Barbed Wire and Cherry Blossoms (11 page)

Hiroshi knows the only thing that will soothe his mind is writing a letter to his parents, to confess the shame of not dying in the war. A letter to relieve himself of the burden
of the shame he carries. A letter to relieve his mother of her heartache, to tell her that her son is alive.

He lies down and waits for sleep to find him. He thinks about how he will eventually get home. Will he have to wait until the war is over? Should he ask Mary for help to get to a boat? When will he be able to feel the sunshine on his face again? He wants his chaotic mind to stop – stop thinking about war and death, and stop stealing hope from him. He thinks of Mary, picturing her handing him food, offering him comfort, and that thought puts his mind and body at ease. He thinks he is a different man when he is with her. He breathes in the jasmine again. He feels the tension drain from his neck and recites out loud another of Bash-o's Haikus while he thinks of her, wishing he was living Bash-o's words:

The irises, they

do too, tell of the pleasures

of the sojourn, no?

Mary's heart sinks the minute she lays eyes on Hiroshi the next day. It is clear that he has had little sleep: his face looks tired, eyes bloodshot, and his smile is slower to form than on previous days. He slumps when he stands to welcome her.

‘Are you all right?' she asks, knowing full well that no one could be all right in his circumstances. Mary wishes she could give him a hug. She is on the brink of tears looking at him.

‘Can I have some paper please?' he says softly. ‘To write a letter to my mother.'

‘Yes, I'll bring you some paper tomorrow.' Mary's heart aches for Hiroshi. She can't begin to imagine how much he must miss his family. She is determined that she will get some paper and more kerosene for the lantern and some matches, but she knows she will have to steal it all. This fact does not deter her at all. Stealing in this instance will be the right thing to do.

She does not stay long; the mood in the shelter is intense and sad, and she is wise enough, even at her age, to know that sometimes people need to be left alone, even when they are alone most of the time. She hands Hiroshi more of the rabbit stew her mother says they'll be eating for weeks – and bounding like bunnies afterwards.

He takes it gratefully, and she leaves without another word.

It's 3 September 1944, and Mary skims the newspaper for her own interest before she gives it to Hiroshi. There's plenty about dances, theatre, meetings, balls, and a boring gossip column, but absolutely nothing about the loss of life on Cowra's doorstep.

But no coverage means no mention of the soldier still missing and this is the daily relief that she requires. It's as if the army hasn't yet realised that Hiroshi has not been found, dead or alive. She's grateful anyway; it's better for him to be
invisible in the big scheme of things, that way there is more hope for the future.

The most interesting thing in the
Guardian
is a story about Cowra beating Orange in the football. The names Murray, Bamblett and McGuiness are mentioned and when she shows him, Hiroshi seems as pleased as she is that they are highlighted in the paper. He has never met any of these men but, thanks to Mary, he understands that they are important to the community and most of them, in some way, are her family. He has lost track of how many cousins and second cousins she has, but loves that her family is so large and so close, even though it's a sad reminder that his isn't.

‘In the compound,' Mary begins bravely and somewhat boldly, ‘what did you do for entertainment? Did you play sport?' She knows this might be a stupid question, but surely they were outside during the day and she really wants to know what life in the compound was like. She rarely sees Jim, the only Aboriginal guard up there, so there's no one else to ask.

‘We played a lot of baseball,' Hiroshi says.

‘Baseball?' Mary asks. ‘I've heard of baseball, but I don't know the rules.'

‘It's an American game, with a bat and a ball, and men run around a diamond.' He draws a diamond in the air with his finger.

Mary sees a connection and is excited. ‘We have a game here called rounders, it sounds a little like your baseball. You hit the ball with a wooden bat, sometimes we use a cricket bat that my dad made out of wood, but some of the boys will just use a broom handle if they have to. You have to hit the ball
and then run from base to base and get there before the ball is thrown there. Is that the same as baseball?'

‘Yes, that sounds a lot like baseball. It's called rounders?'

‘Yes.' Mary doesn't understand how or why the Japanese are playing American baseball. ‘How do you know this American game, though, and aren't you at war with the Americans?'

‘We played baseball when I was at university. We have been playing baseball in Japan for many, many years. It is very popular. We had a baseball team in the 1880s but the year I was born, in 1919 is when Japan first got two professional teams. It's strange now; Japan and America are at war. We hate each other. I don't know if we will have baseball again when I go home.'

Mary is taken aback by the comment. Hiroshi talking about going home upsets her; she doesn't want him to leave. But Hiroshi hasn't seen the change in her expression and keeps talking.

‘Back home I followed the Yomiuri Giants. We called them the Tokyo Giants.' Hiroshi laughs for the first time in months. He shakes his head. ‘Tokyo Giants is so American. We are so much like the country we are at war with.'

