The Bomb

by Theodore Taylor

  "They have Hawaiian disease," she said to Sorry. "All they see are the palm trees and the lagoon. They hear guitar music that isn't here. They look around and say, 'Not a bad place to live,' and fly back to Bikini with their portable typewriters and suntan oil."

  ***

  In mid-June, Sorry began to paint Abram's stolen outrigger and sail. The villagers could understand the new coat for the canoe but wondered why the sail was being painted. It would be stiff and difficult to handle, everyone knew.

  When asked, Sorry just smiled widely and said, "To brighten up the sea."

  No sailor of the Marshalls would ever be satisfied with that answer. No sailor would ever do anything to cut the speed or handling of a canoe.

  "You're up to something," Manoj Ijjirik said, observing the brush spreading the red lead over the mainsail.

  "You'll know soon, Manoj," Sorry replied.

  He'd thought of little except the bomb drop over the last few weeks. He'd gone over it and over it in his mind—when to sail, how far away to be when the bomber flew over. He was confident they'd see him down there, a splash of vivid red against the blue sea. The newsmen would tell the world about it instantly; the navy would postpone the test. Then the navy would find another place for the tests and everyone could go back to Bikini. There'd be no radiation poison falling on it. It would work, Sorry was convinced, and it was all Abram's idea!

  Tara came down to the beach. "You were serious, weren't you?"

  Sorry was on his knees, wielding the brush. He straightened up. "Yes, I was very serious."

  "Does your mother know? Does your grandfather know? Does Chief Juda know?"

  Sorry shook his head. "I'll tell them when I tell everyone else."

  "This is insane, Sorry. Abram probably wouldn't have tried it, after all. It was just something he dreamed up out of frustration."

  "I don't think so. I think he believed it would work."

  "You have more intelligence than that. The navy isn't going to call off the test because of a single red canoe in the lagoon. All those ships! All those men! It's costing millions..."

  "We'll win by simply getting in the way, like Abram said. They won't drop the bomb. The newspapers and radio will report it, and they'll find another place."

  Tara sighed and shook her head in dismay. "I thought you had more sense than to even think more about it. Abram would be the first to say don't do it, Sorry. Do not do it...."

  "My mind is made up. I'll sail two or three days before the test, then hide out on Lomlik. During the night, I'll sail closer to the target fleet. I can put the canoe within six miles of the Nevada and still be safe."

  "Who said that?"

  "Dr. Garrison."

  "Did he know why you wanted that information?"

  "No," Sorry admitted.

  "You should talk about this in the council."

  "It won't do any good."

  Tara started to walk away, then turned and frowned. "Are you certain that Dr. Garrison said you could come within six miles of the Nevada and still be safe?"

  "That's how far people were away from the first bomb test."

  She shook her head. "This is ridiculous."

  She watched him painting for a moment longer, then returned to the canoe and sat down on the rail. "What makes you think they'll see you?"

  "Dr. Garrison said they have powerful bombsights. And I'm going to polish one of the Japanese tins so they can see flashes when the sun shines on it."

  "Oh, Sorry..." Worry and frustration spread over her face.

  "Tara, my father would have done it. He was not a coward. Neither am I."

  On a cloudy June 24, Dave's Dream, the B-29 Superfortress that would carry the Able bomb, made practice runs over the target fleet. Dave's Dream dropped a harmless practice bomb and hit the Nevada almost bull's-eye. The Able bomb was similar to Fat Man, the one dropped on Nagasaki. It was eleven feet long and weighed over 10,000 pounds. Painted on the casing of the bomb, which would soon unleash tons of deadly radium over the quiet lagoon, was the name Gilda, a Hollywood movie character played by the beautiful actress Rita Hayworth.

  14

  Grandfather Jonjen blew his conch shell to again gather everyone for Tara's nightly news report.

  "They'll now drop the bomb July first at eight-thirty," Tara announced.

  The shot had been postponed twice for unknown reasons. This time, Armed Forces Radio said all the target ships were in place with animals on board, and the bomb was waiting on Kwajalein, guarded by marines.

