“Would you like to go to lunch with me?”
“I’d like that a lot,” she said, and Steve began to think that the day might not be a total loss after all.
At that moment, the sirens began to howl.
* * *
Harris yawned. Sitting in a car and looking at an apartment building in Mexico City was worse than dull. He had enough seniority to dump these jobs on more junior FBI agents, but no, his informant in the Mexican Army had been specific. He and he alone should be at the expensive-looking apartment building at eight o’clock in the morning on this date. He was told he might appreciate Mexican justice being served, and the thought indeed intrigued him.
A few minutes after eight, Juan Escobar, colonel in the Mexican Army and informant for the Nazis and Japanese, stepped through the door. He was in casual civilian clothes and seemed well satisfied with himself. Harris recalled that Escobar had a mistress, and it seemed logical that he’d spent the night with her. He clearly looked smug after getting laid and Harris envied him.
So what did that have to do with him and the FBI? Maybe he was going to watch Mexican police arrest Escobar for providing aid to the Germans and the Japanese? That was a pleasant enough thought, but why did they think it was necessary for him to be there to watch?
Escobar stood near the curb and looked around as if he didn’t have a care in the world. He was obviously waiting to be picked up by some junior officer. Harris stiffened as the colonel was approached by two men in equally casual clothing. His mind registered the sight of the pistols being drawn. They were jammed into Escobar’s gut while he began to protest, a look of terror on his face. The men fired rapidly and Escobar’s eyes widened and then glazed over.
As Escobar toppled to the ground, blood pouring from his chest, the men took his wallet and watch. One more shot to the chest to make certain he was dead, and the men ran down the street and around the corner. A few stunned people came out and slowly began to approach Escobar’s body. Harris quickly shook off the shock of the murder. He had been told that justice would be served and he couldn’t argue with the brutal fact. Also, he had to admit that faking the robbery might actually mask the fact that it had been an assassination by other members of the Mexican military.
He waited only a few seconds to gather his nerves and drove back to his office in the American Embassy. He didn’t want the Mexico City police wondering what an American FBI agent was doing so close to the killing of a respected Mexican Army colonel.
The somewhat grumpy woman assigned as his secretary had taken a message from someone who refused to give a name, only saying that Mexicans don’t like traitors either. Harris crumpled the paper and threw it in the wastebasket.
He thought he should talk to the ambassador before leaving to go back to the U.S., but just then someone loudly announced that the Japs were attacking California. The hell with the ambassador, Harris thought as he ran out of the embassy, he had to get a flight back to California as soon as possible.
* * *
Amanda had just arrived for her shift at the hospital when the sirens began to scream. Oh God, she thought. What should she do now? Patients were staring at her as if she knew what to do. Some could be moved, but many could not. But where to go? Was anyplace safe? Worse, there was an appalling lack of shelters.
The supervising nurse solved at least part of her problem. “Get as many as you can down to the basement and stay with them. I’ll take care of the ones who can’t move.”
Amanda and another nurse managed to get a good twenty men down from the second floor and to a room in the damp and claustrophobic basement. Another dozen wounded made it themselves, some even joking how Japanese bombs and shells motivated them to get their butts out of bed and made them forget their little aches and pains.
When everyone was pretty well settled on the floor of the basement, Amanda went back upstairs. The sirens were still wailing, but did that mean enemy shells or bombs? Or maybe—please—maybe it was a false alarm. She’d endured bombs, shells, and false alarms in Honolulu, what seemed an eternity ago. Just a couple of days earlier, she’d relished discovering so much about herself and Tim, and how much they enjoyed making love and thinking about the future. What the hell was happening to her little world? Tim was off to somewhere dangerous and she was under enemy fire in San Diego. Where was God in all this mess?
“Our ships are leaving,” someone yelled. She dashed to a window. Sure enough, the handful of American warships that had remained in San Diego Bay were steaming as rapidly as they could toward the open sea.
