Burial in the Clouds Read online

  We arrived in Minamata at around eleven o’clock, having managed to make our peace again on the train. A little up the slope near the station, along the Kagoshima Main Line, we spotted what appeared to be the old house of an illustrious family. Attached to it was a tranquil, luxuriant garden, with a mountain standing off to the back. We were intrigued, and after talking it over a bit, we decided to ask the family to let us see the house, knowing well how rude we were being.

  “We are from the naval air station in Izumi,” we said, introducing ourselves. “And we were wondering—that is, if it’s no inconvenience to you—if we might enjoy your garden while we take a rest.” And they graciously ushered us in.

  We found ourselves treated to a subtle infusion of powdered tea, which we rarely have a chance to drink, along with some cakes from Kagoshima called harukoma. The head of this household is a Mr. Nobunori Fukai. The family served the lords of Minamata Castle for generations. Mr. and Mrs. Fukai appear to be in their fifties, and they have a gentle, pleasant daughter, probably a few years younger than we are. She made the tea for us. There was a discreet garden pond among the bushes, and I could hear water dripping off the rocks. Deutzias were flowering. We grew silent for some reason, but we were fully gratified at heart. Personally, I have never been much interested in the gardens at Dai-sen-in or at Ryoan-ji Temple, and I certainly don’t mean to compare the Fukais’ garden with those. But it has been a very long time since I knew such serenity, and in such a peaceful setting.

  As noon approached, they offered us a few tidbits. We declined, not wishing to abuse their hospitality, but they insisted. And after that, it was “Bread is better than birdsong,” as they say. (I can’t deny that we had more or less anticipated this.) Gratefully we enjoyed locally brewed sake, bonito sashimi garnished with ginger, sea urchin from Shimonoseki, and Suizenji seaweed soup, all the while telling the Fukais of our present circumstances and of our backgrounds. The Fukais have a son, a graduate of Keio University, who serves as a technical lieutenant in an army unit at Tianjin. They said fate brought us together and expressed the hope that we would visit whenever we were given an outing, treating their home as our own. We took our leave at around one thirty, in high spirits—in fact, feeling blessed.

  However, the meal the Fukais served was a bit too elegant to fill our stomachs, and when we returned to Izumi we ate a plate of fried rice with chicken, two bowls of oyako-donburi, a plate of sushi, and some scalloped noodles, and finally satisfied ourselves. As might be expected, I left more than half of my dinner at the base untouched. But I am becoming voracious again these days.

  June 15

  American troops have started landing on Saipan. I heard that the combined fleet hoisted a “Z” flag and sailed in with all its remaining vessels. They haven’t announced any military results yet.

  We had our first takeoff and landing exercises. It was a dual flight and we all scrambled to get the good voice tubes. Wind direction: North. Wind velocity: Beaufort No. 7. I flew for thirty minutes.

  The special course today was glider training. In bursts of fifty paces, done on the double, we hauled a secondary glider out to the end of the airfield. In the midst of the exercise, G.’s towline broke, injuring him slightly and snapping his watch band. The watch flew off into the air, and we searched for it after the order to cease the exercise was issued. It was a pleasure to grope about in the grass for the lost watch, teasing one another. “It’s a treasure hunt at our seaside school,” someone said. “Whoever finds the watch, he’ll get G.’s milk tomorrow.”

  The day was long, and we cast deep shadows across the grass. I found myself more curious about the lark eggs nestled out here somewhere than about G.’s watch. I lay down flat so as to spot the bird when it alighted, and then made a search. After a few tries, I found the nest: three tiny eggs, gray-colored and oval-shaped, neatly arranged. The lark chattered on anxiously from a distance. M. told me that if a person touches its eggs, a bird will refuse to sit on them, so I gave it up, leaving the nest and my heart behind.

  “Here it is!” someone shouted. The works of the watch were still intact and with a new glass cover it will be perfectly usable. We were all set to return to the barracks when Wakatsuki cried out abruptly, eyes skyward, “What the hell?!” We all looked up, and beheld an aircraft engaged in aerobatic exercises. A man had crawled out on its wing.

