second and then toppled slowly forward while the soldiers laughed and the civilians moaned.
“Fuckers,” Perkins said.
Ruby forced herself to be calm even though she wanted to both kill and vomit. “Pictures, keep taking the damned pictures.”
The Japanese officer walked slowly down the short line of kneeling men and repeated the process five more times, each to the loud cheers of the gathered soldiers and the further groans of the civilians. When they were done, the heads and bodies were tossed into the inlet.
“Ruby, you think they know we’re up here?”
“They’ve got to know somebody’s likely watching them from the trees and they don’t care. That was a lesson. Now the Japs’ll use the civilians as hostages and probably have them working for them, repairing roads and maybe building an airstrip.”
“So what do we do now?”
Damn good question, she thought. “First, we get to the radio and tell them all about these latest bullshit murders. Then we head inland to Fairbanks. Three hundred miles is a long ways to walk, but maybe we can commandeer a car. I’ve got a feeling that Fairbanks is where all the action is going to be. Hopefully, we can find an airplane there and get your pictures south to somebody who’ll publish them and let the world know what first-class pricks the Japanese are.”
“Ruby?”
“Yes?”
“Is commandeering the same as stealing?”
On his return to San Diego, Dane was informed that the brass wanted his opinion of the PBY raid. He’d been deposited at Vancouver by Tuller and stuffed into the back seat of a Douglas Dauntless scout plane. They took off immediately and, after refueling at San Francisco, arrived at the base. Dane was so exhausted and drained that he’d managed to fall asleep in the Dauntless.
“Once again, I don’t get a chance to clean up,” Dane lamented jokingly.
Merchant laughed and slapped him on the shoulder. “I believe the admirals think you dress like a slob all the time. By the way, once again Nimitz is going to be there as well. We’ve issued a press release telling the world how the navy has struck back at the Japs who dared to invade Alaska. All the boys on those planes are heroes. Now all we have to do is figure out what they accomplished.”
Before Tim could make the scathing comment that was on the tip of his tongue, he was ushered into a conference room where Nimitz and Spruance were holding a meeting with others who wore stars on their shoulders. “Congratulations on making it back safely,” said Nimitz. “Spruance says you have a habit of doing that.”
“A damn good habit, if you ask me,” added Spruance. “Now, what can you tell us about the raid? And don’t pull punches.”
Dane turned to Nimitz. He was the senior man in the room. “Sir, if you wanted a public relations coup, you got one. We came in low and they didn’t notice us until we were just about on top of them. We dropped our bombs and started to fly away. At that point, things began to fall apart. We were so low that we began to take a lot of small-arms fire, and the Catalina is far from bulletproof. Three of our planes went down for certain, and we have to assume that the crews are all dead or captured.”
“But what damage did we do to them?” asked Spruance.
“Sir, we bombed a field full of tents. I saw a lot of Japs running, and bombs exploding, but I doubt very much if we did any substantial damage. We didn’t have all that many bombs and they were small ones anyway. That, and I’ve been told that bombing a field doesn’t cause all that much damage.”
Merchant interrupted. “Spotters on the ground say that at least twenty Japs were killed. They determined that by counting graves dug the next day, and they don’t know how many were wounded. They also say that at least six crewmen were captured, and beheaded by this Colonel Yamasaki, or some other Jap officer.”
Nimitz’s face turned red. Normally mild mannered, the admiral was outraged. “That bastard’s going to burn in hell.”
Dane continued. “We sent in twelve planes and three were shot down. Every other plane was damaged in some manner, and there were wounded on several others. The PBY I was flying was fortunate. We only had two men lightly wounded, although I did count at least thirty bullet holes in the fuselage.”
Spruance shook his head. “So we just about traded casualties with the Japs, but we lost three valuable planes destroyed and nine others damaged. If we put the raid in that context, we lost.”
“However,” said Nimitz, “morale has jumped with the announcement. Just like Doolittle’s bombing of Tokyo, the price was high, but we showed the Japs that we could and would strike back. Dane, what’s your opinion of using the PBYs for a repeat raid, and be blunt.”
Dane was not in the mood for candy-coating a report for admirals under any circumstances. “It’d be a disaster. The Japs will be ready next time and they will have some kind of an early warning system in place. Our planes would be cut to pieces. The PBY is simply not a fighter or bomber. A regular bomber could hit them from higher up, fly faster and hit them with more bombs, and make them squeal. In my opinion, it’d be murder to send PBYs again. Like it or not, we should wait until the field at Vancouver is ready.”
“Even then we’d need an interim field for them to refuel,” said Nimitz. “We’re developing runways at Juneau and Fairbanks. When those are ready, the army’ll hit the Japs hard from the air. In the meantime, you’re right. No more PBY raids.”
With that, Dane and Merchant were dismissed. Dane went to his desk and sat down wearily. His body still ached from all the hours in the PBY and then in the cramped Dauntless. At least he could move around a little in the Catalina. Even the kid lieutenant who’d flown him in the Dauntless teased him about being too big for a fighter cockpit. Maybe he should go to the gym and work out, maybe get some kinks out of his body. Maybe he should have a couple of drinks and take a nap. That sounded like a much better idea. On leaving the meeting, Merchant had as much as told him that the war would get along fine without him until the next morning.
A young sailor Dane recognized as being from the mail room walked up with a puzzled look on his face and a letter in his hand. “Sir, this has been kicking around a bit, but we think it’s for you since there aren’t that many Danes around. Whoever wrote it didn’t know your correct address here and had your rank wrong.”
Puzzled, Dane thanked the kid and took the envelope. Whoever it was indeed had the right name but had his rank wrong. It was amazing that the navy figured out that it might be for him. He opened it and gasped in shock and pleasure. It was from Amanda.
Dear Tim,
Obviously we arrived safely in California and I’d love to fill you in on the details, but I can’t at this time. I’ll explain later, I hope. “We” consists of two other nurses named Sandy and Grace along with yours truly. Let it suffice that we are all weary, hungry, sunburned, and know a lot more about the ocean and ourselves than we ever thought possible. Or ever even cared to know. Otherwise, we are fine and nothing that a few good meals and a little rest won’t cure. For a variety of reasons, my hair is cut shorter than the average marine’s and I’m even thinner than I was before. I didn’t put a return address on the envelope because we are going to be moving soon and I don’t know exactly where we’ll wind up. I just hope this letter finds you and that you too are well. A very nice marine captain and his wife helped track you down. I hope.
We are planning on picking up the pieces of our nursing careers and have collectively decided that San Diego would be a good place to be, what with all those good-looking sailors hanging around in seedy bars. I hope that meets with your approval. Because of paperwork, it could be a couple of weeks before we get there. We have some money, so we’ve been able to get some new clothing and I’ve even bought some new glasses. Mine were lost in the journey.
I just realized I’m being presumptuous in assuming that you even want to see me at all. I thought we started something very interesting and special back in Honolulu a thousand years ago, and I hope you would like to continue it as well. If not, I’ll understand.
In the meantime, like it or not and ready or not, I’m coming down, and I’m bringing the other two musketeers with me. Know any other good-looking sailors?
Love and aloha,