She asked a navy captain whether or not the departing ships were going to take on the Japanese, and got an answer that surprised her.
“Sure hope not. Two cruisers and half a dozen destroyers aren’t going to stop the Jap navy,” he said. “They’d get killed. The navy’s just trying to get those little ships out to safety. That is, if there is any place safe.”
Thunder boomed in the distance. “Our shore batteries,” the captain said. Amanda recalled that Tim had told her there were eight- and ten-inch guns in batteries on Point Lomas overlooking the entrance to the bay. More distant thunder told her that the Japs were within range. This was confirmed by giant splashes in the harbor, some frighteningly close to the fleeing warships.
“They must have spotter planes up,” the captain said.
“So why don’t we shoot them down?”
“Good question. I don’t know where the hell our planes are. It’s as if we don’t have any.”
A massive shell hit a destroyer. The explosion lifted it out of the water. It landed and capsized. Amanda watched in horror as men tumbled into the water. A new sound intruded. Planes, Jap planes. Antiaircraft guns began firing and adding to the din.
Amanda was no fool. Her place was with her patients, not where bombs and shells might be falling. She ran downstairs where most of them waited stolidly. She gave them all the information she had, which seemed to please them. Nobody liked to be kept in the dark.
“Thank you, Nurse Dane,” a sailor with his arm in a cast said, grinning. The announcement that she was married had caused great amusement. A couple said they were heartbroken and wondered why she’d dumped them, and she’d replied that she still loved them all.
Something exploded nearby, and the building shook. The lights went out, but they’d brought some flashlights. Another sailor laughed nervously. “This place wasn’t built on a low-bid contract, was it, ma’am?”
Another explosion and pieces of the false ceiling began to tumble down. “Get under something,” she hollered.
Half the men had done that already, but it did motivate the rest to take cover under anything they could find. Desks and tables were the favorites. She looked around for something to hide under.
She was already flying across the room when she realized that another explosion had occurred, and this one terribly close. She hit the wall with enough force to knock the wind from her. She gasped for breath and felt pain surging through her body. Debris was falling on her and she couldn’t move. As she felt consciousness ebb, she heard screams and realized at least one voice was hers. Then it became dusty and dark.
* * *
Farris and Nancy cowered in a long slit trench. It was filled with men and women, civilians and military, and even a few children. The Japanese were pounding the base. A shell landed nearby and showered them with dirt and debris. A child began to scream in stark terror.
Antiaircraft batteries nearby began to fire. Farris risked looking up and saw a pair of Japanese planes, the damned Zeroes, fly low overhead. It was obvious that Jap carriers as well as their warships were very close.
A Zero streaked across the bay, only a few feet above the water. The antiaircraft battery opened up with its twin 20mm guns. The plane flew through the shells and fired its machine guns, riddling the battery. Men staggered out and fell, some quivering.
“Where the hell are our planes?” a Marine sergeant asked. Then he saw Nancy. “Hey, she’s a
fucking Jap.”
The enraged Marine threw a punch that Nancy ducked. Farris grabbed the man and pushed him against the wall of the trench. “Do that again and I’ll kill you.”
Nancy grabbed his arm and pointed to the destroyed antiaircraft guns. “Some of those men are still alive.”
Farris climbed out of the trench and ran to the ruined battery, with Nancy right behind him. While most of the gunners were shredded meat, two men were still alive. He grabbed one and she grabbed the other. The two men moaned at being roughly manhandled, but there wasn’t time to be gentle.
Farris pulled at his wounded man. He was too big to carry, so he dragged him. The pain to his damaged shoulder was excruciating, and he felt it pop. Incredulously, he saw Nancy managing to drag the other man the few dozen yards to safety. Halfway there, the Marine sergeant and another enlisted man arrived to help them with their burdens.
