‘Corrigan?’ Rachel said.
‘She stuck me with the knife,’ Corrigan muttered. There was no anger or pain in his voice; just indignation. ‘Bloody woman!’
Rachel felt something wet and warm on her hand. ‘You're bleeding.’
‘What did she do that for?’
‘It was meant for me.’
Still drugged from sleep, Corrigan didn't seem to fully understand. ‘That's the second time she's tried to stick me with a knife,’ he mumbled. ‘When I get hold of her I'll give her a bloody good hiding.’
But Corrigan never carried out his threat. Next morning Sanei's small bundle of possessions was gone and they never saw her again.
*****
The knife had left a gaping wound in Corrigan’s shoulder. Rachel washed it with alcohol and stitched it as best she could. Corrigan made no sound as she worked on him, drawing the lips of the wound together as quickly as she could.
‘I can't believe she did this,’ Corrigan said.
‘She put a knife in you before, didn't she?’
‘That was nothing. That was just temper. Heat of the moment. But this time she planned it. She must really hate me.’
‘Or love you.’
‘Same thing in the end, isn't it?’
‘It was meant for me.’
‘How can you be sure of that?’
‘Because if you hadn’t sat up when you did, the knife would have gone right through my chest.’
He waited while she put another suture in the wound, his hands clenching into fists.
‘I'm almost finished.’
‘I'm all right. A little bit of pain never hurt anyone.’ He gave her the familiar crooked grin. He reached out for her. She pulled away. ‘You're not going to get maidenly on me again, are you?’
She ignored him. Everything she had felt the night before had evaporated with the dawn. Now she felt embarrassed and awkward in his presence. But how was she supposed to feel? She had bared her soul as well as her body to a man she could not afford to love. She felt dirty and sullied, and it didn't help when he teased her.
She closed the final suture, giving the brown thread a final tug that raised the lips of the wound in a tight peak. Corrigan gave a grunt of pain. That’s for making fun of me.
‘It hasn't done any permanent damage,’ Rachel told him. ‘Just another scar to add to your collection.’
He started to pull his shirt back on. ‘What's the matter, Miss Goode?’
‘Should anything be wrong, Mister Corrigan?’
‘You've consorted with the Devil and now you're feeling rotten. You've been human for half an hour and now you can't forgive yourself.’
‘That's got nothing to do with it.’ She snapped the medical bag shut. ‘Damn you,’ she added and stormed out of the tent.
Chapter 58
Wolfgang Heydrich was a broken man.
He sat slumped in a cane chair on his verandah, brooding on the rotten hand Fate had dealt him. The remains of the Deutschland rotted by the charred stumps of the jetty, and now the Japanese refused to pay him for his copra. He suspected the Japanese colonel and his vicious first lieutenant somehow blamed him for the debacle with Corrigan.
He was trapped on this stinking island, among barbarians.
His servants had all deserted him, gone back to their villages. Only Alice Melama'a still remained.
Look at this place! The bungalow and the outbuildings all needed a new coat of paint; the chickens pecked at the coral sand and no one to go and collect the eggs. An old sow rooted under the steps.
He scratched at his crotch. Sweat itch again. Sweat! It was the only thing in abundant supply at Marakon now. It oozed out of his every pore, soaking his stained cotton shirt, stinging the sores under his arm and in his groin.
Tiny ulcers had formed under one armpit. Now they would get infected and fester. Everything went rotten in this damned place.
He heard footsteps on the verandah and he looked up.
It was Alice. ‘What do you want?’ he spat.
‘Mary come for see you, boss.’
‘What Mary? What does she want with me?’
Alice shook her head.
‘If she can cook, she can start in the kitchen. Anything would be better than the slop you serve me.’
‘Mary say she want talk-talk longa you.’
‘What? Oh, all right. Tell her to come here.’
I bet I know what she’s after, he thought. If she thinks she’ll get higher wages just because I’m down on my luck, she’s very much mistaken. I’ll give her a good slapping and send her on her way back to her village, to remind the others who’s master here.
