There was a moment’s hesitation, but then the second plane came in for its strafing run, and as one man went below the others raced to the doorway, shoving to get under what James knew was nothing more than the false protection of the overhead deck. The Panay was no battleship; it was a river gunboat.
“Below decks! Below decks!” He stood by the doorway as the last of them piled in, a couple of sailors carrying a man wearing a clerical collar, a missionary knocked unconscious, bleeding profusely from a head wound.
He heard a crack of a rifle, a lone sailor standing on the deck, armed with a Springfield ’03, swearing, firing as the first plane continued to climb away.
“Bombs!”
He looked up and saw yet another plane, not one of the fighters, now coming down on them, pulling out of its dive, two dots detaching.
He needed no urging. This time he flung himself flat on the deck, only to be met by the hard steel as it was flung upward by the two bombs bracketing the gunboat.
The three fighters wheeled, coming back in for yet another strafing run. Stunned by the blast, soaked by the cascades of water coming down, he suddenly no longer cared, standing back up, filled with rage.
Atop the main cabin he heard someone swearing and, looking up, saw a sailor actually holding an American flag up, waving it, as if the bastards would somehow now see it at last. He started to shout for the man to get the hell down, but his cry was drowned out by the roar of the planes, the staccato snap of bullets, the sailor diving down for cover, flag falling from his hands.
“Abandon ship!”
Startled, he looked back to the young commander of the Panay, hands cupped, shouting the order; but already men were going over the sides. Actually there was no need to do so; the bracketing of the bombs had staved in the fragile hull, and the Panay was already settling to the bottom of the muddy river, water beginning to cascade over the railing. All he had to do was just simply step over and into the Yangtze. The water was cold, damn cold, startling him. A sailor tossed a life jacket to him, which he simply grabbed hold of, to keep afloat, kicking the few yards to the weed-choked river-bank.
Another of the fighters wheeled in like a vulture over a dying beast and rolled in for a strafing dive. James pushed the civilian by his side down into the weeds, diving to get under the muddy water. An instant later it felt like he had been kicked by a horse, shoving him down into the mud, no pain, just numbness. He convulsively gasped, the filthy water of the Yangtze flooding into his lungs.
In four feet of muddy water, he began to drown. He felt hands around him, pulling him up, rolling him over. Panicked, he kicked, struggled, the pain suddenly hitting, agonizing. He vomited, aspirating more water and filth as he did so, choking. He heard voices, someone shouting, still struggling he felt land under him, mud stinking of human waste.
Somebody rolled him on his side, slapping him on the back. Gasping, he was finally able to draw a breath.
“Down!”
More gunfire, a plane racing over low, a split second of shadow passing like an angel or demon of death, the roar of the engine, someone swearing.
“That’s it, sir, take a breath, that’s it!”
The voice was almost gentle. He had lost his glasses, the world looked fuzzy, but he saw the stripes of a chief petty officer who was kneeling over him.
“Let me get your tie off, sir,” and the officer snaked it loose, popping a few buttons off his uniform, taking the tie.
“This might hurt now, sir, hang on.” And damn it did hurt. As the sailor raised James’s left arm, it felt like someone had driven an ice pick up it. Blood was pouring out of his hand. He tried to move it, winced, the last two digits dangling loosely. The sailor wrapped the tie around the hand, tight it felt, too damn tight; he gasped slightly, but said nothing.
“That’ll do for the moment, sir.”
It was still hard to breathe. “Thanks,” was all he could gasp out.
“I’m going back in now, sir, there’re still people out there. Stay low.”
James could only nod, suddenly feeling small, helpless. As with anyone with astigmatism, the loss of glasses made him feel naked, vulnerable. My other glasses, in my luggage. He looked up, absurd. Panay was settled to the gunwales, smoke pouring out of her.
“I can’t believe it,” the petty officer gasped, “the bastards. I can’t believe it.”
