Blood Red Sun

by Mertz, Stephen

  “What shall we do next?” Nagano asked. “What avenues are open to us?”

  “The resurrection at Atsugi will not be quelled,” Okada said respectfully. “It will spread.”

  The Baron said, without turning, “Major, you were returning to your post. The Kempeitai will be extremely busy these next several days. You will be privy to much useful information.”

  “As you say, Baron.”

  Okada let himself out. After the door had closed behind him, Nagano said, under his breath, “Peasant.”

  “Indeed.” The Baron nodded agreement. “But he may prove useful to us.”

  “He will become more difficult to deal with.”

  “What do you suggest, General?”

  “Only that we be cautious in our dealings with him.”

  “And so we shall.”

  “I do not like to say it,” Hayashi interjected, “but Okada may be right about this being the time to commit the remaining resources available to us, before the situation deteriorates any further.”

  “No,” said the Baron. “We bide our time. Our mistake was in overestimating the morale of the troops. The men did not rally to the Bushido code as we thought they would. Were we to attempt to stage another coup, one as or more sweeping than Major Hatanaka’s and the rebellion at Atsugi, we still could not succeed without broad support from all levels of the military, from the officers to the lowliest private.

  “The failure of Major Hatanaka’s coup serves as evidence, gentlemen, that such support does not exist; otherwise, it would have come forth last night, as we, not to mention the unfortunate major, had anticipated.”

  “You make it sound as if all is truly lost,” Hayashi said with dawning understanding. “Is all that remains for an honorable man … seppuku?”

  “That is not what I meant to suggest,” the Baron said sharply. “My father was born when Japan was feudal, with a shogun in Yedo and the land divided among the daimyo. He used to tell my brother and me stories when we were very young about when he was a small boy, when he would see great lords arrive in Yedo borne in palanquins, surrounded by their retainers carrying swords. He remained until his death a figure from that age.”

  The Baron reached up and removed a sword from where it hung displayed upon the wall. The polished Muramasa blade glinted in the sunlight streaming through the window. He held the sword firmly, straight up. He studied Hayashi and Nagano from behind the blade.

  “I promised my father on his deathbed that I would never sheath the sword of the samurai, and I never shall.”

  “I am with you to the end, no matter the outcome,” said Nagano solemnly. “I am in it to the death.”

  “And I,” said Hayashi. “But what can we do to sway this support in the military to our cause?”

  “The men have lost hope.” Baron Tamura sliced the air with the sword. “We will find a way to give them back their hope, to renew their spirit and their faith in themselves. We will show the world that the spirit of Japan, the Bushido code, lives.”

  Keiko watched from her window as Nagano and Hayashi stepped into their cars and were whisked away. She had been watching from her room since dawn. Okada had left a short time earlier. Her uncle would be alone now.

  The hours since that moment on the ledge outside his window were a blur. She felt exhausted, drained physically and emotionally.

  She had bathed to relax after returning to her room, then sat in a chair that had been her favorite since she was a child, the overstuffed one close to the window. She had stared out into the night, listening to the boom of the surf.

  A profound sadness enveloped her and, for some reason, shame, in knowing that her uncle and those soldiers with him were plotting rebellion. They had spoken of a coup in progress.

  She turned on the radio, but there was no mention of a coup. After lowering the volume she had drifted off into a fitful sleep cut short by nightmares she could not remember though their jangly traces left her edgy the moment she awoke.

  Keiko watched the cars carrying General Nagano and Colonel Hayashi disappear down the drive and through the front gate. The waiting was over. She had bided her time patiently for this moment, until after her uncle’s visitors were gone.

  Keiko did not know what she would say to her uncle, nor did she fully understand her own feelings. She only knew she could no longer put off confronting him about what had happened. She must take action.

  She went to find him.

  There was not enough air in the cubicle that served as an interrogation room. As the sun outside climbed, the heat in the Quonset intensified until now, at 1130 hours, it was nearly intolerable, made worse by a constant, grating commotion, a distraction from the rest of the brig on the other side of a thin partition.

