by Len Levinson
Frankie was enough of a combat soldier to know he’d better check out the images to be sure. Maybe his eyes weren’t playing tricks on him. Maybe Japs were climbing up the hill, although he figured that was unlikely. Why would Japs want to climb up the hill? There were no Japs in the area anyway.
Unslinging his M 1 rifle, Frankie stalked toward the edge of the cliff. He realized it would make sense for Japs to come that way if they wanted to attack the cave. The Japs would approach the cave on its flank, instead of head-on.
He drew closer to the edge of the cuff but couldn’t see anything moving now. He smiled, because he realized he’d been seeing things. There was no point going all the way to check, and he paused, turning back toward the cave.
He stopped. Something told him he ought to go to the edge of the cliff and look down to be sure. Perhaps Japs were clinging to the side of the cliff, where he couldn’t see them. He thought he might as well go all the way to make certain. If Japs were there, he’d better get ready for them.
Frankie thought he was being overly cautious and silly, but he knew from bitter combat experience that it was better to be overly cautious and silly than to be dead. If Japs were climbing the side of a cliff, the best way to get them would be with a hand grenade.
Frankie felt ridiculous as he crouched down and pulled a grenade from his lapel. There were no Japs on the side of the cliff; yet, he felt as though he had to go through the motions. He pinched together the ends of the pin so it would come out easily, and then he thought, Fuck it, I’ll pull the pin and hold the lever in, to realty be on the safe side.
He pulled the pin and stepped softly toward the edge of the cliff, the grenade ready to explode in his right hand except for the arming lever, which he held down. He carried the pin in his left hand, because he was sure he’d have to replace it as soon as he looked down the cliff and saw nobody there.
Silently he moved toward the edge of the cliff. He raised his size-ten-and-a-half combat boots slowly and brought them down as if they were feathers. Closer he came to the edge of the cliff. It was only a few feet down now, and he bent forward, but couldn’t see anything.
He took the last step and leaned over the edge. His eyes goggled out at the sight of a Japanese soldier pointing a pistol directly up at him! Frankie leaned back, and the pistol fired. The bullet soared past Frankie’s face and came so close he could feel its heat. He turned the lever loose on the hand grenade and it popped away as he dived to the side. He rolled over as he hit the ground, then rolled over again as a bullet ricocheted off the rock where he’d been. Then he stopped and rolled the grenade toward the heads of the Japanese soldiers sprouting up all over the edge of the cliff.
The Japanese soldier with the pistol fired at Frankie again. The bullet struck the ledge directly in front of Frankie, blowing rock splinters into his face, bringing forth dots of blood. Then the hand grenade exploded a few feet behind the Japanese soldier with the pistol, at about the level of his ankles. The blast plastered the Japanese soldiers in the vicinity against the cliff and filled their bodies with scraps of shrapnel. Four Japanese soldiers were killed instantly, and five were wounded severely. The wounded ones relaxed their hands and rolled down the side of the hill.
Frankie leaped to his feet and ran in a zigzag toward the mouth of the cave. “Japs!” he screamed. “Watch out!”
He carried his M 1 rifle in his right hand and plunged into the mouth of the cave, sailing over the heads of all his buddies and all the nurses, who were assembled there. Landing on his stomach, he scrambled around and faced the front of the cave.
Everybody looked at him. He looked back at them. The eyes of the nurses were full of terror.
“Where are they?” asked Lieutenant Breckenridge.
“They were coming up the side of the hill near the latrine! I got a bunch of them with a grenade, but I don’t know how many more are there!”
Lieutenant Breckenridge realized the Japs were trying to assault the cave from the side. The only thing to do was fight the Japs from inside the cave. There was no rear entrance, and he and the others were trapped like rats. Sooner or later the Japs would lob a hand grenade into the cave, and that would be the end of the road for him and the others.
“Well,” Lieutenant Breckenridge said, “all we can to is try to hold them off as best we can. We have room for five men here at the front of the cave. The rest of you stay back and throw out any hand grenades that land in here. I want La Barbara, Yabalonka, O’Rourke, and Shilansky to man the front of the cave with me. Let’s go!”
