Savage Sniper

CHAPTER SEVEN

Having been summoned to HQ, Deke and the others quickly dismantled their makeshift sun shelter, knowing it was unlikely they’d return. Then the six of them — plus Thor — made their way to the command tent.

They took their time crossing the beach, similar to men on the way to the executioner. Nonetheless, Deke felt a stubborn pride in the fact that when there was a hard job to do, it was usually Patrol Easy that was called to do it.

At this point it was still anybody’s guess why they had been called to HQ, but recent experience indicated that it wouldn’t be to take part in a division cookout and baseball game.

Headquarters was a hubbub of activity, with a steady stream of men and messengers going in all directions. Weary officers and sergeants trudged in and out of the tent that had been set up on the beach. The tent’s canvas flanks were buffeted by the tropical sea breeze. The constant flapping made a sound like a tethered sail. Two guards were posted outside the tent, just in case some diehard Japanese suddenly appeared. Their uniforms had the ragged and filthy appearance that could only be the result of several days spent fighting across the interior following the landing that had taken place on the beach.

“Maybe we’ll get guard duty,” Rodeo said.

“Fat chance of that,” Philly muttered. “Look around. Almost every poor bastard on guard duty is walking wounded. No, they’ve got something else in mind for us.”

One of the guards, a soldier with a thick bandage on his shoulder, reached out to scratch Thor’s ears, but the war dog was having none of that. His warning growl was a low rumble.

“I wouldn’t do that unless you want to lose a hand,” Egan advised.

The soldier quickly withdrew his hand, as if he had just touched a hot stove.

“We’re supposed to meet our lieutenant here,” Deke told him.

“Go on in,” the soldier said, keeping a wary eye on Thor. “But if I were you, I’d leave that dog out here. The Filipino too.”

Egan obliged by taking a cigarette break, Thor sitting beside him. “Fill me in later, fellas.”

But Deke wasn’t going to leave Danilo behind. He turned to the guard. “He’s one of us. He goes where we go.”

The guard squared his shoulders as if he might make an issue of it, but looked away from Deke’s hard glare. “Suit yourself,” the guard replied. He stepped to one side so that they could pass.

The tent was full of tired-looking men in uniform, most of them with a few days’ worth of stubble on their faces. It was quite dark compared to the relentless brightness of the beach. The tent flaps had been left rolled down to keep all the paperwork from blowing around, which meant that the interior felt stifling.

A haze of tobacco smoke added to the murkiness within. The atmosphere was not improved by the proximity of soldiers who had not had the luxury of showering for several days. On the plus side, everyone stank about the same.

Deke looked around for someone in charge, but it seemed like every officer there was too busy to pay attention to them. Where the hell was Lieutenant Steele?

Finally, after a few moments, an older man in a major’s uniform stepped out from the gloom at the back of the tent and greeted them keenly. “You boys must be Patrol Easy?” he said with a smile.

“Yes, sir,” Deke replied. Although he didn’t outrank anyone in the patrol, he always seemed to become their point man by default. After all, headquarters was just another jungle of sorts.

The officer introduced himself as Major Henry Flanders, an intelligence officer from General MacArthur’s staff. Hearing that, all sorts of alarm bells began to go off in Deke’s mind, as he recalled their earlier mission to take out the guns on Hill 522 near Palo ahead of the first landing on Leyte. Those orders had come right from the top. Now what?

“You boys are doing one hell of a job out there, and I want to thank you for that,” Major Flanders said quietly. Deke couldn’t help but notice that the major’s combat uniform was sweat stained, but clean in the sense that it wasn’t covered in grime, gun oil, and flecks of dried blood.

Deke’s first impression was that Major Flanders was a no-nonsense sort of man, right down to the .45 on his hip. The worn leather of the holster hinted that the sidearm had seen some use. The major was in his late forties and heavyset but not fat — it looked as if he could still throw a punch or two that would get someone’s attention, and probably had done just that from time to time.

Coming from most officers, Deke would have dismissed the major’s words of thanks as only so much biscuit gravy, but Flanders appeared nothing but sincere. He offered them cigarettes from a fresh pack. Rodeo and Philly accepted, and when Philly tried to hand back the pack, the major waved him off. “Keep it,” he said.

