Wounded Tiger

by T Martin Bennett

  “No!” Kanegasaki shot back. “She was very strong.”

  Nothing was making sense to Fuchida. He felt dizzy and bewildered as he hung his head and rubbed his neck.

  Kanegasaki grinned. “I know the feeling.” He lowered his head. “We were horrified when we learned who she really was. Her name was Peggy.”

  Fuchida continued to shake his head while contemplating. Collecting himself, he sighed deeply and looked up at Kanegasaki from the top of his eyes. He spoke softer. “What happened to her parents?”

  “She told us her parents were missionaries in Japan, but fled to the island of Panay in the Philippines thinking they could hide in the mountains until the war was over, but our soldiers eventually found them.”

  Jimmy, Charma, Frank and Gertrude stood panting in the jungle, their soiled, torn clothes soaked in sweat as they slowly turned toward the Japanese soldiers rigidly pointing their bayonetted rifles at them. The four raised their hands in surrender as the soldiers quickly surrounded them and herded them back to the camp.

  Arriving at the clearing they saw over 400 soldiers and Filipinos pressed into service for the hunt. The lead soldier waved to Watanabe near the center. “We got them! They didn’t get away!”

  As Jimmy shuffled to the center of the group, he scanned the frightened eyes of the rest of captured members of Hopevale standing there – Jennie, Dorothy, Fred and Ruth Meyer, and eleven year old Earl Rounds with his parents behind him, their hands on his shoulders. He looked at Mr. Clardy, a miner with his wife and two children. The Japanese had a total of seventeen people at Hopevale – everyone. Since Jimmy spoke Japanese, he knew that the group looked to him for some kind of leadership, and to somehow find a way out.

  Watanabe stood with his hands on his hips, leaning back triumphantly and said to his men, “Just as I thought. Building an American city in the hills!” His soldiers smiled in victory.

  “We’re missionaries,” Jimmy said in perfect Japanese. “We want no part of this war or any war!”

  Watanabe and the soldiers were stunned. “How did you learn Japanese?!” he demanded.

  Charma stepped forward and also spoke in Japanese, “My husband and I spent our lives in the service of the Japanese people.” A strand of dirty hair fell across her face. “We only came here to get away from all the fighting.”

  The Japanese were only further confounded by this woman, likewise fluently speaking their language. Watanabe’s eyes narrowed with suspicion.

  Jimmy continued, “If you have to take us as prisoners, we’ll all come with you peacefully. We won’t resist.”

  “Liars!” a soldier exclaimed. “You aren’t missionaries, you’re spies, giving information to the guerrillas! We have orders for all Americans to be killed!”

  Watanabe grinned. “We have people who say you’re helping the guerrillas. Admit it!”

  The confusion of the other Hopevale captives deepened on their pained faces as they witnessed an argument they couldn’t understand.

  Shigeru, the Japanese officer who surreptitiously visited Hopevale, stood close by, just as anxious, but never giving a hint of his feelings. His eyes darted from Watanabe to Jimmy as they lunged and parried with words.

  Holding his arms out wide, Jimmy countered. “We don’t have any guns, but if a wounded guerrilla comes here, yes, we help him, but we’d help a Japanese soldier just the same.”

  “So, you’re collaborating with the guerrillas!” Watanabe snarled.

  “No! We’re not collaborating!”

  As Jimmy dropped his arms, Watanabe proudly produced a crumpled chocolate wrapper imprinted with the words “I Shall Return!”

  “Liar!” he fumed. “Americans are bringing supplies in through this camp and you know it!”

  Jimmy’s face went blank. The other members of the group could clearly understand what was happening now. Jennie and Dorothy grasped each other’s hands.

  Looking more helpless than ever, Jimmy gathered his courage and shouted back, “We can’t stop them from coming through here any more than we can stop you!”

  A soldier pushed into the crowd. “Captain! Look what we found!” He held up a pair of binoculars splashed with mud. Jimmy’s face fell.

  Another Japanese officer spoke up. “The guerrillas meet here to make plans to attack! They’re all spies!”

