Jungle Sniper

CHAPTER TWENTY

Deke followed Danilo, maintaining an interval. He could almost feel the tension in the Filipino’s wiry shoulders, so he knew Danilo was alert and watchful. Again, Deke didn’t think there were any Japanese around, but maybe Danilo knew something they didn’t. He had been fighting the Japanese for much longer.

The trail was well worn underfoot, and it was clear that a large number of men had passed this way recently. The boot prints were not American. Deke realized that would have been the Japanese column, retreating deeper into the jungle.

From time to time, a tree limb or vine would block the path — it seemed to be the jungle’s not-so-subtle attempt to reclaim the trail or warn them off. Whenever that happened, Danilo’s huge bolo machete would be in his hand in a flash, lopping away the intruding brush. Much as Deke loved his bowie knife, it didn’t have the heft to chop away vines and branches in one swift blow. No wonder so many of the Filipino guerrillas carried bolo machetes. They were the right tool for the job, all right.

Captain Merrick came up, his uniform striped with dark sweat stains. Like most of the men in the company, he carried an M1 rifle. His uniform and helmet bore no insignia — he didn’t need it because all the men in his unit knew who he was. It would have been hard to pick him out as an officer at all, except for the confident way that he held himself, as though he had a ramrod for a spine, even moving down this jungle trail.

“What was your name again?” he asked Deke.

“Private Cole. Most just call me Deke.”

Merrick nodded. “Listen up, Deke. We need to pick up the pace,” he said. “We’re never going to get across the peninsula at this rate. Tell this Filipino gentleman to hurry it up.”

“I don’t think he understands much English.”

“Figure it out. Poke him in the rump with a bayonet if you have to. That’s kind of a universal message.”

Captain Merrick fell back along the trail, checking on the men as he went.

Fortunately Deke didn’t need to poke Danilo with a bayonet. The guide seemed to have understood the urgency in Captain Merrick’s tone of voice; either that, or he understood more English than he let on. He glanced back at Deke with a questioning look.

“You heard the man,” Deke said. “Hurry it up. Rapido.”

Danilo picked up the pace. Danilo didn’t seem happy about moving faster along the jungle trail, and neither did Deke. He understood the captain’s sense of urgency, but some things were better off not being rushed.

It had been growing darker and darker under the trees, and now it started to rain, which was a frequent occurrence on Leyte. An hour later the sun would be out again.

The rain fell gently at first, creating a soothing patter of raindrops on the leaves. Soon the rain fell more heavily, turning each broad leaf into a miniature waterfall that sluiced water onto the heads of the troops. Inside a helmet, the falling water hitting the steel echoed annoyingly. More rain dripped down the backs of their necks and ran under the collars of their field shirts.

A few soldiers stopped to put on their ponchos, but by then they were already wet. He caught a glimpse of the four-eyed soldier struggling to get his poncho over his haversack, holding up the line to the point that a sergeant shouted at him. The clumsy kid managed to get so tangled up that another soldier had to fix his poncho for him. Deke shook his head, wondering what the army expected them to do against the Japs with soldiers like that. It didn’t help that as they waited in the rain, the column of troops looked less like soldiers and more like miserable drowned rats.

Deke didn’t like the rain one bit because it muffled any sound and disguised any movement. All that he could see ahead were wet leaves and sheets of falling rain. There could be an entire Japanese battalion waiting in ambush around the next bend in the trail.

The jungle presented its challenges, so different from the mountain forests back home. Whenever he had been able to slip away from farm chores, Deke had spent hours wandering the woods and overgrown fields of farms abandoned during the Great Depression, the land slowly reverting to a state as wild as it had been when the first settlers arrived before the Revolutionary War.

It took surprisingly little time for trees to begin growing in the fields, for fences to rot away, for sheds to crumble. The landscape was all too eager to become wilderness again. For some reason, these scenes of lonely ruin appealed to him. He had gone out rambling in all sorts of weather and in different seasons, trekking through snow, summer thunderstorms, the chill winds of late autumn under bruised skies.

More often than not, he’d had a rifle or shotgun in hand in case he came across any game for the stewpot. It was just how his ancestors had lived and survived in those mountains, and Deke was formed from the same clay.

While other men like Philly griped and complained about the Philippine forest, Deke managed to appreciate it. The thick canopy created a green roof under which they moved in shadow, even during the daytime, and the walls of vegetation pressing against the edges of the trail created a sense of isolation that he enjoyed. Even the heat and humidity were something he could embrace when he thought back to all the times he had shivered his way through the farm chores on a winter’s morning.

The thousand shades of green and brown, broken up with bright flashes of color from flowers or jungle birds, were hard not to appreciate. Other men kept their eyes focused on the mud and dirt of the trail, but Deke’s eyes roved the surrounding landscape, ever alert. Maybe he was only imagining it, but the jungle seemed to be watching them in turn as the column of soldiers passed by.