‘And you played baseball in the camp?'

‘Yes, we made the baseball gloves ourselves from old boots, and masks for the catcher. We would take one grille out of the Kendo masks we used in our own Japanese martial arts and we would turn it into a catcher's mask.' Hiroshi puts his hands up to his face.

Mary doesn't ask about Kendo because she is conscious of time and wants to know more about the Japanese playing
American baseball with other soldiers. ‘Did you play sport with the Italians?' Mary asks, knowing that they were the first prisoners to arrive in Cowra. ‘Everyone says they are very funny.'

‘No!' Hiroshi says aggressively, a tone that Mary has not heard him use before. He sees her reaction to his voice, and repeats more softly, ‘No. I am sorry, no, we didn't.'

There's silence for a few seconds and then he adds, ‘We did not mix with the Italians. We had our separate places of living.'

‘Yes, but surely they would let you play baseball against each other?'

‘We did nothing with them,' Hiroshi says, conscious that Mary might judge him for hating the Italians as well as the Americans. Hiroshi hasn't really heard Mary speaking about hating anyone. He thinks Mary is a nice girl who is too young and probably too sheltered to understand anything of life in a prisoner of war camp, regardless of how much she might like to try. ‘They are very different to us. They sing a lot and play instruments.'

‘What instruments did they play, and what did they sing?'

Hiroshi is not eager to respond, he did not and does not care for the Italians. Like most of the Japanese soldiers, he feels an unspoken level of contempt for them, perhaps because they were allowed out into the community while the Japanese weren't. Or perhaps it is because they were happy to wait the war out in Australia and didn't wear the pressure of shame for being a prisoner of war. He is sure the Italians don't have an Emperor or a centuries-old philosophy of dying with
honour. He has read that the Italians had signed an armistice with the Allies, which makes him hate them more. In Hiroshi's eyes they have no shame, which also means that he and the other Japanese soldiers think they are better than the Italians.

The Italians were held in A and C Compounds and the hardline fascists were held in D Compound. He doesn't want to tell Mary that even though the Japanese enjoyed operas and dramatic performances in B Compound every month, the Italians were thought to do it better and had their own opera society and band. It irks Hiroshi that the Italians also played soccer and created their own field to play on.

Hiroshi also partly resents the fact that the guards always considered the Italians cheerful. ‘Why aren't you more like the Italians?' he'd heard more than once. He's never seen it, but knows the Italians had building skills and many were artisans back home. Unlike the Japanese, the Italians had turned their camp into a place like their home country: there were garden beds between the mess halls, and the men used their skills as cobblers to turn old car tyres into sandals to sell in the community.

Either way, it is not easy to explain the reality of life in the POW camp with Mary here in front of him with eyes wide and a warm smile that could make any man soft in the heart. He just wants to see her smile more. ‘I think they are called saxophones.' He gestures to blow into a pretend pipe-like instrument and fingers imaginary keys.

Mary loves her father's banjo playing, and Uncle Muddy on the piano accordion is fantastic and when the Williams
boys play their guitars, it's like a party, but something new, something from another country, that is special, and her face lights up.

‘The guards told us the Italians, they play something called a mandolin . . . it is like a small guitar,' he says, gesturing to indicate the size of the instrument.

‘My Uncles play the mandolin too, but gee, it would be wonderful to see the Italians play it. I guess they have different songs,' Mary says cheerfully.

Hiroshi knows that she simply does not understand that nothing about the Italians is wonderful.

There has been silence between them now for the longest time, both lost in their own thoughts of Italian prisoners of war.

‘It's time to leave,' Mary suddenly declares. ‘But before I do, I have a surprise for you.' She watches Hiroshi's face as she hands him the writing materials. Mary has shown initiative and told Mrs Smith she wants to practise writing. This has landed her a notebook and two pencils, which Hiroshi gently takes with both hands.

His heart wells with happiness and gratitude but also the fear of penning the truth of his existence to his parents, even though he doesn't expect they will get to read it.

As she walks through a gentle mist that will later turn into a heavy downpour, Mary is proud of the charity she is offering Hiroshi and hopes the notebook gives him something to pass the time in the long hours he is alone in the shelter. She also hopes that Mrs Smith doesn't ever ask to see the notebook again, because that will require another lie
and she has already lost track of how many lies she has told in the last month. She's glad that even though she has been baptised, she has never been expected to go to confession at St Raphael's, because she would need to be in the confessional for a very long time. While her mother would like to go to church more often, Mary is glad that Aboriginal people from Erambie only go to church on special occasions like weddings and funerals.

By the dim light of the kerosene lamp, Hiroshi begins to write, but it is far harder than he thought it would be. He is already feeling the heartache and pain of the words he must pen to his parents. It takes him almost an hour before he can write something other than the opening greeting. But then the words flow and so do his tears.