But the native girl who appeared a few moments later had not come to beg for work. She had much higher ambitions.
When Wolfgang Heydrich recognized her, his jaw dropped in astonishment.
‘Mein Gott,’ he whispered, getting to his feet. ‘A miracle!’
*****
Colonel Nakamura studied the latest field reports from Lieutenant Tashiro. Somehow the Americans had found out about the tracker dogs. It proved how important the radio must be to them if they sent a warplane to Santa Maria just for that.
He heard the sound of horse's hooves. A muscle in his cheek twitched. That must be the German planter. Now he didn’t have his yacht anymore he came into the settlement on an ugly piebald horse. The horse was always accompanied by a legion of flies and it stank.
The door to his office opened and one of the guards stepped in.
‘The fat planter is outside, Nakamura-san. He asks to speak with you.’
He leaned back in the cane chair. It squeaked in protest under his weight.
‘Fetch Kurosawa,’ he snapped. ‘Then you can bring the barbarian in.’
*****
When Heydrich entered Nakamura did not bother to look up. Heydrich fidgeted. Let him grovel, Nakamura thought. He despised any man who continued at his work when his country was at war. In Nakamura's opinion, Heydrich should have left his plantation and returned to serve with the Wehrmacht in 1939.
‘Colonel Nakamura,’ Heydrich said finally.
‘Ask him what he wants,’ Nakamura said to Kurosawa.
Heydrich smiled. ‘I have come here to help you.’
Kurosawa translated this information to the colonel.
‘Tell him I consider that unlikely.’
‘You want to catch the Englander, don't you?’
‘He asks us if we are still looking for the English bandits,’ Kurosawa repeated.
Nakamura looked up. ‘More native gossip?’
Heydrich understood the tone of the colonel's voice, if not the meaning. ‘Look, what happened last time was not my fault,’ he said to Kurosawa. ‘It cost me dearly. My schooner, and my boathouse, both turned to cinders. To mention nothing of the food your soldiers took.’
The young Japanese knew how Nakamura would react to this last impertinence. Still, he was only there to translate. He told Nakamura what the Austrian had said.
Nakamura's eyes flashed. ‘It seems my men did not have the time to also teach you some respect. I would find it a pleasure.’
Heydrich did not wait for the translation. ‘You cannot treat me like this!’ he shouted. ‘I have information, and I can help you. I am a very influential man among the natives on this island!’
‘You must tell Nakamura-san what you know,’ Kurosawa said.
‘First I must know what this information is worth.’
‘You want money?’
‘I will lead you to the English bandits. In return you will give me a boat and pay me for everything your soldiers stole from me. And then I want a good price for my copra.’
‘He wants to bargain,’ Kurosawa said to his commander. ‘A new boat, compensation and an agreed price on his copra.’
Nakamura smiled, revealing the gold eye tooth beneath his upper lip. ‘He is suddenly very brave.’
‘Is it a bargain?’ Heydrich asked Kurosawa.
&n
bsp; ‘Perhaps you waste time of Japanese soldier again?’
Heydrich drew closer to the young officer, theatrically lowering his voice. ‘Not this time. I have a great prize. Come outside - you will see.’
‘He says he has something to show us.’
Nakamura sighed and stood up. The two Japanese walked to the door and Nakamura threw it open. The colonel folded his hands behind his back.
Heydrich's horse had not been tethered and was chewing contentedly at the small patch of lawn around the flagpole. It flicked lethargically with its tail at the swarm of flies that hovered around its rump.
Then Nakamura noticed the girl. She was squatting on her haunches in the shade below the steps, her arms folded across her knees. She was a pretty girl, with an oval face and a coffee-brown body. He wondered why he had not seen her in the settlement before. She would make a handsome addition to his stable.
‘What is her name?’ Nakamura said.
‘Sanei,’ Heydrich said when Kurosawa relayed the question. ‘She came to Marakon two days ago. She asked me to bring her here. Before that she was with the Englander on Mount Teatupa.’
