1942

by Robert Conroy

  Franklin Delano Roosevelt had had a good day, and that was all that counted.

  Lieutenant Uji Goto knew he wasn’t much of a warrior, but his new commander at Hilo, Major Osami Shimura, was even less of one. Shimura was short, fat, flabby, lazy, and dissolute. He was generally drunk by noon, and Goto thought he might be using opium as well.

  Shimura also was a coward. He had close to five hundred men at his disposal and had done nothing to rid the island of Hawaii of the American guerrillas who, in the opinion of Goto and other more determined officers, operated with impunity outside Hilo.

  “Too many,” Shimura had said on several occasions. “There are hundreds of them out there just waiting to ambush us. Our job is to hold Hilo, not run all over this wretched island chasing shadows.”

  Goto wondered how a group of well-armed Americans could become shadows, but he said nothing. He had read the raw intelligence data and knew there was only a very small American force in the field, somewhere between fifty and a hundred, and they would not be able to stand up to a battalion of Imperial marines if they were cornered.

  Of course, Goto acknowledged that cornering them was the problem. Hawaii was four thousand square miles of jungle, mountain, and volcanoes, some active, in which the Americans could hide. As a boy visiting relatives, he had hiked some of the trails and knew that a full division of Imperial marines might not be able to root them out unless they had to stand and fight for something they deemed important.

  With an active campaign out of the question for the immediate future, he settled into a fairly comfortable existence. Like the other officers, he got drunk almost every evening and spent many of the nights in the local brothel. The madam, a fat Hawaiian with many gaps in her smile where the teeth had rotted out, quickly understood his unique pleasures. She made certain he had access to several girls in their early teens, although she had been disturbed by his requests for girls who were even younger. So far, she had not been able to get any prepubescent children for him, and that disturbed Goto as well.

  Of course, if he could get back to Honolulu, with its larger population, his needs could be more readily fulfilled. In order to get back, he had two choices: First, he could wait out the necessary time, as Omori had suggested, or, second, he could do something outstanding that would require him to be sent back to Honolulu regardless of what the civilians thought. Who gives a shit, he snarled to himself, what the civilians think?

  Thus, it was with some eagerness that he greeted the foul creature who stood before him. “Sergeant Finch, you are to be congratulated on all you have done for Japan. I can only hope you will be as successful here.”

  Finch was uncomfortable but tried to hide it. He should not have been sent to Goto’s quarters, where his presence might be noted. Even though it was night and he was wearing civilian clothing and a hat, someone might have recognized or remembered him.

  “As always, Lieutenant, I will do my best.”

  “It was easy for you on Lanai. The Americans there were total idiots and there was really no place for them to hide. Here on Hawaii, it will be different.”

  Indeed it would, Charley thought. Finding the guerrillas would be the first part of the problem.

  “How will you explain yourself?” Goto asked. “You will appear to them as a reasonably healthy POW. How will you explain yourself?”

  Finch bowed. He had not been invited to sit. “I’m fortunate in that most of the POWs on Oahu have been sent to Japan. I will say that I escaped during transit, made it to Molokai by boat, was hidden on a farm, and then fled to Hawaii with the purpose of meeting up with the Americans. It is a simple story, and one they won’t be able to check out.”

  Goto grunted. Finch couldn’t tell whether he agreed or not. “When you find the Americans, how will you contact us?”

  “Sir, on Lanai I was able to drop notes in a stump by the road. This island is too big for that sort of thing. I’m afraid I will have to desert the Americans when the time comes.”

  That answer did not totally please Goto. It meant that Finch could be used only one time and that his fat commander would have to be induced to move rapidly, something that just wasn’t likely.

  However, like Finch, Goto had no choice. He would use the tools at hand, not the ones he wished he had.

  On the other side of Hilo, Lieutenant Sammy Brooks, USMC, crouched in the hole he’d dug in the side of the hill overlooking Major Shimura’s quarters. Shimura had commandeered a large and stately house on the outskirts of Hilo that must have belonged to someone with money.