  McGiver sat to one side of the table, General Goro across from him. They had not said a word to each other for the past half hour.

  They just sat there, sweating, listening to the flies buzz. McGiver had nearly smoked his way through a pack of Luckies. Goro looked as if he wanted badly to ask for one, but said nothing. McGiver blew smoke across the table into Goro’s face, reached over and snubbed out another butt in an overflowing ash tray. McGiver wore a .45 automatic in a shoulder holster.

  Captain Delaney stepped in. McGiver wondered again at the way the younger man never seemed to sweat, as if ice ran through veins in a body controlled by a cool intellect and nothing else. Delaney closed the door to the cubicle and leaned back against it.

  “Looks like we’re all through with you, General, for now.”

  “What will happen to me?”

  “You’re going to be our guest a while longer, but you’re out of my hands. For now.”

  “Major Corbin—”

  “Has been relieved of duty.”

  “He should have been relieved of duty before he could harm me.”

  “The major earned his right to every chance the brass gave him,” said McGiver. He lit a cigarette. There were large circles of sweat under his armpits. He blew smoke at the Japanese officer.

  Delaney told Goro, “Those radio messages you agreed to send from here did the trick, General. The word is in from all over the island. The counteroffensive is off. Your troops are coming down out of the hills to surrender, as you instructed them to.”

  “Just out of curiosity, General,” McGiver grinned, “Why did you send that message to your forces, telling them to call it off?”

  “You know why.”

  “I want to hear you say it, monkey face.” McGiver’s tone grew sullen.

  “The message from the government news service you showed me,” Goro said. “My Emperor’s wishes.”

  “Your Emperor,” McGiver snorted. “You’re not going to have an emperor when we get through with you, what do you think about that?”

  “Mac,” Delaney said.

  “That is unthinkable,” said Goro.

  “Listen to him.” McGiver blew more smoke into Goro’s face. “Go ahead and think the unthinkable, you goddamn little—”

  Delaney said, “That’ll do, Mac. We had enough of that from Corbin. Get the general into a cell.”

  “Glad to. Let’s go, monkey face.”

  Goro rose and allowed himself to be led out.

  As they passed, Delaney instructed McGiver, “See that he doesn’t get his hands on anything sharp. We’re going to have some conversations in the future with the general and we don’t need a hari-kari to foul us up.”

  “Will do.”

  Goro paused for a moment in front of Delaney.

  “Captain, I have cooperated, have I not?”

  “You did just fine, General.”

  “And you will see to the matter of Sergeant Ballard?”

  “Striking an officer is a serious offense.”

  “Even such an officer as your Major Corbin? I am in enemy hands. I expect no favors and would grant none if our positions were reversed. But it is to your benefit, not mine, that you take steps to help Sergeant Ballard from the trouble he ca
me into in protecting me, in following his orders from General MacArthur and delivering me into your hands safely. I know the value of a good soldier, Captain, if you do not. A man like Ballard and those with him … one does not throw away such men.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  Chapter Eleven

  When Eichelberger walked into MacArthur’s office, Krueger was already there. MacArthur paced, sucking on a pipe, his head wreathed in a cloud of gray smoke.

  MacArthur said, “On the desk, Bob.”

  Eichelberger crossed to the desk and picked up the onionskin there. He read aloud.

  “Emperor will order end to hostilities 4:00 P.M., Tokyo time, this date.” He set down the piece of paper. “It’s finished, then.”

  MacArthur did not interrupt his pacing. He muttered, “I told them months ago to be alert for conciliatory gestures, that the break would come from Tokyo, not the Japanese army, but no one would listen to me. I felt sure peace was near. Had my advice been followed, the resort to atomic weapons would have been unnecessary.”