Kurosawa wheeled round in shock.
‘What did he say?’ Nakamura asked.
‘He says she has come from the camp of the English bandits, Nakamura- san.’
Heydrich nodded eagerly. 'Ja,’ he said. ‘She can lead you right to their camp.’ He put his head on one side, and gave Kurosawa a sly grin. ‘Now you will ask the good Colonel if we have a bargain, ja?’
Chapter 59
Mitchell studied the young men in the dugout, slumped on wooden trestles or leaning against the earth walls in the stifling heat. They were all so young to look so old. They were the surviving pilots from Marine Air Group Twenty-Three, the Cactus Air Force of Guadalcanal.
The battle for Guadalcanal was all but over. A week ago Uncle Dan - Rear Admiral Daniel Callaghan - and Rear Admiral Norman Scott had sailed the cruisers past Suvo Island to stop the Japanese launching another naval bombardment on Henderson Field. Their tiny force had been smashed to pieces by the big guns of the Japanese battlewagons, Hiei and Kirishina. Callaghan's fleet had sailed so close to the enemy battleships that at times the Japanese could not depress their guns low enough to hit them.
Somehow, despite terrifying losses, the Americans held them off; but they paid in full measure for their courage. On that hot night two admirals and one thousand American sailors died in just half an hour.
At dawn Mitchell and his fliers took off from Henderson Field to exact their revenge. They caught the crippled Hiei in The Slot; they strafed the decks while the Douglas Dauntlesses from the Enterprise attacked with torpedoes and bombs. By four o'clock that afternoon the huge battlewagon was at the bottom of the sea.
Then they went after the Tokyo Express, which was sailing unescorted towards Tassafaronga on the western tip of Guadalcanal island. They attacked, returned to Henderson to refuel, then attacked again. The next day they went back, caught them as they were trying to land reinforcements on the beach.
They strafed with their machine guns and cannons as the men of the Hiroshima division scrambled down ropes into the surf. By the afternoon the sea around the sampans had turned crimson. When they finally headed home for the last time they left behind a pyre of black, billowing smoke shot through with orange flame, the graveyard of the largest ever Tokyo Express. Mitchell’s Cactus Airforce and a handful of fliers from the Enterprise had smashed an entire Japanese division.
The strain of those few deadly days was etched on the face of every man in the dugout. They looked like shuffling cadavers. Whenever he closed his eyes he could see the black puffs of flak bursting around him as he dived, towering columns of spray and smoke from the transports, panicked Japanese foot soldiers rushing across the decks like ants, leaping to their deaths in the burning sea.
Cannon fire drummed in his brain. He could not take a breath without smelling burning glycol. Every night when he collapsed on his bunk he heard shrieks in his headset as a friend died.
I wonder if I’ll ever be able to sleep without hearing them.
Today it was quiet. The number of warships and bombers heading down The Slot had slowed to a trickle. Too early to be sure but it looked as if they had achieved what was once unthinkable; they had won.
All there was to do now was to wait for news of the last of their number who was yet to make it back; a buddy they had never seen, but who had lived with them through the worst of the battle, these three long months. They all listened to the whine and crackle of Shoop’s radio. They smoked cigarettes. They shook their heads. Minutes became hours. One by one they drifted out.
Finally, only Mitchell and Shoup remained.
‘That's the fifth day they've missed the sked,’ Shoup said.
The latest scuttlebutt from Coastwatcher's Headquarters in Townsville, Australia was that she had requested an urgent evacuation by the US Navy. Intelligence had reported that the natives on the northern islands, fearing reprisals and disillusioned by word that the kiaps had left for good, were turning against her.
‘Maybe they're just staying off the air to keep the Japs off their tails,’ Shoup said, breaking the long silence.
‘Yeah,’ Mitchell said. ‘Maybe.’
In truth he just hoped she had died clean.
Chapter 60
The office of the Supervising Intelligence Officer in charge of the Coastwatchers in the North-East Pacific area was in a back room in Area Combined Headquarters in Townsville. It was into this room that a slight, pale man in an ill-fitting naval officer's uniform was shown, one day late in the November of 1942.
