Samurai!

by Martin Caiden

  I hardly recall standing—trying to stand—before Captain Saito, who stared at me incredulously. I think I spoke to him, but everything began to black out again. All of a sudden I wanted to go to sleep. That was it. Sleep. What was I doing here, anyway? Then there was only blackness.

  Nishizawa and Ota carried me to the car (they told me later) waiting outside the Command Post. Nishizawa hurled the driver from the seat and slid behind the wheel, driving fast—but carefully to avoid any bad bumps—for the hospital. Sasai and Ota stayed with me in the back seat, supporting me.

  The chief surgeon was waiting for me in the operating room. He cut off my tom uniform and at once began to work on my wounds. Through my sleep I felt blinding stabs of pain from time to time as the doctor cut into my scalp. (He saved two jagged pieces of 50-caliber bullets to show me later.) I felt a knife blade scraping against my skull.

  I awoke almost as he finished. I stared up at him as he bent over me. My eyes—I remembered my eyes. Suddenly panic gripped me. “My eyes!” I shouted, “Doctor, what about my eyes?”

  “You are seriously wounded,” he replied. “I can do nothing further for you here.” He peered at my face closely. “You’ll have to be sent back to Japan where a specialist can work on you.”

  A feeling of disaster engulfed me. I feared for my right eye. I could see nothing on that side. The thought of being blinded horrified me. I would be useless as a fighter pilot. But I had to fly; I had to fly fighters again!

  Four days passed slowly in the hospital. Bandages covered my body. The doctor withdrew four pieces of metal stuck in my flesh, as well as steel splinters from my cheeks. On the fourth day I felt slight movement in my left hand and leg. The muscles barely twitched, but at least they moved! On the other hand, the head wound began to rot in the high tropical humidity, and my right eye remained blind.

  Meanwhile, the fighter sweeps and bombing raids against Guadalcanal continued without let-up. Every day I heard the thunder of the planes as they raced down the runways and took off for the distant battlefield.

  Rabaul had its own daily visitors, the high-flying Fortresses, which attacked the two airfields. Every time the enemy bombers approached I was carried to a shelter with the other patients.

  Each evening Sasai and Nakajima visited me. They suggested that I return to Japan. Only the temperate climate of the home islands and a leading specialist could cure my eye injuries, they said. I refused to go home. I was irrational and irritable. I insisted I could be cured right here at Rabaul, that there was no reason why I couldn’t be flying again in a few weeks.

  If I had only known! It is difficult to explain my feelings, my reluctance to leave the hellhole that was Rabaul. I realize now that I bordered on the hysterical from the nightmare prospect of having to end my career as a pilot. There was the matter of honor, as well. I felt I was honor-bound to remain at Rabaul as long as I could. Even if I could not fly, I could help the green pilots. I might be able to warn them of the mistakes which could cause their death. All the reasons melted into one; my return to Japan meant a final judgment by an eye specialist, and I feared and rebelled against what I might be told.

  Sasai and Nakajima abandoned their arguments. The matter was ended on the morning of August 11, when Captain Saito, the commander of the Lae Wing, came to my bedside. He was as kind to me as he could possibly be, and equally adamant.

  “I know how you feel, Sakai,” he said, “but I have taken all factors into consideration. My orders are that you will be sent home to Japan on rotation, and assigned to the Yokosuka Naval Hospital. You will leave tomorrow by transport plane. The surgeon has told me that your only hope lies with the doctors at Yokosuka.”

  He smiled at me. “Your going home will do as much for us as it will for you, Sakai. We will all know that the best medical care in Japan will be yours.” He rose to his feet.

  For several moments he looked at me, then leaned down and placed his hand on my shoulder. “You have done a marvelous job for all of us, Saburo,” he said softly. “Every man who has ever flown with you is proud to have known and to have fought with you. When your wounds are healed, come back to us.” Then he walked away.

  That evening Sasai came to visit me. He was visibly tired from the day’s mission over Guadalcanal. I told him of the orders sending me home the next day. In a little while all my old friends had assembled in the room for a modest farewell party. No one sang, or talked loudly or cracked any jokes. We merely talked quietly, mostly about Japan.