  “Ack!” we gasped, as the body pulled away from the plane, plummeting, as if sucked down, over beyond the field headquarters, from an altitude of 800 meters. The man died instantly. It looks like a suicide. The plane went into a spin and crashed in a barley field. It wasn’t long before his identity was disclosed: Senior Aviation Petty Officer D., an instructor attached to the 7th Division. I couldn’t fathom it. Why, at such a crucial time, would he kill himself, wasting his valuable skills?

  I asked Instructor Yamaguchi about it when he stopped by the barracks after dinner. “It was probably a woman,” he replied matter-of-factly. But as to that, my mind wasn’t settled, and in the evening I got poor marks during signal-communication drills. The transmission speed is fifty-five letters per minute. From the OD’s room, the instructor sent in all manner of playful messages.

  “Haveyoufoundlarkeggs?”

  "Yesterdayastudentsnuckintothekitchentocabbagesugar Iknowwhodiditbutwon'ttelltheseniorofficersDestroythismessag ewhenyougetit." (Those who got it laughed.)

  “Raiseyourhandifyougetthefollowingabbreviationsn.”

  “hoshiyohoshi.” (This means “from gunner to gunner.”)

  “kayotsushi.” (“from captain to signaler.”)

  “tototototo.” (“make an all-out charge”—a signal we will doubtless use some day.)

  They made the rounds at 2130. Senior Aviation Petty Officer D.’s suicide left me dismayed.

  June 28

  In the morning, the chief flight officer gave us a lesson on torpedo tactics in the drill hall. But whatever the topic (navigation, torpedoes, etc.) it is all basically a review of what we learned at Tsuchiura. This officer doesn’t appear to be comfortable in the classroom anyway, and his talk grew livelier when he turned to the military situation on Saipan.

  The newspapers all say, “Our women bravely rise up! Reenactment of the Mongolian Invasions at Iki Island!” But it seems the hostile troops have already seized a good portion of the island. Should Saipan fall, all the bases north of the South Sea Islands, such as those on Tinian, Iwo-jima, Guam, and Truk, will likely be useless, and the enemy will advance full clip toward the Philippines and mainland Japan. We have yielded control of the skies, and the enemy task force cruises freely around the Marianas. I hear that the combined fleet lost three of its jewels—the aircraft carriers Taiho, Shokaku, and Hiyo—and that it has already left the theater of operations, fleeing to a point not so very far from where we sit behind the scenes. The enemy fleet has emerged more or less unscathed, they say. It’s distressing to think that this operation degenerated into yet another lost battle. Japan must retain some kind of confidence in her future success, but it’s all so mortifying. I cant bear to sit on my hands back here. Sometimes I fear we might not complete our training in time. But even as I say this, the thought steals into my mind that I might actually return home alive. I banish this idea as best I can, partly because we are forbidden to entertain it, but mostly because I know I lose my edge in the cockpit if I ever allow it to take root, and this would be dangerous. There is no denying that the grim complexion of the war unsettles me, though. I am also, to some degree, affected by Fujikura’s opinions.

  Flight training this afternoon, as the sky cleared up. They say the better trainees be allowed to fly solo before long. I guess I’m making some sort of progress, but I had a stomach problem for three days, coinciding more or less with the naval battle in the Marianas. I brought up three large basins of vomit, so exhausting myself that I had to take a few days off, and thus I’ve fallen behind. I feel very questionable.

  Today I was assigned the duty of recording secretary. I atten
ded the division officer at field headquarters, clipboard in hand, and timed each flight from takeoff to landing.

  “Aircraft #X taking off.”

  “The wind has shifted.”

  “Aircraft #Y, you are not clear for takeoff.”

  “‘Gyro’ requests permission to land.”

  “‘Gyro’ may land.”

  ‘“Deck’ will now land.”

  On and on it went. It was quite nerve-wracking.