“Thank you, sir,” said Philly, sounding like he meant it for once. Then again, when a man said he was from MacArthur’s staff, that tended to prompt respect.

“Let’s grab ourselves a corner of this circus tent and let me explain what this is all about.”

The major led the way to an unclaimed corner of the tent and told them to grab a knee, while he remained standing. Once again, Deke looked around for Honcho. To his relief, he saw him come through the tent flaps, spot his men, and make a beeline for the corner. He was carrying several bottles of Coca-Cola, which explained his absence from the tent.

“I see you boys have met Major Flanders,” Lieutenant Steele said. He handed the bottles around, and the men accepted them eagerly. To Deke’s surprise, the soda pop was even somewhat chilled. It had been weeks since they’d had anything to drink other than canteen water and coffee that was just this side of rusty water. “I thought you all could use something cold to drink while you heard his proposition for us.”

“Proposition?” Philly snorted, then took a long drink from the bottle and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He smacked his lips in satisfaction. “That makes it sound like we have any choice in the matter.”

“Just shut up and drink your soda,” Steele said. “Major, they’re all yours to brief.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant.”

Major Flanders once again praised the men for what they had done up to this point, saying that MacArthur was pleased with the progress on Leyte.

The major filled them in on what they had accomplished so far — they had located several Japanese positions scattered throughout the jungle and hills and were actively rooting out any remaining resistance they came across. It wasn’t anything that the men didn’t already know, but the major’s words made it official.

Then Major Flanders got down to business, revealing why Patrol Easy had been summoned to HQ. Lieutenant Steele had framed it as a proposition, but it soon became clear that the men were being presented with something that they couldn’t turn down — it just wasn’t in their nature.

“You men know that General MacArthur is especially concerned with the status of prisoners of war held by the Japanese. The Japanese have several POW camps, some that we know about and some that are just coming to light. He has warned the enemy in no uncertain terms about the dire consequences of harming any of these POWs. However, the fear is that the enemy will use these prisoners as pawns or bargaining chips.”

“That’s against the Geneva Convention,” Philly complained.

“When has that ever stopped the Japanese?” Deke responded, some heat in his voice as he remembered how the Japanese had killed his buddy within minutes of the beach landing on Guam. He had witnessed nothing but cruelty from the Japanese. More incidents came to mind. “For starters, you saw how they killed all those civilians back in Palo.”

Flanders jumped back in. “Speaking of which, there’s a fear that the Japanese may kill the prisoners outright rather than release them. The prisoners are mostly Americans, airmen who’ve been shot down, sailors picked up at sea, maybe even a few infantrymen captured back in forty-one. There are a few Australians mixed into the bunch.”

“I like those Aussies,” Philly said. “They sure know how to fight.”

Flanders continued, “Unfortunately, we have evidence that there has already been some killing of prisoners, although these are isolated incidents, thank God.” The major paused, looked around to make sure no one else in the tent was eavesdropping, then lowered his voice. “There was a situation recently where the enemy forced our men to dig what they said was an air-raid trench, but it turns out our boys were digging their own grave. They doused our men with gasoline and set them on fire. Burned alive.”

“Those slant-eyed sons of bitches,” Philly muttered.

Deke felt a white-hot surge of anger go through him. He was sure that the others felt the same way.

“If General MacArthur is so damned concerned about the POWs, then why the hell doesn’t he send in some paratroopers or a bunch of tanks to go liberate them? Seems to me that this is all a lot of hot air.”

“Deke,” Lieutenant Steele said, growling a warning. “That’s enough of that, soldier.”

A look of irritation passed over Major Flanders’s face at Deke’s outburst. He opened his mouth to say something, then reconsidered when he met Deke’s angry gaze.

Deke knew better, but he couldn’t help it. His anger bubbled over sometimes when it came to the hot air spouted by the likes of officers, businessmen, and bankers. There were those who talked about it and those who acted. Deke didn’t have much patience with the first group.

Sadie had once compared him to a chicken pot pie that was all hard crust on the outside and bubbling hot on the inside.

“You’re nothin’ but a mouthful of hot gravy waiting to burn somebody,” she’d said.

