Seasons of the Heart (14 page)

Nothing could be worse than the camp, Phillip had decided, and with Bugleman’s death there was no one he really minded leaving. He had lined up the next day with thirty other GIs. As they shuffled out of the camp, Phillip experienced a sense of freedom, but it faded quickly as he was jammed into a train which took them back to the coast. From there they went from bad to worse. When they got off the train they were marched to the docks and thrown into the hold of a transport. The weeks-long trip was a hell of vile water, little food, and agonizing heat. Added to that, Phillip was violently seasick. But in a way, the constant nausea and near delirium were a blessing because afterward he remembered little of the trip.

Once in Burma the men were forced to hack their way through the jungle to the site of the railroad. Phillip could not believe the sick and malnourished prisoners could work so hard. No one was spared, neither officers nor enlisted men. Phillip strained his bony shoulders under the weight of heavy ties and boxes of iron spikes, the ceaseless hammering and pounding jarring every nerve in his body.

In charge of the work gang was a sadistic officer named Oto. Like Nakanishi, he despised and loathed the white men over whom he had been given power. But unlike Nakanishi, Oto displayed a total lack of military discipline. His worst outbursts were often followed by quiet interludes when he would retreat to his tent. Later he would emerge with a vacant stare and refuse to speak to anyone for several hours.

Some of the men whispered that Oto smoked opium. Phillip neither knew nor cared. His only goal was to survive. He worked as little as possible, trying to conserve his strength, but not so little as to attract the guards’ notice.

As the months passed, the death toll began to mount alarmingly. Meanwhile, pressure from the Japanese High Command increased. Oto’s opium sessions decreased and his temper became more and more vicious. Impossible work quotas were imposed, which sapped the prisoners’ little remaining strength. Those who didn’t perform were dragged out of the work party and beaten with bamboos.

One day Oto stumbled out of his tent at noon, red-eyed and bleary. He strode to the worksite, surveyed it for a minute, then, pointing to a fair-haired soldier staggering under a load of timber, he barked a string of orders. The guards immediately seized the young soldier, who had been pulled from the line with Phillip at Morton Air Field. He had been desperately ill with malaria and had lost so much weight that he could barely walk, let alone work. The guards threw him to the ground and stripped his shirt from his back. Then they began to beat him. Frantically, Phillip made his way over to Oto, hoping to get him to stop his men, but as he approached he saw Oto’s mouth curl in a faint smile.

It was that expression that made something snap inside Phillip. He had vowed that he would never again do anything to attract attention—and punishment—to himself, but he couldn’t just stand there and do nothing. How could any man remain silent before such an act of barbarism?

“Captain Oto—I beg you to stop. What you are doing isn’t an act of military discipline—it’s cold-blooded murder.” Phillip paused for a moment to catch his breath. He was almost amazed he was still alive. He continued: “You’ve heard the rumors—Japanese victory isn’t sure now. You might have to answer someday for this outrage.”

Oto was dumbfounded by this act of rebellion, and his first impulse was to shoot this insolent American as an example. But in spite of his drugged state, the commandant heard an inner voice that cautioned prudence. The winds of war had indeed been shifting, and if his prisoners were abused unnecessarily, he might be held accountable by an Allied war crimes tribunal. Furthermore, he needed every available man to complete this section of the railroad. If he killed this man, he might provoke a work slowdown. Oto could read between the lines of the communiqués he was getting daily from Tokio. If he failed in his assignment he might well be shot.

All these thoughts crowded into his mind as he stood, tapping his riding crop on his boot and reflecting.

“I will order the beating stopped. But you, my friend, will spend time in the monkey cage. I heard that your week there made you volunteer for Burma. We will see how you like my accommodations.”

Mention of the cage left Phillip stupefied with terror. He let himself be led away in a daze, unable to take satisfaction in the fact that the young soldier had been spared.

The dreaded bamboo box sat in a cloud of flies, near the middle of the compound. It was damp and fetid at night, then blazingly hot all day long. As the bars closed with chilling finality, Phillip knew in that moment that he would have done anything, said anything, betrayed anyone, sold his very soul to escape. All he could hope was to die before he went insane.

