne asked.

  I gave the policeman a green mountain apple.

  “You don’t say?” He bit into the apple. “T’anks,” he said with his mouth full.

  “Don’t suppose I could look down there?” I pointed to the bamboo mat covering Seto’s underground cave.

  “I’m not supposed to let anyone…” The policeman looked in all directions. “But if you don’t tell and don’t touch anyt’ing. And I mean not’ing! They took one box of stuff out of there the soldier asked for, and the rest they need to inventory.”

  I wasn’t about to wait for him to change his mind. Lickety-split I lifted the mat and motioned for Daphne to climb down first.

  She shook her head. “I’ll stay up here and watch Bobo. You go ahead.”

  I started down the bamboo ladder. “Bobo, stay!” I commanded when Bobo looked about ready to plunge down the hole after me. Bobo barked. Daphne kept a firm grip on his collar.

  “Five minutes,” the policeman warned.

  This didn’t seem scary at all, I thought. What a difference, climbing down the hole with daylight flooding the shaft and a policeman standing above ground.

  But the farther I descended to the bottom, the cooler and damper it got. The walls closed in on me. I was suffocating again, not just from being underground, but from the overwhelming stench. My left foot hit bottom first. I turned, let my eyes adjust to the dimness, and saw Seto’s underground cave. I doubled over to make my way into the tunnel.

  “Two minutes. Hurry up,” the policeman called down the shaft.

  I got on my hands and knees and crawled through the cave. I touched the sticky blackened ceiling. “Good t’ing it’s supported with bamboo and beams,” I said quietly to myself. “Still, wonder how long will it take before it caves in?”

  I crawled faster through the tunnel until I reached what looked like a crude campfire spot with stones all around and cooking pot in the center. Stacked to the side, from floor to ceiling, were chopped up bamboo, logs, and coconut husks. I sniffed the pot, which contained something gray and slimy on the bottom. “Yuugg.” I gagged back vomit.

  I held my breath, only taking quick short breaths when necessary, and crawled to the end of the tunnel where it was hollowed out in a rounded, taller compartment. Light streamed down from a shaft over another, bigger cooking spot. Two tiers of shelves were loaded with old tin pans of assorted sizes, bottles, spoons, a rusted coffee can, and a tea kettle. I touched two plain spoons and ran my finger over a pair of scissors. I wondered if the scissors had been Seto’s favorite possession, because the blades were sharpened, probably on a rock.

  I knew how he felt. I missed my favorite possession—Sammy’s baseball.

  I was anxious to get out of the cave, yet curious enough to still linger on my way back through. As I crawled toward the ladder, I paused to look at Seto’s clothes neatly folded and stacked beside a mat woven of bamboo leaves. I’d seen manamkos weave hats from the long slender leaves. I picked up a case the size of a matchbox and opened the lid. Needles. Made sense, the newspaper article said Seto had been a tailor in Japan and wove and sewed all of his clothes while living in the boonies.

  “Boy, get up here. Time’s up,” the policeman called down.

  “Kiko, are you okay?” Daphne’s voice echoed down the shaft.

  Quickly, I ran my hand over a cloth lying on the mat. Strange, wonder what this was used for? I laid the cloth back down on the mat, scurried to the ladder, and climbed out of the hell-hole as fast as I could.

  “Creepy, eh?” the policeman said as soon as my head poked above ground. Bobo licked my face and I pushed him back, anxious to get out of the cave.

  “You okay?” Daphne said again.

  “Kay-o. Kay-o.”

  She looked relieved.

  “Here, let me help you up.” The policeman reached down and clasped my wrist and arm. I grabbed his arm and heave-hoed up top.

  I took a deep, long breath, then let it out slowly. “How could anybody live down there? Even for one day?”

  “Beats me.” The policeman put the bamboo mat back over the hole. “You better get going now.”

  “T’anks for letting me take a look around.”

  “Yeah. But no telling, you got me?” The policeman cocked one eye; it twitched.

