was just too narrow to permit more than one of those leviathans to pass at a time. Fargo recalled that there had been real fear during the Pearl Harbor attack that one of the American ships would be sunk in the channel and plug it up. At one point, the entrance was only about a quarter mile wide, and the navigable portion much less than that.
Fargo smiled as the noise level finally abated. Smaller ships, destroyers or light cruisers, made a different, lighter sound as they too entered the anchorage in a stately parade.
“Where the hell they gonna park them all?” he heard one of his men whisper. The sailor didn’t know just how many ships there had been when the entire American fleet was in the harbor. He also had no idea how big the harbor was. It would require planning, but Pearl could handle a very large number of ships.
But there was still only one narrow entrance.
If, as Admiral Lockwood had explained, the Jap fleet might come out in a helluva rush, then they might not be looking for one small submarine right at the entrance to the harbor.
Maybe, Fargo thought and smiled, he would get a chance to do some real damage and still get away.
The sound of the ships finally ceased. He waited until he knew the wreck was in shadows and carefully raised the periscope. With it only a few inches above the water, he looked around. The entrance to the harbor was empty. The Japs had disappeared inside. He swung the scope and looked out onto the ocean. A picket line of destroyers was in view but several miles away. It was highly unlikely they were looking in his direction. They would be watching for an enemy that would come from the sea if it came at all. He was as safe again as he had been before the Japs had arrived. The Monkfish was inside the Japanese defense perimeter.
Hell, Fargo thought. He had indeed sailed right up their asses.
Akira Kaga was greeted as a long-lost brother by the pilots stationed at Wheeler Field. He wore his real Japanese uniform for the occasion, and the young men were suitably impressed by the decorations and the wound he had suffered for Nippon.
He had invited himself for a tour and an opportunity to talk to the men stationed in what had become an isolated outpost that still bore the scars of the battles earlier in the year.
Only a handful of buildings at the airfield had been repaired sufficiently to use, and a surprisingly small number of planes was lined up along one runway.
Schofield Barracks was in even worse shape, which was one reason why there were no Japanese soldiers in the area. There were only the pilots, their mechanics, and a handful of Japanese marines as guards. The prisoner of war pens were vacant and stood as haunting reminders of the American defeat. Akira wondered how many of those thousands who’d been imprisoned there were still alive. Judging by the emaciated condition of those he’d seen before they’d been shipped off, few would have survived the long voyage to Japan. It was something else that Japan would have to answer for.
As he looked around, it occurred to Akira that the place was even more poorly defended than it had been on December 7.
A Captain Masaka had greeted him warmly and introduced him to the other men, who appeared glad to have him there as an interruption to a boring existence.
After his talk to the troops, which was different from the one he gave to the civilians, Akira asked for a further tour of the facility, and Masaka was happy to oblige. Akira limped badly, but he was able to keep up with the captain. His determination in using the artificial leg was beginning to show dividends.
“Tell me,” Akira asked, “why are you stationed here and not at Hickam, Ford Island, or the other strips closer to Honolulu and Pearl?”
Masaka grinned. “I wish we were. But Admiral Iwabachi fears sabotage, so he had us put as far away from Hawaiian people as possible. That and the fact that the other fields are still unusable made this the logical choice.”
Masaka’s statement confirmed what Akira had heard and observed. As everywhere else, the damage done in the fighting here had not been repaired. Of course, the Japanese in Oahu didn’t need a lot of airfields with only a couple dozen planes at their disposal. But it did explain Novacek’s interest in Wheeler’s vulnerability.
“Are the planes always parked this close together?” Akira asked. The Zeros and scout planes were almost wingtip to wingtip.
Masaka shrugged. “Admiral’s orders, and admirals always know best, don’t they? We have only a squad of guards, and they can’t watch the planes if they’re scattered all over the place. I know it’s like how the Americans had theirs when we attacked them, but there are no American ships, and, besides, we’re in the middle of the island, where we’d get plenty of warning.”
“Of course, when Yamamoto’s fleet comes, any concerns will all become immaterial, won’t they?”
“Precisely.” Masaka beamed. “And perhaps I can get a billet in Honolulu, where I can have a little fun with the local women. We get some prostitutes bussed here every weekend for those who can’t get off duty, but they are usually quite ugly. It is a miserable existence here in the middle of paradise.”
Akira laughed sympathetically with the young man. He wondered how many combat missions Masaka had flown. Probably only a few, maybe none.
Akira walked around the area a little longer, taking note of the locations of the sandbagged guard bunkers. Mentally, he answered the question Jake hadn’t asked: He could take Wheeler and destroy the planes. But then what? A simple raid would result in some killings and destruction, but if it were an isolated instance, the attackers would be hunted down and killed. Admiral Iwabachi would be particularly furious when he learned that Japanese had done this, and his vengeance would be terrible.
No, this had to be part of something much bigger than simply embarrassing the Japanese, and he was pleased to be participating in it.
Charley Finch smiled contentedly as he sorted supplies. After what had seemed an eternity of furtive looking, he now had knowledge that was useful. A few casual comments and a couple of glances at documents he wasn’t supposed to see had told him that the Americans were up to something. Security in the camp was lax, and everyone seemed to think that everyone else was totally trustworthy. This had given him a golden opportunity, and he had made the most of it.
Incredibly, Novacek had gotten his hands on an airplane.
But what the hell was he going to do with it? Finch now had a solid idea where it was located, but he had no idea what kind of plane it was, or what it was going to be used for.
He could rule out a bomber, although stripped-down B-17s had flown from California to Hawaii last December. A bomber needed bombs and more fuel, and Charley was confident that Novacek had neither in any serious quantity.
So that left somebody’s personal, civilian plane, a leftover from before the war. Perhaps there was even more than one, but how did that change matters? Those were dinky-ass things with no range and minimal bomb- carrying capability.
Still, they could carry small bombs and could be fitted with machine guns.
That must be it, Charley decided. Fucking Novacek must be planning an attack on a Japanese outpost, and Hilo was the logical answer. All the Jap garrison at Hilo had was a couple of small seaplanes that they used to pretend they were scouting. Now all he had to do was get the information to Lieutenant Goto and collect his reward. He wouldn’t be able to guarantee the total destruction of Novacek’s group, but he could sure cut their balls off.
“Oh, there you are.”
Charley looked up quickly. It was Alexa Sanderson, and she was smiling at him. She sure was looking better since she and Novacek had started screwing each other’s brains out. The relationship was an open secret in the community, with no one disapproving. Charley didn’t care who she fucked.
“Jake wanted me to give you a message.”
“Sure,” he said.
“He wants you to go to a couple of the farms by Hilo that’ve been supplying us with food. Tell them we’ll need additional supplies and we’ll need them fast.”
“Uh, how fast, ma’am? They can’t grow what they don’t have.”
Alexa laughed easily. “Of course not. Tell them to gather what they can and have it ready at the prearranged sites within two weeks. For some reason, Jake thinks we may have to move from here fairly quickly, and he’ll want supplies positioned where we can get at them.”