They managed to get the two wounded men into the trench. People moved away to give them room. “How’s your first aid?” Nancy asked. Farris and the Marine sergeant admitted theirs was okay but that was about it. Even in combat, Farris hadn’t had to treat wounds.
“Then my skills are better,” she said. “Living in a place like Bridger made us all very independent. Let’s get organized; start helping me.”
Steve’s left arm was again limp and useless. All he could do was watch while Nancy and another woman did what they could for the wounded men.
“Sorry about being such a jerk, sir,” the Marine sergeant said. “I didn’t realize she was an American.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“I think your shoulder’s been dislocated.”
Farris agreed with the diagnosis. The Marine pushed him against the wall of the trench, grabbed his wrist, and jerked. The pain was excruciating and he nearly fainted, but the shoulder popped back in.
The Marine offered Steve a cigarette. “That woman is something else.”
“Yeah. She sure is.”
* * *
The explosions in and around the base represented both fear and an opportunity for Gunther Krause. For a while he had been having second thoughts as to whether the Americans would honor their agreement or, once he was no longer useful, discard it and him as well. Now, as the shells fell on the base and in the city, he knew the answer. The government would need a scapegoat for the burning mess that was the San Diego Naval Base and that person’s name would be Gunther Krause. The Americans would manage to blame him for the devastation and the slaughter.
When he agreed to help the Yanks lure the Japanese, he had no idea it would result in so much destruction to an American city. No, he thought ruefully, there would be no freedom for him. If he managed to escape the firing squad or noose, they would put him in a place where he’d never even see the light of day.
When the shelling started, his two guards had left the house and run to a slit trench, assuming that he would follow. If he was smart, that is where he would be. But if he was really smart, he thought, he would take advantage of the chaos and confusion. Maybe he didn’t like the idea of spending the rest of his life on the run, but it beat a firing squad by a lot. He quickly packed the suitcase they’d allowed him to bring with him and ran outside. He was dressed in civilian clothes. The American military didn’t want him defiling their uniforms and that suited him well this morning.
His two guards had left their jeep in the street. He got in and drove off. As he approached the gate to the base, he saw people in uniform running in and trying to get to their posts, while others, mainly civilians, streamed out. The guards weren’t in the least bit interested in who was leaving and only looked quickly at those entering. As long as you were white, in uniform, and not Japanese, you were okay. He parked the jeep and simply trotted out and into San Diego. Crowds were headed out of the city and he joined them.
Krause had only gone a few blocks when he saw that, incredibly, his bank was open. He entered and asked to open his safe deposit box. A Hispanic female clerk named Maria helped him. She explained, angrily, that their idiot of a manager wouldn’t let them close the place, not even for a Japanese bombardment. If she didn’t need the job so much, she’d walk out. She added that the pay was lousy and she was thinking about quitting and going to work in a nearby factory like her husband did. She said they’d lived in the town of Grover, a ways north of San Diego, and had been shelled out of their homes by the Japanese. It looked like it was going to happen again. Krause wanted to strangle her.
Finally alone in the booth, he emptied the contents of the box. He now had more than ten thousand dollars and three sets of identification. He also had a .32 Colt revolver. Krause happily departed the bank, found a car, hot-wired it, and drove off inland along with much of the population of San Diego. He was confident that the police would have too much on their hands to worry about a stolen car, especially when they would recover it shortly. He was uncertain as to exactly where he would go, but east would be the general direction and then he would take a Greyhound bus to somewhere. Kansas City sounded like a nice destination. He would be a German refugee who’d fled Hitler before the war. Yes, that would get him sympathy. Maybe, he thought, he would make it after all.
He laughed. The Third Reich was doomed to a slow death in the frozen steppes of Russia and would ultimately be trampled by the vengeful Soviets, but there was no reason for a similar fate to befall him.
* * *
Admiral Chester Nimitz clutched his chest and tried to hold back the tears that threatened to spill down his cheeks. In the background, his aides, his staff, were imploring him to go to a shelter. A couple had even tried to pull on his arm, but he had shaken them off. However horrible this was, it was something he had to see, especially since he had caused it.
