She heard something outside, shouting. She walked to the door and opened it.
“Leave that boy alone!” Margaret screamed. If not for her mother, she would have gone into the middle of the fray. Instead, she was holding back, standing at the edge of the curb.
She had tried to stick to her promise to James not to go outside. She and her mother had had breakfast, deciding to let the woman on the sofa sleep, not quite sure what to do with her when she woke up. Margaret still felt a bit leery of her, realizing she was being foolish; if ever there was a loyal husband it was James. It was just that the girl was so darn pretty, even in her shocked, disheveled state. Her mother actually pitied her, in spite of the more than one foul racist comment that had spilled out in her hysteria, as she sobbed that all Japs would burn in hell.
“Suppose it was Chinese that killed our James,” her mother had argued, the two of them whispering together in Japanese after James had left and she had gently slipped Dianne’s head from her lap to a pillow. “How would you first feel? Remember your papa couldn’t stand the Spanish. Men are sick over such crazy things; it infects us too.”
They had decided to just let her sleep and had quietly worked around her. Margaret’s cousin had yet to come home, nor called since yesterday. All radio stations were off the air, there was no newspaper, they were in a vacuum, except when they looked out the windows and could see the fires still burning down at Pearl and in downtown Honolulu.
And then they heard the commotion.
Someone shouting and yelling. She had looked down the street. It was fifteen to twenty men and a couple of women, most of them obviously drunk, weaving their way up through the neighborhood, cursing, yelling, and in their midst they had a rope around the neck of a young man, actually more likely a boy of not much more than sixteen or seventeen, face bloody and puffy. He was Japanese.
That had set her mother off, and the old woman was out the door and down the steps, shouting for the mob to let go of the boy.
Some of the neighbors were out, watching, others nervously peeking out from behind half-closed shutters or doorways.
“Come on out, you goddamn Japs!” someone was screaming. “We got one of your murdering sons of bitches!”
The neighborhood was primarily nisei. An old man came down his walkway, shouting for the men to leave the boy alone, and to Margaret’s horror one of the drunks punched him in the face, sending him sprawling backward.
Some more neighbors were coming out, almost all of them women; old men, frightened children ordered to stay inside. Their men were gone, many called up with the national guard units, or at work. More than a few were married to Caucasian sailors and soldiers, like Margaret and her cousin, with husbands and sons in the middle of the fight--and more than a few would receive telegrams in the days to come.
One of the drunks had several rocks, and he threw them at the old man’s house, breaking a window, the sound of it shattering sent a cold shiver through Margaret and made her think of the infamous Crystal Night of Germany. So it was beginning. . . .
The drunks were laughing, cursing, shouting that the boy was a pilot they’d caught.
Margaret drew closer, could hear the kid pleading in perfect English that he worked for Western Union as a messenger.
There wasn’t even a vague semblance between his blue uniform and that of any Japanese sailor, soldier, or pilot.
“Let him go, you damn cowards!” Margaret screamed.
“Let him go?” a drunk, breath stinking, potbellied, scrawny looking like a scarecrow, unshaved, was up alongside her, and shoved her back so that she nearly lost her balance.
“Let’s string the son of a bitch up right here. Let the other Japs watch,” someone cried, and the small mob started to move toward a tree with an overhanging branch.
“Hey, I’ve always wanted to try one of ‘em,” another drunk shouted, and he pointed toward Margaret. “Heard they put out real good.”
“Go for her, Steve,” one of the mob shouted. The drunk, leering, stepped towards her.
Her kick caught him in the groin; he doubled over with a gasp, collapsing back.
Several of his friends now turned toward her and she backed up, three men closing in, her mother screaming . . .
The bark of the .38-caliber pistol roared out. The three advancing toward Margaret froze.
Dianne stood on the porch, pistol held high, cocked it, and leveled the weapon at the three.
“I’ll kill the next son of a bitch that moves!” she cried.
There was a frozen tableau. The three that had been coming toward Margaret, the dozen or so who had been struggling vainly to toss the rope up over the limb of the tree. A couple of the men with the lynch mob had guns in their hands; one of them started to turn toward Dianne. She swung the revolver and pointed it at him.
“Move and I’ll blow your head off you, filthy bastard,” her voice breaking. “And God damn you, I know how to do it. My boyfriend is a pilot and he taught me how to shoot.”
Ever so slowly Dianne came down the three steps from the front porch, moving toward Margaret and her mother.
“Get inside,” she hissed.
The two women backed up, got behind Dianne, but refused to retreat further.
“I’m staying with you,” Margaret snapped, and then she looked over at the mob around the boy.
“Now let him go!”
More neighbors were gathering, coming over to join the three in support.
One of the drunks, apparently some kind of leader of the group, started towards Dianne. He had a pistol in his hand, his other hand up, and he was actually grinning.
“Come on, blondie, put the gun down. What are you doing defending these Japs anyhow?”
“Let the boy go!” Margaret screamed.
“Shut up, bitch,” the leader shouted.
The roar from Dianne’s pistol snapped out, spinning the man around, dropping him to the pavement, screaming, clutching his shoulder. She cocked and now trained it on the rest of the group.