There was so much to see, from a bird with brilliant plumage taking shelter from the rain to massive vines, each the thickness of a man’s arm, that hung from the canopy like tendrils. If it hadn’t been for the threat of the Japanese, he would even enjoy walking through a place such as this, rain and all.

The Japanese, he reminded himself. We’re going to fight the Japanese. The Japs are going to be more than happy to fight us.

He kept repeating the thought, trying to make sense of it, trying to fathom what that meant here in this dense jungle cover. It seemed a fool’s errand, in a way. Why hadn’t they simply gone by ship around the peninsula with the bulk of the troops? But some general had decided to keep the Japs guessing, or maybe to keep the pressure on them, so here they were.

Captain Merrick called a halt. “Ten minutes, boys. Get a load off if you want. Just make sure you don’t sit on any snakes or set off any booby traps.”

Some men flopped down on the dank, rotting leaves immediately, while others took their time, investigating first. It was hard to say what worried them more — the captain’s mention of snakes or booby traps. The ones who had simply dumped themselves into the mat of rotting leaves were probably too tired to care, one way or another.

In the middle of the jungle trail, Danilo squatted on his haunches the way the Filipinos did. It didn’t look comfortable to Deke, but it did keep your ass out of the mud.

Deke didn’t rest but moved along the line, taking the measure of the men. He passed the soldier that he had pulled out of the wreck. He couldn’t help but shake his head at the sight of the soldier’s chubby frame. Baby fat. The kid couldn’t have been more than eighteen. He was poking around in the weeds with a stick, making sure the coast was clear before he sat down. Deke wanted to tell him that whatever critters might be in the bushes were the least of his worries.

That kid was no soldier. What was he doing here? Why was Deke here? Why was any of this happening?

All because the Japanese had decided to bomb Pearl Harbor, that was why. December 7, 1941. His cousin Jasper had been one of the casualties that day, along with thousands of other sailors. Oddly enough, the coming of the war had liberated Deke from the sawmill. Give me the jungle any day.

Deke looked into the chubby soldier’s face. It was expressionless, blank. A lamb headed to slaughter. He wasn’t afraid. He sat there on the rotting leaves, rifle practically tossed on the ground, waiting for whatever would happen next.

“What’s your name again?” Deke asked.

“Dickie Shelby,” he said in a squeaky voice.

“Didn’t you have glasses before?”

“I broke them when a branch slapped me across the face.”

“Uh-huh. Can you see anything without your glasses?”

“It’s a little blurry,” Dickie admitted.

“Keep your rifle out of the mud,” Deke said. “You might be needing it soon. Just make sure you’re close enough to tell it’s a Jap you’re shooting at.”

A man nearby didn’t seem to like the fact that Deke was handing out advice that bordered on orders. He asked harshly, “What are you, our new sergeant?”

“Shut up,” Deke growled.

The man seemed like he was about to say more, but he got a glimpse of Deke’s cold eyes and clammed up.

Deke moved on. He found Merrick a little farther down the line. The captain gave him a nod of acknowledgment, waiting to hear what he had to say. “Got something on your mind, Deke?”

“I don’t like this,” he told the captain. “We could be walking right into an ambush in this rain. Let me and Danilo go on ahead and make sure the trail is clear.”

“Who the hell is Danilo? You mean that Filipino?”

Deke nodded. “I can tell that he knows this ground.”

“All right,” Merrick agreed. “Send word back if you come across something.”

“Don’t worry,” Deke said. “I reckon you’ll hear me shooting.”

He returned to the front of the column and told his plan to Philly and Yoshio. They would stay with the main column. He rousted Danilo off his haunches, and they left the column behind. He felt better without the distraction of the rain-soaked column following immediately after. With just him and Danilo, it would be a lot easier to sense any enemy activity ahead.

The trail began to climb, then kept going up and up. The trail was steep and slippery in places, with roots trying to trip him. Clearly they had reached some of the mountains they had glimpsed earlier in the distance. That was progress for you. The jungle kept getting thicker and thicker, the heavy leaves seeming to absorb more of the light so that they were moving through shadow.

The air remained hot and humid, almost stifling down here where there wasn’t any breeze. The rain had stopped, but there was still so much moisture dripping from the trees that it was hard to tell.

The bare ground of the trail was wet and slippery, but if you stepped off the trail for a moment, the layer of damp, dead leaves felt as though you were walking on a soggy sponge.

Up ahead, a vine thick as his arm hung down from an overhanging tree branch. The vine moved, which was odd, considering there was no breeze. Taking a second look, he realized that it was not a vine at all, but a large snake. He gulped, keeping an eye on the snake as it slithered along the branch and out of sight, taking its time. The sight of snakes back home didn’t much bother him, but he felt a shiver run down his spine. That ain’t a garter snake.

