“No,” he answered, and she saw anger flare in his eyes. “The dumb fuckers were throwing it away. Oops”- he flushed-”I’m sorry.”
The women laughed. “We’re both familiar with basic military terminology,” Missy answered. “I believe that word was little Jerry Junior’s first.”
Jake laughed, the anger gone. “The bread was decreed stale. It’s a little hard, but add water and it’ll soften up. You do have water, don’t you?”
“A well,” Alexa said.
“Good. The canned stuff is dented and therefore not worthy for our boys to eat, and the C rations might have been shipped improperly. It’s insane. We may be starving in a few weeks, but some fools still think we’re at peace and there’ll be an inspection in class A uniforms on Saturday morning. There’s a war on, and half the army still hasn’t figured it out yet.”
“What are C rations?” Alexa asked. She’d heard the term but had no idea what they were.
“They came out a couple of years ago,” Jake said. “Each package contains an unidentifiable meat, lemonade, hard candy, cigarettes, crackers or bread, and toilet paper.”
Alexa grinned impishly. “Then the assholes who threw them out should have kept them.”
“Absolutely.” Jake laughed again. He felt so totally at ease with Alexa and her friend. “I know you don’t smoke, but hang on to the cigarettes. They might be valuable soon. Hell, they already are.”
That sobered them. “The Japs are on their way, aren’t they?” Alexa asked.
Jake shook his head. “I didn’t tell you that. But think about something: The Japs haven’t hit the civilian water supply, only the military. That tells me they’re planning to invade and don’t want so much destroyed that they can’t sustain themselves after they take over. If all they wanted to do was destroy this place, they’d be flattening everything. No, they’re being very selective.”
“Do you remember Jamie Priest?” Melissa asked.,”He was on the Pennsylvania.”
“It’s sad, and it’s gonna get sadder,” Jake said. News of the sinking had just been officially released, and it had cast a further pall on the island. He looked at his watch. “I’ve got to get back before somebody notices the trash has been stolen.”
Melissa got up as well. “I think the baby’s crying.” The top buttons of her shirt had come undone while she was handling the packages, and Jake tried not to gape at her ripe, full breasts as she whirled and departed.
“I’ll escort you to your chariot, Sir Knight,” Alexa said. She took his arm, and they walked outside. “I can’t thank you enough for what you’re doing for us. Melissa’s worried sick about little Jerry not getting enough food. She had been nursing, but that’s literally drying up and he’s eating more and more solid food. I’ve lost a couple of pounds, but nothing I’ll miss.”
“I’m glad I can help,” Jake said. He thought that Alexa and Melissa had lost more than a couple of pounds each but didn’t comment. They were no doubt saving some of their food for Melissa’s baby.
Jake was conscious of the feel of her hand on his arm and the occasional brush of her body against him as they walked. This is not happening, he thought.
“Did you really steal trash?” she asked.
Jake chuckled. “It’s a skill I picked up as a child when we were really hungry. Amazing what people will throw out, and even more amazing what others will eat if they have to.”
Alexa shuddered. “I hope it doesn’t come to that.”
Jake disengaged himself with reluctance and climbed on the motorcycle. “If it does, it does. Do what you have to to stay safe. Surviving is all that matters, not the price.”
“Will you come back again? I’d like to see you, and you don’t have to bring presents.”
“I’ll try,” he said as he kicked the motor into life. He would do more than try.
Alexa nodded. “I remember seeing a cowboy movie with John Wayne or somebody like him in it. The heroine told the departing hero to be careful as he went into battle, and we all laughed. It seemed such a silly statement at the time, but I don’t think so any longer.”
She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “Be careful, Jake.”
CHAPTER 8
Colonel Joseph Lawton Collins glared at the two men across the table from him. General Short was unaffected by it, but Colonel Walter C. Phillips appeared upset. It struck Collins as mildly amusing that both men would be named Walter C. He hoped they didn’t have the same middle name. Or the same father.
As a lieutenant general, Short could afford to disregard Collins’s opinions, but news of Collins’s pending promotion to brigadier made people like Phillips uncomfortable. Phillips was widely considered to be only barely competent and would likely rise no further. Therefore, the last thing he wanted to do was anger someone who was going to pass him very quickly, and who someday might be his boss.
Worse for Phillips, he had hitched his star to Short’s, and the general’s star was fading rapidly. It was easy to feel sorry for both officers. They were honest men who were products of a career in a peacetime army, and were not faring well in the shock of combat. Short, for instance, had a lifelong reputation as a highly moral man and a hard worker. Now he would be remembered, if at all, for not being prepared on December 7.
Phillips’s presence at the meeting in Short’s office was somewhat of a surprise. He was rarely included in anything important, and it occurred to Collins that General Short wanted a witness.
“Colonel Collins,” said Phillips. “We all agree that Captain Novacek’s assessment of the situation is excellent, but we disagree as to where it points. His feeling that the Japanese will invade at Haleiwa is only that, a feeling. We know that a Japanese force is heading here and we must be prepared for every contingency. We feel that the Japanese may be softening up the southern half of Oahu for an attack at either Barbers Point, at the west of the harbor entrance, or Bellows Field, which is to the east.”
Collins knew precisely where both locations were and took the geography lesson as an insult. “Why not Waikiki? Hell, they could surf in and register at a hotel. No, landings at those sites would put them in the teeth of our field guns and shore batteries. They will land north and get organized. Then they’ll ram their army down our throats. At least two of our regiments must be at Haleiwa, not one.”
Phillips shrugged. “Look, I know you think a lot of this Novacek. His trip to Haleiwa while under fire was bravely done, and, yes, in hindsight he was right about the local Japanese not being saboteurs, but that doesn’t make him right in this instance. We simply have to protect everything.”
“And wind up protecting nothing,” Collins said, paraphrasing the old military dictum. “What the Japs have proven is that it will be extremely difficult to reinforce any area on the island without air cover. That means we must be dug in close to the point of attack if we are going to stand any chance of stopping them. If they do land at Haleiwa, they will brush our one regiment aside, and reinforcements will be cut to pieces trying to shuttle men north.”
“It’s seductive,” said Phillips, “and we’d stand a good chance of smashing them, but it is too big a chance.”
“I agree with Phillips,” Short said. He hadn’t spoken in a while, and his comment came as a mild surprise. “I don’t agree that our northern regiment will be brushed aside so quickly. The Japs may have pulled a fast one on the navy but they haven’t fought our army yet, and I’m confident our boys can handle the little yellow bastards.”
Collins shook his head in disbelief. “But look what’s happening to the British in Malaya and to MacArthur’s boys in the Philippines.”
Short smiled grimly. “That’s because the Brits have too many Indians and other Asiatics, and Mac has all those Filipinos. No, the Hawaiian Division is made up of real Americans, and they will hold the Japs until reinforcements reach them wherever the Japs try to land.”
Short rose and went to a map of the island tacked to the wall. “We have four regiments. The command will be divided into two ad hoc brigades. General Wilson will command the ones at Haleiwa and at Schofield. General Murray will command the remaining two, and they will be placed to guard Barbers Point and Bellows Field.”
Collins admitted to himself that this command breakdown did make some sense. Had the reorganization of the Hawaiian Division gone into effect, Major General Durward Wilson would have commanded the 24th Division,
