The Ghost Mountain Boys - James E. Campbell [41]
After scouting the area, Lutjens, Brissette, and Schulte were eager to get back to Kapa Kapa to deliver their report. The notion struck all of them at the same time—why walk two days to the coast when they could use the river? If they could build a raft and float down the Kemp Welch, they might be able to make Kapa Kapa before nightfall.
The raft was not a thing of beauty, but the question was, Would it float? When they shoved it into the water, the river was flat and calm, and once Lutjens got over his astonishment that the raft had not sunk, he found himself admiring the scenery. That is when he felt a jerk. His muscles tensed and his pulse raced. The raft rounded a bend, and the current quickened. Up ahead, the course was studded with boulders.
The three men frantically tried to pole their way to the riverbank, but the raft spun round and round, out of control. Lutjens grabbed for a log, and then they heard it—Crack! They had hit a large rock. The collision shot the raft into the air, and hurtled the men into the river. Schulte surfaced first and swam to safety. Brissette grasped a floating log and was kicking for the riverbank when he saw Lutjens caught between two rocks in the middle of a powerful whirlpool. Laying his chest on the log, Brissette straddled it, and pushed himself back into the current. When he passed the whirlpool, he caught Lutjens by his helmet. Gripping Lutjens’ helmet as tightly as he could with one hand, he used his other arm to paddle. When he reached the bank, he pulled Lutjens out of the water and they both collapsed in the mud at the river’s edge.
It was night by the time the men regained their strength. Now they had to confront the reality of their situation: They were weak, wet, and growing cold, and their only choice was to walk. Plunging into the jungle, they used the sound of the river as their guide. They had not been walking for long when they spotted the light of a campfire tended by a lone native hunter. The Americans approached him carefully, and Lutjens, who had the most experience with natives, mimed their experience, the building of the raft, turning over, swimming to safety. Then Lutjens asked the most important question—could the man guide them to the coast? Somehow Lutjens was able to get his point across. He offered to give the man his pocketknife if he would be willing to lead them back to Kapa Kapa. The native hunter agreed.
In the dark of the jungle, the native man led the way, expertly navigating through a maze of knee-deep swamps, fallen trees, and a tangle of limbs and vines. Lutjens was amazed by the man’s ability to find his way. Without his guidance, setting off through the jungle might have been a deadly decision. Lutjens and his party, holding hands and single file, made six river crossings that night, and each time the native hunter unerringly found sandbars on which they could walk, avoiding the river’s deep holes and the fast current. When one of the men stumbled, the native man, hardly half the size of Lutjens, would tighten his grip and hold him up. Lutjens later remembered that the man’s hand was “like steel.” In the early hours of the morning, the hunter led Lutjens and others to the army encampment. Lutjens thanked the man for his service and gave him his pocketknife, and the man trudged off into the jungle.
Lutjens, Brissette, and Schulte were exhausted, and their legs were covered with cuts, scrapes, and bruises. Later that morning, Lutjens consulted with Captain Schultz, informing him of the difficulties a road building crew would encounter upriver. Schultz radioed Colonel Quinn, who had just arrived in Port Moresby. Quinn did not deliberate long. Company E and the 91st U.S. Engineers would have to hack another road through the jungle.
Chapter 7
THE BLOODY TRACK
FROM WHERE THEY STOOD on top of Ioribaiwa Ridge, General Horii’s soldiers could smell the salt air. They were “wild with joy,” wrote Seizo Okada, the