Colonel Carlson appeared, coming up the beach.
McCoy Saluted.
"Oh, ifs you, McCoy," Carlson said. "Getting your people sorted out?"
"Yes, sir," McCoy said. "I've got at least a platoon of Able Company with me. I'm about to send them down the beach."
"Good," Carlson said. "But despite the confusion, so far so good."
"Yes, sir," McCoy said.
The unmistakable crack of a.30-06 cartridge broke the stillness, clearly audible above the hiss of the surf.
"Oh, shit!" McCoy said, bitterly.
There was no following sound of gunfire. Just the one shot.
"What was that?" one of the Raiders asked, when neither Colonel Carlson nor McCoy spoke.
"That was some dumb sonofabitch walking around with his finger on the trigger," McCoy said furiously. "He might as well have blown a fucking bugle."
"I think this might be a good time for you to join your men, McCoy," Colonel Carlson said, conversationally, and then walked back down the beach.
Chapter Twenty-one
(One)
Butaritari Island, Makin Atoll
0700 Hours, 17 August 1942
At a quarter to six, a runner from Lieutenant Plumley's Able Company had reported to Colonel Carlson that his point (that is, the leading elements of Plumley's troops) was at Government Wharf and that he had captured Government House without resistance. Carlson sent the runner back with orders for Plumley to move down the island in the direction of the other installations, that is to say, southeast, or to the left.
Carlson had expected the bulk of Japanese forces to be in the vicinity of Government House, and had made his plans accordingly. Now it seemed clear to him that the Japanese were in fact centered around On Chong's Wharf, about two miles away. If he had known that, he could have ordered Plumley to move quickly down the island, so that he could get as far as possible before he encountered resistance.
But once the presence of the Raiders on Butaritari became known to the Japanese-and the goddamned fool who had fired his Garand had taken care of that-the situation would change rapidly. If he were the Japanese commander, Carlson reasoned, he would move up Butaritari's one road as fast as he could, until he ran into the enemy.
Carlson's prediction was quickly confirmed. Another runner appeared, saluted, and, still heaving from the exertion of his run, announced, "We got Japs, Colonel."
Carlson extended his map.
"Show me where, son," he said, calmly.
When the runner pointed to the Native Hospital, Carlson nodded. His professional judgment was that the Japanese commander had established his line at the best possible place; the island was only about eleven hundred feet wide at that point.
He turned to his radio operator and told him to try to raise either of the submarines. So far Carlson's radio communication with the submarines had been just about a complete failure, but his time, he was lucky.
"I got the Argonaut, sir," the radio operator reported.
Carlson snatched the microphone and requested Naval gunfire on both the island (to shell Japanese reinforcement routes) and the lagoon, where two small ships were at anchor.
"We do not, repeat not," the Argonaut replied, "have contact with our spotter."
"Then fire without him," Carlson snapped, and tossed the microphone to the radio operator.
There came almost immediately the boom of the cannon firing, and then the whistle of the projectile in the air. Then there was the sound of a shell landing on the island, and almost simultaneously an enormous plume of water in the lagoon.
"Get them again, if you can," Carlson ordered the radio operator. "Tell them to keep it up."
Without thinking about it, without realizing he was doing it, Carlson counted the rounds fired by the cannon on the submarines, just as a competitive pistol shooter teaches you to habitually count shots. When the booming stopped, he was up to sixty-five, and both of the ships in the lagoon were in flames.
And then the Nautilus called him, and before the voice faded, Carlson heard that the Japanese-language linguist aboard the Nautilus had heard the Japanese send a message in the clear reporting the Raider attack and asking for reinforcements. Carlson asked if there had been a reply, but the radio was out again.
That made Carlson think of McCoy, and to wonder if it would not have been smarter to leave him aboard the Nautilus or not even bring him along at all. Japanese-speaking Americans were in short supply.
A moment later, McCoy showed up in person.
"I thought you would want to know what we're facing, sir," he said, and pointed out on Carlson's map the locations of four Japanese water-cooled machine guns, two grenade launchers, and a flame thrower.
"They got riflemen, a bunch of them, filling in the blanks in the line," McCoy said, pointing, "and snipers in the tops of most of the coconut trees along here."
"You didn't want to send a runner?"
"I didn't have one handy that I trusted with a map, sir," McCoy said.
"Well, then, Lieutenant, you can just keep running. Go find the Baker Company commander and tell him I said to get moving, down the island."
"Aye, aye, sir," McCoy said, and ran off.
In the next four hours, a procession of runners reported that Baker Company was making slow but steady progress down the island.
At 1130, two Japanese Navy Type 95 reconnaissance planes appeared over the island, flew back and forth for fifteen minutes, dropped two bombs, and then flew away. Carlson knew that meant the Argonaut and the Nautilus, essentially defenseless against aircraft, had dived, and there was no longer any reason even to try to raise them on the radio.
The Nautilus surfaced again at 1255, but immediately dived again after their radar detected a flight of twelve aircraft approaching the island. The submarines would remain submerged until 1830 hours.
At 1330, the Japanese aircraft arrived over Butaritari Island. It was quite an armada: two four-engined Kawanishi flying boats (bombers); four Zero fighters; four Type 94 reconnaissance bombers; and two Type 95 seaplanes. They promptly began to bomb and strafe the Raiders, and they kept it up for an hour and a half, but without doing much real damage.
Then, apparently convinced they had wiped out whatever antiaircraft capability the Raiders might have had, one of the four-engined Kawanishis and one of the Type 95s landed in the lagoon. They were promptly engaged by.30-caliber Raider machine-gun fire. The Type 95 caught fire. And the Kawanishi hurriedly taxied out of.30-caliber range and began to discharge its passengers-thirty-five Japanese soldiers intended to reinforce the Butaritari garrison-apparently oblivious to the fact that a slow but steady fire from a Boys.55-caliber antitank rifle was being delivered.
When the Kawanishi made its takeoff, it almost immediately entered into a series of violent circling maneuvers. The last of these sent it, with an enormous splash, into the lagoon.
The Japanese aircraft that remained over Butaritari then left, but more Zeros returned at 1630 and bombed and strafed the island for another thirty minutes. From the way they were flying and choosing to drop their bombs, it was evident to Carlson that there was little if any communication between the Japanese defenders of Butaritari and the aircraft that came to their assistance: The Zeros were attacking a portion of the island he had ordered the Raiders out of (to better counter Japanese sniper fire). And the Japanese had promptly moved into this position. The Zeros were consequently attacking Japanese positions and troops.
By 1700, Carlson understood that he had an important decision to make. He had two options. His mission was to destroy enemy forces and vital installations, and to capture prisoners and documents. So far, the Raiders had killed a number of Japanese, but there were no prisoners, no documents, and no serious damage to installations.
Choice One was to continue his advance.
But the operations plan called for the Raiders to evacuate Butaritari at some time between 1930 and 2100. And it also called for attacking Little Makin Island the next morning.