“After the war, I’ll never eat fish again,” Jake said, then got to the point. Every minute on Oahu was fraught with potential danger, and he wanted to get back to Hawaii and Alexa as quickly as possible. “I understand your dilemma, Toyoza. You have men but no weapons.”
“Correct.”
“And we have Japanese uniforms,” his son added. Akira paced the small room with a pronounced limp. He was still trying to adjust to an artificial leg.
“What will you do with weapons if I get them for you?” Jake asked both men.
“Kill our common enemy,” Akira responded.
“They will be Japanese,” Jake persisted.
“I know,” Akira said sadly. “But that is how it must be. We will kill Japanese soldiers just as many white people must kill their German and Italian cousins. Japan is now our enemy. It may have taken some of us a while to realize it,” he said with irony, “but we understand it now.”
“How many are you?”
“Just under fifty,” Akira answered, and Jake noted that the older man was deferring to the younger.
“If I were to question their loyalty,” Jake said, “you would tell me that they are all totally committed to your cause. However, I have to tell you that a solid cadre that was smaller in numbers would be better than a more dubious larger group.”
“I understand,” said Akira, “but I am certain of them. They have all been initiated, shall we say.”
Akira explained that the group had kidnapped two Japanese soldiers when they were drunk and off duty. Each conspirator had plunged his knife into the body of one of the soldiers and, therefore, had shared in the murder. The corpses were then dumped into the ocean and, according to Toyoza Kaga, were considered to have deserted. Foul play was not suspected by the military police or kempetei.
Jake was both shocked and impressed by the cold-blooded callousness of the act. He decided he wanted neither Toyoza nor Akira as his enemy. “If I get you weapons, you must swear to follow my orders. I don’t know exactly what is going to happen or when, but it will be soon, and whatever you do must not be premature and jeopardize it.”
“We understand,” Akira said. “Now, what and where are the weapons?”
Jake grinned. During the Japanese siege and invasion, he’d cached away quantities of army supplies in the wild hope that they’d someday be useful. Now his foresight was going to be rewarded.
“I can get you several dozen Springfield rifles and several hundred rounds of ammunition. There are a couple of crates of grenades and a dozen.45 automatics and ammunition. You’ll have to clean the weapons because they’re in the ground, and I’m sure they’re rusted pretty badly. If that’s not enough, you’ll have to get other guns from what you referred to as our common enemy.”
“Magnificent,” Akira said. “How far away are they?”
“They’re in several places,” Jake said, “one of which is only a mile from here. Now”-he paused-”I would like a favor from you, Toyoza.”
“What is it?”
“When you sent the woman, Alexa Sanderson, to me, she left a close friend behind. The friend’s name is Melissa Wilson, and Alexa is concerned about her and her small son. Can you check on her?”
Jake thought he caught a wariness in Toyoza’s eyes. It passed in an instant, if it had existed at all.
“I will do that,” Toyoza said and stood up. “Now let us get to the rifles.”
Colonel Shigenori Omori was repelled by the utter lack of secrecy in Admiral Iwabachi’s headquarters. Everyone and his proverbial brother appeared to know the timetable for the arrival of the great fleet and Admiral Yamamoto. How could they keep the Americans from finding out?
Iwabachi was unimpressed by his concern. “Let them find out, Colonel. Let the Americans come and we will defeat them. Let their sympathizers here rise up, and we will squash them like the insects they are. I am confident that our navy can handle theirs, and I am doubly confident that you know everything that is going on in the islands. Surely you can’t be afraid the little band of Americans on Hawaii will try something.”
Omori had to concede the point. He knew of absolutely nothing amiss on Oahu, and the situation on Hawaii, while an aggravation, was contained. So why did he feel uneasy?
Iwabachi laughed. “Yamamoto will see what we have accomplished in so short a time and be pleased. Perhaps it will even mean a promotion for us.”
Omori smiled and nodded. He was not as impressed with Iwabachi’s efforts as the admiral was. While the fuel tanks had been reconstructed, only half of them were full. Nothing had been done regarding clearing the wrecked American ships from where they’d been sunk, and the antisubmarine boom had not been repaired. Shore batteries that had been smashed by the bombardment remained that way, and the antiaircraft batteries were less than half effective. Pearl Harbor had a long way to go before it could be considered a fortress.
Of course, there were reasons for this situation. Iwabachi’s orders had been to concentrate on the fuel storage tanks and, when that task was complete, to develop the defenses. It had been stressed that Oahu without fuel was useless. Iwabachi had not been given adequate resources to do much more than the first job, and the remaining tasks had been pushed further and further back. Omori did not think Yamamoto would be pleased, regardless of what Iwabachi thought.
He and the admiral ate in what had been the American officers’ club, and it still disturbed Omori to see American Negroes moving about in the kitchen and cleaning the tables. This was another area in which he and the admiral disagreed. Despite the fact that the Americans were technically civilians and certainly not white, Omori considered them a possible threat. Iwabachi had laughed at him and asked him how a handful of shambling, ignorant people with black faces could ever threaten Japan.
After the meal was over, Omori returned by car to his office. With the removal of the remaining American prisoners to Japan, he had moved his operations to Honolulu. Only the Japanese naval air section remained at Wheeler Field. That consisted of two score Zeros and a handful of reconnaissance craft, along with their pilots, mechanics, and a small number of guards. This was something else that Omori felt was inadequately done. The islands needed more planes and more soldiers. Perhaps that lack would be corrected after Yamamoto arrived.
He sighed as his car neared the hotel where he kept a suite. There would be liquor and the pleasure of watching the Korean woman, Han, perform with another American woman. The hell with it. If Iwabachi wasn’t concerned, why was he?
CHAPTER 20
Reinhard Hardegen had commanded the sequentially numbered U-123 before the start of hostilities between Germany and the United States. His and a handful of other boats had been sent to American East Coast waters in what was called Operation Paukenschlag, or Drumbeat. They’d launched themselves furiously against unprotected and unsuspecting American shipping. The drum they had beaten was the American merchant fleet.
It had been what Hardegen and his comrades referred to as yet another “happy time,” as ship after ship was sunk off the American coast. U-boats boldly went up the Mississippi, the St. Lawrence, and into the port of New York. Hardegen himself had seen the city’s skyline and marveled at it. The Americans had been totally inept in their antisubmarine defenses. It was as if they never thought war would come to them. The Germans exulted as the idiots had even kept their city lights on, which enabled tankers to be silhouetted against them in the night.
Hardegen had been ruthlessly efficient, although not unnecessarily cruel. He had not shelled lifeboats; slaughtering the innocent was not in him. Once, he had positioned the U-123 between the shore and a burning tanker that he was shelling with his deck gun. He did not want to accidentally send shells from the gun over the tanker and into the crowds of Americans gathered on the nearby beach to watch the show. He wondered what they’d thought when the U-123 had emerged before them, almost literally a stone’s throw away.