The corporal bobbed repeatedly, his face still quite serious. “Yes, sir. Should I then speak to Captain Ono?”
“If you must,” I said, feeling that I would soon grow most annoyed with him if our conversation went on any longer. But I felt somewhat protective of him, and I feared he might provoke Captain Ono, who was known in the camp for his sometimes volatile outbursts, a mien which should have seemed quite odd for a medical doctor but somehow didn’t seem so at the time. In fact, Captain Ono was quite controlled, if a bit grimly so, wound up within himself like a dense, impassable thicket. A week earlier, however, he had beaten a private nearly to death for accidentally brushing him as he passed on a narrow footpath near the latrines. Ono ordered the man to kneel and in plain view of onlookers beat him viciously with the butt of his revolver, until the private was bloody and unconscious. He treated the same man soon thereafter in the infirmary, in fact saving his life with some quick surgical work in relieving the building pressure of blood on the brain. I know that the commanding officer, Colonel Ishii, had actually spoken to the captain afterward of the benefits of meting out more condign discipline, and the captain seemed to take heed of the suggestion. In fairness, it was an isolated violence. Still, I was concerned for Corporal Endo, and so I said to him: “Will you tell me what your interest in all this is? You won’t find the captain very patient, if he agrees to speak to you at all. He’s a very busy man.”
The young corporal nodded gravely. “Yes, sir. I should not speak to him until asking you. I’m grateful for your advice. You see, sir, I was hoping that I could be among the first of those who might meet the volunteers when they arrive. If there is to be a greeting in the camp, for example, I would be honored to take part—”
“Corporal Endo,” I said sternly. “There will be no public greeting or reception of any kind. You ought to strike any such notion from your thoughts. As to meeting the female volunteers, it is the officer corps that will first inspect their readiness. Enlisted men, as I’ve been informed, will be issued their tickets shortly thereafter, and it will be up to you to hold a place in the queue. I’m new to this myself, in fact, and so my advice is that you make do with the limits of your station and rank and fit yourself as such to best advantage. I see you are most anxious to meet the volunteers, as will be most of the men when they learn of their arrival, and so I suggest you remain as circumspect as possible. I am also ordering you not to corroborate or spread further news of their arrival. There will be time enough for foment in the camp.”
“Yes, Lieutenant.”
“The other piece of advice I have is that you put away all the picture cards you’ve collected. Don’t look at them for a while. Resist them. I believe you’ve developed an unhealthy reliance upon them, as if they and not rice and tea were your main sustenance. Do you think this may be true, Corporal?”
“Yes, sir,” he said regretfully.
“Then take my advice. Bundle them up and put them in the bottom of your footlocker. Or give them away to someone.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll try,” he replied, his voice drawn low in his throat. “Would you be willing to take them from me, Lieutenant?”
“Certainly not,” I said, anticipating him, and so, unangered. “You’ll have to find somebody else. I’m already disappointed in myself for having taken an initial interest. As I’ve said, this is not your fault. But now that I consider it, you ought to throw them away or destroy them, rather than blighting another. There’s an atmosphere of malaise in the camp, and I believe it’s partly due to a host of anticipations, both good and bad.”
“It’s assumed the British and Americans will soon mount another major offensive, in the northern and eastern territories.”
“No doubt they will. As the commander instructed the officers last week, we must all be prepared for a cataclysm. We must ready ourselves for suffering and death. When the female volunteers do arrive, perhaps it would be good if you make your own visitation. This is most regular. But keep in mind, Corporal Endo, the reasons we are here as stated by the commander. It is our way of life that we’re struggling for, and so it behooves each one of us to carry himself with dignity, in whatever he does. Try to remember this. I won’t always be around to give you counsel.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”
“Is that all?”
“Yes, sir,” he answered, rising to his feet. He bowed, but didn’t lift his head immediately, and said, “Sir?”
“Corporal?”
“If I may ask, sir,” he said weakly, almost as a boy would who was already fearing he knew the answer. “Will you be visiting the volunteers as well?”
“Naturally,” I immediately replied, picking up the text I had been reading. “You may take your leave now, Corporal.”
I didn’t look up again, and he left my tent shortly thereafter. I was glad. In truth, I hadn’t yet thought of the question he’d posed, and for the rest of the evening and part of the night I wondered what I would do. I had answered the way I had for obvious reasons, to assure the corporal of the commonness of all our procedures, and yet the imminent arrival of these “volunteers,” as they were referred to, seemed quite removed from the ordinary. Certainly, I had heard of the longtime mobilization of such a corps, in Northern China and in the Philippines and on other islands, and like everyone else appreciated the logic of deploying young women to help maintain the morale of officers and foot soldiers in the field, though I never bothered to consider it until that night. And like everyone else, I suppose, I assumed it would be a most familiar modality, just one among the many thousand details and notices in a wartime camp. But when the day finally came I realized that I was mistaken.
* * *
THE CONVOY ARRIVED a few days after I spoke to Corporal Endo, just as he had heard reported. It had been delayed by an ambush of native insurgents and had suffered significant damage and loss of supplies. There were at least a dozen men with serious injuries, for three of whom there was nothing left to be done. Two trucks had had to be abandoned en route, and I remember the men immediately crowding around the lone one bearing the twenty-kilo sacks of rice and other foods like pickled radishes and dried fish. At the time we were still in good contact with the supply line, and there were modest but still decent rations available to us, though it was clear the supplies were growing steadily feebler with each transport. The ambush had left the truck riddled with bullet holes, and one of the sergeants ordered a few of his men to pick the truckbed clean of every last kernel of rice that had drizzled out of pocks in the burlap. They appeared as if they were searching for insects or grubs. It was a pathetic sight, particularly when the sergeant lined up the men after they finished and had them pour their scavengings into his cap, which he in turn presented to the presiding officer-in-charge.
In fact I believe the whole group of us had nearly forgotten about what else had been expected, when a lone transport drove slowly up the road. It stopped and turned before reaching us in the central yard, heading instead to the commander’s house of palm wood and bamboo and thatch, a small hut-like building situated at the far east end of the expansive clearing. I could see that the doctor, Captain Ono, had just emerged from the commander’s quarters and was standing at attention on the makeshift veranda. The driver stopped in front and jumped out and saluted the captain. Then he went around and folded down the back gate to the bed. He called into the dark hold and helped an older woman wearing a paper hat to the ground. She seemed to thank him and then turned to bark raspily inside. There was no answer and the woman shouted this time, using a most crude epithet. It was then that they climbed down from the back of the truck, one by one, shielding their eyes from the high Burmese light.