  “I don’t much care for the one condition of their surrender,” said Krueger. “That continuation of the imperial reign stuff. Unless Hirohito is dethroned, the whole war in the Pacific will have been in vain.”

  “You’re wrong, Walt,” MacArthur countered. “The Japanese people would never renounce their emperor, and without him there can be no orderly transition to peace. They would never submit to allied occupation unless he ordered it. I have no desire whatsoever to debase the emperor in the eyes of his own people.

  “I have plans for Japan’s future, gentlemen. Big plans. A vision, if you will. First, of course, we must disarm and dismantle their military structure, send the soldiers home, dismantle the war industry. We will then use the instrumentality of the Japanese government to implement the occupation. Free elections will be held. The formation of labor unions will be encouraged. Military indoctrination will be eliminated from the schooling. And we will see to it that women are given the right to vote.”

  “Good luck on that one,” Eichelberger said dryly.

  Krueger chuckled. “That particular task could prove more difficult than fighting our way across the Pacific. Women have been second class citizens in Japan since before their recorded history, haven’t they?”

  “That is why we must ensure it being done at this time,” MacArthur said. “Women don’t like war. The military will be totally discredited.”

  Eichelberger frowned. “I just hope this whole surrender business isn’t a grand-scale trap. They’ve proven their treachery every day since Pearl Harbor.”

  “And there’s the internal struggle over there to take into consideration,” Krueger added. “We don’t have any real idea what the hell’s happening inside Japan, given the fanaticism of their military. Let’s not forget it was the generals who got Japan into this. The Emperor is supposed to have resisted them at the start but they conned him into it. The army ran the show then and they do now.”

  “They anticipate internal strife,” said MacArthur. “They’ve requested a preliminary meeting in Manila and have asked for a short time to set their house in order. They’ve admitted that die-hard officers are talking rebellion or might even try to sabotage the surrender. They assure us steps are being taken to deal with these problems. We’ve given them two weeks. That gives us some breathing room, too. But that doesn’t mean we won’t have our hands full until then.

  “I want reservations made for an entire floor of the finest hotel in Yokohama. We are going into the enemy’s camp, gentlemen, and we shall stand tall and walk proud and show no fear. We shall thus earn their respect and, most likely, their cooperation. We shall—”

  He stopped speaking when upraised voices erupted from the outer office, beyond a closed door.

  “What the hell,” Krueger growled.

  He pulled himself from his chair and went to the door and threw it open. Eichelberger joined him in the doorway and MacArthur came to stand behind them, towering over both.

  The first thing to assault their senses was the stench of body odor and the smell of death.

  A pair of GIs stood arguing with the general’s aide who had blocked their way into the inner office. They had obviously not changed clothes since coming in from the field. Each man still wore grimy fatigues, combat webbing, knife, pistol, a rifle slung over his shoulder. They did not look like men who would be stopped by someone standing in their way if they truly wished to pass.

  MacArthur’s aide was reaching for his sidearm. The general touched the gun arm, staying the pistol in its holster. “Hold it, Captain, that won’t be necessary.”

  Krueger turned toward the phone on MacArthur’s desk. “We’ll have the MPs here in a jiffy.”

  “That won’t be necessary either, Walt.” MacArthur stepped from the doorway. “I recognize both of you men from your files. Mischkie and Hanklin. Ballard’s team.”

  “What’s the meaning of this?” Eichelberger demanded of the two.

  “We apologize for the interruption, sir,” Mischkie said.

  “I find that somewhat reassuring.” MacArthur glowered sternly. “But it doesn’t tell us what warrants you two causing a scene in my office.”

  “Like my buddy says, sir, we’re right sorry about barging in here like this,” said Hanklin, “but there’s a matter requiring your immediate attention, sir.”

  “Soldier, there’s more needing my attention than you’ll ever know about. Now what are you doing here, and it better be good or you’ll be on your way down to the brig to sit in a cell with Ballard.”

  Mischkie blinked. “Then you know. That’s what we were trying to get in to tell you about, General.”