One of the fighters banked over low, circling, and he could catch a glimpse of the pilot in the open cockpit looking down.
The petty officer stood up, raised his arm in the classic gesture of insult, finger extended, shouting obscenities.
James said nothing, looking up, at the circling plane, the face of the enemy above him.
We’re at war now, he thought. America would never accept this, could never accept this. They had fired on the flag, on a ship of the United States Navy. It could only mean one response now–war.
The White House
Washington, D.C.
14 December 1937
“Sir, I know you are furious about this Japanese attack on the Panay, but there is just nothing practical we can do about it,” Secretary of State Hull wearily asserted to an angry President Roosevelt.
“Cordell, this is my navy, and they have sunk one of my gunboats. We have to do something.”
“Mr. President, Gallup reports 70 percent of the American people want us to withdraw from China, not just the military, but everyone, every civilian, every missionary, the logic being if none of us are there, no one can get shot at and thus we avoid a war.”
Disgusted with this bit of intelligence and the logic it implied, the president could only wearily shake his head.
“Congress is even more isolationist than the American people. There would be no congressional support for a real confrontation with Japan. The American people oppose the Japanese aggression and sympathize with the Chinese, but they simply do not want to get involved.”
“You may be right for now, but I have a feeling time is going to teach all of us some very painful lessons about aggressive dictatorships in both Tokyo and Berlin. For the moment, you are right. You and Joe Grew work up some strong statement, and raise as much Cain with the Japanese as you can without getting us into a shooting match.”
As Hull turned to leave, FDR couldn’t resist one last parting shot. “Just remember that I am going to watch them constantly and take advantage of every mistake they make to teach the American people that we have to stop the dictatorships before they threaten us directly.”
FOUR
Nanking, China
15 December 1937
Staggering with exhaustion, Cecil Stanford, correspondent for the Manchester Daily, pushed through the terrified, jostling mob. Attached to a bamboo pole, held aloft in his right hand, was a makeshift British flag, painted onto a torn bedsheet. In his other arm, nestled in tight against his breast, two small Chinese girls, ages most likely about two, both of them soiled, covered in feces and vomit, both screaming hysterically even as they clung to him. Clutched around him were several score of people, terrified, pressing in tight, all but climbing on top of him, petrified to be at the edge of the group staggering through hell.
The children had been pressed into his arms a couple of blocks back; a woman, horrific looking, blood pouring in rivulets down both her legs, had staggered up to him. The cause of the bleeding was obvious, far too obvious because she was naked. She had pressed the two screaming children into his arms, staggered back away, and collapsed in the gutter.
They turned the corner, his goal only a few blocks away, and there they were–half a dozen Japanese soldiers.
They were obviously drunk, whether drunk on liquor, drugs, or some primal insanity was immaterial now. He braced himself, unashamed to inwardly admit that he was terrified. If only Winston could see him now, what would he think of his choice of “spies”? For that matter, if Winston could see, at this moment, the goddamn nightmare of this city, what would he say, what would the entire world say?
/>
He had come to Nanking shortly after the incident at the Marco Polo Bridge up in Peking, since it was the purported capital of the Nationalist forces.
The bridge incident had exploded into what was officially being called the “Second Sino-Japanese War,” a polite reference to the fact that the two sides had a brief skirmish back in 1894–95. But that war had been fought with at least some dignity; this, this was beyond any imagining, beyond anything he had believed in and loved about the Japanese.
Within weeks after the takeover of Peking, Japanese armored columns had poured into the central China plains, the forces of Chiang Kai-shek ineffective at best, cowardly at worst. Four weeks ago he had been in Shanghai, covering events there, but felt it best to try to make it back to the temporary capital, perhaps to even seek out an interview with Chiang Kai-shek. To no avail.
