Yasuyuki Kasai - Dragon of the Mangroves

“Those soldiers are much alike. Didn’t you see their faces? This was their des-tiny. They were destined, more or less, when they were placed under him. A dog can’t choose its master. It’s too late to get them back,” said Shimizu. “We can get to Yanthitgyi faster anyway, Lieutenant. We can save them there.”

The academy officer and his soldiers had already disappeared into the darkness. Members of the rescue party looked on silently, puzzled. Unable to find any other outlet for his anger, Sumi rudely brushed away Shimizu’s hand.

Sumi’s rescue party set out marching to the sea again. Sumi’s blood was still boiling. It wasn’t because he had been abused by the young idiot. He simply couldn’t stand having missed the chance to put in a good word for himself and to run back to the continent.

Sumi realized he would have to go all the way to Yanthitgyi, just as he had feared. However, it would be quite a different issue if the soldiers would meekly follow his direction, even if he could find friendly troops. He might find himself entangled in a last suicidal attack or something if he couldn’t settle things well.

He didn’t want to get involved in the height of such folly.

But the monotonous rhythm of walking gradually soothed his nerves. As

Shimizu said, the officer from the academy was indeed mad. During this battle, he might have suffered something hard enough to cause him a mental disorder, and his lot was pitiful. It was even more so for his subordinates. Sumi came to think he should at least have given them some food and ammunition at that late hour.

The sun rose over Payadgi Plain. The dense woods ended, and the rescue party came to a broad barren stretch covered sparsely by patches of low weeds. There were no hiding spaces around. A dirt road, seemingly parallel to Payadgi-Ramree Road, ran beside it.

Sumi went scouting alone and found that the enemy had settled there. An Indian fatigue party, similar to the one seen the day before, was mending the road.

It was quite a substantial troop, under the escort of a security squad with nearly ten Bren gun carriers. This troop transport vehicle was tracked, armored, and equipped with a light machine gun, as its name implied. All were parked in the opening just in front of them, with many British soldiers hanging around.

Without exception, they carried automatic rifles or Sten guns. Sumi even spotted an M3 middle tank on the other side of the road.

He tore his hair as soon as he returned to the bush where the other soldiers hid themselves. His party had just gotten stuck again. He didn’t have a strict order to contact the garrison by a definite deadline. However, the garrison planned to carry out the creek-crossing operation at midnight of February 18. He must get in touch with the garrison by that evening to be in time.

But he could not come up with any ideas on how to break through that clearing in open daylight, no matter how hard he might think. He could also find no detour around the plain. What he managed to think up was only a reckless plan to pass through the clearing by pretending to be innocent Burmese farmers.

Some of their group could speak Burmese in addition to Pondgi. And Sumi was good at English. He felt he could cope, even if British soldiers were to challenge them.

But Yoshitake, who was usually courageous, vehemently opposed this plan soon after Sumi suggested it to the soldiers, saying, “Nobody would take us for farmers without hoes or plows. We won’t make it out. Never!”

Yoshitake was right. Sumi realized his own stupidity and was forced to think again about the danger of being challenged by an enemy whom they had no chance to beat.

Then Shimizu showed his aggressiveness here again.

“We’d better take a shortcut through the hills. We should head for the sea by cutting across the all-round position there. It’s not certain that the enemy occupied the area around there, is it? It’s useless to hide here throughout the day. I’ll go myself and find if there is a good route.”

Indeed, it might be worth risking it to break through the hills. Sumi judged it better than sitting and worrying. He made an effort to be cheerful and said, “OK! I’ll go with you.” He ordered the others to stand by in the bush and started for the foot of the left hills, accompanied by Shimizu.

After a while, the two found a game trail and took it into the mountain. This place was overgrown with broad-leaved trees, unlike Hill 306, which was covered with thick tropical rain forests. Now almost all the trees were bare of leaves because of the dry season, so they feared hostile aircraft might spot them at any moment.

However, the trail led them toward Yanthitgyi, according to the compass.

Sumi and Shimizu reached the top after they had ascended the path through the broad-leaved forest for about an hour. It was flat and covered by sparse evergreen woods, cleared sporadically by some meager vegetable fields and irrigation ponds. Sumi supposed he could get a view of Hill 509 if he stood at the edge of its north side. Just then, he sensed someone was near.

About ten meters away, a big, stout man stood smoking leisurely at the bank of the small pond just in front of him. It was a turbaned and bearded Punjabi soldier with a Thompson submachine gun dangling from his shoulder. The man must have sensed something as well, because he looked around abruptly at Sumi.

Their eyes met for a moment. Sumi was startled to encounter the unexpected enemy but barely remembered that he had disguised himself. He tried to feign calm at once. But the opponent didn’t miss his split-second consternation. The suspicion shown in the man’s look turned to hatred in the twinkling of an eye.

Immediately Sumi stuck his right hand into the haversack to rummage for his pistol. But the Punjabi soldier reacted remarkably quickly. As soon as he tossed away his cigarette, he picked up the submachine gun, stabilized it on his hip, and aimed at Sumi in a flash. Sumi’s hand froze instinctively.

Sumi saw the grenade thrown by Shimizu arcing in the air. Almost at the same instant, the forty-five-caliber bullets descended on his feet and made clouds of dust rise.

The grenade landed just in front of the Punjabi soldier and had him run away.

Sumi finally managed to draw his pistol. He fired two rounds back at the man’s back and jumped into a nearby bush with his face distorted with fear and anger.

Both were merely potshots.

The grenade exploded, and twigs and leaves fluttered in the cloud of powder smoke.

Sumi and Shimizu took advantage of this moment to hurl themselves over the bank and slithered down it. Fortunately, dense grass covered this side of the bank.

“Fall back, Lieutenant! Fall back quickly! That bastard cannot be alone. A barrage is on the way.”

The two frantically crawled into the grass. Shimizu was still clenching another grenade firmly while he flattened himself on the ground. A sudden yell in a lan-guage Sumi wasn’t familiar with rose behind them, and it was soon responded to by another call. Then a hail of machine gun bullets fell all over the bank, as if they were proof of Shimizu’s words. It was safe to bet they had gotten caught by a sentry line.

In the midst of the volley, Sumi and Shimizu drew back on the slope of the bank, almost falling off. Sumi didn’t know how much time had passed. While they pushed their way through the dead grass, they came across the defoliated forest where they had started their ascent. Now they were covered with dust and sweat, but all hostile gunfire had ceased.

The critical moment had apparently passed, but Sumi felt his heart thumping fast. The Punjabi soldier whom Sumi had been up against just then was quick, but he wasn’t a marksman. He had jolted hard by the firing reaction, so the first rounds had landed around Sumi’s feet. Sumi had narrowly escaped getting shot.