As the door to the roof flew open, MacGregor turned to run, not sure where to run to. He dove behind a wide chimney before the Japanese spotted him. To his surprise, it was Inaba who went running past. On an impulse, MacGregor stuck out a long leg and tripped him.
Inaba went sprawling, his submachine gun flying out of his hands and clattering across the rooftop.
MacGregor marched toward him as the Japanese sergeant regained his feet. Inaba saw him coming and took a fighting stance, his weight on his back leg, body coiled, his arms raised in some kind of Japanese fighting position. Inaba made a noise that perhaps was intended to be a battle cry, more like a bellow than any kind of word. MacGregor thought it sounded like a noise that an upset steer would make.
“Kee-yiii!”
The big Texan was not impressed. This wasn’t his first rodeo — you didn’t grow up in Texas without getting in a fistfight or three. MacGregor expected an easy fight, but he soon found that he was sadly mistaken. Inaba turned out to know a trick or two. Overconfident, MacGregor swung. The Japanese sergeant easily dodged the blow and instantly hammered the American in the ribs with a quick one-two punch combination. Like lightning, a fist connected squarely against MacGregor’s face. He felt the wind knocked out of him and he sat down rather unexpectedly. Inaba was stronger than he looked, and a whole lot quicker.
Grinning, Inaba waited for MacGregor to get up again. The Japanese seemed to be enjoying this.
MacGregor shook his head to clear it. He got back on his feet and advanced on Inaba, more cautiously this time. He made the mistake of keeping his eyes on Inaba’s hands. He didn’t expect Inaba’s foot to suddenly come flying at him. The kick sent Big Mike sprawling.
Once again, he got to his feet. Once again, Sergeant Inaba was waiting for him. MacGregor didn’t plan on disappointing Inaba, but he decided to change his tactics.
He was at least a foot taller and fifty pounds heavier than Inaba, emaciated though he was. The ropy muscles that he had developed on the family ranch had never left him. Inaba had taken up his fighting stance again. This time, MacGregor kept his distance. With his long reach, he swatted Inaba’s hands away, leaving the man’s chin nicely exposed.
MacGregor swung his fist, putting all the frustration of the last few weeks into it. He struck Inaba a hammer blow squarely in the face, sending the man reeling.
“I’ve got to say, that has been a long time coming,” MacGregor said.
MacGregor raised his fists to hit the man again, but it wasn’t necessary. Staggering, Inaba had reached the edge of the roof. Trying to find his balance, he took one more step back — into thin air. His eyes went wide as he realized his mistake. And then Inaba fluttered his arms like a flightless bird and ever so slowly tipped over backward into nothingness.
He screamed on the way down.
But MacGregor’s sense of victory was short-lived. The last Japanese soldier through the doorway was Major Tanigawa. He emerged onto the rooftop, carrying his double rifle, which he pointed at MacGregor.
From the Texan’s perspective, the dual dark muzzles were big as twin cannons pointed right at him.
“Now hold on, Major,” MacGregor said, raising his hands. “I’m a prisoner.”
“No,” said Tanigawa. “You are a dead man.”
MacGregor closed his eyes, not wanting to see what was coming. It wasn’t fear — he just didn’t want Tanigawa’s ugly mug to be the last thing he ever saw. Instead, in his mind’s eye, he pictured his family — his beautiful wife, his daughter, young Roddy. They would be his last thought in this world.
The moment stretched on. He heard the crack of a rifle some distance away, but still Tanigawa didn’t fire. MacGregor opened his eyes and glared at the Japanese officer. “Just get it over with, will you?”
Deke had made up his mind. He reminded himself that the whole reason they were here in the first place was to rescue the prisoners. He turned his rifle toward the last stand on the rooftop, leaving Patrol Easy to fend for itself for now. Quickly, he picked off one of the enemy soldiers, then another. He desperately wanted to get Sergeant Inaba and Major Tanigawa in his crosshairs, but he had lost sight of them for the moment.
Finally, his luck changed. Across the square, through the scope, Deke saw MacGregor scuffling with Sergeant Inaba, who seemed to have lost his submachine gun in the fracas. Deke tensed at the sight of the Japanese sergeant confronting the much bigger American. Deke held his fire — it was a long shot and the angle wasn’t good, so he was afraid of hitting MacGregor. Twice, Inaba knocked the bigger man down. But then the tables turned. MacGregor punched Inaba, and Deke watched in surprise as the sergeant staggered backward and then toppled from the roof.
