Days of Infamy (43 page)

However hard they had been hit, they had also hit back. At least
thirty of the attacking planes had reportedly been dropped by excited Wildcat pilots and gunnery crews. It was damn small compensation.

Damage control reported that the forward hundred feet of the ship was torn wide open, while a bomb hit aft had punched clean down to the port side turbine, blowing it apart. That had shut down one of their props completely. Secondary blasts were cutting through both port and starboard engine rooms.

She was already going down at the bow, flooding so rapidly that it made him think of the stories about the
Titanic
, which had been torn open forward, stern lifting out of the air until the ship rose nearly vertical before sliding beneath the waves. At the same time the
Lex
was taking on a sharp list to port, so rapidly that panicked sailors were already abandoning positions below, afraid they would be caught below decks if the carrier rolled over and turtled.

He was responsible for the lives of over two thousand men on board, though only the good Lord knew how many were still here and how many were already dead.

With half this damage, if just below the water line from the torpedoes, or just the bomb hits, he could have put their backs to the wall and ordered a fight to the finish to save this ship. He had never been on a sinking ship before, but all his knowledge and instincts told him that
Lexington
was dying, and would either go down bow first or roll over.

He sighed, looking over at Admiral Newton, who without comment just nodded in agreement.

“Prepare to abandon ship,” he said softly. “Order destroyers to come alongside to take on survivors. Make sure all wounded are properly evacuated. I want no one left behind.”

The intercom system was entirely knocked out, but the order was passed by mouth, shouted down from the bridge, to fire crews
battling the blazes, and then down below, where already men were sensing the inevitable and beginning to stream up to the deck.

THE MOOD IN
the hangar was electric. Radio operators were monitoring both Japanese and American frequencies, shouting out reports, everyone cheering with them when the cry went up, “Definitely scratch a flattop.
Akagi
is burning bow to stern!”

There were backslappings, cheers, a delicious taste of vengeance at last after the heartbreaking confusion of yesterday’s battle of inconclusive reports, and the gut-wrenching sight of the few battered planes returning, pilots numbed with shock.

The voices on the radio sounded exuberant even though squadron leaders were now beginning to report in the heavy toll exacted
for their kill: nearly all the Vindicators and Devastators gone, but still, they had made a kill, and once the survivors were refitted and refueled, they would go out and take another of the four carriers reportedly sighted, of which one was definitely finished.

And then the reports from
Lexington
came in, and then suddenly just went off the air, until one of the ham radio operators announced he had communication with a Wildcat flying combat air patrol. The man’s voice was breaking.

“She’s going down. God damn, they got her, she is going down.”

The gathering in the hangar instantly sobered. There had been hope against hope that
Enterprise
and the attackers from Oahu had perhaps sunk two of them and that maybe there were only two or three left and
Lexington
would finish the lot. But the retiring strike wave reported confirmation of at least three carriers still out there, one pilot chiming in that he had seen two more, farther to the south.

“We don’t have a single carrier left in the entire central Pacific,” Collingwood whispered, awake because of all the confusion and now sitting by James’s side.

“What about the orphans?” someone asked, a pilot standing to one side, eyes hollow, hands in pocket. James looked over at him, didn’t recognize him, and saw a squadron insignia on his sleeve indicating
Enterprise
, the name Dellacroce stenciled on his shirt.

“Order them back here,” General Scales, who had taken command of communication, announced.

There was a moment of silence. Nearly everyone in what was now called the “radio shack” was Army.

“Who knows ranges here?” Scales asked.

The lone
Enterprise
pilot stepped forward.

“I flew Wildcats,” he announced.

“Your name, son?”

“Lieutenant Dellacroce.”

Scales looked at him appraisingly and then actually went over and shook his hand.

“Heard about you. You’re the pilot who nailed five Japs yesterday. Proud to shake your hand, son. You are America’s first ace in this
war. Word’s already out that you’re being put in for the Medal of Honor.”

Dave took his hand, but there was no warmth, only a distant gaze, and James, like so many others, saw and understood that gaze. He was in shock.

James stood up and went over to Dave’s side.

“Tell us what your planes can do. Can they make it back to here?”

“The dive bombers, if fully fueled out, have a range of fifteen hundred miles, but that’s a bunch of civilian-time baloney. Cut that in half for wartime flying, and that is with no damaged fuel tanks. They just might make it. Wildcats, twelve hundred miles, but again, cut that in half, two-thirds if they’ve been dogfighting for fifteen or twenty minutes. A few might make it in.”

“Get the pilot from
Lexington
on the radio,” Scale said. “All birds from
Lexington
to head for Oahu or splash down near that civilian freighter off Kauai.”