  “No!” Charma replied. “We’re teachers and professors!” Pointing with authority, she continued, “She’s a music teacher, she’s a French and math teacher, and he’s a surgeon for the children’s hospital. We’re no threat to anyone!”

  Watanabe stood staring, huge drops of dust-laden sweat trickling down the sides of his face, his bulging eyes glaring with intensity at Jimmy as they both came to the visceral realization that each of them was everything the other was not – despising each other for their beliefs, yet admiring each other for their tenacity.

  Shigeru briefly bowed his head to Watanabe and spoke softly, “Captain, excuse me for suggesting, but perhaps we should leave them alone. They’re unarmed civilians.”

  Still staring at Jimmy and Charma, Watanabe paused a moment, sighed heavily, then, without looking away from them shouted, “Get me the radio! Call headquarters! Do it now!”

  A soldier bolted off through the crowd to another soldier with a small leather-bound box, knelt down, opened it, and quickly grabbed the receiver. He cranked the handle and waited for a reply.

  Watanabe gave a last, angry glance and Jimmy, Charma, and the group of captives, then turned and briskly marched away toward the radio where the soldier held out the receiver.

  Other soldiers were dismissing the Filipinos, unneeded now that the Japanese had their quarry in hand. Lieutenant King, the tortured American who ultimately led the Japanese to Hopevale, sat slouched against a tree under guard, exhausted, breathing deeply, nearly unconscious.

  Jimmy ran both hands through his sweaty hair, exhaled deeply, and looked into the faces of his people. He knew they were desperate to know something, anything, about what was going on. “He’s calling headquarters because the orders are to execute all Americans. We’re Americans, but we’re not guerrilla fighters. They have to know that.”

  In his headquarters in Iloilo, Lieutenant General Kawano stood at his desk with the phone to his ear, trembling with anger. “They’re Americans! They’re spying on our movements and reporting it to our enemies by radio! Execute them all immediately before I come up there and do it myself ... and you with them! Now!”

  The soldiers parted as Watanabe strode back into the center of the circle with one hand on his sword. He walked up to Jimmy’s face. “We came here for one purpose and one purpose only! Nothing has changed! The decision is final!”

  Jimmy half expected the answer and considered his response. Bowing and holding his bow he said, “Please allow us thirty minutes to pray together, then you may fulfill your duty however you wish.”

  Watanabe squinted, glanced at Shigeru, and then looked back at Jimmy’s bowed frame. “Thirty minutes. Go!”

  Jimmy gently rose, looked Watanabe directly in the eyes and said, “Thank you very much” in such a tone of such sincerity that shamed the soldiers. Looking at the members of his group, Jimmy motioned with his head for them to follow as he led his party through the soldiers while being escorted by several guards.

  Frank sidled up to Jimmy. “What’d he say?!” The group pressed in around Jimmy and Charma.

  Jimmy only looked forward as he answered. “They’re going to execute us, but they gave us time to pray.” He put his arm around Charma. “So let’s thank the Lord together.”

  Frank nodded with acquiescence and likewise put his arm around Gertrude and Fred Meyer grasped his wife’s had as they all headed to the open chapel under the trees they had built – for one final meeting. Charma held a rag to her face wiping her eyes and nose.

  Shigeru walked up beside Jimmy. He said in English, “So ... your story ends here.”

  Jimmy stopped and looked at him as the rest of the group
continued towards the Cathedral in the Glen, as they called it. “Can you read English?”

  Shigeru nodded.

  Charma gazed at Jimmy in curiosity as he pulled out a ratty, dog-eared book from his shoulder bag and flipped to a certain page with underlined words. He spun the book around to Shigeru, confidently put his finger on the page, and looked Shigeru in the eyes. “Please. Out loud.”

  Shigeru looked around hesitatingly, then peered down at the page and read: “‘In your great pride you claim, “I am a god. I sit on a divine throne in the heart of the sea.” But you are only a man and not a god, though you boast that you are a god.’”

