Deke had often imagined what it would be like to be with a woman, and now that the veil of mystery had been lifted tonight, he decided that it was everything he had imagined — and then some. He was glad that he had waited to find someone whom he cared about rather than running off to the whorehouses like some of the boys had done back in Hawaii. With his scarred face and body, he had doubted that he would ever experience a night such as this without having to pay for it. Juana had given him a great gift tonight.
She murmured something and wrapped herself around him, soothing his restless mind. They heard the occasional thump of artillery or the rattle of a machine gun beyond the walls, but that all sounded far away and they felt safe enough in this house, with their armed companions on watch in the next room, isolated for a few hours from the war. Juana’s steady breathing soon indicated that she was asleep. Deke closed his own eyes, then slept deeply.
But the Japanese wouldn’t leave him alone, even on this night of all nights, haunting his dreams. He kept seeing the enemy snipers shooting at them, hearing screams as men went down around him. Deke tried to shoot back, but in his dream there was always something that wasn’t working right. Sometimes his rifle wouldn’t fire. Other times his finger couldn’t even pull the trigger, as if locked in rigor mortis.
All the while the grinning face of an enemy sniper taunted him through the rifle scope. Again and again he felt the terror of imagining enemy crosshairs on him, helpless to get out of the way, his heart hammering in his dreams. Even as the noose closed around the enemy, the Japanese seemed to grow more powerful.
He woke in the morning because he felt Juana’s eyes on him. Her face lay inches away, the two of them breathing the same air. He stroked her warm body under the blanket, pleased that his fingers worked just fine despite the unsettling dreams.
It was already light, dawn filtering in through the shattered windows. In a few minutes Honcho would be rousting everyone for another day of war. They still had those hostages to rescue. Time was running short for these prisoners. But for now it was just the two of them. Just as with Honcho the night before, he realized how little he really knew about Juana. Did she have any family? What had her life been like before the war?
Finally, he wondered if what they had done together now joined them in some way. At the same time, he knew that this one night might be all that there would be for them. It had been a sojourn for them both, a renewal, a reminder that they were young and alive. It was all so distracting, given the business at hand.
“Juana, I—” he began.
But Juana was having none of that. She touched his lips to silence him. “Do not think of me today,” she said, as if she had read his mind. “That will get you killed.
“We’re still chasing those damn Japs—”
Reluctantly, Deke disentangled himself from Juana’s arms and slipped out from under the blanket. Juana did the same, and he got a quick, glorious glimpse of her naked body. They dressed in the dim light, the candle having melted down until the wick lay sputtering in a puddle of wax, signaling the end of the dark night, and he felt his old resolve returning like the rising sun itself.
The night with Juana had renewed something deep within him. His eyes glinted as he bent to blow out the candle and then reached for his rifle. Deke’s sense of determination had returned stronger than ever.
He decided that Juana was right. The fight would end today, one way or another.
The sun rose on another hot and muggy morning. Instead of the promise of a new day, the rising sun revealed a city that was a battleground. In the distance, they heard scattered gun shots and the boom of artillery like the thunder of an approaching storm. Normally, birds would have greeted the new morning, even in the city, but their singing among the shattered trees had either been drowned out by the sounds of war or the winged songsters had done the smart thing and fled.
Patrol Easy had been surprised by the arrival of a messenger from headquarters. He was a slight young man, a real bantamweight built for speed and stealth, the perfect candidate for messenger duty, or what in army slang was called a “carrier pigeon.” He had come to remind them about the looming deadline for the artillery barrage to resume. The colonel hadn’t bothered with a written message, considering that what he had to relay was short and to the point.
“The colonel says you’ve got two hours. He says that after that, he’s going to open fire no matter what.”
“All right, we’ll take what we can get,” Lieutenant Steele said. “Did you run into any Japs getting here?”
