The Lieutenant's Nurse

by Sara Ackerman

  She sat next to him and picked up his clammy hand. “What’s your favorite animal, Jimmy?”

  “I dunno,” he said.

  He looked like he would burst into tears at any moment.

  “Do you like dogs?”

  “I think so.”

  She laughed. “You think so, huh? Well, then, you’re in luck. We have a doctor here named Dr. Jones, who happens to bring his dog, Scout, to work with him every other day.”

  His eyes widened. “Into the hospital?” Jimmy asked.

  She nodded. “Yep, and she’s the sweetest thing this side of cherry soda. The only thing you have to worry about is getting licked to death.”

  In four short months, since Jones began bringing Scout around, she had seen kids go overnight from hollow-eyed and hopeless to smiling and asking when Scout was coming back. Administration had balked in the beginning—dogs carry disease—and a few parents complained, but when they saw the results, people quit fussing. Jones, Dr. Brown’s peer, was one of two doctors who could get away with such a thing. Where Brown ruled the surgical ward, Jones ruled the Woods Wing.

  “When is she coming?” he asked.

  “Tomorrow morning, and I’ll make sure you’re the first person she visits, okay?”

  His lower lip stuck out and a small bob of the head was all he gave.

  “You’re going to be fine, Jimmy, stay brave for your brother. Can you do that for me?” Another nod.

  She brushed aside his damp and matted hair. “Good.”

  “Nurse?” he said in a very small voice.

  “What is it?”

  “What does Scout look like?”

  “She is sleek and gray like mercury, with yellow eyes and big floppy ears. And all she wants is to please you and make you laugh. If you don’t fall in love instantly, I’ll give you a quarter. Deal?”

  A thin smile appeared on his face. “Deal.”

  Ten seconds later, the hospital alarms went off. A feeling of dread whooshed through her limbs. Instincts told her to run straight back to the operating room, but she was terrified of what she would find. Nor would Dr. Brown want her, of all people, showing up to help. Maybe it was something else. Please, let it be something else!

  She knew it wasn’t something else.

  THE ONE-TWO PUNCH

  December 2

  Never show weakness. The rule applied not just to combat, but to women. Even though Clark felt like his insides had been detonated, he had somehow managed to maintain coolness. How could he not have seen this coming? Even when they were dancing and he was holding her close, taking in the smell of roses, he sensed a hesitance. Something was holding her back.

  Damn.

  The walk to the radio room was a death march. With each step, leaving behind the only thing in recent memory that had stirred some feeling in him. He had finally thrown away his reservation, worked up the nerve to kiss her and then this. Hell, the drive to Waimea Bay with her was all planned out in his mind. In a week from now, her cheek would be healed enough to swim, and he couldn’t wait to see the expression on her face when he pulled up to the overlook. In that way her eyebrows arched up just before she smiled. Eva would be tough to forget, but he was good at turning off pain. He’d had lots of experience.

  Wilson was waiting for him. “I’m glad you’re here.”

  “So am I,” Clark said. The radio room situation would be the best kind of distraction.

  “I can say with certainty that the signals are coming from moving objects. They are moving away from Japan, closer to Honolulu,” Wilson said. “Signals are being sent on the same frequency as the last two nights.”

  “And you trust your direction finder?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Let me have a listen,” Clark said.

  He put on the headphones and turned the knobs. His mind spun along with them. A fleet of Japanese ships approaching Oahu could only mean one thing. He thought back to his last meeting with Ford and Admiral Kimmel down in the Dungeon, before he had flown to San Diego the previous week. They had been debating the location of the Japanese subs and carriers. One thing both Station HYPO and CAST agreed on, was that the Japanese Navy was up to something in the South China Sea. A strong offensive movement was likely there. Less clear was what was happening closer to Hawaii. Station CAST maintained that there were no forces in the Marshall Islands, but Ford and Clark’s team at HYPO had been tracking submarines there. At least fifteen or twenty. As far as aircraft carriers, indications were one, possibly two. All of this was purely based on radio intelligence. They informed Kimmel and Washington of this, but the Marshall Islands were 2,500 miles away. Hawaii was not a target. If anything, Japan was bolstering its defenses for when it attacked Singapore or the Dutch East Indies.