  It was daylight, and he had several hours more to wait. Beside him was his rifle, the ‘03 Springfield he thought of as his best friend. Brooks was an outstanding shot, and, in his opinion, the Springfield was a more accurate sniper rifle than the new Garand being issued to the army. Screw the army, he thought, he’d keep his Springfield.

  As a marine, he had been well taught in the craft of stalking a prey. He would not be found except in the unlikely circumstance that someone literally stumbled onto where he was hidden. He knew that what he was doing was against Jake Novacek’s orders, but he just didn’t care. It was impossible for him to be on the same island with a pack of Japs and not strike out at them. He’d heard of Novacek’s ambush of the Jap patrol and knew that the Japs hadn’t launched any offensive against them. He was confident the same would be the case this time.

  Brooks hadn’t intended an ambush. His original plans were for several days of in-depth reconnaissance of the Hilo garrison, but, when he realized how small and ineffective the Jap force was, he knew he could strike and flee into the interior with little concern.

  He had lied to both his commander in California and Novacek. His brother wasn’t in a Jap prison camp. His brother was dead. Word had come from the Philippines, through a civilian who both knew his brother and had seen him die, that Captain John W. Brooks had been bayoneted for insolence en route to a prison camp after the surrender at Bataan. His insolence was begging for water. He was then buried alive in a sandpit by fellow prisoners, who would have been killed themselves had they not cooperated. When the grievously wounded man had clawed his way out of his grave, he had been reburied. John W Brooks did not escape death a second time.

  Although he detested it, Sammy Brooks understood the need for patience. Already he had spent almost a day in his hole. He ate sparingly of his rations, drank sips from his canteen, and relieved himself into a hole dug in the bottom of his hideout. The waiting was agony, but he would be well paid for it.

  Finally, shadows faded into a gray night. There were plenty of stars, which was both a blessing and a curse. His target would be easy to see, but so would he as he fled. He would count on confusion and a defensive reaction to his attack to enable him to get into the safety of the hills.

  A car pulled up in front of Shimura’s quarters. A guard got out of the front seat and ran to his station at the rear of the house. The driver exited and opened the rear door for the fat major to get out. He then ran to the porch to open the door for Shimura, after which he would take up duty as a front sentry. Brooks knew that they changed every four hours from a guardhouse that was a couple of miles away.

  In short, Shimura’s security was incredibly lax.

  The major walked to the house and waited for the guard to open the door. The range was three hundred yards. Brooks squeezed the trigger, and there was a startling blast of sound and light. Shimura’s head exploded in a froth of gray and red while the sentry gaped in astonishment.

  “Damn,” muttered Brooks. He’d been nervous, and his shot had ridden high. He had aimed for the Jap’s torso, not his head. It was too easy to miss the smaller skull. He had been lucky.

  He worked the bolt and fired a second time, dropping the shocked guard beside his master. The second guard raced from the back, and another bullet toppled him. This was excellent. Anyone who had heard the gunfire was unlikely to investigate, and there was no one to notify the other soldiers at the guard shack. Someone in the
area might phone, but it was unlikely. No one would want to get involved. The Japanese reaction would take time.

  “Three for three,” Brooks exulted and laughed, and then he turned somber. “That’s for you, Johnnie,” he sobbed.

  He gathered his rifle and his gear and began the lonely trot into the hills.

  It never rains in sunny Southern California, at least that was what Jamie Priest had always thought. This day, however, had brought a torrential rain and a cold wind off the ocean, and neither showed any sign of letting up.

  He and Suzy Dunnigan had moved their picnic from the beach to the small, two-bedroom bungalow that had belonged to her father. It was a mile away from the ocean, and, by the time they got there, parked the car, and got their things from it, both were soaking wet and cold.

  No matter. While there was no furnace in her house, there was a Franklin stove, which, after only a few minutes and a handful of wood, gave off enough heat to dry their swimsuits while they dined off a blanket that was spread on the floor by the stove.