  Sorry's pulse quickened.

  "How big is that bomb?" Manoj Ijjirik asked.

  "I have no idea," Tara replied. "The radio said it will be the same size and type as the one they dropped on Nagasaki. They called that one Fat Man."

  Fat Man. Sorry got a mind picture of a huge-bellied bomb spewing up an atomic cloud.

  ***

  By now, late June, they were in the wet season, always a blessed time in the northern Marshalls. Rain pelted down on the new roof of the church.

  The white men had all gone back to their support ships for the blast. Before departing, Lieutenant Hastings promised that no one would be in any danger on Rongerik. An LST would be waiting in the lagoon to take them to safety if the cloud laden with particles of plutonium came that way.

  Other questions were asked, and Tara tried to answer them as best she could, looking at her broadcast notes.

  Would they hear the bomb go off? She didn't know.

  Would they see the flash? She didn't know.

  Would the cloud look like any other cloud? She didn't know.

  Would rain fall from it? She didn't know.

  The villagers were asking impossible questions. Few of them had ever used a phone or lived with electricity or ridden in an automobile, and they were desperately trying to understand what the white men had suddenly brought into their lives.

  ***

  After the news report, Sorry stood up and took a deep breath. Then he said in a steady voice, "I'm going back to Bikini on Friday. I'll be on Lomlik Sunday night. I hope to be within six miles of the Nevada on Monday morning. I hope they'll see me and call off the bomb—save our island, find some other place."

  For a moment, there was dead silence. The villagers could not believe what they'd just heard.

  Mother Rinamu, quickly getting to her feet, said, "You'll do no such thing, Sorry. Have you lost your mind?"

  Leje Ijjirik laughed hollowly. "Even if they see you, they'll drop the bomb. One crazy boy in a red outrigger. That won't stop them."

  Chief Juda said, "That sounds like something Abram would do. You got the paint from him, didn't you?"

  "Yes, and the idea," Sorry quietly admitted.

  "We might have known," Leje said with disgust.

  Tara stood up and said, "I'm going with him. Abram was right. We have to protest what's happening out here."

  Sorry was astonished. Tara was coming along?

  Leje said, "Two crazy people..."

  Everyone was now looking at Tara. She moved to stand by Sorry.

  Then Grandfather Jonjen hoisted himself up on his crooked stick. "I'm going, too," he said.

  Manoj Ijjirik rose up and asked for volunteers to man a larger canoe.

  No hands came up. No voices spoke.

  So much for Sorry's idea of having the whole village sail to Bikini. He looked around at the 160-odd faces before him. There were frowns and more looks of disbelief: looks that said, You're crazy, Sorry Rinamu!

  Tara broke the trance. "We're simply thumbing our noses at the giant." She put her thumb up to her nose, wiggled her fingers, and drew needed laughter.

  The people lingered after the announcement and talked to Sorry and his mother and Tara and Jonjen. They wanted to be part of what was going to happen at their atoll, yet none had changed their minds about going.

  Even Manoj Ijjirik didn't volunteer to ride in the red canoe.

  "Why are you coming?" Sorry asked Tara later, still surprised at her
decision.

  "I think someone has to protest, as Abram said. I couldn't let you do it alone. And I now think it will work. I really think it will."

  Then Sorry asked Jonjen why he was coming.

  "Someone has to be there to pray."

  ***

  The next morning, almost everyone went down to the beach to look at the canoe, unable to believe where it was going to go, what it was going to do.

  Sorry answered the same question—"Are you sure they'll see you?"—again and again. His answer was yes.

  At noon, Tara went to the community house, where the new radio was kept, and started the generator so she could listen to the news and recharge the battery. Sorry and Lokileni went with her.

  Soon she said, "They're moving everyone on Wotho and Eniwetok to Kwajalein, just in case the wind blows the wrong way." The weather report indicated clouds and rain over the northern Marshalls for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. The villagers were expecting their "safety" LST to show up by Sunday night.

  Sorry said, "I think we can sneak right into the lagoon without being caught."

  He'd use the regular white sail to make the voyage from Rongerik to Bikini, then change to the red one at Lomlik.