  After listening for a time, and registering coded signals, he put the headphones down and turned to Wilson. “Something doesn’t add up here,” Clark said.

  Wilson looked grim. “It seems pretty clear to me, sir.”

  “How has no one else picked up on this?”

  “No one else is looking on those low frequencies.”

  “When do you head back to California?” Clark said.

  “On the fifth.”

  “The sooner the better, with what’s out there.”

  The implication hung in the air between them.

  Wilson frowned. “In all my years, I’ve never come across anything so puzzling. No one seems to think the Japs are coming for Hawaii, but here they are.”

  Thirty years at sea could take a toll on a man, and Wilson had the creased and leathery skin to prove it. But Clark could tell he was as sharp as the day he started, with triple the experience of anyone else aboard.

  “Keep this between us, okay? The guys in Honolulu will know what to do,” Clark said.

  “I hope so,” Wilson said.

  A feeling of dread swept over him. He and the boys at HYPO had missed something. Station CAST in the Philippines had missed something. Washington had missed something. Something big. “I’ll stop by in the morning to pick up your report. Make sure to include anything and everything, so no one can dispute it.”

  “Does this mean what I think it means?” Wilson asked.

  “I’m afraid it does, sir,” Clark said.

  * * *

  Sleep was elusive, but in the end, he managed a few hours. He woke early, packed his bag and shaved. One look in the mirror and he felt like he’d aged ten years overnight. The evening had started off so well, only to turn into a one-two punch to the gut. First Eva, then Wilson. He’d spent the first few hours tossing and turning and getting tangled in his blankets, picturing her face and the smooth curve of her neck. The next few hours were spent trying to figure out what the Japanese Navy had up its sleeve. Hawaii was not prepared in any way for an attack. Carriers were at sea, planes were in the Philippines and people were still going on as if they lived in a tropical paradise immune to any invasion.

  The thing that bothered him the most was whether or not he should warn Eva. This wasn’t the kind of information you shared with civilians, or even low-clearance military. Telling her would be breaking the law. But how would he live with himself if anything happened to her and he could have prevented it? He shook his head, told himself to stop ruminating. Eva wasn’t his concern. At this very moment, she was probably giddy about seeing her man and getting gussied up for Boat Day. No, he would go eat breakfast and steer clear, then find Wilson.

  Focus on the situation northwest of Oahu.

  On the walk up, his mind began to wander. In China, he’d heard about the green recruits of Japan’s Kwantung Army and how they were required to blindfold prisoners and tie them to poles and then bayonet them to death. Straw dwellings of peasants were set on fire. Hundreds of thousands of innocents were killed in the bombing of Shanghai. Women raped. Human beings turned into fighting mach
ines and drained of all decency. It happened in war, he knew that. A strange fluke in our design.

  Would there be anywhere safe to hide on Oahu if it were invaded? His neck began to sweat. By the time he reached the dining room, he was so worked up, he turned around and headed straight back down.

  Screw it.

  NO TURNING BACK

  December 3

  Circular twenty four forty four from Tokyo one December ordered London, Hong Kong, Singapore and Manila to destroy Purple machine. Batavia machine already sent to Tokyo. December 2 Washington also directed to destroy Purple, all but one copy of other systems, and all secret documents. British Admiralty London today reports embassy London has complied.

  —A message sent from OP-20-G, Captain Laurance Safford to Admiral Kimmel at Pearl Harbor and the Fourteenth and Sixteenth Naval Districts.

  UP IN FLAMES

  The consul general is burning his papers.

  —An intercept from the FBI telephone tap in Honolulu, listening in on a conversation with the Japanese consulate’s chef and someone else in Hawaii.

