Days of Infamy (68 page)

He found another question: “How are our engineers doing on electronic ranging gear like the Americans have?”

“I'd hoped
Zuikaku
and
Shokaku
would have it,” Captain Kaku answered. “No such luck, though. I think we understand the principles. Now the problem is getting it into production, installing it aboard ship, and training men to use it.” He shrugged. “We have our picket sampans out there, and we have H8Ks patrolling beyond them, and we have the cruisers' float planes for close-in reconnaissance. Wherever the enemy comes from, he won't take us by surprise.”

“That's what counts, sir,” Fuchida agreed. “As long as we meet the Americans on anything like equal terms, we'll beat them.”

“I see it the same way,” Kaku said. “Admiral Yamamoto is less hopeful. He fears the United States will outproduce us no matter what we do.”

“Let the Americans try,” Fuchida said. “If we keep sinking their ships, it doesn't matter how many they build. And we'll be building, too.”

“
Hai
.” The captain of the
Akagi
nodded. “This is also how it seems to me, Fuchida
san
. You're a sound man, very sound.” What Kaku no doubt meant
was that he and Fuchida held the same opinion. He went on, “The admiral has a different view. He says we have no idea of how much matériel the United States can produce once all its factories start going full tilt.”

“And the Americans, who have so much, begrudge us the chance of getting our fair share,” Fuchida said angrily. “They think they should be the only big power in the Pacific. We've taught them a thing or two, and if they want another lesson here, I'd say we're ready to give them one.”

As if his words were the cue in a play, a yeoman from the radio shack stuck his head into the wardroom. “Ah, here you are, Captain-
san
!” Excitement crackled in his voice. He waved a sheet of flimsy paper. “We have a report from one of the flying boats. They've spotted the American ships, sir! The pilot reports three enemy carriers, sir, with the usual supporting ships. Range about eight hundred kilometers, bearing 017.”

Three against three
, Fuchida thought.
Equal terms—just what I asked for. Now to make the most of it
.

“
Domo arigato
,” Kaku breathed. After thanking the yeoman, he went on, “Any sign of transports—of an invasion fleet?”

“Sir, I have no report of them,” the radioman answered.

“If they are there, sir, they may be hanging back, waiting for their carriers to dispose of ours,” Fuchida said. “I wouldn't want to expose troopships to air strikes.”

“
Hai. Honto
. Neither would I.” Captain Kaku turned back to the yeoman. “You've informed Admiral Yamamoto?”

“Oh, yes, sir,” the man said. “He nodded to me and he said, ‘Now it begins.' He
spoke
to me, sir!” He seemed immensely proud of himself. A Christian to whom Jesus had spoken might have sounded the same way.

Kaku got to his feet. “I'm going to sound general quarters,” he said to Fuchida. “They're still out of range, but now we know where they are.” To the yeoman again: “Do the Americans know that flying boat has spotted them?”

“Sir, if they do, the message didn't say,” the yeoman told him. Fuchida nodded to himself, liking the response. The man wasn't trying to read anything into what he'd got from the H8K. Many radiomen might have.

“Let's tend to business, Commander,” Kaku said. “You'll want to get your men ready for what's ahead of them, I'm sure. And we're all going to be busy before very long.”

“Yes, sir,” Fuchida said. He and Kaku both hurried out of the wardroom.
The skipper of the
Akagi
headed for the bridge. Fuchida made for the pilots' briefing room on the hangar deck, right under the flight deck. Hardly knowing he was doing it, he rubbed at his belly as he hurried along. If he had a bellyache, he would just have to ignore it. More important things were going on. General quarters sounded before he was even halfway to the briefing room. He nodded to himself. This was why he'd gone to the Naval Academy at Eta Jima, to the naval aircraft training center at Kasumigaura, to war against the United States in the first place. One more strong blow . . .