  A bit startled, Shigeru glanced up at Jimmy, who stared into his face. Shigeru continued. “‘Therefore, this is what the Sovereign Lord says, “Because you think you are as wise as a god, I will now bring against you a foreign army, the terror of the nations. They will draw their swords against your marvelous wisdom and defile your splendor! They will bring you down to the pit, and you will die in the heart of the sea, pierced with many wounds. Will you then boast, ‘I am a god!’ to those who kill you? To them you will be no god but merely a man. I, the Sovereign Lord, have spoken.”’”

  Jimmy lowered the book, all the while looking into Shigeru’s eyes. “It’s your story that’s coming to an end, my friend.” He paused. “Mine’s just beginning.”

  The hair rose up on the back of Shigeru’s neck. “What is this book?”

  Closing it, Jimmy held the spine up so he could see the worn words Holy Bible. “The world’s worst kept secret,” he said.

  Charma impatiently tugged at Jimmy’s sleeve, desperately trying not to disintegrate into uncontrolled weeping. He patted her hand and started off again following the last of the group to their private sanctuary.

  Walking again beside Jimmy, Shigeru ventured his final question. “You’re not afraid?”

  As he held Charma closer to him, Jimmy said without looking, “I gave my life away a long time ago,” He gave a parting glance at Shigeru and said with a smile, “No one can take it now.”

  Shigeru stopped and observed the members gather and kneel into a circle, some hugging, some weeping. They were coming into the longest, darkest night of the year: December 21 – the winter solstice.

  Hiding in the nearby woods under heavy foliage, Jack the miner crouched with three other guerrillas witnessing the spectacle while grasping their weapons, useless against the overwhelming force of the Japanese presence. Through clenched teeth he whispered in a muffled shout to himself, “It’s me you’re looking for, not them!”

  A Japanese soldier leaning against a porch post next to a cogon grass Christmas tree took a long puff of his cigarette and studied the hundreds of flying insects highlighted by the orange setting sun in the humid air. Others lay on the ground for a brief nap. Kneeling on the dirt and gripping the handle of his katana with one hand and the sharp end with a folded cloth in his other, Watanabe meticulously drew his sword across a water stone again and again as his sweat fell to the ground.

  Children clung tightly to their parents in the circle as prayers were offered up from the greatest depths of heart. Soldiers stood off to the side, pretending not to hear or see anything. From high above, macaque monkeys watched, seemingly concerned.

  The very last ray of burnt orange sunlight glimmered off the gold rim of Watanabe’s watch as he turned it to his face. He nodded to the officer beside him. The rest of the soldiers roused themselves and pulled their rifles over their shoulders.

  An officer approached the condemned prisoners who were finishing a hymn. “Let’s go!” he said in Japanese. “Now!”

  Jimmy nodded and helped Charma up, her face smeared with grime and tears.

  The other soldiers closed in and walked them back to the center of the camp where Watanabe motioned for Charma to be blindfolded first. Shigeru followed at a distance. He couldn’t bear to watch, nor could he bear to leave.

  Dumbfounded, Jimmy looked at Watanabe as if to ask why a woman would be the first to be killed.

  Watanabe could see his question. “She speaks the best Japanese. She’s the guiltiest.” He looked at one of his officers. “Take the children to one of the huts.” Two soldiers grabbed Earl and the two other young boys and tore them away from their parents.

  “Mom! Dad!” Earl screamed out.

  His horrified mother wept silent tears.

  With a black blindfold around her head, Charma was pushed to her knees by a soldier in front of them all.

  She moaned loudly in English as she bent her head forward, “Why are you killing us? We’re missionaries!”

  Watanabe took his stance beside her, then, in one motion, drew his sword high above his head. Jimmy looked away and closed his eyes. With a shout and brisk swing, he struck it downward, spattering his khaki pants with fresh blood.

  The birds above burst into flight from the trees.

  Prodded by bayonets, the howling children were forced up the stairs of a hut. Earl screamed out again, “Mom! Dad! Jack! Jack, help me!!”

  Jack watched, immobile, as the strength drained from his body. A feeling of weakness swept over him, a powerlessness he’d never known before. His knees nearly buckled beneath him. One of the guerrillas beside him looked at Jack and raised his rifle. Jack shook his head, then fixed his eyes again on the cruel spectacle before him, blurred by the water in his eyes.

