The Year of Counting Souls

by Wallace, Michael

  They pushed through the brush for about thirty feet before Fárez stopped. “Lieutenant. It’s me, Fárez. Where’d you go?”

  Louise held her breath, suddenly sure that they’d come too late and there would be no answer. Or that Fárez had taken them off the trail in the wrong direction.

  But the corporal was answered by a cough and a weak voice. “Over here. Did you get the doc?”

  “No, sir, but I got Miss Louise. She’ll see that you’re patched up good enough to get back to the hospital.”

  They found Kozlowski propped against the trunk of an enormous tree with a strangling vine as thick as Louise’s thigh wrapped around it like a giant snake. His face was gray when Louise turned the flashlight on him, and he held his hand against his side as if it were the only thing keeping his intestines from spilling out.

  But he was alive and conscious, and Louise felt a burn of purpose as she opened her bag. She could help this man. She could save his life.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Sammy started to lose confidence in the plan when Corporal Oto stirred from his morphine haze. Sammy had been reading poetry by lamplight but now shoved the book into his pocket and turned off the lamp, hoping the man would settle back down. Oto kept moving about on his patati mat, then cleared his throat.

  “Mori, are you there?”

  “Assuming you mean me and not my brother, then yeah. I’m here.”

  “I should get up. The captain will have my skin if he knows I’ve been sleeping.”

  “You’re sick,” Mori said. “You weren’t sleeping, you were resting so you could do your job. Anyway, nothing has happened. I’m still here, right?”

  “I need to take my shift on guard duty.”

  “No, you don’t. The other two know you’re getting treatment. The nurse told you to stay still, remember?”

  “Yeah.” Oto didn’t sound convinced.

  Where the devil was Louise? She’d been gone for a couple of hours already. If Oto got up and went to the hospital, the three men would quickly figure out that the nurse was nowhere to be found. They’d put hard questions to Sammy, which he wouldn’t be able to answer.

  “What about the village?” Oto asked. “Who’s keeping an eye on it?”

  “Nothing is happening in the village. It’s perfectly quiet—the villagers are all asleep at this hour. And the hospital is a few women and a bunch of sick soldiers. Nothing is going on. Relax.”

  “I’m trying. It’s hard.”

  “I feel like I’m talking to a kid,” Sammy said. “Close your eyes and go to sleep. Come on. Those bone worms must still be bothering you. Don’t want to get them moving about, do you? They’ll migrate away from the treatment, and you’ll never get rid of them.”

  “I should have said something to your brother. It hurts like hell. I kept thinking it was the wound, you know. Didn’t want to come across like a shirker.”

  “You had reason to complain,” Sammy said. “The nurse said you weren’t stitched up properly. What happened?”

  “I was with Colonel Umeko when we came ashore with the Kanno Detachment. American planes bombed us trying to stop the landing. There was some kind of explosion. A big piece of metal knocked me into the mud. I got on my feet and went on with the rest of them, because there wasn’t any field hospital.”

  Sammy allowed himself a mildly subversive comment. “The Americans always have hospitals. Why don’t we?”

  Oto talked past this as if it hadn’t been spoken. “I told the colonel, and he had a medic splash me with iodine and wrap it up. Never saw a needle or stitches, and it healed funny. Nothing to be done for it now, I guess.”

  Sammy relit the lamp and turned it up slowly to let their eyes adjust. He went to the door and windows to check the mosquito nets. Flying insects piled on the outside of the netting, desperate to hurl themselves at the lamp.

  “You could go to the American hospital,” he told Oto. “Once the bone worms are gone, I’ll bet they’d help you. If it’s only been healing for six weeks, they could still do something about it.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know, cut it open, stitch it up so it heals right.”

  “Nah, I’m not going to say anything to the Americans. What kind of complainer would that make me?” Oto pulled himself into a sitting position and chuckled. “May as well whine about my bald spot.”

  “So you’ll live in pain for the rest of your life?”

  “Yeah, probably. Rest of my life will be about a month, I figure. The army doesn’t care if we live or die, Mori. You know that, right? We serve Japan, we die in the service of the emperor.”