  But the Americans had other ideas about our small gathering. What had turned out to be a quiet few hours ended up in a mad dash for the shelters, the other pilots carrying me out of the hospital. I gritted my teeth with shame and bitterness. I felt so helpless! Here were the same men whom I had led into combat, and now they were carrying me around like a half-blind, crippled child! I wanted to scream and shout and tear the bandages off my body. But all I could do was to lie there with my eyes tightly closed.

  Early the next morning I limped slowly to the pier; a barge waited to take me to the flying boat anchored on the water, you, Saburo. Much more than you will ever know.”

  Sasai held my hands tightly in his own. “I’m going to miss you, Saburo. Much more than you will ever know.”

  Tears started down my cheeks; I could not hold them back. I choked up and could only hold his hands.

  Sasai withdrew his hands, unbuckled his belt, and handed it to me. I stared at the famed engraved Roaring Tiger. “Saburo, this belt was given to me by my father. One for myself, and one each for my two brothers-in-law. One of us has already died. I know little of the magic qualities of the silver tiger, but I wish you to keep this buckle and wear it for me. I hope it will help to bring you back here to us.”

  I protested, but to no avail. Sasai would not have it otherwise. He placed the buckle and belt in my pocket, then clasped my hands again. “I’ll see you again, Saburo. Don’t say farewell! We shall meet again, and soon, I hope.”

  He helped me into the barge. In a moment it was chugging toward the waiting plane. Nishizawa, Ota, Yonekawa, Hatori, Nakajima, and all my friends waved from the pier. They were shouting for me to hurry back, to fly with them again.

  In a few moments they were blurred. I could still see only a few feet with my left eye. I stood as straight as I could on the barge, my right hand raised, as they blurred into dim and unrecognizable forms. Then I cried like a child.

  There were few passengers in the flying boat, myself, an orderly assigned to take care of me on the return trip home, and several war correspondents. We stopped at Truk and Saipan to refuel.

  It was a long time since I had walked on my home soil. I had no idea of what conditions would be like back in Japan, but I was totally unprepared for the shock of Yokohama. We landed in the Yokohama harbor early Saturday evening. There was little purpose in reporting that night to the hospital, and I went into the city, where I could take a taxicab to my uncle’s house in western Tokyo.

  These people—they had absolutely no idea of what the war really was like! I gaped in astonishment at the bustling crowds, at the bright signs and lights. I could not believe the sounds of battles which raged off the Solomons. I heard nothing but incredible lists of American shipping destroyed, of hundreds of airplanes shot down.

  The crowds of people in their light and colorful summer clothes stopped outside the stores and the corners where the radios trumpeted. Every time the announcer mentioned another major defeat over the enemy loud cheers and cries resounded through the streets.

  The nation was drunk on false victories. It was hard to believe that a destructive war was going on. In the stores I saw that only certain commodities were being rationed, but that the daily necessities of life were available in abundance.

  I wanted to get out of the city, and quickly. Everything at Lae and Rabaul seemed so unreal! Could these two separate worlds exist simultaneously? The blood and dying only short hours away by airplane, and the cheering for non-existent victories here a
t home?

  I waved down a cab and gave him my uncle’s address. We passed through Yokohama and entered Tokyo. Several minutes later a policeman halted the vehicle and stared through the window at me. My uniform was blood-stained and I was still swathed in bandages.

  “What happened to you?” he demanded.

  “I’ve just returned to Japan from the front,” I answered sourly.

  “So!” he cried. “So you were hurt at the battlefront! Where? Tell me; and how?”

  “I’m a pilot,” I spat. “At Guadalcanal. I was shot up in a fight.”

  “Guadalcanal!” The young policeman’s eyes gleamed. “We hear a lot about that nowadays. I understand that only yesterday we had a smashing victory over the Americans. The radio said that our Navy sank five cruisers, ten transports, and ten destroyers. It certainly must have been an exciting spectacle to watch!”