  “Sure, kay-o, we no tell.” I petted Bobo’s neck and Daphne nodded her head. But before we left I asked the policeman, “Did you see that cloth with all the embroidery? What was that?”

  “Weird, huh?” the policeman said. “One of those old military guys who checked out the place said when soldiers in Japan go off to war, people make a thousand stitches on a piece of cloth. They take it with them as a good luck charm. Doesn’t look like it worked for him, did it?”

  “No, guess not. Doesn’t seem he was too lucky having to hide underground all that time.”

  “If I went off to war, all I’d want is a good gun, bullets, and knife,” the policeman said. “I’d make my own luck.”

  “A knife, eh? Like one of those Swiss Army knives?”

  “You betcha,” the policeman said. “The best Swiss Army knife money could buy. Never know when it’d come in handy.”

  Daphne tugged on my T-shirt, signaling we needed to go.

  “Well, we best be going,” I said. “T’anks again. Which way did you say the reporters went?”

  The policeman pointed. I took Bobo’s collar from Daphne and pulled him away from the tunnel. We trotted off toward the falls. We were almost to a clearing when Bobo veered in front of me. I swerved and stumbled over a tree root. Daphne caught me by my arm and steadied me. I slipped my hand in her warm hand. Daphne met my eyes with hers, smiled, and squeezed my hand. The warmth ran up my arm and through my entire body. Even if I wasn’t too tongue-tied to say anything, what would I have said to her? I didn’t want to spoil the moment. All I could think was, she likes me! I don’t deserve a girl as wonderful as her, but still Daphne likes me!

  We held hands the rest of the way. One part of me wanted this walk to never end. Another part told me that we better hurry up or Missus DeLeon wouldn’t let me see Daphne alone again for the rest of my life.

  After a long hike through the boonies we came across a crowd of reporters and officials gathered around a cave opening. Bobo slipped through people’s legs, but Daphne and I couldn’t get through until someone called out, “Whose dog is this? Come and get him out of here!”

  “Excuse me, excuse me.” I elbowed my way through the crowd, keeping hold of Daphne’s hand, to claim Bobo. One policeman restrained a barking, snarling Bobo by the collar. A US soldier held up a plastic bag with human bones and two skulls in it.

  Reporters murmured the names Hayato and Nakamura. Evidently Seto told authorities where to look.

  “What are you going to do with the bones?” a woman reporter called out.

  The soldier, hold
ing the bag of bones, said, “First, we will verify who they were and how they died. Then, if we do find these are the two Japanese soldiers, we’ve assured Seto and the Japanese consulate we will send the bones to Japan for burial.”

  I figured we’d seen and heard enough for one day. Not exactly a romantic first date—visiting an underground tunnel, the stench of death, soldiers waving skulls and bones. Still, I wouldn’t have traded the walk in the boonies while holding hands with Daphne for anything. The only thing that would have made the day more perfect is if Sammy had been waiting for me at home to tell him all about it.

  *

  I was getting ready for school Monday morning and found Nana crying while reading the newspaper. Eggs hissed and sizzled and spurted until smoke filled the kitchen. At first I thought it was because Tatan had been acting crazy again so Nana had to take him back to the doctor. But then she crumpled the front page and let the paper drop to the floor.

  I waited until my nana was preoccupied scraping burnt eggs into the sink. I picked up the front page, smoothed it out, and scanned headlines to see what upset her.

  It couldn’t have been the news headline about someone I never heard of defying President Richard Nixon. Couldn’t have been about an embargo in British Columbia, wherever that was. Could it possibly have been the smaller right-hand headline?

  DEAD COMRADES HAUNT DREAMS OF STRAGGLER

  I browsed farther down the page to a small box where I noticed what looked like fingernails had pierced the print:

  BOYS DIE IMITATING HERO SETO

  The article said four boys from a Japanese elementary school were buried alive. They dug a play cave with a steel pole as they tried to emulate their new hero Isamu Seto.