The four men Lieutenant Breckenridge named took positions at the front of the cave, while the rest lagged back. Captain Stearns told the nurses to get their medicine and bandages ready in case somebody got wounded. The nurses crawled to the rear of the cave to prepare the materials. Lieutenant Breckenridge felt naked without a steel helmet on top of his head. He was reluctant to raise his head and take a look, but it had to be done.
He raised his head and looked outside, then ducked quickly. He’d seen nothing, and no one had fired at him, so he felt emboldened to take a longer look. Raising his head again, he squinted and tried to see Japanese soldiers, but couldn’t spot any. He poked his head out of the cave to examine his right flank, and didn’t see anything there either. Then he turned to the left. No Japs could be seen from that direction. He ducked down behind the natural rock barricade.
“Can’t see them,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean they’re not there.”
A second after the last word was out of his mouth, a machine gun opened fire in the jungle below, and bullets ricocheted off the roof of the cave. The nurses in back of the cave dived to the ground as bullets whistled over their heads. The machine gun in the jungle lowered its sights, and the bullets ripped into the rock barricade. Other bullets flew over the barricade and bounced off the rear walls at the rear of the cave.
Lieutenant Breckenridge held his head low and clicked his teeth in anger. He had no way to put the machine gun out of commission except by backing it down with his Thompson submachine gun and Yabalonka’s BAR, but he couldn’t afford to waste the bullets, and he wouldn’t be able to silence the Japanese machine gun for long anyway.
“Listen to me,” he said to the others. “Keep your heads down and wait until they get close. Then we’ll stop them.”
Frankie La Barbara snorted cynically. “For how long?” he asked.
“As long as we’ve got bullets,” Lieutenant Breckenridge replied.
The Japanese machine gun continued to fire in bursts, and its bullets whacked into the stone wall in front of the cave or ricocheted off the ceiling and walls inside the cave. The GIs and nurses lay on the floor, and everybody was scared, but not so much that they couldn’t function or think straight.
The combat veterans knew pretty much what to expect, because they’d all attacked Japanese bunkers at one time or another and knew the scenario. The first step was to pin down the people inside with machine-gun fire, as the Japs were doing then. The second step was to assault the bunker from the sides. The machine gun would stop firing when the Japs got close to the mouth of the cave, and then the Japs would try to throw grenades into the cave. The GIs were glad the Japanese army didn’t have flame throwers, because it was better to be blown up than roasted alive, if you had to make the choice.
TWELVE . . .
“Sir?” said Major Cobb.
“I’m awake,” replied Colonel Hutchins, lying on his cot.
“It’s oh-three-thirty hours.”
“Light the lamp on my desk, will you Cobb?”
Major Cobb walked to the tent and lit the wick of the lamp with the flame from his Ronson. Colonel Hutchins reached for his shirt on the chair beside his cot and took out his pack of Camels. Major Cobb rushed toward him with his lighter. Colonel Hutchins took his first nicotine puff of the day, and it made him dizzy.
“Those other three patrols come back?” Colonel Hutchins asked as the light in the kerosene lamp made shadows flicker o
n the walls.
“No, sir.”
“I guess we’ll have to presume that they were killed out there.”
“We’ve heard sporadic gunfire throughout the night. You can hear some right now.”
Colonel Hutchins yawned. “Where is my old recon platoon, now that I really need it? See if you can scare me up a cup of coffee, will you, Cobb?”
“I’ll tell Lieutenant Harper, sir.”
Major Cobb walked out of the tent. Colonel Hutchins stood and put on his pants, the cigarette dangling out of his mouth. He walked barefoot to his desk and sat down, pulling out the top drawer. His bottle of GI gin was there, and he unscrewed the top, taking a big swig.
The GI gin warmed him up and banished the shitty morning taste from his mouth. He screwed the top back on the bottle and closed the drawer. On top of his desk was the map of the Eighty-first Division’s location and the territory in front of it. At four-thirty the artillery bombardment was supposed to begin, and Colonel Hutchins wanted to visit his front line, to make sure his men were ready for the attack that would follow the bombardment.
Lieutenant Harper marched into the office, carrying the cup of coffee. “Good morning, sir.”
“What’s so good about it? Wake up Bombasino and tell him to bring my jeep around. I’m going to troop the line, and you’re coming with me.”
