Brave Hearts (20 page)

Catharine didn't know the enlisted man who handed her the note just after breakfast, and he was gone before she could thank him. She recognized Jack's handwriting on the envelope and ripped it open.

The message was brief:

Dear Catharine—Gone to Cavite in search of transport. I'll be back. Love—Jack.

Cavite.

The Japanese controlled the province. Much of the artillery fire that blasted Corregidor came from Cavite. Cavite crawled with Japanese.

Catharine's head jerked up, and she stared across the inky blue channel toward Cavite.

Three quinquis—wicks dipped in coconut oil, then set afire—blazed in the nipa hut. The lights wavered and jerked as the sharp ocean breeze slatted through the bamboo walls. They cast light and shadow intermittently across the dark, impassive face of the village headman.

“It would be very dangerous,” he said in sibilant Spanish.

Jack's face didn't change, but he felt elated because he knew the headman knew of a boat. It had taken Jack a week of cautious approach, of moving from one native barrio to another, before he'd made contact with a Filipino willing to bring him along an obscure jungle trail to this meeting. But now Jack knew; a boat existed. Then his elation subsided. Knowing and getting were poles apart.

“There will be no danger to you or any of your villagers,” Jack said in slow, emphatic Spanish. “All I require is the boat, with enough fuel to cross the South Channel to Corregidor.”

For an instant, the impassive face showed a trace of surprise. Jack knew the headman wondered why any fool would go to Corregidor.

The Filipino said quietly, “A boat is worth very much. What can you offer?”

“Ten thousand dollars.”

The headman's dark eyes were uninterested. “American dollars are worthless now.”

“Ten thousand dollars in silver.”

It was suddenly still in the smoky, ill-lit hut.

“Silver.” The headman's face creased into a frown. “Where is this silver?”

“When I see the boat, I will take you to it.”

“Do you take me for a fool?” the headman demanded derisively.

Jack picked up his pack from the floor. He opened it, aware that the Filipino watched with a catlike intensity, his hand resting on the knife in his belt. Jack plunged his hand into the pack and pulled out a small leather bag. He jerked open the drawstrings and poured out a stream of silver coins. The coins clattered into a pile, then glistened in the soft light of the quinquis.

The headman picked up several of the coins and studied them. He looked up at Jack. “It would be very dangerous. The boat must be brought here by night and camouflaged by day from the Japanese planes. If the crew were captured, it would mean their lives.”

“Twelve thousand.”

They bargained, Jack estimating how much silver his crate held, the headman estimating the food and medicines he could buy for his people.

They shook hands at eighteen thousand.

They stood shoulder to shoulder on the dusty patch of ground outside the outlet: nurses, doctors, soldiers, marines, ambulatory patients, civilians, off-duty support personnel. The crowd was silent except for an occasional shocked murmur when the night sky over Bataan exploded anew, each burst angrier, louder, more violent. Light moved in the sky, red, gold, orange, and pink; the noise was constant, the far-off roar of exploding ammunition like the thunder of an avalanche. The spectators watched somberly because they knew this was the deathwatch; this was the dying agony of an army that had fought beyond reason since December. Now it was April, and the bloody, convulsive end had come.

A woman sobbed somewhere in the darkness to Catharine's left, but Catharine's eyes were dry. She wished she could cry. Her throat ached with unshed tears—this was pain too deep for tears. Jack had told her so much about the young soldiers who had fought these dreadful months. Even if they survived, what would happen to them when they were captured by the Japanese?

And what would happen to those now standing here watching the fall of Bataan? Because if Bataan fell, Corregidor would soon fall. Capture now was certain. Some nights in the tunnel, men talked of what happened to those captured by the Japanese.

Everyone standing here would either die or be captured.

A curtain of fire shimmered across the night sky. Catharine lit a cigarette with trembling fingers. She drew deeply on it. She'd thought it couldn't get any worse, the terrible bombardments by day and by night, the endless shrill whining shrieks of the incoming shells, the mind-numbing detonations every few seconds, the lack of food, the heat, the dust, the flies, the quivering concrete walls.

But it was going to get worse.

Spencer frowned at the sheet of paper in front of him. He'd have Peggy . . . Then he remembered again; each time it was a twist of pain. Peggy was on her way to Australia. From there, she'd go by ship to San Francisco. The pain of her going ached deep inside him, but she was on her way home to safety. She was going to be all right.

Peggy would get over him. That would be best for all of them.

He wanted Peggy. He needed her, but he knew that it would never work out. A divorce would be a disaster for him. Divorce . . . A hot flicker of anger moved inside him. How could Catharine have become entangled with a newspaperman? The kind of man who didn't have a dollar in the bank and never knew how long he'd hold a job. Spencer knew about that kind of man: worthless, restless, undependable. Catharine would come to her senses. He should have put her aboard that submarine. Now, who knew what was going to happen. He'd requested Washington to send another sub. He felt suddenly empty, sick. The gold was too important for Washington not to rescue it. They had to take care of the gold. When the sub came, he and Catharine would get out. He'd work everything out with Catharine. After all, they were so well suited. They'd worked together as a team for so long.