  The target ships lay quietly at anchor about four miles off the Bikini beach. The Nevada was at zeropoint position, and not far away were other battleships—Pennsylvania, New York, and Arkansas—in their standard navy gray. The carriers Saratoga and independence, veterans of wild air battles, were there. Foreign ships included the ugly Japanese battleship Nagato, squatting like a huge toad, and the sleek German cruiser Prinz Eugen, probably the finest warship afloat. Others were spread out from zeropoint roughly in a wagon-wheel formation.

  15

  The more most of the villagers thought about it and talked about it over the next four days, the more the return to Bikini seemed so heroic, so daring, that it could not fail. It was a way of telling the whole world about a small band of people who were helpless against a giant.

  There they were on a spirit-ridden little island, feeling abandoned by the Americans, feeling the Americans had stolen their land, and believing that they were certain to starve in not many months. Rongerik could not support them, they knew. And this was a chance, perhaps their only chance, to say, World, look at us. Look at what you've done to us!

  Sorry heard the talk and felt encouraged by it. Mother Rinamu was now thinking that way, talking that way, proudly reminding everyone that it was her son who was going to stop the bomb. Even Leje Ijjirik became quiet.

  ***

  Sorry walked along the beach with Lokileni the morning of June 28, not long after sunrise. Beneath all his hero talk were doubts and fears.

  "Are you certain you want to go?" she asked.

  Without the slightest hesitation he answered, "I'm certain, Lokileni."

  "I'm frightened for you," she said. "If you get too close..."

  "I won't. Jimman will tell me when I'm six miles away."

  He hugged her, and then she went off to join the women and children picking red hibiscus in that one area of Rongerik beach—the only nice part of the island, some thought. A path of flowers would be made from the church down to the outrigger.

  The canoe was ready, with chunks of baked tuna and grated coconut and bottles of fresh water, plus a dozen K-ration boxes—combat rations—left by the navy. There were mats to sit on and sleep on. They were taking fishing gear to catch meals along the way. The voyage shouldn't take more than seventy-two hours, if the wind was favorable.

  Sorry spent a few minutes with his mother, embracing her, telling her not to worry, that he would see her in about six days. She smiled at him through brave tears and said, "Take care of yourself."

  Then the villagers went to a church service. Grandfather Jonjen read from the Bible and prayed for God to protect His children and allow them to change the minds of the white men and convince them not to drop their terrible weapon over the home lagoon.

  Then they sang "Amazing Grace," faces toward heaven.

  After the service, Sorry led Tara and Jonjen, each wearing leis and warrior headbands, down the hibiscus path to the canoe. That was in the tradition of the old tribes, who went off to war in fifty-foot canoes, with their clamshell axes.

  The villagers lined up on either side of the path, clapping hands and wishing them well. Even Leje Ijjirik was there slapping his palms together.

  Sorry's confident face seemed to be wreathed in gold from the early sun, the way the leaders must have looked when sailing two hundred years ago—strong and handsome.

  Good-byes were said, the lateen sail was raised, and the canoe, with Jonjen and Tara in it, was shoved out into the water by many men. Sorry leapt in.

  He broke out in a wide smile and held his fingers up in the sign that the Americans had taught them, the victory sign. The villagers kept waving until the red canoe with the white sail grew dim on the horizon and went out through Bok Pass.

  On June 30, a reminder signal went out from the command ship, Alt. McKinley, "One July Is Able Day." Within minutes, final preparations were made on instrumentation ashore and aboard the target ships. The pigs, goats, caged rats, mice, and other animals were in their assigned positions. In the late afternoon most of the support ships still in the lagoon began to leave. A few stayed behind to check on the target vessels and make certain all personnel had been taken off. The support ships were assigned to areas east and northwest and would stay in those relative positions until after the bomb drop. The Alt. McKinley had been code-named Sadeyes and the silver-colored bomber, Dave's Dream, had been code-named Skylight One.

  16

  The clouds hid the red canoe on the way to Lomlik. Now and then they'd hear the sounds of aircraft engines above; there seemed to be dozens. One sounded as if it would break through the low clouds. At times, there was light rain.