The siege of the city had caught him and nearly all the defenders of the ancient walled city off guard, the Japanese army rushing forward with lightning speed. In less than three days the defenses had crumbled, and the Japanese army had poured in. For a few brief hours, very brief hours, there had been an uneasy tension, Japanese commanders purportedly declaring that they came as liberators, that personal property and rights would be respected, but that fleeing soldiers disguised as civilians must be turned in. And then, it seemed in a matter of hours or minutes, the army had given itself over to a medieval pillage, the likes of which transcended Cecil’s worst nightmares.
A small committee of Westerners, a few missionaries with the guts to stay on, a couple of consulate officials who had stayed on either by choice or by being simply trapped, and a half-dozen correspondents like himself had formed what they called the “International Committee.” It was all a bluff. A few dozen Westerners roping off an area, putting up their flags, standing guard at each intersection, and declaring that to cross the line would trigger a war with their respective countries.
It was a bluff, born of madness, and it had united together Brits, Italians, Americans, Portuguese, and all of those led by a German business executive from the Siemens Corporation, John Rabe, a member of the Nazi Party. It seemed that the display of the swastika, hand-painted onto strips of cloth and tied to rope blocking off the streets, was more of a deterrent than anything else.
Rabe had been everywhere since the madness started, sending demands to the Japanese commanders, organizing the cordon around a section of the city where Westerners lived, cajoling and rallying the few exhausted Europeans and Americans to redouble their efforts as tens of thousands died, literally right in front of them.
What had driven Cecil outside the barrier line was the sight of half a dozen Chinese schoolgirls and a nun, Chinese as well, being dragged off just a block outside the cordon. Grabbing his makeshift flag he had run out into the street in pursuit.
In a far saner world he would have stood riveted, waiting for someone else to act. But within that small cordon of several dozen blocks, hundreds of thousands of terrified civilians had now sought refuge from the rampaging Japanese troops. In that terrible instant, he knew there was no one but himself.
He had stepped forward, running down the street, turning the corner, pushing past a terrified family running in the opposite direction, running blindly. Several buildings were burning, agonized screams coming from within; two drunken Japanese soldiers staggered out of the inferno, one of them pointing at Cecil and shouting an insult about English dogs.
The small procession of horror turned a corner and he raced after them, following, closing in. And horrified, he slowed at the sight he now beheld. The nun had tried to fight back even as two of the soldiers started to push the girls through a shattered storefront window, a small furniture store, the beds and sofas within obvious for what was to be done. The nun had clawed at the face of their leader, a lieutenant, and Cecil, horrified, saw the sword come out and, in one blow, the nun decapitated.
The girls, her charges, were screaming, shrieking wildly. The lieutenant looked at the corpse lying on the sidewalk, head having rolled into the gutter, the lieutenant swaying slightly on his feet.
Cecil slowed, trying to still the pounding of his heart.
He thought of all the fine young men he had taught at Eta-jima. Boys who would ask for help translating a Shakespeare sonnet to send to a hoped-for beloved back home, or a letter to a mother or father in English to demonstrate their skills, knowing that the proud parents would parade from neighbor to neighbor, showing off the skills of their honored son.
Were these one and the same? Could the boys he had taught ever do this, ever condone this? Where was the honor of Japan this day?
He slowed, drawing in his breath.
“Lieutenant!”
He drew himself up, trying to remember the housemaster at Harrow who, at not much more than five feet, could strike terror into the heart of any boy. He stepped closer, letting the bamboo pole with the crudely drawn British flag atop it come to a rest position.
“Lieutenant! Face me and come to attention before a superior.”
The lieutenant was obviously drunk, not much more than a boy, twenty-two or -three at most. The sharp command, given in Japanese, had caused him to instinctively turn and come to attention. The half-dozen soldiers, the rapists with him, paused, the schoolgirls still shrieking hysterically; and he wished that for the moment they would shut up.
“I am a duly appointed representative of the government of Great Britain,” he lied. “Those girls are students from a school sponsored by my government, and they are now in my charge.”