  BOAT DAY

  Boat Day had finally come and Eva was miserable. She felt like a rotten, selfish person. Leading Clark on like that. What had she been thinking? The truth was, she hadn’t been thinking. Clark had been a burst of color in her black-and-white life. The missing Ruby, the guilt over leaving, and the lying, all of that erased in his presence. He had made her forget, if only temporarily.

  A soft knock on the door.

  Jo glanced at her. “Are you expecting anyone?”

  “Nope, it must be the bellman.”

  Eva opened the door and found herself face to chest with Clark. Bleary-eyed, he looked around her toward Jo. “Look, I’m sorry to barge in like this, but can we talk in private for just a moment?”

  Eva’s hair was pinned up to set the curls and she was in a bathrobe provided by Matson. “If you wouldn’t mind, I can get changed and meet you in the lounge in fifteen minutes?”

  Jo cleared her throat. “I was just leaving. Come in, Lieutenant, by all means.”

  “Don’t leave on my account,” he said, but Jo was already out the door.

  The poor woman was probably weak with hunger by now. The seas had calmed a little, and Eva swore she could hear Jo’s stomach growling before she climbed out of bed. But now she would be alone with Clark. A warning bell went off in her head. He stepped in and shut the door behind him.

  “About last night—” she started to say.

  “Look, I’m not here because of that,” he said, making no move to sit, cornering her between him and the bed. His face was all buttoned-up and stern.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “I need you to swear to secrecy,” he said.

  She swallowed hard. “All right.”

  Ruby always swore her to secrecy, but it usually involved a boy she had a crush on or something Mrs. Green, the town gossip, had told her. This had a whole different feel.

  “Tell no one. Friends, coworkers.” He paused. “Boyfriend.”

  “I swear.”

  “When Wilson came and got me the other night, he was picking up Japanese radio signals somewhere northwest of Honolulu. Over the past few nights, we determined without a doubt that a fleet of ships is approaching Oahu from the northwest,” he said.

  “What kind of ships?” she asked.

  “Imperial Japanese Navy ships. Warships.”

  He was close enough that she could smell the Ivory soap on his skin. The fleck in his eye seemed darker this morning. Here Clark was, telling her something dangerous and life altering, and all she wanted was for him to take her in his arms and kiss her. Boy, did she have her priorities wrong.

  “Did you hear me?” he said.

  Her heart felt like it had dropped into her abdomen. “What does this mean? Everyone says the Japanese would never attack us,” she said.

  “I’m turning in our report straightaway, and I’m sure by now our stations on Oahu are onto them. But I wanted to warn you. In the off chance of an invasion, there’s a place on the North Shore I want you to know how to get to.”

  “You’re scaring me,” she said.

  “This is worst-case scenario. But you should be prepared.”

  “Is that where you’ll be?”

  He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter where I’ll be. Once you get to the bay I told you about, with the big surf, find a place to park your car out of sight. You’ll see two gun turrets on each side of the beach, but you want to go back into the valley, not stay near the beach. Follow the stream back about a mile and you’ll come to a concrete bunker built into the hillside. Two miles back is another one.”

  For some reason, her fear was peppered with anger. “So I should just waltz in there and tell them you sent me?”

  “Eva, this is serious. There are actually pillboxes all over the island, but this is somewhere you could hide out for a long time if necessary. The military isn’t using them. There are banana trees, guava trees and even big fat prawns in the stream. And, of course, water.”

  “How far from Pearl Harbor is it?” she asked.

  “About an hour, maybe less.”

  She pictured Japanese soldiers coming ashore, shooting and burning and taking prisoners at every turn. Clark’s vision sounded like a better option. If she could make it there without being caught. The roads out there couldn’t be very good and she had never been good at fishing. “Maybe I should do a practice run.” Her voice sounded panicky even to her own ears.

