Broken Jewel - [World War II 05]

by David L. Robbins

  “What’re you getting at?”

  The piano player cast furtive looks left and right. “I got something I need done. It’s mighty important.”

  “Important to who?”

  “The whole camp.”

  “Then why are you the one asking me?”

  “‘Cause the camp don’t know. Come on, walk.”

  McElway led, ambling away from the latrine to the worn path between barracks. Tal waited until they were clear of people before speaking.

  “What do you need me to do?”

  “How well you know the camp?”

  “Every inch.”

  “You been outside it? Under the wire?”

  “Not since we put it up. No.”

  McElway walked, looking at his own feet. They dragged.

  “Think you could get outside?”

  “I reckon.”

  “I’d do this myself, boy. You know that. But I ain’t up to it.”

  “What do you need?”

  Mac ran a rheumy eye across Tal’s shoulders, measuring him to determine if he could do this thing.

  “Two weeks ago, I put word out to the local guerrillas. I needed some-thin. I heard yesterday they got it. I’m supposed to meet somebody outside the camp to pick it up.”

  “When?”

  “Tonight.”

  “What is it?”

  McElway spit. “Can’t tell you that. Can’t nobody in the camp know but me.”

  “Why not?”

  “In case the Japs catch you on the way out. ‘Course, they probably gon’ shoot you, if they do.”

  “And if they catch me on the way back?”

  “You throw it away. It’s small. Then they shoot you. Or bayonet you.”

  “And if they don’t catch me?”

  “You bring it to me tomorrow morning here at the latrine. Then you go ‘bout your business.”

  Tal stopped walking. Mac quit more slowly, taking a few extra steps. He came back to Tal.

  “Tell me what it is,” Tal said. “I’m not risking my ass for something I don’t know what it is.”

  “Sonny, you just got to trust me on this one.”

  Tal waited while a missionary couple walked by on the path.

  “I trust you, Mac. It’s you don’t trust me.”

  The old man dug a leathery hand into a pants pocket. He pulled out an egg.

  “You take this. Eat the shell, too. Get you some calcium.”

  “Keep it.”

  The old man shook his noggin. He folded Tal’s young hand over the egg.

  “You got to heal.”

  With a fingertip, Tal broke a hole in the egg. He sucked out the yoke, swallowed, then shoved the shell whole in his mouth and crunched down.

  McElway put up his pink palms. “You think about it some more. Get back to me. And don’t tell nobody.”

  ~ * ~

  The camp loudspeaker announced a roll call.

  No one could determine the reason; roll calls were infrequent, only when the commandant had a punitive purpose or the guards suspected someone might have escaped.

  At seven o’clock, all 2,100 internees lined up in front of their barracks. Outside the infirmary, those who could stand from their beds arranged themselves in shaky queues.

  Tal remained shirtless, waiting with everyone else for Toshiwara to emerge from his hut. With Christmas a week away, the Philippine sun kept enough of its strength to make standing in the open morning uncomfortable. The plaints of children drifted from the several married barracks.

  After half an hour, the internees stiffened with the appearance of Nagata. He strolled from the commandant’s headquarters.

  The boys of No. 11 muttered: Why was Nagata conducting the roll call, not the commandant?

  Tal lost sight of Nagata among the buildings. He heard the first barracks count off. When they were done, the residents would remain in place until the entire camp had been counted. This would take over an hour, with no sitting, water, or shade. The sun began to bake on the raw swaths of Tal’s ribcage. Next door, Remy raised his fedora in a morning greeting.

  Another half hour passed before Nagata, his tall interpreter, and two more guards tromped in front of No. 11. The purpose for the roll call remained hidden. Nagata, drenched in the rising heat, swaggered like a bantam rooster, hands on hips.

  The monitor of No. 11, a good-looking Australian kid named Donnelly, had worked in the San Miguel brewery before the war. He called the boys to attention. “Kiatska!” Tal figured that Donnelly had brewed the bomber lotion Remy’d brought to the infirmary.

  Tal came to attention with the others. Nagata’s lip curled in distaste. He said, “Komatta yatsura”

  The tall guard interpreted. “Naughty children.”

  Nagata pointed behind him, across the camp and beyond the wire, to the window in the third floor of the animal husbandry building.

  “You rike? Huh?”

  Somebody in the lines mimicked a farting noise. Quickly, Donnelly belted out the order to bow. “Rei!”

  So that was why this roll call was being conducted by Nagata. He was on a victory tour after last night.

  Tal looked to the girl’s window. No trace of her red robe had appeared in the window all morning.

  Everyone stood bent at the waist, face to the earth. Tal bowed last.

  “Ahhh,” Nagata purred, noticing him. “Tuck-san.”

  Tal kept his head down. Nagata’s boots halted in the dirt in front of him.

  Fingers ran across Tal’s scabs. Nagata tapped lightly, testing them for hardness. Tal winced at the ground. He preferred the feel of Nagata’s belt.