  Suzy had chosen a white wine from a California vineyard he’d never heard of. Jamie’s perception of California wines was that they were cheap and bitter, and he found himself pleasantly surprised by the richness of the taste. The wine, coupled with the radiant heat, made them feel warm and mellow.

  Jamie spent a couple of minutes examining the house. There were a number of pictures of Suzy’s father, along with a couple of her as a thin and serious-looking child, and the house exuded a fairly masculine air.

  “Dad bought this place after the divorce. I only moved back a few months ago. I graduated from Stanford last June and always thought my dad would move back here and take possession. Then, after he was killed, I didn’t have the heart or courage to change anything.” She laughed softly. “However, I had already moved into the larger bedroom and taken over the big bed. My stuff is in his closet. Even before Pearl Harbor, I didn’t think he’d mind if I took it over.”

  “I like it. What will you do with it when you leave to serve your country?”

  Congress was on the verge of approving women in both the navy and the army. With Nimitz’s endorsement, Suzy was a virtual shoo-in for officers’ school or even a direct commission in what would be called the WAVES, the Women Accepted for Voluntary Emergency Service. She thought someone had strained hard to make the acronym work for the navy.

  But it was a sore point insofar as Jamie’s request for a transfer to a combat command had again been denied.

  “I’ll probably rent it out. Do you think you’d be interested?”

  Jamie thought that he might. It would beat the hell out of the bachelors’ quarters he shared with several dozen close friends.

  “Yeah, since I’m not going anyplace, I might just take you up on it.”

  She reached over and took his hand. “Jamie, you know they can’t send you out. You may be the last of the Pennsylvania’s crew, and they can’t risk you. You’ll be promoted, and you still have a great career if you want to stay in the navy when the war’s over, but you know you won’t see any more combat in this war.”

  Jamie knew it, but he didn’t have to like it. Everything she said was correct. He’d been informed that his promotion to lieutenant commander would come down any day. They both thought it was overdue and probably delayed because of uncertainty regarding his role with the doomed battleship. Privately, Jamie thought the four pissed-off admirals who’d traveled to see him had stonewalled it for as long as they could.

  “Don’t feel bad,” she said and squeezed his hand. “Whatever happens, I won’t be getting shot at either. With a little luck, I’ll be back in San Diego doing what I’ve been doing, only wearing a uniform.”

  “That’s important to you, isn’t it? The uniform.”

  “Because of my father, yes.”

  “And that’s why you like me, right? Because I look so good in a sailor suit?”

  Suzy laughed and squeezed his hand harder. “Who says I like you?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “Of course,” she said with a smile. “And it doesn’t bother me at all that you won’t be in combat. You’ve seen more than enough of it. I don’t want you hurt.”

  Jamie was delighted. Even though he knew she was fond of him, it was the first time she’d said it. He wondered if the fact that they were just about finished with the second bottle of wine had anything to do with it.

  He reached for her, and she came toward him on the floor. He kissed her very gently, and she didn’t respond. God, he thought, have I misjudged? “I guess I shouldn’t have done that.”

  She shook her head and smiled. “I don’t know why, but you surprised me. Try again.”

  He did as directed. This time her lips parted and she melded into him. She slid across his lap and kissed him back. To his delight, her tongue was exploring his as eagerly as he was hers.

  This time Suzy was wearing a one-piece bathing suit. They parted, and Jamie slid the straps off her shoulders and pulled it down to her waist. Her breasts were small, but he thought them indescribably lovely. He caressed them, then kissed her nipples until they hardened while she ran her hands over his buttocks and held the erection that strained against his swimsuit. She wriggled to help him as he slid her suit over her hips and down her legs. Then she undressed him and they caressed each other as they lay on the carpet.

  She was lithe and small, and he thought he had seen no one more beautiful as he ran his hands, lips, and tongue over her body. He wanted to take her right there, but Suzy got to her feet.