  “It wouldn’t hurt,” he said, shifting around on his feet.

  He seemed like he was gearing up to kiss her goodbye, then thought better of it. Eva couldn’t help it, she jumped forward and wrapped her arms around him as a child would. He was like a big, warm rock. At first his arms just hung there, but a few seconds later he pulled her tight enough to squeeze the air from her lungs. Tears streamed down her cheeks. When he kissed the top of her head, a sob escaped from deep in her chest that sounded more animal than human.

  “It just wasn’t our time,” he said in a soft voice.

  A moment later he was gone.

  * * *

  Eva ignored the breakfast bell and spent the next hour on the opposite side of the deck from where she usually found Clark. Staring out into the ocean was supposed to be a balm for tattered nerves and yet all she wanted to do was cry. Such a lovely sight with high cotton clouds and yet it did nothing for her. People showed up in shockingly bright fabrics and the kind of getups you would only see on a tropical island—strapless with flowery prints and exceedingly bright colors.

  “Look, there it is!” someone nearby shouted.

  Sure enough, a faint green outline loomed on the horizon. She remembered clearly, while reading the Matson brochure, how it had seemed so alluring and so distant, “...the first view of the jagged cliffs of Oahu brings a wave of excitement, an ineffable feeling of romance and mystery.” Here they finally were, and there was none of that. Nowhere in the brochure had it mentioned a fleet of Japanese troops lurking off Oahu. Or the possibility of war breaking out at any moment.

  As they neared enough to see the coastline, two young girls ran past her, screaming, “Diamond Head, Diamond Head!” Smaller boats streamed alongside them now, with sepia-skinned people hanging halfway overboard and waving. The rolling seas that they’d encountered yesterday had lain down and the water was now a brilliant turquoise. Pretty soon, welcoming crews climbed aboard, bringing garlands of flowers that they called lei, and draped them around everyone’s necks. Eva had never seen such an extravagant greeting. A tugboat called the Mikioi guided them into the harbor, where Hawaiian boys were leaping into the water to retrieve quarters. They had been warned the boys would only go for quarters, not nickels or dimes, and especially not pennies. It was all so festive.

  If only.

  Amid
the hundreds of faces, blurred by serpentine streamers, Eva searched for Billy’s. A troupe of women in long leaf skirts danced the hula, while a band of men in white uniforms played Hawaiian tunes. Once off the ship, she struggled to push through the masses, looking and looking. In his last letter, he had said he would do his best to meet her at the pier, and on the odd chance he couldn’t make it, he would send someone.

  The heat was for the record books, or maybe this was normal for Honolulu. Either way, her shoes were going to melt into the pavement at any moment. Half-clad women held up cardboard signs. Holzman. Rigg. Abernathy. Spencer. Eva spun around. Would Clark be leaving with one of these beauties? With women like this around, who needed a wife?

  What also struck her was how colorful the people were. Not their clothes, their skin. She tried not to stare, but they were honey, ochre, copper, chestnut and everything in between. Some were voluptuous with thick manes of hair, others were rail thin and had jet-black hair glistening in the sun like strands of glass. All of them were smiling. Aloha! Youkoso! Just then, someone grabbed at her arm from behind.

  “Excuse me, are you Evelyn Olson?” a man in uniform said.

  Her body went rigid. “Who wants to know?”

  The shock of hearing the name Olson was like someone pressing a hot iron onto her neck. Her paperwork into the Army Corps said she had attended University of Lewistown nursing program in northern Indiana, with experience at Greenwood Hospital, where her close friend Eve Cassidy had studied and subsequently worked. In a desperate state, Eva had borrowed Eve’s transcripts and changed the e to an a, hoping no one would notice. Eve had agreed, with the stipulation that she would forever claim ignorance if anyone found out. The army had been so pressed for nurses to send overseas, they hardly checked. Thank goodness for friends who believed in you. And in one day, Evelyn Olson had become Eva Cassidy.