A vision he had seen on the Death March still haunted him. They had come upon a young Filipino soldier tied to a post, left by the Japanese to die, water placed just beyond his reach. He had gone mad and was running back and forth on all fours like a rabid dog.

God, don’t let me end up like that. Let the end be quick,
Phillip prayed.

He had been almost three weeks in the cage when the Allied forces invaded Burma and Australian soldiers liberated the camp. They had found Phillip almost catatonic. He was skeletal by then, riddled by beriberi, and his hair had fallen out in clumps. He was covered with vermin. The cage stank unbelievably, and he was so crazed by his confinement that he believed the soldiers who released him were Japanese come to further torture him. When they approached the cage, he had flown into a terror-stricken frenzy.

Kicking and clawing, Phillip had raved wildly as his rescuers dragged him out. A medic rushed over and restrained him. They hadn’t released him until he reached the psychiatric hospital in Honolulu….

Sitting in the solarium, gazing out beyond the flowered terrace to the Pacific, Phillip took the first hesitant steps to recovery. Some part of him would have been content to spend the rest of his life in this island paradise. It was as if his soul had been permanently scarred. He doubted if he would ever ask for more than three meals a day and a soft bed in which to sleep. But later that night he confronted the task of writing Ann. The doctors had told him if he wasn’t up to it, they would tell one of the officers to send her a telegram.
That would be cruel
, he thought.

Now he looked down at the note paper and picked up a pen. Four times he started. My dearest, My dear Ann, Darling, darling, darling…. His hand was trembling so badly that he could not form the letters.
My God, what can I say after all this time?

Over four years had passed since he had seen her. He hadn’t written since the day he had sailed for Corregidor. Did she know what had happened to him? Had the army notified her that he had been taken to a psychiatric hospital? His dog tags had disappeared somewhere along the line—Phillip couldn’t remember where. God only knew what Ann had been told, if anything.

Finally he picked up the pen again.

My dearest Ann,

I don’t even know how to begin. By now, they must have let you know that I am still alive and in a Honolulu hospital. They tell me that I’ve been here for several months, but it is only in the last few weeks that I have begun to remember who I am and how I got here.

Now that I am able to write, I am not quite sure what to say or how to say it.

Except for a period at sea, I’ve been a prisoner of war, first in the Philippines and then in Burma. When I was rescued I apparently wasn’t lucid. I still can’t remember what happened. But I was luckier than the rest of my men. None of them survived.

Well, enough of that. I have been thinking and wondering about you, Ann. You have been in my mind, day and night for over four years. The thought of you was often the only thing that kept me from giving up.

But I realize that things have probably been very different for you. Four years is a long, long time, especially for someone as young and lovely as you, Ann. And, of course, you had no way of knowing if I were still alive. It would be only natural if you had begun to plan for a future without me.

I feel I must warn you that I have changed a great deal physically. At times, I barely recognize myself. I lost about sixty pounds while I was in captivity, and though I’ve regained some, I am still only about 135, which is pretty skinny for six feet. My leg was broken over there and did not heal properly, so that I walk with a limp. But the worst is that I have a bad scar across my face. I have to be honest with you, Ann—it’s pretty horrible.

I guess what I am telling you is that you have your whole life ahead of you, and I don’t want to tie you down to a broken-down wreck of a man.

I still love you, Ann—more than anything in the world. But I will understand if you feel that we cannot pick up the threads of our lives as if nothing had happened.

If all goes well, I will be released in two weeks’ time and my ship will dock in San Francisco on April 15th.

With all my love,

Phillip

A
NN’S HEART ALMOST STOPPED
beating when she saw the writing on the envelope—shaky but unmistakably Phillip’s. A wave of dizziness swept over her and she had to support herself against the wall as she made her way to the living room. For several minutes after reading the letter she sat in shock. Then, remembering her in-laws, she ran down the hall to their room.

“Eva, darling! It’s Phillip! He’s alive! He’s coming home!”

Eva was still unable to speak, but her faded blue eyes blazed with sudden joy. Ann threw her arms around the old woman as Simon wept with joy.