  I looked up at Nana. She stood at the stove crying and fingering her rosary beads.

  “Nana?” I wanted to comfort her but didn’t know how. “You all right?”

  “God help us mothers,” she sobbed.

  I got up and hugged her until she wiped her eyes, kissed my cheek, then took out more eggs from the refrigerator.

  *

  Tatan took a turn for the worse Monday night. His speech slurred, his eyes glazed over, and he drooled like a baby cutting teeth.

  “Might be the medicine,” Nana said. “We saw a different doctor last time, and I heard about drug-drug interaction.”

  Either that or betel nut, bats, and “purple mushrooms” don’t go good together, I thought, but kept my mouth shut.

  So, Tuesday morning I skipped school and went to Tumon with my parents to help with Tatan and Sammy’s Quonset Hut.

  At first I didn’t plan to sneak in and see Seto. But once I realized I would be at Guam Memorial Hospital with Nana to take Tatan to the emergency room, I found myself gathering gifts. I scooped sticky rice and tuna Nana brought for lunch into a plastic container. I asked Tata if I could buy some plain wooden chopsticks and dried seaweed from our shop.

  “I’ll work in exchange.”

  “Sounds fair,” Tata said. “What you need them for?”

  “A gift, maybe.”

  It wasn’t until I got to the hospital I realized that seeing Seto wasn’t going to be as easy as strolling up to just anybody’s room, walking through a door, and saying, “Howzit.” There were guards, not to mention reporters and cameramen, and nurses to sneak past.

  First I checked out the cafeteria. I’d heard that’s where press conferences were held. No one there but people cooking, cleaning, and eating.

  Next I went up to the floor where I’d heard rumors Seto was being held. Sure enough, a guard stood at a door by the nurses’ station. I decided to hide in the lounge at the end of the hall and think about how to get in to see the old soldier.

  When the dietitian delivered lunch, she brought an extra tray for the guard. While he was distracted, I double-timed it down the hall and slipped into Seto’s room unnoticed.

  Where was Seto? His bed was empty.

  The door bumped into me when the dietitian carried in a tray, so I ducked through the open bathroom door and shut it behind me.

  “Mister See-toe,” the dietitian sang. “Lunch is here.”

  Silverware rattled on the fiberglass tray as the dietitian set it on the lap table by the bed, then I heard the swoosh of the room door shut.

  I peeked out from the bathroom. The coast was clear so I walked over to the bed.

  Clear broth, Jell-O, milk, and something green and gooey-looking. Maybe Seto was out searching for something better to eat if this was all they were feeding him.

  I looked around the room. “Auhh,” I caught my breath, startled. In the corner of the room on wadded up sheets lay a skinny, sunken-faced Japanese man with a too-big blue hospital gown wrapped around him. The man grinned, showing several teeth missing.

  “I no can sleep in bed,” Seto said in English.

  “Howzit,” I blurted out, then felt like a fool. What should I say? I shifted the container, seaweed, and chopsticks into one hand and extended the other to shake.

  Seto pointed to his lunch instead of taking my hand. “You like? You eat. I no like.”

  I chuckled a little, but not too loud so the guard wouldn’t hear. “I brought you lunch.” I handed Seto chopsticks and seaweed, and popped the top of the rice and fish containers. The tuna smelled good as it overwhelmed the hospital antiseptic scent.

  “Ah! Japanese!” Seto rubbed his stomach, then rose to his knees and bowed at the waist. “Domo arigato!” He took the container and shoveled rice in his mouth, then ripped open cellophane and savored every morsel of seaweed.

  I gathered my nana’s container and walked toward the door. I turned one last time to see the straggler who hid in the boonies for twenty-eight long years—almost twice as long as I’d been alive and for as long as Sammy was old.

  “Do you remember me?” I asked Seto.

  Seto squinted and cocked his head to the side. “Aaaahh!” Seto said something in Japanese I didn’t understand. The soldier held up his forefinger. He got up off the floor and fumbled for a box beneath a steel cart.