  Wakatsuki suffered an accident. His plane (#4) flipped when its landing gear hung up on an obstruction during landing, and he ground to a halt upside down. I held my breath. We wear seatbelts and shoulder straps to bind us into the airplane, but in due course Wakatsuki untangled himself and emerged unperturbed with the instructor. God bless the Red Dragonfly. Had it been a real warplane, they would have both been goners. The Red Dragonflies are very stable. If we ever lose control in the air, they tell us, we should simply let go of the stick, and the plane will right itself naturally. Wakatsuki had a slight limp. But nevertheless he managed to sprint to the command tent and shout out a report, his face flushed, “Aircraft #4, Cadet Wakatsuki, reporting in from the third flight! The landing gear was damaged, and the propeller was completely destroyed. There is no other problem."

  The division officer motioned Wakatsuki forward until they stood face to face, then he gave him a whack. “Idiot! You sound like you’re proud! You damaged the undercarriage. You wrecked the propeller. And there is no other problem?”

  Relieved of my recording duty, I climbed into aircraft #7 for her eighth flight of the day. After taking off, I penetrated the clouds at an altitude of 300 meters. I call them clouds, but they were wispy, more like mist really. They slipped by at tremendous speed. The airfield vanished and then reappeared through the rifts. The island mountains of Amakusa were draped in clouds. The scene brought back a memory of a trip to Unzen I once made with my parents during the rainy season, when our bus climbed up through the mist.

  All in all, the most difficult thing is to complete a pull out at five meters as you come in to land. Unlike army pilots, navy fliers must execute a pullout-and-stall at a height of five meters in order to drop the tail of the plane for a three-point landing on the deck of an aircraft carrier. No matter how many times I try, I wind up touching down front-wheel first. I need more experience if I am ever to get the hang of it.

  Flight operations exhaust me. I crave for books during our evening study sessions. Strange to say, though, these days I don’t ever feel like taking up the Manyoshu. Stray poems from it come to mind during breaks between lectures and flight training, but I feel no inclination to open up the book and read. Instead, I want to read someone who can school a young fighter on matters of real consequence, firmly but responsibly, and in light of our actual situation. But such books are few and far between. Otherwise, I prefer to read something short and sweet, say, the fairy tales of Andersen, or the stories of Chekhov. Some men attain self-forgetfulness through the pleasures of the table, but only one thing really eases my mind: reading a great book that admits me to a wonderfully secure world. I write home for a few.

  July 8

  Yesterday was the night of the Star Festival. We stood in ranks facing the moon and practiced issuing commands. The Milky Way was beautiful.

  The Star Festival puts me in mind of the girls in the merchants’ district of Osaka. Dolled up in large-patterned red yukata and yellow waistbands, they sit outside on benches, fans in hand, and chat idly along in their regional accent.

  “That’s not right, Yuki-chan. That’s just not fair.”

  “Yeah, but my brother said it’s okay.”

  The sweet colloquial rhythms of Osaka echoing in my ears, before my eyes a slip of silver paper inscribed with the words “Star Festival,” the glow of sparklers.... But soon enough we are placed on Defense Condition 1. No time to fantasize about girls in yukata. It would appear that better than a dozen B-29s flew in from the direction of Chengdu, China, for a midnight raid on northern and western Kyushu. Yahata, Sasebo, and other cities all suffered damage.

  Today is Imperial Rescript Day. The Sunday schedule was unexpectedly applied, and we were granted liberty. We took the train to Minamata and headed straight for the Fukais. Mr. Fukai was in Kumamoto today. The daughter, Fukiko, helped her mother prepare a meal for us, wearing pants made from a coarse, splash-patterned fabric. I felt guilty barging in unannounced. But what might otherwise have been a plain-looking pair of work pants looked fetching on Fukiko. The subdued light of the Fukais’ house imparted a grace to her fair face and limbs, and I have never known a girl with such elegant nails. Mrs. Fukai kept us company for the most part, while Fukiko, to our disappointment, tended to disappear into the kitchen, not that any of us (I assume) was thinking of her in any special way. We aren’t allowed to indulge such thoughts. Fukiko is quiet by nature, but she laughed with amusement when we related the story of Wakatsuki emerging from his plane so free of care after landing it upside down.