“Yes, sir. Should I bring you some breakfast?”
“Yes, and you’d better get something to eat too. It’s going to be a long morning.”
The machine-gun fire stopped.
“Now!” screamed Lieutenant Breckenridge.
He and the others rose up and looked around for Japs, but they couldn’t see any in front of them. Lieutenant Breckenridge leaned out of the cave and aimed his submachine gun to the right. Something moved and he saw an object flying through the air at him. He jumped up and caught it with his right hand, then threw it with all his strength and ducked behind the wall.
The grenade exploded thunderously, and shrapnel cut into the rock that surrounded the front of the cave. Lieutenant Breckenridge raised his head and saw Japanese soldiers attacking the cave from both sides, and then a bunch of Japanese soldiers jumped down from the part of the hill above the cave, landing directly in front of the opening.
“Banzai!” screamed the Japanese soldiers.
Lieutenant Breckenrdige opened fire with his Thompson submachine gun, and Victor Yabalonka pulled the trigger of his BAR. The other GIs fired their M 1 rifles, and the Japanese soldiers fell before the hail of bullets. The GIs maintained their fire, blowing the Japs away, but more Japs continued to charge. Two of them threw hand grenades that sailed over the heads of the GIs behind the front wall of the cave.
Farther back, the Reverend Billie Jones caught one of them and threw it out of the cave. At the same time Craig Delane caught the other and hurled it back. Everybody hit the deck. A Japanese soldier leaped over the barricade, and the two grenades detonated almost simultaneously, shredding the Japanese soldiers in the vicinity.
The Japanese soldier landed inside the cave, carrying his rifle and bayonet, and the first thing he saw was the light-complected face of Lieutenant Susan McCaffrey farther back in the cave. The Japanese soldier blinked, because he didn’t expect to see a beautiful western woman in the cave, and then the Reverend Billie Jones rose up in front of the Japanese soldier.
The Reverend Billie Jones had a big boulder in his right hand, and he smashed it into the face of the Japanese soldier, who raised his rifle and bayonet to defend himself but was too late. The Japanese soldier fell to the ground, and Billie Jones bent over to strip him of his weapon and ammunition. Blood oozed out of the busted skull of the Japanese soldier. The nurses in the back of the cave were horrified, because they’d never seen somebody get killed at close range.
Lieutenant Breckenridge raised his head and saw dead Japanese soldiers littered around the front of the cave, but more Japanese soldiers were charging from the left, right, and front of the cave, screaming at the tops of their lungs, shaking their rifles and bayonets and baring their teeth. Lieutenant Breckenridge raised his submachine gun and pulled the trigger.
Click!
He was out of ammo and didn’t have time to reload. Three Japanese soldiers jumped into the cave; one was an officer brandishing a samurai sword. The Japanese officer saw the Reverend Billie Jones and swung the samurai sword at his head. The Reverend Billie Jones dodged to the side, avoiding the blow, and then lunged forward, grabbing the officer’s wrist. The Reverend Billie Jones was the biggest, strongest man in the recon platoon, and he was mad. He held the officer’s wrist tightly and kicked him in the balls.
The officer’s eyes rolled up into his head, and Billie Jones tore the samurai sword out of his hands. He looked around and saw Craig Delane lying on the ground, blood pouring from his stomach and a Japanese soldier standing over him. The Japanese soldier turned toward the Reverend Billie Jones, who swung his sword with all his might. The Japanese soldier raised his rifle and bayonet to protect himself, and the sword clanged against the barrel of his rifle, sending sparks flying in the air. Then the Japanese soldier closed his eyes and dropped to his knees. Standing behind him was Pfc. Wilkie, who had clobbered the Japanese soldier with his M 1 rifle. The Reverend Billie Jones raised his samurai sword in the air and drove it downward, chopping off the Japanese soldier’s head to make sure he was dead. At the rear of the cave Lieutenant Doris Pagano passed out from the horror of it all.
The Reverend Billie Jones looked around and saw the third Japanese soldier lying on the ground. Pfc. Shilansky stood over him, the bayonet on the end of his M 1 rifle dripping blood.