  “We’re arrows in a quiver,” Sammy agreed. “If we’re recovered after the hunt, so much the better, but the huntsman doesn’t cry over the arrows lost in the pursuit.”

  “Yeah, that’s good. Just like that.” Oto rubbed at his scar tissue. “You think this is all right sitting up? It won’t push the worms out? It hurts to sit too long in one position.”

  “I’m sure they’ll stay put so long as you don’t move too much.”

  “You’re a learned man, Sammy. Isn’t that right?”

  “I’ve read a few books.” His hand felt to the lump in his pocket, where he’d put the book Louise returned.

  “They say you know your poets, even write some yourself. A real Japanese. Why’d you do it?”

  “Do what?”

  “You know, tell the foreigners all that stuff to make Japan look bad. It wasn’t even true, most of it.”

  “It was all true. I only repeated what I saw with my own eyes.”

  “Oh yeah? So you saw a few bad things. Did you tell the foreigners what the Chinamen were doing to us? They were shooting at us, Mori. Trying to kill us every moment of every day. I was there, too.”

  “That’s what enemies do—they try to kill you.”

  “Those damn Chinese wouldn’t stop fighting, wouldn’t stop laying traps. I saw a man with his leg blown off by a mine. It was put there after we’d already cleared the road. Blasted treachery, is what it was.”

  Something dangerous had entered Oto’s tone, a warning like the huff of a viper in the leaves beneath one’s feet. Fail to heed that warning, keep stepping forward, and you’d feel its fangs in your calf, the burn of venom entering the blood.

  “Another time, they ambushed us from a canal,” Oto continued. “We’d cleared the area, we were interrogating prisoners. Three Chinamen came out of the water and started shooting. Good thing their guns jammed in the mud. Only one fired. We got ’em all. Turns out they were men who’d thrown away their uniforms and pretended to be civilians. Can you believe that?”

  Sammy knew he should keep his mouth shut, but couldn’t help himself. “Men resort to desperate measures when they’re defending their homeland.”

  “You shut up. You don’t know what you’re talking about. I had friends die in China. Those men in Nanking—are you saying it’s their fault what happened? Huh, are you? I’ll cut your fucking throat, do you hear me?”

  Oto glared until Sammy was forced to look away. For a moment Sammy was torn between two urges. The first was the same one that had made him veer his bicycle in front of the American truck. Goad Oto until he made good on his threat.

  The other was to calm the situation, withdraw what he’d said. Go back to where he was before, when Oto and the others had nearly forgotten his treasonous behavior. Keep them calm and sedate so that Louise could help the injured American soldier.

  “My apologies, Corporal. I should not have said that.”

  “Damn right, you shouldn’t have.”

  “I was wrong.”

  “Yeah, you were.”

  Sammy glanced back at Oto, whose face was red and his nostrils flaring. He’d sounded so reasonable moments earlier that Sammy had forgotten his earlier assessment. And now Oto seemed in an extended state of agitation. That was no good.

  “Sammy?” a voice called from outside. Louise. Bad timing.

  “Yeah,
hold on,” he answered in English. “Don’t come up here.”

  “What does she want?” Oto said irritably. “Tell her to go away.”

  “Probably only to follow up on your treatment.”

  “She can do it in the morning. I’m going to get up and do my damn job.”

  Sammy called out to Louise, “He’s in a mood. My fault. Can you get him another shot of morphine?”

  “I gave it all to the lieutenant.”

  “He’s here?”

  “Not here, but close enough. Fárez has him on the other side of the village. We’ve got to get him inside to Claypool—he’s losing blood.”

  Sammy glanced at Oto, who was still glowering as he pulled on his pants, then turned back to Louise. “All right. I’m coming out. I have to bring our friend here. He’s not going to let me out of his sight.”

  “Oh, that’s not good. Well . . .”

  Oto stood and buttoned his shirt. “Why is she still babbling like an idiot? I thought I told you to send her off.”

  “She’s been waiting for you all this time, and she wants one more look at you.”

  “No point in it.”

