Devil at My Heels - Louis Zamperini [85]
Overjoyed does not begin to describe my state of mind, but my celebration was cut short on March, 1, 1945, when my own transfer came in. My destination: Camp 4-B in Naoetsu, 250 miles northwest of Tokyo, on the other side of the country. A few other prisoners, like Tom Wade, moved with me. The rest came to say good-bye.
NINETEEN SQUARE MILES of Tokyo had burned in the recent fire-bombing raid, and our train to Naoetsu went right through the devastation. I’d seen the area before the destruction, home to huge power lines, electrical transformers, and generators, factories, private houses. Now all I could see was charcoal for miles as thousands of buildings were reduced to ash. Only one silhouette stuck up repeatedly through the waste: lathes, the machines used to make airplane and ship parts. What a sight, these charred metal monsters framed against an overcast Tokyo sky.
Then we slid into a tunnel and a cold, depressing blackness.
Twelve hours later the train arrived in Naoetsu, a city about forty miles outside of Nagano, where the 1998 Winter Olympics were held. Snow blanketed the ground in huge ten-to twelve-foot drifts, reaching to the rooftops. How the hell would we walk through this stuff? People actually tunneled down to get into their homes. The guards herded us through gloomy streets. In the distance I could see the dirty smokestacks of a factory perched on a hillside overlooking the Sea of Japan and the prison camp.
We shuffled into Camp 4-B’s main courtyard, and the gate closed behind the last man. A guard shouted for everyone to stand at attention and wait for inspection. And wait we did, in the bone-numbing, frigid wasteland: five minutes, ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty. I could hardly move my half-frozen hands and feet. If this was “punishment camp,” then the penance had already begun—and I expected it would soon get worse.
Finally, the door of a rusty, corrugated tin shack by the main gate opened. The camp commandant stepped out onto the icy parade ground, moved briskly into the light, and surveyed his new arrivals.
I felt my knees buckle and my heart collapse.
The Bird.
I steadied myself on the man next to me in line, but inside I gave up all hope. I thought, Oh, what they’ve done to me! This is futile. There’s no escape. It was the lowest ebb. The cruelest joke. The kiss of death. I realized I’d never get away from the Bird.
Watanabe marched down the line and found me. His black eyes bored into mine. It was impossible to look at him, and impossible to look away. His face twisted into a sick, sardonic smile. He didn’t seem surprised at all to see me.
In his book, Tom Wade put perfectly exactly how I also felt at that moment: “If someone had given me a pistol then, I would have just blown my brains out.”
10
“IF GOAT DIE, YOU DIE!”
Even taking into account the barbarity of my captors, I couldn’t imagine they were so devious that they’d planned all along to get even with me by transferring the Bird from Omori—to raise my spirits—and then to crush them again by moving me to his new command.
I was only one man, yet it seemed so.
They knew I hated the Bird’s guts. I’d ruined their propaganda plans, and when they’d threatened me with punishment camp, I’d acted almost pleased. I would have worked in a coal or salt mine to be away from Watanabe. How many nights had I already dreamed about strangling him? So what better comeuppance than to make my greatest fear come true? It was a hateful, brilliant plan.
And what about the Bird himself? Was it all his idea, or had he been banished to Naoetsu because of my failure to play along with Radio Tokyo, and then cleverly used as a pawn in my continued torture? He may have run Camp 4-B, but I’m sure there were other places he’d rather be.
Whatever the sorry truth, I’ll always believe our intertwined fate was more than mere coincidence.