  Looking up at the cloud cover, Tara asked, "What are they doing?"

  Sorry had no idea.

  If the clouds parted and that aircraft found them, they'd likely be reported, be forced to turn back. The radio had said that all sea traffic had to stay at least 150 miles away from Bikini during the next three days.

  Sorry stayed to the north of the atoll and sighted Nam, then Worik; and finally, at sundown Sunday, there was long, skinny Lomlik, where the Rinamus owned land. The clouds had pulled back in midafternoon, and by twilight the canoe was in the home atoll.

  Bikini Island was only a smudge, but even in the poor light of sundown they saw that the face of the lagoon had changed completely. In the far distance were the anchored dark forms of the larger ships, the aircraft carriers and battleships.

  Most of the "live" ships had departed, leaving the "dead" ones, many with animals aboard, to wait the night out. A tower with a big instrument on top was mounted on Lomlik, facing the target ships. Sorry had an eerie feeling as they pulled near its steel legs. It looked mean and hateful in the shallow light.

  Sorry had been to Lomlik dozens of times to pick coconuts, Jonjen many more times than that. Jonjen looked around their land. He said, "The white men always seem to spoil whatever they touch."

  They were home—but they weren't home, because this wasn't home to them anymore, wasn't the lagoon that Sorry had grown up in. It was a foreign water now under a foreign flag. They couldn't see any change on Bikini itself; it was too far away in this graying dusk. But they knew the change was there. The beautiful lagoon had turned hostile, its outriggers replaced by warships.

  They talked very little. There was not much to say. What could be said of the bomb, and of the bomber that would be up there tomorrow morning with a Fat Man in its belly?

  They ate K-rations, and just before bedding down, Sorry said, "Have you changed your minds? If you have, go over on the barrier beach in the morning. If I can't stop the bomb, you'll be safe there, I think."

  Tara said, "We're going out with you, Sorry."

  Jonjen said, "I didn't come all this way to sit on the barrier beach."
/>   "I want to head for the target fleet not long after midnight," Sorry said.

  They stretched out on their mats, and soon Grandfather Jonjen, at peace with his world, was snoring away, as usual, under the stars.

  Neither Sorry nor Tara could sleep.

  Sorry said, "When I was seven, we knew the typhoon was coming. The old men, like Jonjen, could tell it was coming our way by the looks of the sky and by how the breeze was blowing, the smell of the air. The birds vanished from the atoll and even the fish went to the bottom. I'd heard about typhoons from Jonjen and was so frightened I could hardly speak. After a time of total silence, with not a whisper of breeze, it roared in, sending us up the palms and destroying the village. I feel like that now, Tara. Frightened, suddenly. It's so quiet here; the lagoon is so black."

  She said, after a silence, "I was thinking yesterday that we were too young to die. Why should we take this chance? About halfway here I thought about asking you to turn back. Then I thought about what Abram would do. He would keep going, I knew, and he would shake his fist at the navy."

  "That's what I thought, too, when that plane came so low. Abram would keep going. So we've come all this way and must go out there tomorrow morning and hope they'll see us..."

  Sorry finally dozed off.

  Around two o'clock, he awakened Tara and Jonjen to say, "Let's put the red sail on."

  That took about ten minutes.

  Then they ate K-rations again and were ready to go, Tara and Grandfather Jonjen climbing into the canoe.

  Sorry shoved off and caught the light breeze, sailing south toward the target area in the pitch-dark lagoon.

  They didn't speak, worried that the white man's electronic ears might hear them. Ears that Dr. Garrison had described.

  Book III

  The Bomb

  At 5:43 A.M., July 1, on Kwajalein, the four engines of Dave's Dream mumbled sweetly as it taxied out to the long runway, the atom bomb tucked in its belly. Then the engines began to roar as pilot Woodrow Swancutt opened the throttles. Dave's Dream quivered at runway's end while all the instruments and dials were checked one last time. Finally, the brakes were released and she began to roll, gaining speed until liftoff.