  That was too much. “I’m sorry, sergeant,” I snapped at him, “but I’m late.” I shouted at the driver. “Go ahead. At once!”

  Many years had gone by since the first time I had walked into my uncle’s home. The house stood unchanged, a link to an era which now seemed a million years in the past. For several minutes I stood on the sidewalk, taking in the familiar structure, the lights, the sounds. A strange feeling of peace descended upon me. My irritation fled, and I opened the door, exactly as I had done in my childhood, and, using the same words I had always cried upon entering the house, shouted, “Here I am! I’m home!”

  A startled “Who’s that?” came from the kitchen. I grinned; it was my aunt.

  “It’s me!” I called back.

  There was silence for a moment. “It’s me! Saburo!” I shouted in joy.

  My uncle’s voice burst through the house, a startled “What?” Then they came running out to the portico.

  For almost a full minute they stared at me. My uncle, my aunt, and my two cousins Hatsuyo and Michio, unable to speak, stood with their mouths open in astonishment. I returned their gaze patiently as their eves took in my blood-stained uniform and the bandages.

  My uncle’s voice was a querulous whisper. “It really is you, Saburo?” I could barely hear his words. “It is Saburo; it is not a ghost I am seeing?” He strained forward, afraid that I might vanish into thin air.

  “No. It is no ghost,” I answered, “It is really I. I’m home once again.”

  This was like returning to life. The battles, the dying, the wounds, squeezing the trigger, flicking in rolls to escape pursuing fighters, cowering in the mud of the bomb shelters...all of it fled, all of it became unreal, remote, a shadowy world which never existed but which hung over my shoulder like the ghost my uncle had believed me to be.

  To sit in a home like this again! To talk with my uncle and aunt, to see Hatsuyo and Michio again, to relax! To know there would be no bombs tonight, no Fortresses cruising high above 20,000 feet, no Mitchells and Marauders screaming in, no blasting explosions or shrieking fragments of steel or fiery tracers into the billets...it took a long time to relax as the evening wore on. Every now and then I shook my head in amazed happiness over it all. We had so many things to talk about! It was almost three years since I had spent a night with this family.

  Hatsuyo was no longer the high-school girl I remembered. I stared at her, trying to realize that this beautiful young woman really was my same cousin. Even Michio, a wild boy in the lower grades when I had gone to high school, was a husky young man. I kept staring at Hatsuyo, trying to catch up with all the years which had passed so strangely and—now that I was seeing them again—so quickly!

  I stayed the night at their home. It was the first night in many years that I had enjoyed a deep and sound sleep. Not even my wounds, which had kept me awake for the last week, disturbed me.

  The next morning I left by train for Yokosuka. The everyday life of the people in the city seemed even more startling than the night before. The passengers, especially the young girls and women, looked at me only once. They grimaced at my appearance and looked the other way. Their deliberate concentration to avoid looking at the bloody bandages unnerved and enraged me. No longer was I the leading ace of Lae and Rabaul, the man whom Captain Saito asked to come back, the pilot who cried with his other fliers. I was a bloody, dirty, and, yes, it was true, a distasteful sight to my own people. I was disgusted.

  No sooner had I reported to the Yokosuka hospital than an orderly took me to the chief surgeon’s room. I was puzzled; today was Sunday. Except for dire emergencies, the chief surgeon would not be on duty. He surprised me by greeting me personally.

  He smiled at my astonishment. “I left word that I was to be notified the moment you showed up,” he explained. “I’ve just come from my billet. You see, I received a special letter from Captain Saito of your Lae Wing, requesting me to do everything possible for you.” He looked at me for a moment. “Captain Saito went to great pains to tell me of what you have done in the Pacific. I understand that you are the leading fighter ace of all our pilots?”

  I nodded.

  “I can well understand your captain’s apprehension, then. Come,” he took my arm, “we will begin work on you at once.”

  A few minutes later I was in the operating room. The surgeon scraped off the rotten flesh from my head wound. He worked quickly and surely, and paid no attention to my gasps as the knife cut and scraped along the skull. When he had cleaned out the wound and applied fourteen new stitches, he personally brought me down to the eye department.