The place was also lousy with mosquitoes. They buzzed in Deke’s ears, landed on his sweaty neck, flew into his nostrils. Deke was soon covered in bites. Some sort of centipede dropped from overhead and landed on Deke’s arm, then quickly legged it toward the back of his bare hand. Before he could flick it away, he felt a sting, and within minutes a marble-size welt grew on the back of his hand. It hurt like fire, but he ignored the pain, keeping his attention focused on the trail ahead. He reckoned that a Japanese bayonet through his guts would hurt a whole lot worse.

Everything in this place seemed to be out to get them, never mind the Japs. He recalled how Father Francisco had shared a story about how an expedition of Spanish conquistadors had entered the deep jungle during their exploration of Leyte and were never seen again. The priest had shared the story with a certain amount of pride, as if the jungle had settled some kind of score against the Spaniards. At the time, Deke had taken it as an old wives’ tale that those tough bastards with their swords and armor had simply been swallowed up by the jungle. Now he wasn’t so sure.

For whatever reason, the pesky critters didn’t seem to bother Danilo. Maybe he was just used to them. He didn’t swat at mosquitoes or so much as give the snake a second look.

Fortunately, Danilo hadn’t led them astray yet. Even Deke, for all his woodsy skill, wasn’t sure that he could have found their way back, considering that none of the trails were marked. The various forks and crossings got confusing. Their orders were to forge ahead. Either from instinct or experience, Danilo was finding the way forward.

It was hard to say how far they had come. A few miles, maybe? Surrounded by forest, the lack of any visible landmarks made it hard to judge. Somewhere behind the clouds, the sun began to go down. Deke was sure that when darkness came, it would come quickly. He looked around a little uneasily at the dense trees on either side of the trail. Already he couldn’t see more than fifty feet before the trees receded into the jungle gloom.

When they reached a wide place in the trail, Danilo signaled a halt. Deke nodded in silent agreement. It was getting dark, and there was no point in continuing. It would be too easy to simply wander off the trail. Deke pitied anyone who happened to.

He went back and found Captain Merrick, who agreed to a halt.

“Do you want us to dig in?” a sergeant asked, studying the ground beneath his feet doubtfully.

Merrick looked at the ground, thick with tangled roots. “Tell the men to do what they can,” he said. It went against every bone in the captain’s body not to at least try to dig in. “I don’t know how they’ll get through this mess. Let’s make sure we have guards posted at either end of the trail. If there’s trouble, that’s where it’s going to come from.”

Orders were given and the guards were posted. Some men managed to scoop out a shallow hole that was soon filled with rainwater, mud, and all sorts of creepy crawlies.

Deke saw that he’d been right — night fell swiftly. There was no tropical afterglow as there was near the beach areas. It was like being inside a cave.

Before it was completely dark, Danilo produced a string hammock from his bag, along with mosquito netting that he draped over his face. In minutes he was asleep in relative comfort.

The soldiers weren’t nearly so lucky. After their C rations, nobody slept, or not well. The men not on guard duty managed to snatch some sleep, dozing off as they sat upright, clutching their rifles. A few of the men rigged shelter halves in the branches in an attempt to stay dry. Others had a better idea and used the canvas to cover the soggy ground.

Deke sat beside Philly and Yoshio, the three of them huddled under ponchos. Although the rain had stopped, the trees still dripped, and the night was cooler than expected.

“I can’t decide if it’s wetter on the inside or the outside of this poncho,” Deke said.

“It’s a toss-up,” Philly agreed. “I do know one thing, which is that it’s darker than the inside of a cow out here.”

Yoshio spoke up. “Philly, how do you know what the inside of a cow looks like?”

“Stick with me, kid, and you might learn something yet.”

Deke strained to see much beyond their little huddle. He could hear the other men — coughing, muttering in low tones, the sound of a canteen cap being screwed back on — but he couldn’t see them. “There’s an old country saying about passing the night — in other words, getting through the dark hours. This is gonna be a night to be passed.”

Deke decided he was all right with that — not that he had any real choice. Beside him, Philly and then Yoshio dozed, but Deke stayed awake, listening.

Once the rain had stopped, the nighttime jungle came awake. He heard singing insects louder than an orchestra, night birds, screech owls. At some point he heard a low growl in the distance and the sort of animal scream that came only from something being torn by claws and teeth. Hunters and prey. You’ve got to be one or the other in this world.

The jungle noises unsettled the men nearby, who gave voice to their complaints, or even pointed their rifles into the forest.

Deke didn’t mind the noise. If the creatures that lived here were going about their business, it meant that there weren’t any Japs on the prowl. If the jungle fell silent, that was when they’d have to worry.

Minute by minute, hour by hour, the night passed.

As for tomorrow, it was anyone’s guess what the dawn would bring.