  “Look, you’ve got to go to the hospital anyway,” Sammy said. “If you’re going to take your place for guard duty, I mean. She’s going to give those men treatment, too. What if you need another injection?”

  “It can wait.”

  “You want to wait on bone worms? They’re not even the little ones, either. One big worm can burrow into your toe and grow until it stretches to your pelvis.”

  “I don’t think I have those kind,” Oto said, but was that a tiny bit of doubt Sammy heard in his voice?

  “And forget it if they reach your brain. You can feel them eating you from the inside. The nurse didn’t think I had worms, but I told her to give me a shot anyway. I wasn’t going to take a chance. She gave it to me right after you closed your eyes to rest,” Sammy added quickly. He gestured. “Come on. You’ve already had the worst of it. One more shot just to be sure. You’re not afraid of a shot, are you?”

  “Of course not.”

  Sammy called out in English, “Use your most soothing tone. I told him he needs another shot, but he’s balky.”

  “I sure hope the other guards are as gullible. That would make our job easier.”

  Sammy turned to Oto. “She said to walk slowly. The medicine is making the worms sleepy so they can be killed, but sudden movement might still wake them up.”

  “It all sounds made up to me, this bone-worm business,” Oto said, but nevertheless, he walked stiffly and slowly as the two men came outside and down the stairs.

  He’d apparently decided not to risk his life on his doubts.

  It seemed to go well at first. The two guards studied Oto walking stiffly up and agreed to come into the hospital for treatment as soon as the situation had been explained to them. Sammy said he was going to get an injection as well and assured them that they’d have their own private area apart from the Americans and Filipinos.

  But then the more alert of the guards, the older fellow named Terasaki, pointed out that they shouldn’t all go inside at once. Someone should stand watch at all times.

  Sammy could see it unraveling. “You’re worried about the Americans?” He let the mockery sound in his voice. “What are they going to do to us?”

  “That’s right,” Oto said, nodding. “These Americans are cowards. They surrendered. They won’t try anything.”

  Terasaki grunted. “You think I’m worried about the Americans? Hah! You said the injection put you under. What if Captain Mori comes back and finds us that way? You saw what he did to that Sakdal. He’ll do us worse.”

  Sammy’s brother had given the Sakdals orders to stop harassing the villagers, then punished one of them when he was caught messing around with a village girl. Yoshiko had staked the Sakdal for ten hours in the sun. It was a lesson for Japanese and Filipino alike.

  The others fell silent at this. Yamaguchi, the final secret police, wore a mustache that looked like a caterpillar napping on his upper lip and fiddled nervously with it. “That’s right,” he said. “I don’t want to be staked.”

  “But what about the bone worms?” Oto said.

  “He’s right, we have to get treated,” Sammy said. He avoided looking at Louise, who had cast him an anxious glance as the conversation continued in Japanese. “But we don’t want to face Captain Mori, either.”

  “Captain Mori.” Not “my brother.” He needed them to see him as just another soldier trying to balance their health against orders from their superior.

  “Then what do we do?” Yamaguchi asked. “We’ve got to get treated, but we got these prisoners to watch. You’re the smart one, Mori. Tell us.”

  Sammy bit at his lower lip and glanced off to one side, as if thinking it over. “Hold on, what if we . . . ? Hmm. I don’t know, maybe not.”

  “Yeah?” Terasaki said. He still looked doubtful.

  “Here’s what I think,” Sammy continued, more decisively this time. “Oto has the worst case—he can already feel the worms, and his life is at risk. He’ll get treated, together with you two. Don’t want it spreading. My treatment is precautionary. I’ll stand guard while the three of you get your treatment, and then I’ll get mine last.”

  He held his breath as the three men glanced at each other. Oto and Yamaguchi seemed game, but Terasaki shook his head.

  “That’s no good. You’re one of the prisoners.”

  “You think I’m going anywhere?” Sammy shifted on his crutches to make the point.

  “No, of course not,” Terasaki said. “You may be a traitor, but you’re no coward. You’d never run away, of course not. But it seems wrong, that’s what I mean. Captain Mori comes back and sees you there on duty while we’re all asleep—it looks bad.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll take the blame. The nurse gave me medical advice in English, and I translated it. You men had no choice.”