Lieutenant Dellacroce turned and walked out of the hangar, gaze fixed on the western horizon, where he knew yet more of his comrades were dying, or nursing in damaged planes. He felt nothing other than infinite weariness.

“SIR, YOU MUST
leave the ship now!”

Yamamoto barely heard him, absorbed in other thoughts. Memories of the first time he had walked her deck, even before launch, dreams of what she would be, the backbone of a new modern navy for Japan, his own times aboard her in various command positions, and now this last time as admiral.

He knew her as intimately as he knew his own children. He had seen her grow and change. He had seen the early rickety biplanes taking off from her deck, and then this morning, in her final strike, sleek Zeroes, Vals, and Kates.

Another explosion rumbled up from below, and he could see the look of concern in Genda’s eyes. Tucked below the air officer’s arm was a folded canvas bag.

“The Z flag?” Yamamoto asked, and Genda nodded.

“Any still on board?”

“Just those waiting for you, sir.”

“Have all wounded been properly evacuated?”

Genda hesitated.

“Well?”

“Sir, I regret to say that there are still some men trapped far below decks, fires and flooding above giving them no escape. Men too critically injured to be moved,” he sighed. “Sir, they can’t be evacuated. Moving them will kill them anyhow. They beg to go down with their ship.”

He sighed and for the first time in a very long time, others saw tears openly coursing down his weathered cheeks.

“If I leave them behind, what will others say?”

“You have done all that you can possibly do, sir,” Genda replied heatedly. “Remember you yourself said that you would not tolerate the utter foolishness of commanders insisting they go down with their ships. You must now set that example!”

Genda reached out as if to grab his arm but an icy stare caused him to hesitate.

He turned for one look back from the bridge.
Akagi
was now listing over thirty degrees, the starboard side of the deck awash. A last few were still going over the side just aft amidships, where there was a hole in the fires that entirely engulfed both bow and stern. Two destroyers were close alongside, cargo mats draped over into the water, oil-soaked men looking like black ants climbing up them, while launches were in the water picking up the injured and those too weak to climb. Another destroyer trailed astern, picking up men going off the aft end of the ship.

“Let’s go then,” he said softly and went back through the bridge, which was now empty except for a few of his loyal staff and his personal steward. He hesitated.

“My lighter and cigarette case?” he asked, and his steward smiled, reached into his pocket and pulled them out. The lighter, an American Zippo, keepsake gift from an American captain whose name he could no longer remember; the cigarette case, won in a card game years ago, back at Harvard.

He went out onto the deck. Several firefighters were waiting. They tossed asbestos blankets to him and Genda, draping them over their heads to ward off the intense heat, the blaze consuming the deck. Another explosion lit off below; the ship lurched, as if trying to rise out of the water. Another explosion rippled after the first one; what had been the forward elevator unhinged, lifting up thirty or more feet into the air. The fire crew pressed in around their admiral as fragments and burning pieces of deck came raining down.

The deck was slick with water and firefighting foam. It was nearly impossible to keep his footing, and he slipped, nearly sliding off and into the gun deck, its railing already beneath the water, which was black with oil.

A destroyer was lying fifty yards off, dangerously close if the ship should actually pitch up over and start a death roll. A few cables were slung across, a stretcher case being transferred, and the firefighters directed him to one of the lines. There was still a wounded man waiting to be transferred, face bloated from steam burns, eyes swollen shut.

“Him first,” Yamamoto announced, and no one thought to argue, waiting a few tense moments as the sling was run back over, the stretcher secured.

Water was now lapping up onto the side of the deck. Below came an endless cascade of crashing, as lockers, mess gear, plates, tools, anything that could move was breaking loose, each additional pound of weight shifting
Akagi
further off balance, adding its mass to the water still pouring in through the holes slashed by the torpedoes.

He could tell she was going.

He looked at Genda and forced a smile.

“Time to go, forget the line,” and he motioned to the water now lapping but a few feet away.

Genda hesitated.

“I am the last one off,” he announced sharply. He turned to the fire and rescue crew, who were preparing to run the transfer line back from the destroyer.

“Into the water, my men. Your duty here is done.”

They hesitated, a few even bowing, refusing until their admiral went first.

“Now! I won’t leave until you do.”

There was hesitation, and the half dozen men stepped off into the oil-slick water and started to swim toward the destroyer. Genda looked at his admiral.

“You promise you will follow. If not, sir, I could never live with the shame of leaving you. I will kill myself if you do not come with me.”

He smiled.

“I can’t allow you to do that. All right then, together, but you take the first step and try and keep our Z flag out of this muck.”