  Hanklin put in, “Couldn’t get no help from nobody but the Sarge said we were on direct orders from you. We figured you ought to know about the fix he’s in.”

  “I know about the fix he’s in. I don’t approve of enlisted men striking officers.”

  “Uh, yes sir, we understand that, sir,” said Mischkie. “You being an officer and all, sir,” Hanklin added.

  Mischkie shot him a look to shut up and said, “Sir, Major Corbin was preventing Sergeant Ballard from carrying out your orders, namely keeping General Goro in one piece like we’d been told to. Believe me, we went through hell getting our hands on him. Real hell.”

  “I know about that and I know about Major Corbin.” MacArthur lost some of his sternness. “I ordered him relieved of duty. Delaney from Intelligence is keeping us informed. He’s informed us that General Goro is cooperating fully. As for you two, we’ll forget this incident, considering what you’ve been through and the good job you did, if I have your assurance that when you leave here you’ll return to your quarters on the double and burn those fatigues and reacquaint yourselves with some soap and water.”

  “Reckon we can give our assurance on that right enough, sir,” said Hanklin. “What about the Sarge?”

  The general’s aide snapped, “You were dismissed, soldier.”

  MacArthur said, “Don’t worry about Sergeant Ballard. I have something in mind for him and for you.” He turned back into the inner office, saying to Krueger and Eichelberger, as if nothing had happened, “Now where were we? There’s much to be done,” and the office door closed after them.

  She found him on the parapet that faced across Cape Nojimba to the east, out across the endless ocean beyond. He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, the salty breeze playing with wisps of his hair.

  For a moment, seeing him standing so, she saw in her mind’s eye with instant clarity a nearly identical setting years earlier when she was thirteen years old. She had been sent up here by one of the house staff to bring her uncle to the phone, not knowing what the horrible news would be. He had been standing, gazing out across the ocean, exactly as she found him now.

  That was the day she had learned her father had been killed in China. She blinked away the memory and with it the ache that reached across the years.

&n
bsp; Keiko walked over to stand beside the Baron, the breeze playing with the strands of her hair. The morning mist had dissipated. A fierce sun beat down upon sparkling blue water beneath the harsh sky.

  Several seconds, a half minute, passed with neither of them saying a thing. Then she spoke.

  “What are you thinking, Uncle?”

  “I am thinking that out there is the enemy, poised to strike at the heart of Japan.”

  “And what do you think of me? I must know.”

  “Do you recall when you were a child, the day you came up here to summon me to the telephone for the call about your father?”

  She tried not to reveal a jolt of surprise at his words, and the ache from those years ago stabbed again.

  “I remember.”

  “I thought in the years since that I had come to know you. I have seen you blossom from a lovely, gifted child into a beautiful, talented young woman. I thought I knew you.”

  “Uncle, may I speak freely?”

  “You always have, child.

  “What I heard you and those men plotting last night is wrong.”

  “Do not speak to me of wrong,” he rasped with controlled emotion. “It is wrong to turn one’s back on traditions which have sustained us as a people since our beginnings.” He held his arms straight at his sides, his hands clenched. “You disappoint me, Keiko, and you concern me. I am in a quandary. Who were you spying for out there on that ledge? Was it to satisfy your own curiosity or for someone else?”

  “You think I work for the enemy?”

  “Not for the Americans, no, certainly not. We have discussed your time in the United States often enough for me not to doubt the sincerity of your rejection of Western values. However, your loyalties could be divided. I on the one side, your former superiors in the War Ministry on the other. There are powerful factions on Ichigaya Heights as adamantly opposed to the idea of rebellion as yourself. The War Minister, General Anami, chose seppuku over disobeying his Emperor. Perhaps one of these factions has exploited your closeness to me.”

  “You know that could not be true.”

  “I do not know what to believe about you. Your sentiments are with the premier and the old women politicians who have misled His Majesty.”