“Who’s next?”
The wounded man was rolling back and forth, screaming for them to kill her. The rest of the group was frozen. Several started to back away, turned, and ran.
From up on the corner to Pali Highway a pickup truck came around the corner, tires squealing. Margaret’s heart froze. She saw guns sticking out of the back of the truck.
Oh God, it’s starting, it’s really starting!
She tried to grab Dianne by the shoulder, pull her back. The mob looked up at the truck, a few shouting, laughing that friends were coming to help, and another crying a foul oath as to what he was going to do to the traitorous blond bitch.
The truck skidded to a stop. Three national guardsmen armed with Springfield .30s leapt off the back, one of them a nisei, led by the driver, an elderly sergeant.
Without hesitation the three enlisted men leveled their rifles straight at the group, the sergeant with .45 semiautomatic drawn, expertly poised.
“All you drunk sons of bitches, back off right now,” the sergeant shouted.
There was still a frozen moment.
“Let go of that boy now or we shoot! I’m giving you exactly three seconds!
“One . . .”
The mob began to break up.
“Two ...”
They turned and started to run back down the street.
“Three!”
The sergeant raised his pistol and fired it twice, and now what had once been a mob was running in blind panic, facing a gauntlet of taunts from those lining the street.
Dianne, who had been standing rock solid, suddenly just seemed to dissolve, shaking.
The sergeant looked over at her, approaching cautiously, making a point of lowering his pistol.
“Ma’am, please lower your gun.”
She did as ordered.
“Now carefully uncock it.”
She put her thumb on the hammer, pulled the trigger, and let the hammer slowly drop back into place.
The sergeant took it all in: the badly beaten boy, a couple of women from across the street helping untie him from the rope that was already around his neck, the kid shaking uncontrollably, sobbing, the drunk that Margaret had kicked still in the gutter, clutching himself in agony, the wounded man.
The sergeant walked over to the wounded man on the street, and then stepped on his wrist, forcing him to release his pistol, which he picked up.
“Shut your goddamn mouth or I’ll do it for you,” the sergeant snapped, sticking the pistol in his waist belt. He walked up to Dianne. “What happened?”
She couldn’t speak, she was shaking so hard.
“They were going to lynch that boy,” Margaret cried. “Look at the kid, he’s a Western Union boy for God’s sake. They said he was an enemy pilot.”
Her own voice was breaking.
“That scum in the gutter tried to rape me, so I kicked him where it hurt.”
The sergeant could not help but let a flicker of a grin cross his features.
“It got ugly and then my friend here,” and she put a hand on Dianne’s arm, “saved us. She had to shoot that one man, he was getting set to shoot her.”
Margaret hesitated.
“Dianne’s boyfriend was a pilot; he was killed in action on Sunday. She works with my husband, a naval officer, and was staying here.”
The sergeant looked at her, nodded, and then looked back at the wounded man in the street.
“Load that son of a bitch up,” he snapped. “We’ll take him in.”
The women who had been helping the Western Union boy were bringing him over. He was badly bruised, obviously terrified.
A second car came around the corner, more guardsmen getting out, a captain leading the group.
“What’s going on here, Charlie?”
Charlie nodded to Margaret, went over to the officer, the two huddling for a moment, the captain taking it in with a sharp gaze as the sergeant whispered to him.
She could sense these two knew each other well, perhaps were close friends in civilian life. She sensed that the older sergeant was actually the real leader of their rescuers.
The captain nodded and first went to the terrified boy.
“Son, you’ll be OK. No one is going to hurt you. I want to take you into the hospital and get you checked. Do you understand me? Then we’re going to find out who the rest of these scum are and have them arrested for what they did to you.”
The boy couldn’t speak, but just nodded his head.
Two soldiers helped the boy back to the command car. Another two hoisted up the wounded drunk, who yowled with pain as they dragged him off and unceremoniously dumped him in the car as well.
The captain came up to Dianne and actually saluted.
“Ma’am, I’m sorry about this. One of two things can happen. I take you in, there are reports to file, charges pressed, that piece of slime there might try and press countercharges back. Your name will get out, and I hate to say it, but there are more than a few like them out there today that might bother you later. This is the third incident I’ve had to deal with so far today.”
“Or you forget about her,” Margaret interjected.
The captain smiled.
“Ma’am, I don’t know who you are other than one hell of a brave lady. Do we understand each other?” Dianne forced a smile.
He put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed.
“I’m sorry about your loss. We’ve all lost someone, something,” and as he spoke he looked back at the street, the coil of rope. “God, we’ve all lost something if we turn to this.”
He saluted her again and turned away.
“Sergeant, stay here and post a guard on this street.”
The sergeant smiled, saluted. The command car with the wounded drunk and the terrified boy backed out of the street and on to the highway.
“OK, folks, let’s get back inside,” he announced. “The show is over. You’re safe, I promise you that by God.”
“Hey, I know you, Steve, you piece of shit,” the sergeant said, dragging the man still in the gutter up to his feet. “You say a word about this, you come back around here, and I’ll finish the job.”