  “Not on the floor,” she said and giggled. She pulled him into the bedroom, and they fell onto the bed. She wrapped her slender legs around him and drew him onto her and into her. They both groaned and climaxed quickly. It was too soon, but they knew they had all night to get it perfect.

  The next morning, they made love for the third time. Then they took a bath and did it again. They would be late for work but didn’t much care.

  “Remember what I said about you renting this place?” she asked. They were still naked and back in bed.

  “Of course.”

  “Well, why don’t you move in now? You can sort of get used to it while I’m still here. You can even save on your laundry bill, since we won’t be wearing much in the way of clothes.”

  Jamie thought that was a marvelous idea with one concern. “But what about your neighbors? What’ll they think?”

  “Screw the neighbors,” she said firmly. She sat up so that her breasts hung almost into his face. “Let ‘em think what they want. Besides, don’t they know there’s a war on?”

  Akira Kaga’s right leg had been amputated just above the knee. It was a challenge to walk with crutches, but he was the kind to rise to challenges, and he had become surprisingly mobile in only a short time.

  With his father driving, and accompanied by two kempetei, he began speaking to groups of civilians throughout Oahu. The majority of the people he addressed were Japanese, although a few Hawaiians did attend. He never saw a white face in the crowds.

  Akira and his father worked hard on what he would say and precisely how he would say it. He wanted the underlying meaning thoroughly comprehended by the Japanese of Hawaii. The two kempetei men weren’t particularly subtle, and, besides, they were kept drunk by friends of Toyoza Kaga.

  Akira told his listeners that the Japanese soldier was brave and resilient, traits that were essential when fighting in China, where there were no supplies and less in the way of medical care, facts that required them to loot the enemy and local civilians.

  He saw surprise on their faces. No supplies? No medicine? Why couldn’t Japan take care of her fighting men? Many of his audiences had donated money to help Japan defeat China, their long-standing enemy. Where had it gone?

  Akira then told them of the tens of thousands who’d died fighting the Chinese and how the Chinese kept on coming. Japan would persevere, he said, no matter how many Japanese had to die to accomplish it, and no matter how many more y
ears it would take. Japan, he said, would ultimately conquer vast China, a land that was as large as a mighty ocean and in which the Chinese were forever retreating. It might take a hundred years of agony, but Japan would prevail.

  He saw a stirring in the crowd. In effect, he had told them that the war between Japan and China would never end. They had not been informed of the scope of the casualties, and this too shocked them. Heavy casualties, no supplies, no medicine, and no end in sight to the killing? Japanese soldiers reduced to looters and beggars? This was not the stuff of glory.

  Akira responded to the accusations of atrocities committed by the Japanese in China. They were not true, he said, although it was sometimes necessary to take food from the peasants since the Japanese army didn’t have enough for itself. He said it was sometimes necessary to punish uncooperative Chinese by destroying their property or even executing them. He added that a Chinese woman should feel honored to be taken by a Japanese soldier, even if she initially resisted. As his eyes traveled the crowd, Akira noticed a number of people preparing to leave, their heads down in shame.

  Then he told them that his travel back to Hawaii by ship had been fraught with danger because of the ever-present menace of American submarines. “But we did not fear them, even though they did sink several in our convoy,” he said boldly as it sank in on his audience that Japan did not rule the oceans. He had further told them that the supply line from Japan to Hawaii was as tenuous as the line from Japan to the troops in China. Hawaii was out on an indefensible limb, and many looked nervously at one another.

  “I believe that soon Hawaii will be annexed to the empire of Japan,” Akira said. “When that happens, I will rejoice. That means that the Americans will be forced to fight a decisive battle against us, and, despite their material assets and the overwhelming size of their country, we will prevail. No matter how devastated Hawaii is as a result of the coming battle, we will win. It won’t matter how many thousands of tanks or planes they have, or how many hundreds of warships they hurl at us, it won’t matter. Hawaii’s cities and farms may be destroyed, but we will rebuild. Tens of thousands of Hawaiians may die, but Japan will be victorious.