He felt Yoshio touch his arm in an attempt to calm him down.

“Look, son, we’re all on the same side here,” Flanders eventually said with something that sounded like empathy. “I’m getting to the part where we do something about it.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Conditions at these camps are pretty rough,” Major Flanders continued. “It’s doubtful that the Japanese have enough food to feed their own troops at this point, let alone any prisoners. Our boys are kept on starvation rations at best.”

“We ain’t exactly livin’ high off the hog ourselves,” Deke said. “But it’s a whole lot different when you’re a prisoner.”

“You said it, soldier,” Flanders said, warming to the topic. “But it gets worse. The conditions are filthy — no showers, no clean clothes. Medical attention is almost nonexistent. Finally, our boys are badly mistreated, everything from slave labor to beatings just because it amuses some Jap prison guard.”

None of them liked the thought of fellow Americans being held captive by the Japanese. One thing for sure was that Major Flanders did not paint a pretty picture of the American POWs’ fates. He went on in gruesome detail, describing everything from starvation to beheadings.

“Bastards,” Philly muttered. “I’d really like to get my hands on those Japs.”

“That’s the spirit,” Flanders said. “General MacArthur does not want any more of our men to be abused or murdered by the Japanese, nor does he want our boys to be used as hostages or cannon fodder. As we become aware of these camps, he wants our men liberated by any means necessary. Some of the larger camps near Manila are still beyond our reach.”

“The Japanese still hold Manila,” Lieutenant Steele pointed out.

Flanders nodded, then looked pointedly at Deke. “Here’s the part where we do something about it. There’s at least one POW camp here on Leyte that’s cause for concern. Some of our sources with the Filipino resistance say that the commandant is a real hard case. The Filipinos have given us a location, and we’ve verified it through aerial photographs. We want our men freed from that camp. That’s where you boys come in.”

If the major had intended to whip them up into a righteous frenzy, he had succeeded.

It had been one hell of a sales pitch.

It was all Deke could do not to grab his rifle and set off there and then to liberate the camp — and he didn’t even know where it was yet.

Flanders continued, “We didn’t want to send just anyone on this job. We need just the right men. Your lieutenant here says that you are the best jungle warriors in the division.”

“Damn straight we are,” Philly said.

“Good. That’s just what we need,” Flanders said. “You know as well as I do that we’re shorthanded here — we’re tied up fighting all these damn holdouts — so we can’t spare a lot of men. General Bruce has agreed to free you up for this mission. I can tell you that General Bruce takes this very personally. He cares as much about freeing the POWs as anyone.”

“I’ve only got a handful of men,” Steele pointed out. Lieutenant Steele had surprised them by speaking up. Since he had handed off the show to Major Flanders, they had almost forgotten he was there.

“Don’t you worry, Lieutenant. You’ll have some help from the Filipino guerrillas. There’s a local guerrilla leader named Father Francisco, a Catholic priest, and he’s agreed to help.”

Several of the men nodded. They had fought alongside Father Francisco and his men near Palo. Deke remembered the priest as being tough and smart, a natural-born leader of the fight against the Japanese occupation. It sounded as if the priest had expanded his area of operations since then. Of course, the fight for control of Leyte had also widened considerably since the initial beach landing.

“We can use all the help we can get,” Steele said.

Major Flanders nodded thoughtfully as Steele spoke, then said, “I’d send a whole company if we could, but a patrol will move faster.”

“That’s why they call us Patrol Easy.”

The major seemed amused. “You’re probably not wrong about that.”

“Don’t we have anything else to go on, sir?” Deke asked. “Can you tell us anything else about this POW compound.”

“I’m glad you asked, soldier.” Major Flanders had been hanging onto a folder, which he opened now. Inside were a half-dozen black-and-white photographs. “We do have some aerial reconnaissance. Unfortunately, our boys were dodging a couple of Japanese fighters at the time and had to skedaddle in a hurry. They did get these pictures.”

He had handed the photos off to Deke, who passed them around. The photographs showed the compound from various overhead angles. However, none of the photographs were particularly close or showed much detail.