“Oh, thank God, my son!”

“It’s a miracle,” Ann said softly.

After a while she left them and went to call Ruthie. On hearing the news, Ruthie exclaimed, “Oh, Ann! I’m so glad! What happened to him? Where has he been?”

Half-laughing, half-crying, Ann replied, “Oh, Ruthie, I don’t know! He said he was a prisoner of war. Just what we suspected. All I care about is that he’s alive!”

There was a silence on the other end of the line. Then Ruthie said, “I’m so glad for you, Ann. All this time I’ve felt guilty being happy when you were going through such agony. You know, when we went to Carmel on New Year’s Day, we both felt so badly about leaving you alone that we wished we hadn’t gone.”

“Ruthie, that’s silly. Of course you were happy to have Kenny back—that’s only natural. Listen, you were the best friend anyone could have had these last months. No one else truly understood how much I love Phillip.”

“Well, you’ll have him back soon now, honey. When exactly does he arrive?”

“The letter took so long getting here that the ship will dock on the fifteenth. Can you believe it?”

Ann almost danced with impatience as the days dragged by. She occupied herself in planning fancy dishes to tempt him. If he were thin, she would need to fatten him up.

She looked at herself in the bathroom mirror. Phillip had said he looked different. To Ann, it was impossible that he could be anything but handsome. But had she changed? Her curly dark hair was shorter now: parted on one side and waved. The violet eyes were the same, but her lips had a grim set that made her look older and sadder than the twenty-one-year-old he had said goodbye to. Deliberately, she curved them into a smile.
There, that’s better….

Then the day arrived. Ruthie and Kenny beside her, Ann watched as the huge gray transport ship glided past them and docked at the Embarcadero. Ann contrasted the scene with Kenny’s homecoming. Today there was only a sparse crowd, and no flags at all.

The first men who descended the gangplank were carried on stretchers. Others followed on crutches and in wheelchairs. Finally Phillip appeared, standing by the rail. He seemed to be hesitating.

“Phillip!” Ann cried, but he didn’t appear to have heard or seen her.

She broke into a run, calling, “Phillip! Phillip! Over here!”

He was slowly and painfully coming down the gangplank. As he approached, Ann realized that he had written the truth. He was dreadfully changed. He moved like a very old man, bent, shuffling, limping.

But once he was in her arms, Ann forgot everything but the joy of having him back.

They kissed, and when Ann pulled away to see his face, she was appalled by the lines of suffering that surrounded his eyes; far worse than the angry red scar on his cheek.

Kenny was clapping him on the back. “Great to see you back, old buddy!”

Phillip managed a weak smile. “Kenny … Good to be back.”

He turned to Ruthie and said, “You look wonderful, Ruthie. You and Ann haven’t changed a bit.”

“Except that I’m a mother now, Phillip. Wait till you see our little Jeremy—he’s almost four now.”

“Phil, I’m back in my old man’s firm,” Kenny said.

Phillip was trying to focus on what everyone was saying. He and Kenny had been fraternity brothers, then gone on to law school together. But he now seemed like a stranger. Phillip could comprehend the talk about children and jobs and business as usual, but the words seemed detached from reality.

“Let’s get out of here,” he muttered tersely. Picking up his duffel bag, he set off toward the exit. “Where’s the car—or did you all come by bus?”

“No, sweetheart, we came in Kenny’s car,” Ann said.

As they neared Kenny’s Studebaker, Phillip stopped short. “Ann—where are my parents? Why aren’t they here?”

“They couldn’t make it to the pier, Phillip. They’re waiting for us at home.”

“They’re all right, aren’t they, Ann?” Sudden fear sharpened Phillip’s tone. “Tell me they’re all right!”

“Yes, darling,” Ann replied, her heart sinking. She would have to tell the truth before he saw his mother, otherwise the shock would be too great. “Well, that’s not entirely true…. Your mother had a stroke and she’s not in perfect health anymore.”

Phillip nodded and without another word limped to Kenny’s car.

The journey home was uncomfortably silent. Ann tried to describe her life with his parents. “I gave up our apartment shortly after you left. It seemed thriftier for the three of us to live together.”