Devil at My Heels - Louis Zamperini [129]
Afterward, I invited the men to become Christians and asked for a show of hands. Sixty percent raised them high. “This will in no way shorten your sentence,” I explained. “I am not a part of the army and not part of SAC headquarters. It will not help you that way in the least.” Then I asked for hands again. Some who had been tempted or misunderstood withdrew, but many others in search of a new life persisted.
The colonel said, “Those of you who were Louie’s guards and heads of his prison camps, he’d like to speak with you. You may come forward if you wish.
Without hesitation they did. The moment had finally arrived. I waited onstage, watching men walk down the aisle and faces emerge from the mists of memory. I recognized each vividly: Sasaki, Admiral Yokura, Conga Joe, Shithead, Weasel, Hata the cook, Kano, and others.
But not the Bird.
Without even thinking I jumped off the stage, ran to the group, and threw my arm around the first guard. He pulled back at my friendliness; I don’t think he understood my intention. My sign of affection was unfamiliar in Japanese culture. It was probably also the last reaction he expected from me.
The colonel ushered us into a small room. There I continued to press the issue of salvation, and a few made a decision for Christ, but others didn’t understand or rejected my invitation, particularly the Quack, the medic from Ofuna who had so badly beaten Bill Harris. He remained a committed Buddhist.
During my talk I had praised guards like Kano, who had treated us kindly, like human beings. And yet here he was in the room, a prisoner. I couldn’t understand why. When I asked, he explained that despite letters written by former POWs attesting to his kindness, he had been confused with the sadistic Kono and sentenced to several years. I told him I would try to help.
I also spoke to James Sasaki, who that day decided to become a Christian. “I don’t understand how you can come back here and forgive us,” he said. “Your Christianity must be real, but I don’t understand it.”
“It is real,” I said, “and if you continue in your faith, you will one day understand.”
I had many questions for Sasaki. Why, I asked, had I spent fourteen months at Ofuna, a high-profile interrogation camp, when I wasn’t high-profile? “You were being prepared. We decided to hide you away for a year and a month until your government officially declared you dead,” he explained.
“Why did you have to wait?”
“The element of surprise.”
“Surprise at what?”
“Your voice making broadcasts.”
“Is that why, when I stole food at Ofuna—a crime punishable by death—and the Weasel—a guard who would turn on you if he saw you spitting on the ground—caught me, you never did anything and I was spared?”
“Yes. I kept it quiet. But we made your life as miserable as possible—also at Omori—so that when you were offered a better life at Radio Tokyo, you would accept it.”
“That was Watanabe’s job?”
“Yes.”
“But I didn’t cooperate.”
“I know. And you were sent to Camp 4-B.”
Camp 4-B. The freezing hellhole. In my mind I heard the sound of granulated snow crunching beneath the Bird’s boots as he faced me with a wicked grin the day I arrived. I remember my knees buckling at the thought of never being free of him.
“What about Watanabe?” I prodded. “Is he here? Is he alive?” According to testimony from surviving POWs, the Bird had been listed by General MacArthur as a class-A war criminal, the twenty-third most-wanted. I had expected to see him in the audience, or at least discover that he had been tried and executed.
“Missing. There is still a reward, twenty-five thousand dollars, but we believe he committed hari-kiri,” Sasaki simply said.
I didn’t want to believe that. Despite his cruelty and bluster I thought Watanabe was too chicken to commit hara-kiri. After the war Frank Tinker and I even came up with a possible scenario: Watanabe always wanted to be an officer. Perhaps he had left Naoetsu two days early, escaped to Korea, and become an officer in the North Korean Army, and gotten killed there.
So much for wishful thinking.
I had come