Craig Delane groaned, trying to hold his intestines in with his hands. Captain Stearns rushed toward him and dropped to her knees. She removed his hands from his stomach and unbuttoned his shirt. Lieutenant Jones brought over sulfa medicine and blood coagulant. Lieutenant McCaffrey knelt on the other side of Craig Delane and felt his pulse.
Meanwhile, at the front of the cave, Lieutenant Breckenridge and the four GIs with him threw hand grenades and fired their weapons at the Japanese soldiers swarming toward them. The grenades exploded in a violent crescendo, blowing Japanese soldiers into the air; American bullets tore into other Japs, but still they continued to surge toward the mouth of the cave. Hand grenades flew into the cave, and the GIs inside threw them back. Pfc. Wilkie caught a grenade but bobbled it, and it fell to the ground. In his frenzied mind he realized it was going to explode, and he did the first thing that came to his mind: He fell on top of it, hoping to smother the blast with his body.
The grenade exploded, and Pfc. Wilkie was killed instantly. His heart was blown to bits, along with his lungs and most of his stomach, which burst out of his back, splattering blood everywhere, but he did muffle the worst of the explosion. The shrapnel passed through his body and was spent before it could harm anybody else.
The nurses worked feverishly on Craig Delane, trying to stop his bleeding. Private Yabalonka’s BAR stopped firing; he didn’t have any more ammunition. Jimmy O’Rourke was also out of ammunition, and he didn’t have any more hand grenades. Lieutenant Breckenridge had only one clip of ammunition left, and he was out of hand grenades too.
Japanese soldiers leapt over the barricade and spilled into the cave. The Reverend Billie Jones attacked them, swinging his samurai sword to the side. He slammed the blade against the arm of one Japanese soldier, chopping it off just below the shoulder. A shot rang out and it whistled past the Reverend Billie Jones’s ear as he raised the samurai sword again and brought it straight down, chopping a Japanese soldier’s head in two. The Reverend Billie Jones yanked the gory blade loose and smacked the next Japanese soldier on the hip, cracking his pelvic bone. The Japanese soldier roared like a wild bull as he dropped to the ground, and the Reverend Billie Jones jumped over him, swinging the blade of the samurai sword again and connecting with a Japanese soldier’s face, lopping off the side of his head.
Private Victor Ya
balonka turned away from the barricade and saw a Japanese bayonet streaking toward his heart. He parried the thrust with his big heavy BAR and then slammed the Japanese soldier in the chops, breaking the Japanese soldier’s jaw loose from its hinges. The Japanese soldier fell down and Yabalonka lashed out with his foot, kicking another Japanese soldier in the balls. A Japanese bayonet slashed down at his head and Yabalonka danced to the side, then pushed his rifle butt forward, ramming the Japanese soldier in the face, flattening his nose. The Japanese soldier fell down and Private. Yabalonka spun around in time to parry a thrust that had been aimed at his back. The Japanese soldier in front of him tried to kick him in the balls, but Yabalonka pivoted to the side, catching the blow on his outer thigh, then hammered the Japanese soldier in the head with his rifle butt. The Japanese soldier’s head cracked apart and brains oozed out of the fissures as he fell to the ground.
Victor Yabalonka looked around and saw dark, shadowy figures locked in close combat all around the interior of the cave. He decided to hold his BAR by the barrel and use it like a baseball bat. He turned the BAR around and grasped the barrel. It was hot, but the bandages on his hands were like potholders. He charged the soldiers fighting a few feet away and saw the backs of two Japanese soldiers emerge out of the darkness. Raising his BAR in the air, he brought it down with all his strength on the head of a Japanese soldier. The Japanese soldier’s head burst apart, blood and brains flying into the air. Then Yabalonka swung sideways at the head of the next Japanese soldier, caving in his skull. The Japanese soldier sagged to the ground at Yabalonka’s feet. Yabalonka stepped forward, looking for another Japanese soldier to kill. A group of Japanese soldiers burst through the melee and charged toward the rear of the cave, where the four nurses were working on the supine body of Craig Delane. The nurses heard the Japanese soldiers coming and picked up their carbines. The Japanese soldiers saw the figures on the ground and angled their bayonets downward. The nurses gritted their teeth and fired their carbines on automatic at point-blank range.
