At the Emperor's Wish: A Tale of the New Japan

by Oscar K. Davis

Fiercely through the lifting mist rang the challenge of the guns, and over the heads of the Guards, lying far out on the sandy island, screamed the deadly shells, searching the nooks and corners of the Russian lines. Soichi was in the first line. Across his breast hung his boxes of cartridges, and in the blue cloth tied over his shoulder were his two little baskets of rice. His rifle, polished and cleaned with arduous care, was ready.

For half an hour the shells flew over their heads, and then along the line rang a single shrill blast of a whistle. Instantly they were on their feet and surging ahead. One wild “Banzai!” rolled from their throats and they settled to their work. Suddenly the silent trenches along the hills leaped into life and the storm of Russian lead beat upon them. Steadily they went forward, not a rifle making answer to the fierce fire from the hilltops. Men went down, but only those stopped who could not go on. Into the last of the three broad streams they plunged, and under that unceasing sweep of bullets forged across. Then on the double they sprang ahead, while above them still hurtled the venomous messengers from their own guns. The earth shook with the concussion of the cannon, and the beautiful day smiled on hill and river red with war. Fairly at the foot of the Russian height they halted, and for a brief breathing space stood still.

At the left of the line, where the Guards were to charge, the enemy held the crest of the ridge with a double line of trenches terminating in a square redoubt. There were the red-mouthed guns belching their hail of iron death. In front, on the slopes, were fences and crisscrosses and tangles of wire, winding in and about among traps and pits and jagged stakes, and swept unceasingly by the murderous fire of the rifles and machine guns in the trenches.

Three things Soichi knew no soldier should remember on the battlefield—his home, his dear ones, and his own body. Calmly he surveyed the terrible ground over which he was about to undertake the desperate rush. Up there, on the heights, were the lines to which some of them must go through to plant the flag of the Rising Sun, as the Emperor wished. He wondered who would be the one to win that coveted honor. As for him, this was the hour in which he was to die his “glorious death.”

Almost before he knew it the whistle shrilled again and they were off, running steadily, in wide open lines, straight up the rugged hillside. They cheered once at the start, a full-throated, rousing “Banzai! Banzai! Teikoku Banzai!” but it took too much breath from the running, and they stopped, that the work might not suffer.

Now as he raced along, the young soldier found himself curiously taking note of things occurring around him. His right-hand man went down, and Soichi, seeing him fall, knew that he was dead. There was one, he thought, who had gained the prize of glory. It seemed strange that he, too, was not hit. And there was Lieutenant Kudo, perhaps a pace ahead of the line, running as hard as he could and somehow finding breath to shout to the men. He marveled at it, and with mind bent on that wonder, ran full into a tangled wire that stopped him with a jerk, almost throwing him backward to the ground. It filled him with sudden surprised rage, and he grasped the wire and tugged away at it as if to pull it away by main strength.

All the time he heard the soft voices of the bullets flying close by his head, the little half whisper like the cheep of tired chicks nestling at dark under the protecting feathers of the mother hen. The wire would not yield, though all along its length the men had laid hold as he had, and were putting forth all their might. As he looked, Soichi saw a line of his comrades who had fallen by the fence, struck down on the measured range. He drew back his rifle and brought the sharp bayonet down on the wire with a savage swing, all his weight in the blow. Clean to the ground it went, through all the strands, and the way was open.

On he dashed, not even looking to see whether any followed. Blindly he knew that Kokan was near him, still calling. He was so tired he could hardly lift his feet, and yet he kept on running, running, always running up that death-swept slope. Now the men knew the secret of the wires and there was little delay. Soichi heard the machine guns rattle as he had heard the typhoon rains beat on the iron roof of his father’s warehouse. The Russian guns sent their shells shrieking over the slope and carrying away his mates in groups. He saw men fall into the pits, stumble and throw forward, crumple up and drop, go down all about him. Still the prize was not his. He went on.

Then, without warning, the world came to its end. The whooping and whistling, the shrieking and singing of shells and bullets ceased, and with a far-off, muffled roar, the solid earth rose beneath him and hurled him headlong forward, him and Kokan together. He wondered, curiously, as he was in the air, if it were to be the trick of fate that he and the lieutenant were to win death together. Then he fell, and for an instant neither saw nor heard nor felt nor thought. A voice calling in tones he knew, brought him back to himself and the riot and din of the horrible maelstrom. He struggled to his feet to hear Kokan shouting to him: