1945 (53 page)

Uji sagged and began to sob. After a moment, he managed to speak. "You are right, Sergeant. Even though it is hateful, we must obey the emperor. Take the men to the rear. I will follow."

Yokota looked about at the surviving boy soldiers, who watched him with hope, fear, and confusion mixed on their faces. "No, Lieutenant," he said gently, "you will not follow. You will lead us back to safety. Just like the emperor orders."

General Monck and Colonel Parker left their jeep at the base of the hill and began the climb to the top of the battle-scarred mound. Both men were shocked by what they saw. The ground itself had been scorched, and the Japanese dead still lay where they'd fallen. Burned and blackened bodies with their clothes burned off gestured to them with charred limbs thrust upward. Body parts, many unidentifiable, had to be avoided as they walked. Monck slipped and recoiled in revulsion as his hand came to rest on what might have been part of a skull.

As they reached the crest, they stepped over the trench. There were bodies in it, but others were strewn about as if they had been pulled from the trench.

"Someone was looking for our boys," Parker commented softly. "And making sure the Japs were really dead." American dead and wounded had just been evacuated from the killing ground.

"The smell is awful," Parker added in understatement. The smell was nauseating. "I don't think I'll ever be able to eat roast beef again."

Monck corrected him. "It smells like pork." He wanted to gag.

They passed the blackened skeleton of a crashed plane. Its tail was pointed incongruously to the sky. They had seen many like it in their inspection of the regimental area. Kamikazes had caused almost as many casualties as the Japanese banzai attacks.

An American walked around the hill taking pictures while a second took notes. "Correspondents," said Parker. "I just hope they get the story right for once. It deserves to be told."

Monck led the way through the breach in the earthen berm. Numerous pairs of eyes were on them, but there had been no attempt to challenge or call out to them. For all their rank, Monck and Parker might as well have been invisible. They looked at the living men, many of whom walked or stood like zombies. Finally, one disassociated himself from the group and walked over to them. Monck was hard put to recognize the exhausted and filthy man as Lt. Paul Morrell.

Monck stopped Morrell from saluting and put his arm around the younger man's shoulder.

"I'm sorry, General," Paul said, his voice and body quivering.

Monck was confused. "Sorry? For what?"

Paul's voice was choked with emotion. "I lost half my men."

"No," Monck said with gentle firmness. "You saved half your men. You and your men are heroes. You stood off at least a battalion of Japs and you're still here to talk about it. Son, I'm the one who should apologize. I tried to get you more help, but there was nothing to give you."

But Monck wondered what he could have done that would have saved lives on Round Top. Fewer than seventy had survived unhurt. Monck's doubts would haunt him for the rest of his life, just as Morrell would have to live with his. The fury and intensity of the Japanese attacks had stunned them. Someone who wasn't there had picturesquely described the assaults as waves from a stormy sea crashing over rocks with the rocks finally prevailing. Only the rocks and the waves were flesh and blood, not granite and water.

Paul was not consoled. "I should have used the tank sooner."

Perhaps you should have, Monck thought. But that was hindsight. Paul had fought the battle and won it. He was the one who had to make the decisions and not anyone else. He had done what he had to and done it when and how he felt was right. Morrell didn't know it yet, but he truly was a hero.

"If you had used the tank sooner, it might have been knocked out and been useless. No, Paul, the berm shielded the tank until the right moment."

Paul appeared to accept the statement. "All right, I guess, sir. What's the latest on Major Ruger?" Word had reached him that Ruger had been found just barely alive and under a pile of bodies and rubble.

"He's alive, but very badly wounded. With a little luck, he'll make it, but he won't ever be the same again."

"What'd he lose?"

"His legs. Both above the knee. They were terribly crushed and couldn't be saved."

"He's lucky, sir. He won't have to go back to fighting."

"Nor will you, Paul." Monck turned to Parker and ordered, "Get these men off this hill."

"Yes, sir," Parker said. "The relief from the 77th is just a little ways behind us. They'll be up in about an hour."

"Now," Monck snapped. "I want these men off this hill now."

The Japs weren't coming back, and the survivors of Round Top needed to get as far away from the hill as possible. Monck wanted to get them back to a land of clean clothes, showers, and food. They needed to forget the nightmare landscape that was Round Top as soon as possible.

"Leave the tank," Monck ordered Morrell. It was probably too risky to drive the damn thing downhill anyhow. God only knew how they'd gotten it up there in the first place. "Leave everything. Just get down off this hill." Again Monck turned to Parker. "When they meet up with the column from the 77th, they can use their trucks to take them to the rear."

Paul managed a small smile. "Sounds good to me, sir. Then maybe we can begin to put this behind us."

As Paul walked away to gather his men, Monck wondered if anyone would be able to forget what had happened on Round Top and any of the thousands of other battlegrounds on Kyushu. He hoped they wouldn't.

Debbie Winston sat in the chair in her bedroom. Her bare feet were tucked under the long flannel nightgown. It was the middle of the night and she couldn't sleep. Too much was happening in her life.

Days earlier, the final end of the war had been almost anticlimactic. There'd been no dancing in the streets and few parties had been thrown to celebrate it. Instead, there'd been a feeling of enormous relief coupled with worry that this peace would also somehow fall apart. After all, hadn't the Japs surrendered once before? This time, thank God, it looked as if it would stick.

Debbie's brother, Ron, might yet be drafted, but not until after he finished high school. No fighting was going on, which meant he would be safe, unless, of course, he got sent to Palestine, where a small war raged. Maybe, she thought wryly, a little military discipline would help the spoiled and sulky little snot grow up. God only knew he needed it.

She took a deep breath and again read the letter from Paul. He was safe and unharmed, although his choice of words and phrases said there were things he wasn't ready to talk about, or at least put down in a letter.

This was not all that surprising. She had read with horrified fascination of the final desperate battles on Kyushu. One article in
Life
magazine had mentioned a place called Round Top as an example of the savage intensity of the final conflict. Not until reading Paul's letter did she realize he had been at Round Top. The thought that he had been so close to death had further reinforced her strong feelings for him.

Her friend Ann, whose boyfriend had returned an amputee from the war, had reached over and held Debbie's hands. "All you can do is be there for him. Hold him, listen to him, and understand that he's seen and done things that no one should ever have to endure and that we cannot possibly imagine, no matter how much we read or hear about them."

Paul's letter had been hopeful that he'd be stateside fairly soon, and the newspapers had confirmed it. Those men who'd borne the brunt of the fighting on Kyushu would be coming home in a hurry. They would be replaced by a far smaller number of Americans who'd be taken from the units forming for the now canceled invasion of Honshu.

If she was going to be there to help him through his nightmares, they were going to have to get married fast so she'd be there during his nights. She grinned to herself. She hoped Paul would realize the good that would come from their being wed as quickly as they could arrange it.

Debbie looked out the window of her second-floor bedroom. Snow was on the ground and she wondered if it would still be there when Paul returned. She hoped it would. That would mean they'd be together soon.

Mitsu Okimura walked over to the bunk where the young man who was now her good friend sat propped up and reading a book. When he saw her, he dropped the book on his lap and smiled.

Mitsu shyly returned the smile, but decided to be a nurse before succumbing to the pleasure of his company. She pulled back the covers and checked the wounds on his leg. The infections had almost all but disappeared, and the color of the surrounding skin was healthy. In a way, this dismayed her, as it meant he might be well enough to move on.

"Will I live?" Joe Nomura teased her. She was so serious, he thought, but so pretty.

"Very likely," she answered primly, but the twinkle in her eye betrayed her.

It was an easy thing to say now. Earlier, it had not been so definite. Nomura had shown up at the hospital almost delirious with fever and with a leg swollen to twice its normal size. Dr. Tanaka had considered amputation but decided against it because the young man had already lost an arm. Tanaka, with Mitsu assisting, had spent hours probing the infected flesh for the pieces of shrapnel that had caused the problem. Against all odds, they had succeeded through a combination of Tanaka's skill, and American sulfa and penicillin. There would be scars, but they would recede over time. When he was fully healed, Nomura wouldn't even limp.

Mitsu dropped the blanket back over his legs. "I have a question for you."

"Ask it."

"Several times I have had night duty and come by to see how you were. On a couple of occasions, you were thrashing in your sleep and speaking words I didn't quite understand."

Joe was touched that she would single him out for such care. Peace had brought a dramatic reduction in the number of patients, which meant she was free to indulge in him if she so wished. That she so wished was a pleasant thought.

The American field hospital he'd been trying to reach had closed up and moved for the same reason— no more customers. But now, what did he tell her? Well, he would begin with the truth, at least a little of it.

"It was probably English, Mitsu. I speak it very well."

Her eyes widened. "I thought so. I have learned a little of it here, and I thought I recognized some of the words. Have you been to America?"

He laughed. She said it as if it were some sort of holy place. "Yes. I spent some years in Hawaii."

"I would like to see America someday," she said solemnly. Mitsu eased him out of the bed and up to a standing position. He put his arm around her slight but strong shoulders, and she put hers around his waist. It was time to strengthen his legs so he could walk unaided. Already she suspected he didn't need to have his arm about her, but it was rather pleasant so she did not comment on it. So too she liked the feel of his body under her hands.

"Wouldn't you be afraid of all the Americans?" he asked.

"No," she said firmly. "At least not anymore." Proximity to the American hospital had shown her that the GIs were nothing but little boys who were as normal as Japanese men, just larger and louder.

"But what about the war, Mitsu? Weren't they your enemy?"

Mitsu was puzzled. Why had he said
your
enemy rather than
our
? "Once I hated the Americans. Now I realize that the whole war was an evil wrong that should never have happened. Now I realize too that the Japanese people were duped by warlords. No, Jochi, the Americans are not my enemy. They never were."

They stepped outside. It was chilly, but far from unpleasant. Besides, he could feel one of her small breasts against his side, and that was definitely keeping him warm. In the distance, he saw a car coming down the road.

"Mitsu, did you hear about American-born Japanese who helped the Americans invade Kyushu by spying on the Japanese and performing acts of sabotage?"

She nodded against his shoulder in such a way that he couldn't see her face. "And you're one of them, aren't you?"

Joe took a deep breath. At least that's over with, he thought. "Yes. Will you hate me for that?"

Mitsu looked up at him. Her dark eyes were clear with understanding. "You served your country. How could you be hated for doing that? Tell me, did anything you did truly help end the war?"

He laughed, surprising her. "Yes, Mitsu, it definitely did."

She smiled and squeezed him. "Then that was good and you are good." The car was drawing closer. Probably more American doctors looking for possible radiation-sickness victims, she thought. They couldn't quite believe there weren't any at the hospital.

"Jochi, when you leave, where will you go?"

"Back to Hawaii."

"I wish to go with you."

He was stunned and thrilled. She felt as deeply as he did. He hadn't been imagining it. They'd only known each other for a couple of weeks, but it felt like forever.

"What about your family?" Mitsu's mother and sister had been located in the north. There had been a brief reunion and a parting that had left Mitsu unsettled.

"They will soon move to Yokohama to be with cousins. I have no desire to be with them. They are rooted in self-pity and the past, while I wish to live in the future. Now, will you take me with you to Hawaii?"

"Of course." He pulled her closer to him. The car had stopped almost directly in front of them. "It won't be a problem. I think I'm owed some pretty big favors by some very important people."

The car doors opened. OSS agents Peters and Johnson stepped out. They grinned happily and waved when they saw Joe. Joe laughed. "What the hell took you guys so long?"

"Gonna miss you, Jim," President Harry Truman said as he reluctantly accepted his secretary of state's letter of resignation. "You did a helluva job under some rotten conditions."