He gave him a kick to the backside as the injured man, still clutching himself, staggered off down the street.
Margaret took Dianne by the shoulders and pointed her back toward the house.
The three went inside, closing the door. Dianne was no longer shaking; she was remote, stoic.
“Dianne, please give me the gun. Best we hide it for now.”
She held the weapon tight.
“Not for a while. They might be back.”
There were distant gunshots. All three looked back toward the open window, but the sergeant and his men were out in the middle of the street, obviously not concerned, standing in a circle, and smoking.
“I’ll make those boys some coffee,” Margaret’s mother announced, and she went into the kitchen.
Margaret stepped in front of Dianne and put her hands on her shoulders.
“You were so wonderfully brave out there.”
“No, I wasn’t, I was terrified.”
“Why did you do it?” Dianne tried to force a smile.
“I like your mother,” was all she could say, and then both were in each other’s arms, crying.
Enterprise 10:55 hrs local time
“Sir, it is my pleasure to report, all fires are out, watertight integrity is holding.”
Admiral Halsey, dozing, stirred from his seat, looked up at Stubbs standing before him, and smiled. “Good job, Stubbs.”
“Sir, we got five boilers up and running.”
“The crew trapped in the engine room?”
“Reached them a half hour ago.” He paused. “Sir, half of them were dead from the heat, the others barely alive, but by God they kept us running. We pumped out sections of the two decks blocking them, and have a replacement crew in their place now.”
“Good, damn good,” Halsey sighed. “I want to go down to sick bay, shake their hands, God bless them.”
“It was hell down there, sir,” Stubbs sighed. “I went in with the rescue crew. How they stayed alive in that inferno is beyond me. It would have driven most men insane.”
“Most everything this last day could drive men insane,” Halsey said. “It’s called war.”
Stubbs could not reply.
Halsey stood up, stretched, a bit embarrassed to realize he had indeed dozed off, and been asleep in his chair since sometime before dawn. His bridge crew looked away, as if abashed that their boss was realizing they had stood watch over him, not letting anyone disturb him when he had finally collapsed. An old petty officer had placed him in the captain’s chair and ordered everyone to leave him alone for a while.
And across those hours the survivors of Enterprise had fought to contain the last of the fires, shored up bulkheads about to burst, manned pumps and fire hoses, balanced the ship back to a reasonable list of but four degrees to starboard, then fought to block off flooded passageways. Then they had to fight their way down through two flooded decks to secure leaks so that a way could be found to the blocked-off engine room, their only source of power and hope of survival, and to rescue the forty-one men still alive down there who were keeping Enterprise alive.
Towlines to two destroyers had been cast off fifteen minutes ago, and Enterprise was under way on her own, making eight knots, due east. Forward was Indianapolis with her small group of destroyers, ringing the crippled carrier. Their own surviving destroyers and cruisers were matching speed except for two, one to either flank, that were sweeping wide at fifteen knots, searching out any potential threats from subs.
“Our position?” Halsey asked.
“We’re three hundred and ten miles southeast of Oahu, sir, making eight knots,” Stubbs replied. He nodded. “Any sign of the Japs?”
Stubbs looked over at the chi
ef petty officer who had loyally been standing watch over “his” admiral while he slept.
“Sir, we monitored a fight, just after dawn, three hundred miles west northwest of Oahu. It was Lexington. Newton and Sherman got one of their carriers, confirmed as Akagi. Apparently it was their flagship.”
“Damn good,” Halsey said, “though Newton will never let me live that down, getting a kill like that.”
“But, sir, they got the Lexington. She went down just about the same time as Akagi was sunk.”
“Christ.”
He lowered his head. “Newton, Sherman?”
“No word yet on survivors, sir. Just a report radioed in from Chicago saying that flag had been transferred. Knew that meant Lexington was gone. Jap radio traffic was confirming the sinking as well.”
He looked down at the flame-scorched deck of Enterprise, devoid of even a single aircraft.
“That leaves us the only carrier in these waters,” Halsey announced.
No one spoke. The only carrier, but fought out, barely afloat, limping off from the scene of battle.
“Any more attacks on Pearl, or the islands?”
“No, sir. Last sighting of the Japanese fleet, they were steaming due west at fifteen knots or better.”
“They’re pulling out,” Halsey said. “It’s over for now.”
They had to be pulling out, he realized. We’ve sunk two, maybe three of their carriers. They punched us hard, but we punched back at last, damn it. They were most likely low on oil and would make a run now for the Marshalls. But they would be back, of that he was certain. And we have to be ready for them, he thought with deep determination.
“Our oil supply, sir,” Stubbs finally said, interrupting his thoughts. “We definitely will not make it to the West Coast. Half our oil aboard was lost yesterday; half of what is left is mixed with seawater that will have to be distilled off. Indianapolis reports they are down to forty percent. Our destroyers will run dry within three days, though they can calve off of Indianapolis if we maintain current speed of eight knots, which is all we can maintain.”
“So you’re requesting breaking radio silence to request a rendezvous,” Halsey asked.
“Sir, it’s not my place to advise,” Stubbs replied.
Pearl Harbour and Days of Infamy Page 69