The SIO rose as the man entered the office. He held out his hand. ‘Ian. Good to see you. How are you feeling?’
‘Better, thank you sir.’
‘Good. Glad to see you on the mend again. You had us worried for a while. Sit down.’ Outside the monsoon rains murmured on the lush banana palms. ‘The quacks put everything back together?’
‘I've still got half a mile of bandages round my ribs. Arm's knitting nicely though.’
‘You were very lucky.’
‘I suppose so.’
The SIO's forced bonhomie fell away. ‘I take it you've heard the news?’
Manning nodded. ‘No radio contact for eight days.’
The SIO lowered his eyes. ‘Doesn't mean the Japanese have them. There are a hundred other reasons.’
‘I know.’
‘Who are they, Ian? This Corrigan - is he a planter?’
Manning shook his head. ‘Trader. Did a run up the coast every now and then when he felt like it, ferrying supplies and the occasional visitor. Owned the trading post in Vancoro, but that was never open unless he was sober, which wasn't very often. The woman - only been on the island a couple of years. Her uncle was a missionary. He died of a bullet wound a few weeks before you took me off.’
The SIO shook his head. ‘Remarkable.’
‘Indeed.’
The SIO opened the silver-engraved box on his desk. ‘Cigarette?’
‘No thank you, sir.’ Manning patted his chest. ‘Doctor's orders.’
The Commander took one himself and lit it with a silver lighter.
‘What are you going to do, sir?’
‘We don't even know if they're still alive. We haven't heard anything from them for a week.’
‘Let me go back and look for them.’
‘You? Sorry, Ian. I've seen the medical report. You've done your share. Your war's over.’
‘But theirs isn't. No one knows that island like I do. I know where they're hiding and I can find my way back up that mountain blindfolded. It has to be me.’
‘What if they're dead?’
‘Sir, we can't abandon them now. Not after what they've done.’
There was a long silence, broken only by the rhythmic beat of the overhead fan. The air was like warm treacle. The SIO sighed. ‘I don't know, Ian. The Yanks haven't even got a mess spoon to spare right n
ow, and the old man will scream blue murder if we try and take one of his precious subs off combat duty. He finds that sort of thing hard to justify.’
‘Harder than abandoning a man and a woman who may have helped us hold Guadalcanal?’
The Commander raised his eyebrows in surprise at the tone of Manning's voice. But he let it go. After all, the bastard was right. ‘I'll do what I can, Ian. Meanwhile you'd better get some rest. If you're going to go back up there, you'll need it.’
Manning grinned. ‘Yes, sir.’
*****
If he lived to be a hundred Heydrich would never forget the look on Nakamura's face when he had told him who the girl was. Now there would be no more arguments over the price for his copra. There would be another boat, to replace the Deutschland. His luck had finally turned.
He allowed himself a smile of satisfaction. Not only that he would get even with that scheiss, Corrigan.
He watched the Japanese soldiers unload their equipment at the end of the wrecked jetty. Gott in Himmel, there were almost a hundred of them. For one Englishman and a girl!
He heard footsteps on the teak boards and he turned. It was the girl, Sanei. ‘I want my money.’
Heydrich put his hands on his hips. Who did she think she was talking to? Well, he wasn’ty going to put up with that sort of attitude from a native, especially a woman. He would have to beat it out of her.
‘You got what you wanted,’ he growled. ‘You wanted Corrigan dead. I've arranged it for you.’
‘You promised me money.’
Heydrich took a step towards her and slapped her once, hard, across the face. Sanei took a step back, stunned.
‘Corrigan was too soft with you.’
Sanei spat at him.
Heydrich grinned. He felt a tingling excitement in his groin. He was bored with the passive compliance of Alice Melama'a and the others. This little spitfire was different. But first he would do the Japanese colonel one last favor. He had heard that Nakamura had taken a liking to brown sugar.
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