Sailors and officers ran every which way, hurrying to their battle stations. Fuchida ducked into the briefing room as the mechanics and other members of the maintenance crew began making sure the level bombers, torpedo planes, dive bombers, and fighters were as ready for action as they could be.

One of the dive-bomber pilots made it to the briefing room less than fifteen seconds behind Fuchida. The man grinned and said, “I might have known you'd be here first, Commander-
san
.”

“I'm not that fast,” Fuchida said. “I happened to be in the wardroom with the captain when the news came in. I was on my way over here before the alert sounded.”

“News? What sort of news?” the pilot asked eagerly. “The sort we've been waiting for?”

“Patience. Patience,” Fuchida answered with a smile of his own. “That way I'll only have to tell the story once.”

“Yes, sir.” The dive-bomber pilot didn't sound patient. He sounded like a small boy reluctantly awaiting permission to open a present sitting there on a mat in front of him.

More pilots swarmed into the briefing room, along with radiomen and bombardiers for the Nakajimas and Aichis. They were all chattering excitedly; they knew what the call to general quarters was likely to mean. They kept flinging questions at Fuchida, too, as he stood there in front of the map.

When the room was full, he held up his hand. The fliers were in such a state, they needed a little while to realize he was calling for quiet. Slowly, a centimeter at a time, they gave it to him. “Thank you, gentlemen,” he said when he could make himself heard through the din. “Thank you. The news I have is the news we've all been waiting for. We have found the Americans.”

That started everyone talking at once again. He'd known it would. “Where are they?” “When do we take off?” The questions rained down on him.

“We don't take off yet—they aren't in range,” Fuchida answered. “They're about—here.” He pointed on the map. “One of our H8Ks picked them up way out there.”

“
Banzai!
for the flying boats!” somebody shouted, and a cheer filled the briefing room.
How can we lose with men like these?
Fuchida thought proudly. Another pilot called, “What are we going to do about them, sir?”

“I don't know yet, not officially,” Fuchida replied. “Admiral Yamamoto and Captain Kaku haven't given the orders. But I'll tell you this—we didn't come out here to invite the Yankees to a
cha-no-yu
.”

The officers and ratings laughed. As if the round-eyed barbarians could appreciate a tea ceremony anyway! “We'll make them drink salty tea!” a pilot yelled.

“That's the spirit,” Fuchida said. “Be ready. I expect we'll close with the enemy and attack.
Banzai!
for the Emperor!”

“
Banzai! Banzai!
” The shout filled the briefing room.

O
UT ON THE
Pacific, Platoon Sergeant Les Dillon was playing poker with four other noncoms when the
B. F. Irvine
's engine fell silent, leaving the troopship bobbing in the water. “What the fuck?” He and two other sergeants said the same thing at the same time.

“It's your bet, Les,” Dutch Wenzel said.

Dillon shoved money into the pot. “I'll bump it up a couple of bucks,” he said. He had two pair, and nobody'd shown much strength. But the change in the background noise worried him. “What the hell are they doing? They break down? We're sitting ducks for a goddamn Jap sub if we just park here.”

“Thank you, Admiral Nimitz,” said Vince Monahan, who sat to Les' left. He tossed in folding money of his own. “Call.”

“I'm out.” Wenzel threw in his hand. So did the last two sergeants.

“Here's mine.” Dillon laid down his queens and nines. Monahan said something unpleasant. He'd had jacks and fives. Dillon raked in the pot. “Whose deal is it?” he asked.

“Maybe we ought to find out what's going on,” Monahan said. “We were steaming around in the North Pacific marking time, and then we started heading south like we were really going somewhere—”

“Yeah. Somewhere,” Dillon said drily. The other men in the poker game
grunted. A couple of them chuckled. They'd been heading for Oahu and whatever happened when they hit the beach. Now . . . Now they weren't going anywhere.