“I’ll be damned,” Deke said. He let out a low whistle. “Did you just see that?”
“I saw it, all right,” Philly replied. “That son of a bitch flew about as well as a brick.”
Deke wanted to cheer. He was about to turn his attention back to Patrol Easy down in the square, but what he saw happening next let the air out of that balloon. Major Tanigawa had found MacGregor and was pointing his double rifle at the American. MacGregor was unarmed, and there would be no punching his way out of this situation.
“Can you get him?” Philly asked.
“I reckon,” Deke replied.
The machine gunners on the roof had been easier. This was at a longer range, on a different part of the roof. He had to hurry — he was literally going to get only one shot at this.
He picked up a handful of dust and grit, then tossed it into the air to see which way the breeze was blowing. It wasn’t much of a breeze, but it blew fitfully, promising to snatch his bullet off course during the second or so it needed to cross the distance. One second didn’t sound that long until you measured it out loud, muttering one blue mountain or one Mississippi. Either of those phrases took about one second to say. Plenty of time for a stray eddy of wind or a pocket of humid air to send his bullet off course.
“Any day now,” Philly said. “I don’t want to be the one who has to tell young Roddy that his father is dead.”
Neither did Deke, but some things couldn’t be rushed. Take your time killing him, Tanigawa, Deke silently urged. Take all the time you want.
Deke knelt and pressed the rifle against the warm bricks, letting the rough surface dig into the wooden stock, holding it steady. He let out a breath, drew one in, and held it. When his father was teaching him to shoot, he liked to say, Breathe out fear, breathe in courage.
He settled the sights on Tanigawa.
The breeze touched Deke’s face, then faded away.
Deke squeezed the trigger.
On the rooftop of the legislative building, MacGregor was waiting to die, staring into the muzzles of the Japanese officer’s double rifle, intended for the likes of tigers, lions, and water buffalo. MacGregor knew that he didn’t have a prayer.
He saw that Tanigawa was looking in his direction, but that his eyes were unfocused. Puzzled, MacGregor noticed that a red stain had appeared in the middle of Tanigawa’s chest, rapidly growing in size. MacGregor realized that the distant rifle crack that he’d heard earlier must not have been random.
The Japanese officer sank to his knees, then collapsed.
MacGregor turned and looked in the direction that the bullet had come from. As far as he knew, all the soldiers were fighting down in the square. Who in the world had shot Tanigawa?
Across the square, from another rooftop, he saw a soldier give him a big sweeping gesture, what they called a “hillbilly wave” back in Texas. Even at this distance, he could see that the soldier wasn’t wearing a helmet, but a bush hat with one side pinned up. He must be either a Filipino or a stray Aussie. No matter — MacGregor owed that eagle-eyed bastard his life. He grinned and waved back, thinking, That was one hell of a shot.
Then he picked up Tanigawa’s rifle and fired at the closest Japanese soldier. The big round from the double rifle was as good as kicking the Jap in the chest, and down he went. Following MacGregor’s example, a couple of the other prisoners had retrieved the rifles dropped by Inaba and the other Japanese and were now shooting back.
MacGregor aimed the rifle and fired again, then reached down and dug around in Tanigawa’s pockets for more cartridges. They were big brass shells, practically the size of railroad spikes, or so it seemed. He grinned as he shoved two more shells into the rifle and snapped the breech shut.
Maybe a fight wasn’t what the Japanese wanted from their hostages, but it was a fight they were going to get. And right now they were losing it.
Down in the square, while Deke and Philly were occupied by the fighting on the roof, the rest of Patrol Easy was managing to advance. It turned out that the Japanese had found one of their infamous knee mortars and were using it to walk rounds toward Patrol Easy.
“Juana, take care of that!” Lieutenant Steele shouted, frustrated that the mortar squad was beyond shotgun range. With Deke and Philly out on their mission, she was the best shot that he had left.
He recognized the high-pitched crack of her Arisaka rifle — once, twice — and that was the end of the mortar attack. After that, the enemy fire slackened, but there was still plenty of it coming at them.
It helped that the Japanese were rudderless, having lost their command structure. Unlike the Americans, the Japanese soldier was far more dependent on his officers telling him what to do. The Japanese didn’t like soldiers to think for themselves. Maybe there were some benefits to that for the Japanese and their brutal tactics, but not in this situation.