The overall impression was of a gloomy, forbidding hellhole carved into a jungle clearing. Looking closely, it was evident that there were two separate clusters of rough buildings — one cluster likely housing the Japanese guards and the other cluster for prisoners.

There was a guard tower and a tall fence evident in the photographs. Outside the fence there appeared to be newly turned soil, as if someone was trying to grow something — or more ominously, trying to bury something.

“Do you reckon that’s a garden or a graveyard outside the fence?” Deke asked.

“I don’t know about the garden,” the major said. “Under a magnifying glass, you can see that the disturbed ground is consistent with several graves.”

Philly was squinting hard at the photo in his hand, but without the benefit of a magnifying glass it was hard to see the details. “I’ll be damned,” he said to no one in particular.

“Those photographs don’t tell us much,” Steele said. “Is that all we have to go on?”

“We have a rough approximation of the prison camp’s location,” Flanders said. “The Filipino guerrillas that you’ll be working with do have some local knowledge of the area, although the camp isn’t located near any towns or villages. That information and the photographs are pretty much all the intelligence that we have.”

“The commandant’s shoe size might be nice to know,” Steele said, characteristically tongue in cheek. “Short of that, it would be good to know how many guards we might be facing.”

“Look, this won’t be an easy mission,” the major admitted. “You’ll have to cross through the interior, which you know is mostly jungle and hills, sprinkled with more than a few Japanese patrols. Once you get there, you may be facing overwhelming odds. In all honestly, we really don’t know what you’ll be up against or how many Japanese are garrisoned at this POW compound.”

Philly spoke up. “So we’re going into this more or less blind, huh? In other words, business as usual.”

The major’s smile faded as he said, “I’m glad that you feel that way, soldier. But just to be clear, only volunteers will be going on this mission. This isn’t going to be a cakewalk. If anyone doesn’t want to be part of this mission, now is the time to speak up. No questions asked, right, Lieutenant?”

Now it was Steele’s turn to smile. “I guess you don’t know my men very well, Major. But since you brought it up, I suppose I have to ask. Does anybody want to sit this one out?”

One by one, the men stood and stepped forward, coming to attention in front of the intelligence officer.

“That settles it, then,” Major Flanders said. “I can’t thank you men enough.”

“You can thank us when we bring those POWs home,” Steele said.

Now that they had all agreed to go on the mission, the major revealed a few more details. As much as possible, they were to avoid any Japanese forces that they might encounter in the jungle terrain, although they were welcome to relay any information about the strength and whereabouts of the enemy back to headquarters, using their radio or one of the Filipino guerrillas as a runner.

“I wouldn’t normally say this, but avoid taking any prisoners. They’ll only slow you down. This is a rescue mission, not a combat mission,” he pointed out. “As much as possible, avoid engaging the enemy. There might be plenty of fighting to do, anyhow, once you get to that POW camp.”

He thanked them again for all that they had done thus far — and wished them luck as they went off into the unknown dangers of the Filipino jungle once more. In fact, the major seemed genuinely moved. He shook their hands, one by one.

“Do whatever it takes,” he said. “And bring our boys home.”

Lieutenant Steele looked around at them with satisfaction, as if he hadn’t expected anything less. There was also a glint in his eye that seemed to indicate that he was as affected by the major’s description of the mission as much as any of the men. “It’s decided, then. Let’s saddle up. We’ll be traveling light, so leave the tea service at home.”

“Dammit,” Philly muttered. “I just got that new teapot and everything.”

“If you’re going to carry anything extra, bring ammo,” Steele said. “From the sounds of things, we’re going to need it. One more thing, Major. How soon do we leave?”

“I hate to say it, but this is one of those situations where each day counts. The Japanese are getting desperate enough to do something stupid.”

The major hadn’t come right out and said it, but no interpretation was needed. The POWs might not have much time.

Steele grinned again, the eye that wasn’t covered by the patch glittering intensely in the dim gloom inside the tent, bright as a lighthouse on a stormy night. “In other words, sooner is always better than later,” he said. “We can resupply and head out before dark.”

Major Flanders nodded. He knew better than to wish them good luck. Some soldiers had a superstition that wishing someone good luck was sure to bring the opposite result. “Give ’em hell,” he said.