A few minutes later, the engines started up again. So did the poker game, which had stalled. The troopship swung through a turn. Dillon's inner ear told him they were heading east now, more or less, not south. The game went on. The
B. F. Irvine
went through what felt like a one-eighty half an hour later, and then another one half an hour after that.

“Jesus Christ!” Wenzel said. “Why the fuck don't they make up their minds? They send us all the way out here to march in place, for crying out loud?”

“I know what it could be,” Dillon said.

“Yeah?” Wenzel and Monahan and the other two men in the game all spoke together.

“Yeah,” he replied. “The Navy's got to be up ahead of us somewhere. If they don't clear the Japs out of this part of the Pacific, we aren't gonna make it to Oahu to land. If they've bumped into 'em . . .”

After some thought, Dutch Wenzel nodded. “Makes sense,” he allowed. “They wouldn't want us bumping into carrier air.” He made a horrible face. “That could ruin your whole day, matter of fact.” One more brief pause. “Whose deal is it?”

L
IEUTENANT
S
ABURO
S
HINDO
prided himself on never getting too excited about anything. Tomorrow morning, battle would come: Japan's most important fight since the opening blows of the war against the USA. Some people were jumping up and down about that—and making a devil of a racket doing it. Shindo ignored them. He sprawled dozing in a chair in the briefing room. He wore his flying togs. He could be inside his Zero and airborne in a matter of minutes.

Every so often, the noise around him got too loud to stand, and he'd wake up for a little while. When he did, he thought about what he would have to do. This would be no surprise attack. The Americans knew they'd been spotted. They'd sent up fighters to chase off or shoot down the first H8K that found their fleet. They'd done it, too, though the flying boat had taken out a Wildcat before going into the Pacific. By the time it went down, others were in the neighborhood.

The Yankees might try to get away under cover of darkness—try to scurry back to the West Coast of the United States. Some of the Japanese pilots thought they would. Saburo Shindo didn't believe it. Running now would be cowardly. The Americans hadn't fought very well on Oahu, but they'd fought bravely. They wouldn't run away.

If they weren't running, what would they be doing? Shindo fell asleep again after he asked himself the question and before he answered it. He realized as much only when his eyes came open some time later and he noticed half the people who had been around him were gone, replaced by others. He started chewing on things once more, just as if he hadn't stopped. What
would
the Americans do?

Stay where they were and wait to be attacked?
He
wouldn't do anything that foolish. He would storm forward, launch his own search planes as soon as it got light, and strike with everything he had the instant he found the Japanese fleet. If he could see that, wouldn't the Yankees be able to see it, too? He expected they would.

They had three carriers. The Japanese also had three, including two of the newest, largest, and fastest in the Navy. The Americans had who knows what for pilots. The Japanese had men who'd smashed everything they came up against from Hawaii to Ceylon. The Americans used Wildcats for fighters. The Japanese used Zeros. Shindo yawned and smiled at the same time. A Wildcat could take more punishment than a Zero. It could, yes—and it needed to. He dozed off one more time, laughing a little as he did.

When he woke again, it was with someone's hand on his shoulder. Full alertness returned instantly. “Is it time?” he asked.

“Not quite yet, sir.” The man standing beside him was one of the wardroom stewards. “We're serving out a combat meal before the fliers go up.” He held out a bowl full of
nigirimeshi
—rice balls wrapped in bamboo shoots, with plums at their centers.

“
Arigato
.” Shindo took one and bit into it. The stewards had served the same meal before the fliers set off for Pearl Harbor. Another man carried a tray with cups of green tea. Shindo washed down his breakfast with it.

Akagi
's three elevators were lifting planes from the hangar deck to the flight deck, getting them ready to go into action. Flight-crew men wrestled the bombers and fighters into position one after another. As soon as each elevator went up and came down, another plane went on. Up above, more men
from the flight crew would be fueling the planes and making sure their engines and control surfaces and instruments were in good working order. Armorers would be loading bombs and torpedoes, machine-gun bullets and cannon shells. When the time came . . .