Nimitz recalled an old phrase: “What hath God wrought?” No, this time it was: “What Hath Chester Nimitz wrought?” It was his decision to try to lure the Japanese fleet to California and now he had them. He laughed bitterly and recalled another saying: “Be careful what you wish for, it might come true.” He now had to accept the possibility that the name Chester Nimitz would go down amid the host of history’s fools. Custer and whoever had led the Charge of the Light Brigade and demanded the assault on the Somme would welcome him as a failed comrade-in-arms.
Through the window of his office, he could see small boats moving fearlessly through the attack, picking up survivors from the sunken destroyer. There were precious few sailors being pulled into the boats, and Nimitz assumed that many of them were dead already.
Another enemy salvo crashed onto the base, destroying a warehouse. Something in it exploded with a roar. The hospital had collapsed and he hoped the patients and medical personnel had gotten out. The shore batteries had already been silenced. Japanese ships and planes were shelling and bombing with impunity, and he had invited them in. Intelligence said that at least six and possibly eight enemy carriers were approaching the Baja, so where had the planes bombing and strafing the base come from? Either the Japs had more carriers than anyone thought, or they were using anything that would float and hold planes.
Regardless, the full fury of Imperial Japan was descending on San Diego and Los Angeles, which was also being bombed and shelled. The Rose Bowl stadium had been shelled and the “HOLLYWOOD” sign had been blown off the hill. The handful of fighters he’d held back to provide a token defense had been shot down.
Another explosion rocked the area. A bomb or shell had hit a fuel depot and resulted in billowing flames surging skyward.
“Admiral, let’s go.”
It was one of his aides. This one was brave enough to be insistent. Nimitz allowed himself to be led down the stairs to a place that was, theoretically at least, safe. If the enemy force approaching the Baja was not destroyed, or at least defeated, his name would be reviled.
Nimitz paused. He had a horrible thought. What if Yamamoto had seen through the trick and no Japanese fleet was actually going to the Baja? Perhaps they would turn around, or ev
en head north, attacking and devastating other coastal cities as they went. Perhaps they’d seen through his clumsy ruse and knew that there were no carriers in the Baja. If the Japs made such a fool of him, the word “reviled” wouldn’t begin to describe the contempt he would endure.
Belowground, in his reinforced concrete bunker, his staff looked at him, relief evident on their faces that he’d finally joined them. He made a mental note never to scare them again. A second mental note was that whatever happened, he would endure it.
“What’s the latest?”
“The Jap surface fleets are turning back, sir. Either they’re out of ammo or out of targets.”
“Neither,” Nimitz said. “They’re trying to lure us out. They want us to send all our planes after them and we’re not going to do that. How many planes attacked here and Los Angeles?”
“Maybe thirty apiece,” another aide said. “We think they have a small carrier off each city. Allowing for typical pilot exaggeration, we shot down an estimated twenty of the enemy.”
“A heavy price for a decoy,” the admiral thought out loud.
Another aide looked at him eagerly. “Sir, radar on the hills overlooking the Baja report that the enemy carriers are within their range. They also report that the Japs are close enough to start launching large numbers of planes.”
Nimitz sat down in leather admiral’s chair. Despite his many doubts, the Japs were going to attack. Perhaps this wouldn’t be such a bad day after all.
* * *
Toki ran up to his friend and embraced him in a most unJapanese display of affection, a wide smile on his face. “Today is the day, my friend, go bravely and sink their ships.”
Masao slapped him on the back and laughed. It was a good day to be a Japanese warrior, a samurai. “Make up your mind. A while back you were certain we were doomed because the Americans were so powerful. Now you seem confident that we’ll defeat them. Which is it?”
“Of course I have doubts. Nothing is certain in life, except, of course, death.”
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