  He readied himself for more of Nagata’s viciousness, likely a smack across the back to break open the knitting wounds.

  The guard’s hand withdrew along with his boots. Strolling to the front of the formation, Nagata said, “Wakatte kita ne, Tuck-san.”

  The interpreter’s voice followed. “I think you have learned, Mr. Tuck.”

  Tal held the bow, hands balled at his sides, until Donnelly released No. 11 with the shout, “Yosume!”

  When Tal came erect, his eyes rested on the girl in her red robe standing in her third-floor window. Both arms went over her chest, crossing to her own shoulders. She stood like this, wrapped in herself, touching Tal’s wounded places on her own flesh, while Nagata watched the ninety-six young men count out, calling their number in line and “Ai!” for “present.”

  When they were done, Nagata and the guards strutted to No. 12, where Remy waited. Tal caught his father’s eye. Remy gave him the okay sign. When he looked back to her perch, the girl was gone.

  A half hour later, with the roll call completed, the internees moved into their barracks for the morning meal. Tal took his ticket and waited in line. He received a plate of mush made from three-quarters corn meal, the rest rice; many of the boys in the barracks, even the thinnest ones, had developed a protruding rice belly. Every scoop of gruel was eyed jealously by the next in line to see that equal portions were meted out. Tal ate alone. Many of his barracks mates dropped by to tell him they were glad to see him up and around.

  Staring out a window, Tal licked his finger to scoop up the last grains. The camp was sunlit and half dead. Much had changed in the past six months. Things that had helped keep drudgery at bay had been canceled by the guards or quit for lack of energy. No more Softball games, Sunday concerts, theater shows, debates in Baker Hall. Nagata had confiscated all Red Cross relief packets and turned away every effort of the local Filipinos to help feed the internees. The few camp doctors estimated they were down to less than a thousand calories a day, not enough to sustain normal activity.

  Fresh out of his bunk, Tal wouldn’t have to resume his chores in the repair department until tomorrow. He could sit in the shade with everyone else. He could watch himself dying.

  He turned from the window and left the barracks. Next door, Tal entered the dining room of No. 12. McElway sat finishing his own puny breakfast. The man shook his
head, for Tal to speak with him outside.

  In the open yard, McElway sauntered up slowly, a sore hitch in his step.

  “All right,” Tal said. “I don’t give a damn. I’ll do it.”

  “What you angry about?”

  “Don’t worry about it. I’ll go.”

  McElway rubbed the back of his neck. “Naw, that ain’t gonna do.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t want you to go if you don’t give a damn. You got to care, ‘cause you got to get back safe.”

  “I will.”

  “Now you see, that’s just young and dumb talkin’ right there. No, I don’t need no hero tryin’ to prove somethin’. I need what’s waitin’ for me in that ravine. A man who wants to live is the man gon’ bring me that back.” McElway scuffed the dirt with his toe. “I want to live. You bet.” He seemed sad, resigned to something.

  “I’m all right, Mac. I can do it. I’ll be safe.”

  The old piano player dug a finger into Tal’s chest above his heart.

  “Let me tell you somethin’. I done a few things in my life I regret. Yeah, I played in a bordello, and I drank some. And I done some other things I ain’t sayin’, cause they over with. Now you look at me straight and tell me sendin’ you under that wire ain’t gonna be one more thing I feel bad about.”

  “It won’t be.”

  “It best not. My conscience has got all it can handle.”

  The old man grinned, his cheerless mood disappeared as quickly as it had come on him.

  “All right. After midnight. In the ravine behind the infirmary. Someone from Terry’s Hunters will be waitin’. You get it, you hide it, and you bring it to me outside the shithouse tomorrow morning, same time as we met today.”

  “All right.”

  “And you gon’ like the password.”

  “What is it?”

  McElway raised both long, dark arms and waved them, as if flying.

  “Superman.”

  ~ * ~

  Tal had nothing to trade for a cigarette. He spent the first half of his day trying to steal one. He came up empty, so went to Remy in the shade of the dao tree to have him win one.

  His father asked, “Just one?”

  “That’s all I need.”

  “What for?”

  “Settle my nerves.”

  “You ain’t the nervous type.”

  “Let me know when you get it. I’ll owe you.”

  “You don’t owe me. I’ll handle it.”

  In the afternoon, Remy found Tal in his bunk. He handed over a wrinkled Lucky Strike and sat on the bunk next to Tal’s.

  “I hope you enjoy this. It cost me most of a coconut to get it.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You’re in the rack a little early today. You all right?”

  “Just resting up. Staying out of the sun.”

  “Restin’ for what?”

  “Nothing.”

  Remy poked out his lower lip. “All right. Hey, what were you and Mac talkin’ about this morning?”

  “Women.”

  Remy laughed. “That’s good. He’s got me beat in that department. Maybe after he tells you what he knows, you’ll let me in on some of the good stuff.”

  “Sure.”

  His father curled his nose, sniffing. “I can win you some soap next.”