  “Of course we have a choice,” Terasaki said. “We can endure the worms until the captain gets back. We’ll get our treatment then. I don’t even feel it yet, do you?” he asked Yamaguchi.

  “I—I’m not sure. Maybe.”

  “I certainly do,” Oto said. “They’ve been hurting for days, got right into my injury and infected it.”

  “So get treated,” Terasaki said. “We’ll stand guard until you’re done.”

  “You’re going to risk it?” Sammy asked Terasaki. “They get deep enough into the bone, and they can’t be treated except with surgery.” He nodded at Louise. “That’s what the nurse said.”

  “Oh, what does she know?” Terasaki said. “She’s just a woman. I want to talk to the doctor. Someone drag him out of bed.”

  It was slipping away. Terasaki dug in his heels the longer Sammy pushed. Any more, and the man’s suspicions would bloom into full-fledged disbelief. Fortunately Oto came to Sammy’s aid.

  “We’re wasting time,” Oto said. “We’ll be finished by morning if we don’t sit here arguing about it. Mori and Fujiwara won’t need to know how it happened, just that we got treated. Where’s the harm in it?”

  Still Terasaki looked uncertain. Finally something seemed to occur to him. “All right, but we’re holding an inspection at first light. If there’s even one prisoner missing, someone’s head is going to roll, and it won’t be mine.” He unslung his rifle and handed it to Sammy. “This is your idea. Your head if it goes wrong.”

  Sammy nodded. “I take full responsibility for my actions.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Louise took a risk and increased the dosage of morphine for the third soldier, the one Sammy called Terasaki. He was older than the other two, more alert and suspicious, and she needed him to stay down through Kozlowski’s surgery. Terasaki waited until she’d given shots to Oto and the young one with the mustache, then argued some more with Sammy before finally consenting and allowing Louise to approach.

  She’d laid out the three Japanese men on pata
ti mats toward the front of the building. A hanging blanket served as a makeshift wall to separate them from the rest of the hospital. Terasaki glanced at the blanket, as if more worried about being seen by the American patients than by the shot itself or the supposed parasites it was meant to cure. He watched as Louise tied a rubber tourniquet around his arm to expose the vein but turned away when she stuck the needle in.

  “I still say it was too easy,” she told Sammy as she put away the syringe. “I’m an American, you’re a traitor. Why did they let us do it?”

  “Some fears are stronger than others,” Sammy said.

  Terasaki was already relaxing along with his companions but stared at her, blinking heavily. He let out a long sigh as the drug continued to take hold. She patted his arm and moved to inspect Oto’s back, nudging him until he rolled on his side.

  “And the thought of a little medically ordered sleep was too much to resist,” Sammy said. “Throw in their bluster about not fearing the Americans, and this is the result.” He rubbed his stubble and studied Terasaki’s glazed expression. “Or maybe we’re simply conditioned to obey.”

  Terasaki closed his eyes. Louise stepped away carefully.

  “Bring him in,” she said quietly.

  Sammy spoke in clipped Japanese as he moved toward the front door, no doubt something about taking up his post outside, in case any of the men were still conscious enough to hear. None of the other Japanese responded.

  Louise stood against the wall, watching the soldiers on their mats. So risky. Too little morphine and they’d see what was happening. Too much and she’d kill them. She’d never be able to live with herself if she did.

  The door swung open. Fárez and Sammy staggered in, dragging the gray-faced lieutenant with his arms swung over their shoulders. Louise rushed to help.

  They hauled Kozlowski behind the blanket to the main ward. There all eyes turned toward them. Two more men assisted, and they soon had the patient up on the operating table.

  Dr. Claypool sat on a stool, attended to by the other two nurses. Working in silence, Frankie held him up, and Maria Elena slipped him into his operating gown. When that was done, the two nurses scrubbed his hands with a bucket of water, soap, and a bristle brush. Claypool sat through this with his eyes closed, pale, but breathing steadily.