  “We have called in the best man in all Japan to work on you,” he explained. “Doctor Sakano was drafted from his civilian practice into the Navy, and is now a lieutenant commander. There is no better eve surgeon in our country. When we heard from Captain Saito, we notified Doctor Sakano to be on call for your arrival.”

  So I was coming to the fateful moment. I would know soon just what the decision was to be, whether I would see again, whether I could take to the air. I tried to think of everything but my eyes; I didn’t want to think about it. It was no use.

  The doctor examined me. Several minutes later he stood up. His face was serious and he spoke slowly.

  “There is not a minute to waste, I must operate on your eyes—now. Listen to me carefully; your sight will depend upon what I do to you in the next hour.”

  He paused. “Sakai, I cannot apply any anesthetics. If you wish to see, if you wish me to save at least one of your eyes, you must be prepared to endure all the pain while you are fully awake.”

  I was in a daze. I nodded dumbly, afraid to trust my voice. They placed me on a high bed. Then several orderlies tied me down with straps and ropes. I was unable to move my arms or legs even a fraction of an inch. A strap went across my forehead to keep my head steady, and a nurse clamped her hands against my temples for added safety. The doctor told me to set my eyes on a red lamp hanging from the ceiling.

  “Look at it, Sakai,” he warned. “Look at it. Never take your eyes away from that light. You are not to blink, you are not to even turn your eyes to the sides. Listen to me carefully! You can blind yourself for life if you do not do exactly as I say!”

  It was horrible. More than that, it was the most frightful pain I had ever known. I had always regarded myself as capable of withstanding great pain. The Bushido code had taught me patience, perseverance under the most trying conditions.

  But this! I had to stare at the light. Stare at it until I saw only the red bulb, filling everything. Until the doctor’s hand swam into view, looming and unreal, the sharp, pointed steel in his hand, bringing it closer and closer and closer.

  I screamed. More than once I shrieked like a madman with the terrible agony. I felt I could not stand it for another moment. Finally nothing mattered any longer except that the pain be stopped. My desire to fly again, my desire even to see, none of it mattered any more. The pain! Once I screamed at Sakano: “Stop! Stop it! Gouge it out, do anything, only stop it!” I tried to squirm away from that knife, I tried to slide under the straps. They were much too tight. The do
ctor shouted back at me every time I yelled. “Shut up!” he roared. “You must endure this! Otherwise you will go blind. Stop your screaming!”

  The torture lasted more than thirty minutes. It seemed a million years to me; it seemed that it would never stop. When it was over, I was too weak even to move a finger. I lay on the bed, sucking in air, helpless, while the chief surgeon leaned over me, trying to comfort me as my chest heaved and I sobbed.

  For a month I was confined to my hospital bed. I was steeped in misery. Life meant little to me. I dreamed during the day and night of that long flight back to Rabaul, of all the occasions when I could have shoved the stick forward and plunged into the ocean. It would have been only a brief moment of pain.

  Dr. Sakano visited me often to study my eyes. “I did everything I could,” he told me, “but your right eye will never recover. Not fully. You will be able to see things perhaps one or two feet in front of you, but that is all. Your left eye will be perfectly all right.”

  His words were a thundering sentence of death—of living death—to me. A fighter pilot, with only one eye. I laughed bitterly and the doctor went away.

  My head wound healed rapidly, and the doctor permitted me to walk around the hospital. Every week I put in an application to be discharged and sent back to Rabaul. And every week the application was rejected.

  Finally the chief surgeon personally returned the latest application. He was obviously angry. “I tell you, Sakai.” he complained, “it will be many months before you can even think of returning to Rabaul. My orders are explicit. You are to have at least six months’ convalescence before you can be assigned to any duty—here at home or overseas.”

  I felt like a fugitive, a deserter from the battlefront. I thought of all the pilots, of Nishizawa and Ota and Sasai, going out every day in their Zeros to engage in battle. I was afraid even to listen to the war news over the radio. It reminded me too much of Rabaul.