His eyes moved restlessly, then stopped and focused on the chair where Peggy used to sit.

Shells whined overhead and exploded every five seconds, gouging out huge craters, rocking the main tunnel and the laterals, filling the air with the fine, sandy dust. Men crouched motionless along the tunnel walls, staring dully at nothing. Patients coughed and choked. The wan, thin nurses worked to keep men alive and wondered what for.

Catharine forced herself to get up every morning, to comb her hair, and to use a tiny bit of their precious water ration to clean her face and hands. She maintained a schedule, mornings in the wards helping write letters home or rolling bandages, afternoons sorting through the effects of the dead, packaging up the sad belongings that would be sent home along with the letters—should there ever be transport.

The men in the wards, those well enough to talk, were hungry for visitors. They wanted to talk about home.

Dennis talked about Cindy.

“Her hair, it's kind of like, did you ever see a field of buttercups, Mrs. Cavanaugh?”

Catharine nodded.

“That's like Cindy's hair, a soft yellow but a real yellow, you know.”

Catharine smiled.

The shells exploded with monotonous, relentless regularity. Abruptly, there was a catastrophic explosion. The concrete walls shuddered. Pieces of concrete crackled and fell. The lights wavered, went out.

“Oh, my God,” Catharine cried. Panic suffused her. She remembered the trembling darkness, the pressure, and the weight when she was buried in London.

“Mrs. Cavanaugh, don't be frightened.” Dennis's voice was young, clear, and firm. “It's just the lights. It's happened before. They'll get them fixed. The tunnel won't fall.”

Catharine's heart thudded so hard it hurt.

“It's all right,” Dennis said encouragingly.

Tears pricked her eyes. He was comforting her, this boy who couldn't move. This boy with no arms and no legs and no hope left in his life was comforting her.

She forced herself to speak calmly. “I'm all right, Dennis.” And she was better. She could see the wink of flashlights held by the nurses.

“See, it's quiet now for a minute. You go up and get some fresh air, Mrs. Cavanaugh.”

She wanted desperately to be up and out of the tunnel, away from the stygian darkness and the smell of blood, dirt, disinfectant, and urine.

“You won't mind if I go?” she asked.

“Oh, no. I'm okay.”

She reached out through the darkness, found his thin cheek with its bristle of boyish beard, and touched him.

“I'll come back later.”

She was halfway to the outlet when the bluish overhead lights came back on. Someone had switched to an alternate generator. She let out a deep breath and knew she'd come close to collapse. The darkness and the dirt reminded her terribly of being trapped.

When she reached the outlet and stepped outside, she blinked against the hot April sunlight. The thick haze of dust in the air didn't diminish the biting heat. Others streamed out of the tunnel mouth and stopped uncertainly to shade their eyes.

“Catharine.”

She turned reluctantly to face Spencer.

“I've been looking for you.”

“I work in the hospital in the mornings,” she said dully. It was an effort to talk.

Spencer stepped closer, then bent forward. “We've sent for another submarine,” he said softly.

Jack had said another submarine wouldn't come. What if he were wrong? What if a sub did make it in before Corregidor fell? Dear God, when would Jack return from Cavite?

She looked at Spencer eagerly. She was past pretense, past caring how her words might affect Spencer.

“Jack can go, too. He's a correspondent. They'll make room . . .”

Spencer's gaunt face hardened. “Not for him. Not if I can help it.”

“Oh, no,” she cried. “You can't do that. Not because of me. I'll go to the general. I'll tell everyone that . . .”

Spencer grabbed her arms, his fingers tight and hard. “He's all you can think about, isn't he? Well, where the hell is he?” Spencer looked around the clearing. “Is he hiding down there with the rest of the tunnel rats? Where the hell is he?”

“Let go of me.” Her voice was icy, contemptuous.

Before the fury in her eyes, Spencer released her.

“He's gone to find a boat to get us off this island.”

Spencer's face twisted in an ugly smile. “Is that what he told you? He's gotten the hell out, hasn't he? He got out while the going was good—and you gave up your place on the sub to stay with him. You're a fool, Catharine.”

“He's gone to find a boat.”

She almost taunted Spencer, saying it was more than Spencer had thought to do, would ever think to do, but even in her anger she knew that wasn't fair. Spencer was doing his duty as best he could. Did it hurt him so much that she had given herself to another man? She wished she could be clearly, coldly, and completely angry and excise Spencer from her thoughts. But she couldn't.

“Don't,” she said abruptly. “Don't quarrel with me.”

His thin shoulders slumped; his voice softened. “Catharine, when we get home, we could go to Carmel. Remember when we went there?”

Oh, she remembered so well—the dark cypress trees, bent and twisted by the Pacific wind, the thunderous, booming surf, and the clear, cold air so fresh it made the world seem new. She almost smiled; then her face closed.

She shook her head. “No.” Her voice was weary now and full of sadness. “No, Spencer, it's all gone, all over. We can't go back. When we get home—if we get home—I want a divorce.”

Spencer stepped back a pace. Once again, anger burned in his eyes. “He isn't coming back. You'll see. He's a worthless bum.”