  He held up a dirty white ball. “Baseball boy.” Seto seemed pleased with himself.

  I sucked in my breath and took a step forward. Sammy’s baseball!

  Seto stretched his arms and shoulders back as if he was going to hurl the ball across the room. His eyes looked dazed, as if he was seeing something far off. Then he straightened up, relaxed his arms, and extended the ball toward me. “For you.”

  I took the ball and held it close to my chest. “T’anks.” I bowed my head.

  “Domo arigato.” Seto grinned like a jack-o’-lantern.

  *

  I begged my parents Wednesday to let me skip school again and to take me to the airport to see Seto off.

  “Two days in a row?” Tata teased. “Oh, and I suppose you want I get you an invitation to Governor Camacho’s send-off party, eh?”

  This brought a laugh from even Tatan, who had acted much more alert since Doctor Blas took away some of his pills.

  I grabbed my books and transistor and ran to the bus, not even bothering to feed Bobo or say ’bye.

  Second period had barely begun when I looked up and saw my tata standing in the classroom doorway.

  “Kiko,” my math teacher said. “Looks like your dad needs to see you.”

  “Get your books, Son,” Tata said. “We going to the airport.”

  On the way to the airport, I said, “Tata, I’m glad you gave Sammy the Swiss Army knife. It’s a whole lot more useful than that thousand-stitch cloth Seto had. Never know, that knife may save Sammy’s life.”

  Tata grunted. “Yeah, that’s why I gave it to him. I was afraid somet’ing bad might happen over there Sammy wasn’t prepared for. You never know. A father worries about his son.”

  The word “son” lingered in the air between us, Tata behind the wheel, and me hugging the door.

  “Kiko, sorry I slapped you.”

  It was as if Tata’s apology took the sting out of my cheek. �
��Kay-o. T’ings been crazy lately, eh?”

  “Crazy. For sure.”

  “I know it won’t happen again.” I reached over and patted my tata’s hand on the steering wheel. “I forgive you. Forgive me?”

  Tata flicked his eyebrows twice, then grinned big. “I have somet’ing for you. Thought I’d give it to you for Confirmation, but you’re ready for it now.” He reached into his left hip pocket and pulled out an object. Tata kept his hand cupped around it so I couldn’t see what it was.

  Tata opened his warm hand against my hand. When Tata took his hand away, there lay a bone-handled Swiss Army knife.

  “Wow! T’anks, Tata.” I dug my thumbnail into the silver notch and pulled out a blade. I switched out another two smaller blades, then a spoon, fork, nail clippers, file, and metal toothpick. “It’s a deluxe one all right, like your tatan’s.” I turned it over in my hand, then handed it back to Tata. “I can’t accept it.”

  “Why not?” Tata didn’t take his hands off the steering wheel to take the knife.

  Have I committed the unpardonable sin? I asked God in my mind. I tell you, I wanted to murder that soldier to get even for the man who hurt my nana!

  I laid the knife on the dashboard. “Because I don’t deserve it.”

  Silence hung like a Confessional curtain between us. I turned on the car radio.

  Two songs later, Tata turned down the volume. “If we got what we deserved we might not get anyt’ing good in life. I certainly didn’t deserve a woman as good as your nana. But she married me anyway.”

  Tata smiled and I couldn’t help but smile back.

  Tata picked up the knife off the dashboard and held it out to me. “You earned this more honorably than my tatan did. Have I ever told you how Tatan Bihu Chargalauf got his Swiss Army knife?” Tata shook the knife with each syllable.

  “No.”

  He laughed. “By swapping tuba with an American sailor during prohibition in 1899.” Tata thrust the knife in front of me. “Take it. It’s a gift. You don’t have to earn gifts.”

  For once, I didn’t know what to say. I took the knife, ran my thumb over the handle, and stuck it in my pocket. “T’anks.” But I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I might not go through with Confirmation.