He did not ask; he knew enough of what he faced not to do that. He ordered. Orders for the Japanese, whether legitimate or from someone who appeared legitimate, were to be obeyed without hesitation.
The lieutenant gazed at him, suddenly unsure. One of the soldiers started to pull a girl in closer and muttered, “This one is mine, round eyes.”
Cecil turned and faced the soldier.
“Let go of her now or face a firing squad come morning. Obey me now!”
His command so sharp and in such perfect Japanese caused the soldier to release the girl.
As if the man no longer existed Cecil turned back to the lieutenant. “Your name?”
“Hashima Mitsushi,” there was a pause, “sir.”
“Return your men to order immediately,” Cecil roared. “I shall personally report you, come tomorrow morning, to your superiors.”
He gestured at the dead nun, suddenly struggling to suppress a gag as blood slowly continued to pour out of her body.
Without looking over at the enlisted men, he snapped his fingers. “Release the girls.”
“White devil, who is he…,” one of the enlisted men growled, but the lieutenant turned and barked out a command. “Release them!” Cecil commanded.
He kept his gaze fixed on Hashima, then ever so slowly turned to the six terrified girls.
“Walk toward me,” he said, speaking slowly, still not sure of his Chinese after almost a year in this country. “Stop crying and come to my side.”
They did as ordered.
He wondered if the Japanese could see that he was actually trembling, his entire body shaking, his knees near to jelly.
It was one thing to play the white knight on the mad impulse of the moment, to cross over the protection of the barrier line and go racing off. Now it was all literally balanced on the edge of a razor blade. If Hashima should come to his senses, realize there were no witnesses, a flick of his wrist and Cecil knew he would be dead, the girls alive a bit longer, but then, hopefully, mercifully, dead as well.
He felt the girls crowd in around him, and kept his gaze locked on Hashima.
And then he knew he had him. Hashemi dropped his gaze, looking sidelong at the body of the nun, and then lowered his head farther. He felt almost a touch of pity for the young man. Would what was happening here eventually inure him to suffering, to agony? Or, perhaps just maybe, he might realize the madness that he had given himself over to and spend a lif
etime of regret.
“Stay close to me,” Cecil whispered to the girls, but he did not need to tell them. They clung to him in desperation. He turned away and without a backward glance tried to retrace his way back to the safety zone set up by the German.
Right up to the street corner he more than expected that the lieutenant might rouse himself or his men rebel.
“There are plenty of other bitches,” he heard one of them say as he turned the corner. He dared to look back and saw Hashemi still standing in the street, blade drawn, gaze lowered, fixed on the body of the nun.
For a moment he feared he was lost. The street was choked with smoke, fires spreading, a panic-stricken crowd of several dozen running past him, pursued by several laughing Japanese soldiers armed only with bayonets, rifles slung, waving the blood-soaked blades high. But with each step people fell in by his side, racing out of hiding places; the tragic woman with the two small children emerging from an alleyway and then staggering back to collapse.
He turned the corner ahead and never in his life did he ever dream that he would be glad to see a swastika; but there it was, tied off to a telephone pole, a silken rope blocking the street beyond it, a sea of humanity packed together, huddled back.
Safety was but fifty yards away, and then from a smoke-filled alleyway, six Japanese soldiers emerged, laughing, one of them carrying, of all things, a large clock, another a pile of silk robes slung over his shoulder, no officer present.
At the sight of Cecil and his pathetic knot of refugees they slowed, pointing, laughing. And then one of them boldly stepped forward with a swagger. “You there, stop!”
Cecil did not slow, pushing his group on.
The soldier unsung his rifle and pointed it straight at Cecil and looked up at the roughly made flag. “English dog, stop!”
“Stand aside, soldier,” Cecil snapped back in Japanese. “These people are under the protection of the British government.”
His command of Japanese caused the soldier to pause, and Cecil moved to shoulder him aside. Just thirty yards more and they would be through the barrier.
Pearl Harbor: A Novel of December 8th Page 10