  I learned for the first time that Tokutomi Roka was from Minamata. The Fukais have a number of old books of essays by local literary figures, and also a volume called the Ashikita County Chronicle, which compiles folk songs, ballads, and legends.

  I found a few interesting hulling songs: “Long may my old man live, until the fire bell at the temple rots.” “Divert yourself with song, instead of crying about your work.” And a horse driver’s chant: “If you sing as you please, the trees and reeds will nod, and the river stop to listen.”

  I suggested that we visit the Fukais whenever we are granted an outing, and that each time we copy out a few of these old folk poems, with a view toward making a notebook.

  “Sure. Sounds interesting. Let’s do it,” Sakai agreed.

  Fujikura, however, was displeased. “This isn’t a Japanese Lit class,” he said. “Stop your masturbatory trifling, and don’t be so mawkish.” He seems to be in the habit of objecting on principle to whatever it is we propose.

  For dessert we were served a sweet soup of parched barley flour with dumplings. I stirred the barley flour into the boiling water and raised the bowl to my mouth, savoring its clean bucolic flavor, its gentle aroma and warmth. It was pure delight.

  We returned to base at 1630. Tonight we learned that the final charge was in progress on Saipan.

  July 18

  First solo flight today. Intense heat, glaring sun, blue sky, and cumulonimbus clouds.

  The men on Saipan died honorably, I heard. In the early morning of July 7, they launched their final all-out assault. Some managed to steer in close to Mt. Tapotchau, inflicting heavy losses on the enemy, but all are believed to have met their heroic deaths no later than the 16th. Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo, task force leader at the Battle of Hawaii, was also killed in action.

  “Ours is not to reason why, ours is but to do or die.” We may fall, or we may kick in hard, but we must do it all without question, and that is our life.

  I scarcely have time even to write this.

  July 31

  I was permitted to fly solo only the other day, and now I am already training in aerobatics.

  The summer sea and clouds are exceptionally beautiful. From an altitude of 1200 meters, I made a nosedive toward a fishing boat, a solitary dot on the sea. I made a loop and executed a hammer-head stall and a vertical turn. Up in the sky the air is cool and pleasant, and aerobatic flying is a thrill, but it seems that the brain works far less efficiently at high altitude. Besides, I feel lousy all day after a flight, and my head grows heavy, as if it were under pressure.

  Still, since we began aerobatics and formation flight training, I have noticed on the faces of my comrades the serene expression of men who act without worry about the outcome, as well as a few menacing looks. Flying demands the most rigorous attention, a kind of total effort. At all other times, there is just no use thinking about anything. My body perpetually craves watermelon, cold drinks, and the like.

  They conducted a survey as to which typ
e of aircraft we wish to fly. I listed carrier-based attack bombers for my first choice, land-based attack bombers for my second. In short, I have decided to fly hugging a torpedo to my belly. After all, if we don’t do it, nobody will. Enemy troops have landed on Guam, and they have also reached Palau. Dalian reportedly suffered an air raid last night. The 1st Division and the 8th Division start night-flight training tomorrow. In fact, night-flight training is the ultimate course. We have come a long way in short order. Prepare for death with composure.

  A letter from father arrived today, together with Mokichi Saito’s Winter Clouds and the Iwanami paperback of Chekhov’s stories. They still know nothing of my brother Bunkichi’s whereabouts, and, as news comes in of suicidal charges made on one island after another, they worry, ominously.

  When I open Winter Clouds, the poems about battles, and about Yamato, naturally seize my heart. However, the poems collected here date from 1937 to 1939, which means Saito’s sentiment is often rather distant from ours, even if he does speak of war.

  When a nation rises,

  When her spirit tops the brim,

  Her sons find their peace Even in death.

  My heart full

  With news of battles won,

  I greet the New Year:

  My mind like still water.

  If I put out to sea

  I shall become a water-soaked corpse:

  The guns roar in felicitation

  Over the Pacific.

  Given the present complexion of the war, I could never express such wholehearted “felicitations.” I will copy down a few other poems that caught my eye.