Pacific Sniper

Beyond the killing field, the jungle began. The survivors of the banzai attack had withdrawn into the jungle cover, only to be caught in the bombardment of the big navy guns. There was no telling how many enemy dead lay among the shattered trunks and torn ground. It was doubtful that anyone could have survived the shelling.

The American troops kept to their foxholes, awaiting another attack, but it seemed unlikely that there were enough enemy troops left to mount one.

“What do you think is next for us?” Philly wondered.

“For now, I reckon we sit here and bake until the brass figures out what to do with us.” It wasn’t pleasant, sitting in the foxholes without any shelter from the sun. Deke was glad of his wide-brimmed hat. Still, he could feel his skin beginning to redden and burn wherever the sun touched it. The sunburn made his scars hurt. Every now and then he felt a breeze touch his sunburned skin, and the fresh air reminded him wistfully of the mountains back home.

He wasn’t the only one feeling the effects of the tropical sun. Some men had abandoned common sense by taking off their helmets, even though they remained in a combat zone. The heat and humidity hung over everything like a blanket. Again, the growing smell of the dead didn’t help.

Philly waved in the direction of the burial detail. Several civilians carried shovels and had set to work digging graves in which to bury the American dead.

“Who are those guys? They look like Japs.”

“Not Japanese,” Yoshio said, finally speaking up. “Chamorros.”

“Who?”

“The Chamorros are the native people of Guam,” Yoshio explained. “They are Pacific islanders, not Japanese. In fact, the Japanese enslaved many of them and forced them to work building their fortifications and expanding the airfield. The Japanese were very cruel to these people. I would say it is safe to say that they hate the Japanese.”

“How the hell do you know so much?” Philly asked suspiciously.

“We were briefed before the landing.”

“If those Chamorros hated the Japanese so much, you’d think that they’d fight back,” Deke pointed out.

Yoshio nodded. “Some have tried. There have been guerrillas fighting in the jungle for many months. But you see, they have very little to fight with—maybe a few old rifles and not much ammunition.”

“Just goes to show that it never hurts to have a good rifle handy if you want to stay free.”

“That may be true,” Yoshio said. “However, it is my understanding that the Chamorros are a very peaceful people. Do not forget that they were under the protection of the United States for more than forty years until the Japanese invaded. In a way, we let them down.”

Deke looked more closely at the Chamorros laboring under the hot sun. They were built small, like the Japanese, and most of them looked underfed and exceedingly thin. Their clothes were little better than rags, except where some of them had donned cast-off pieces of American uniforms. Even then, the sleeves and pants were too long, and they had to roll them up. To Deke, who was no stranger to farm labor, the Chamorros looked tough and hardworking.

Lieutenant Steele came by. He still had a bandage over his eye, but he was struggling to keep it in place. The bandage might have started out white, but it was now smudged with mud and blackened with gunpowder and gun oil. “How are you boys holding up?” he asked, absently adjusting the bandage.

“We’ll be fine as long as the Japs keep to the jungle,” Philly said.

“I wouldn’t count on it,” Steele said. “Better keep a sharp lookout. There’s no telling when they’ll be back.”

Steele moved off down the line.

Seeing the lieutenant struggle with his eye patch gave Deke an idea. He picked up the abandoned boot that he had found earlier in the foxhole.

The leather upper was still in good shape, and Deke thought that he could salvage something from it. Growing up on the farm, he always had been good at working with leather, whether it was repairing harnesses for the horses or getting a little more life out of a pair of shoes. There was something satisfying about working with leather—perhaps the durability of it.

Using his razor-sharp knife, he carefully cut an oval patch from the upper. He then used a bit of black greasepaint to finish the edges. He used the tip of the knife to punch holes at opposite ends of the oval. Finally, he threaded one of the waxed bootlaces through the holes.

When Lieutenant Steele came by a half hour later, Deke called out to him.

“Honcho, I’ve got something for you.”

“I hope it’s a Jap prisoner,” the lieutenant said. “HQ wants one bad, but the Japs aren’t cooperating. The only live ones we’ve found are mostly shot to pieces and aren’t much for talking. Speaking of which, Yoshio, you need to get down to the beach and see if you can talk to any of those Jap wounded.”

“Sorry, but it ain’t a Jap,” Deke said as the Nisei interpreter crawled out of the foxhole and hurried away. Deke held out the leather patch, and the lieutenant looked at it quizzically.

“What is it?”