  “Soon as these scabs let me shower, I’ll use it.”

  Remy patted him on the arm, then stood. “That’ll make us even for the cigarette. I’ll see you.”

  Tal tucked the Lucky Strike under his pillow. He stayed in the bunk until late in the day, dozing to be alert that night. At 4:30, he emerged for supper, the only other meal of the day.

  In line, he accepted a half-pint bowl of stewed green papayas, kamote tops, garlic, onions, and a dash of salt. Meat was available only two days a week; tonight was not one of them. Onto his plate, the server plopped a dipper of lugao and another of slimy talinum greens. Again, Tal tried to eat his meal alone, but was joined by Donnelly and five other boys from No. 11.

  “Tuck,” the Australian said, sitting, “no worries, but could you put on a shirt for meals? You’re hard enough to look at without those.” Donnelly rotated a finger over Tal’s shoulders.

  One of Tal’s roommates, Santana, a rangy Filipino-American whose father was a prisoner on Bataan, piped up. “Did you hear that fart noise I made at roll call?”

  Everyone at the table snickered. Donnelly said, “I thought you’d shit yourself.” Tal added, “So did Nagata.”

  After supper, he walked the perimeter of the camp, as close to the wire as the guards would allow. He passed the dao tree, and the overgrown plot where the internees had kept their garden until the Japanese made them stop. The Protestant chapel stood empty. He stopped at the infirmary to have a nurse examine his shoulders. While he waited, he wandered to the rear of the one-story building, to glance out a window at the spot where he would cross tonight. A back corner of the infirmary hid the fence from one guard tower; six-foot-high cogon grass masked it from the other. Outside the fence, a bamboo grove ran all the way to the deep ravine. Tal turned away when the nurse called for him.

  She admired the progress of his scabs. The weeping had almost stopped, and they were thickening despite the poor nutrition in the camp. Tal figured this was Remy’s doing, the odd bits of food his father snookered from others and brought him.

  Leaving the infirmary, he counted the number of Japanese patrolling the fence tonight. He measured the distance between them, their level of attentiveness. He’d have thirty seconds between guards, no more. At ten o’clock, the camp would go into blackout. His enemies after midnight would be the clear night sky, a quarter moon, a careless footstep.

  Before returning to his bunk, Tal strolled on the asphalt strip directly beneath the girl’s window, next to the wire. He’d never dared this before, walking the same path as the guards. Set against what he intended to do that night, this act seemed tame. A guard saw him and threatened with his rifle. Tal cast a wish up to her empty window, that she might find it when she returned. He veered off the tarmac, back into the camp.

  He passed the garage, ice plant, and butcher shop. Strolling into the Vatican, he found the Catholic chapel quiet. Sundown services hadn’t started. The ladies nodded and smiled, the men inclined their heads. Though the missionaries, nuns, and priests were as spindly as anyone in Los Baños, they seemed to have something extra in their systems, as if they could eat God. Tal considered returning for the evening mass before heading under the wire hours later, just to sit outside the chapel and listen.

  Walking out of the Vatican, he decided he would just lay in his bunk and wait. Like his father the gambler, Tal would try fate in his own way.

  ~ * ~

  With the sun long down, Tal took the Lucky Strike from under his pillow. He stuck the cigarette between his fingers and walked out of the barracks as if in search of a light. He ignored a call from a boy who had a match.

  Tal made his way between buildings to the kitchen. Amid the married quarters, he heard through windows mothers putting children down, fathers making up bedtime stories, elder couples coughing. One old husband insisted his wife eat the last of some beans. “I’ll be fine,” he said. “They’re for you.”

  The camp loudspeaker announced the approaching curfew and lights out by playing “Chasing Shadows” by the Dorsey Brothers. Tal looked to the stars to ask if this was an omen.

  The kitchen was the largest of all the structures Tal and the eight hundred had built at Los Baños. Chopping tables, shelves, and cool storage filled more than half the interior space; the rest was given over to a half dozen fire pits built of cinderblock. Above each hung a metal pipe for a vent; Remy in the blacksmith’s shop had forged these. Cauldrons and griddles dangled on chains from iron rods driven into the earth.

  In each pit, coals smoldered. The fires would not be allowed to go out overnight, for the breakfast cooks arrived before dawn. Tomorrow’s cord-wood was stacked i
n a corner. The fire tender, Mr. Kolko, stood from his seat on the firewood. He’d been a rubber engineer in Manila. Three years ago, with the Japanese closing in on Manila, Mr. Kolko held a ticket on the SS Corregidor departing the city. The boat, scheduled to leave at midnight, sailed two hours early because the captain was afraid of the nightly air raids. Kolko didn’t arrive in time to take his berth. The ship wove without escort through the minefields of Manila Bay. An hour out from the quay, she struck a mine. Split in two, she went down in minutes with a thousand passengers and crew. Because of this reprieve, Mr. Kolko, of all the internees in Los Baños, was an affable man.