  “No!” Lieutenant King yelled as two soldiers lunged at him with their bayoneted rifles. “You promised me if I ... Nooo!” They ran their bayonets clear through him into the tree he was propped against.

  Jimmy and Watanabe caught each other’s eyes one final time as the blindfold was about to be tied onto Jimmy. Although he should have appeared as the vanquished, Jimmy’s eyes proclaimed him the victor, exuding authority and confidence before they were concealed beneath the black cloth. He got down onto his knees.

  One after another, Watanabe’s sword fell again, and again, and again, until he completely fulfilled his duty. Pulling a clean handkerchief from his pocket and carefully wiping the length of his blade, he said, “Throw the bodies into the huts.” He folded the handkerchief and wiped his blade again. “And torch them.”

  Pairs of soldiers quickly began dragging the bloody, headless corpses into the two closest huts.

  Watanabe walked up and eyed one of the huts from top to bottom, then pulled out a small matchbox. He struck a match and lit a cigarette, chuckling to himself as he read the cover, “I Shall Return. General Douglas MacArthur.” He touched the burning match to the edge of the cogon grass roof and smiled.

  Soon, all of the huts were crackling, rumbling blazes of fire, sending smoke and embers into the twilight sky. Their mission complete, the soldiers grouped and moved toward the path back down the mountain. Some were weary, others joked with each other.

  Shigeru stood near the front porch of one of the huts and watched the flames engulf the home. He had been swept away in a raging river of war, a torrent that had become a river of blood. His eyes followed the flames as they consumed a hanging banner, “PEACE ON EARTH - GOODWILL TO ALL MEN.”

  “What did her father pray?” Fuchida said as he squashed his cigarette into an ashtray overflowing with butts.

  “What?” Kanegasaki said just before he took a sip of tea. “How would I know? What difference does it make?”

  “What good was it to pray to a god who couldn’t save them?” Fuchida said as he looked out the window into the dark sky.

  “I don’t know. But I do know this,” Kanegasaki set his cup down and leaned in. “That girl loved us like we were her own brothers. Even better than brothers.”

  Perplexed, Fuchida looked down at the table, confronted by a strange force he’d never encountered before. He couldn’t imagine why a girl would do such a thing after what her family had suffered. It was a long-held tradition of the samurai to uphold the honor of their family through revenge killings, or “katakiuchi,” a staple of kabuki stage plays and countless stories of folklore
for generations. It was noble. It was right. It was true justice. What she had done simply made no sense at all.

  But Fuchida couldn’t stop wondering what her father could have possibly prayed. He had to know.

  Chapter 123

  June, 1948. Seattle, Washington.

  “Susan Decker,” the school president said into the microphone that echoed through the graduation hall. A young lady in her black cap and gown strode to receive her diploma among pleasant applause. “Congratulations, young lady.”

  Jake’s family anxiously shifted to get a good view of the next name coming up. Mr. Andrus grimaced as his wife carefully ripped the page of yet another newspaper, this one with the title: Ex-Air Force Man Will Return to Japan.

  “Jacob and Florence DeShazer,” announced the speaker, “Bachelor of Arts.”

  The hall exploded into cheers and a standing ovation as Jake, arm in arm with his new wife, walked across the dais. Florence stopped and shyly turned to the adoring crowd and nodded in thanks. The president didn’t even try to quell the commotion.

  Mrs. Andrus stood with the crowd, clapping furiously as she smiled, tears of joy streaming down her face.

  Chapter 124

  December 3, 1948. Tokyo. Shibuya Train Station.

  Fuchida glanced down at his watch as he exited the overflowing train car in his long, black overcoat and hat, and worked his way through the crowds toward the exit. He had plenty of time to get to his meeting with the head of the historical department in General MacArthur’s headquarters for another set of post-war interviews that would last a full week. It was another ordinary day, but it was also his birthday. He shrugged.

  Things were going well, or at least moving in the right direction. His farm was producing, his home was built, his hens were laying, and the cold stares of the local people were slowly being replaced by nods and an occasional wave. He lived in near poverty, but then his cares were few. The trials of Japanese officers by the Allied tribunal still took some of his time and remained a sore spot.