Bamboo Bloodbath and Ninja's Revenge

  "Even to the damned mat?"

  "We respect the mat that prevents us from breaking our bones on the floor."

  He shut up, and I returned to Gloria. "You know the ukemi?" I asked her.

  "Bobby showed me," she said, performing a creditable backward breakfall, slapping the mat with both hands as she landed. From this, I gathered that Bobby was her former boyfriend who had known judo. The brown belt.

  "All right, let's warm up," I said. "Right-side breakfall, yoko ukemi. Hit it!" And we went down together, slapping the mat resoundingly.

  "Why the bit with the noise?" the skipper asked.

  "It's not for the sound," I said. "We strike the mat just before the body hits, to take up some of the shock. That makes the fall easier to take. Fewer injuries."

  We ran through several assorted falls. "Now," I said, "let's do a throw. Here is the ippon seoi-nage—the one-arm shoulder throw. Start facing each other, right hand on your partner's left lapel." I grabbed a handful of her sweatshirt above the left breast, since she had no lapel. "Left hand on his sleeve. Now turn to the left, switch your right arm to his right armpit, catch his arm, and haul him over your back for the throw." I threw her, taking care to set her down gently.

  Gloria was overjoyed. "That's what Bobby always did!" Then she sobered, evidently remembering her separation from him. What had happened to him?

  "Now you throw me," I said. The skipper chuckled, thinking this was impossible, as I was substantially larger than she. But I talked her through the motions, and when she heaved on my arm I went over and landed resoundingly on the mat.

  "Hey, that's something!" the skipper said, genuinely impressed. "Can anybody do it?"

  "Certainly," I said. "Take off your shoes and I'll show you." He removed his shoes, cleaned the bric-a-brac out of his pockets, and stepped onto the mat. "Oops!" he said, and stepped back off. He bowed. Then he stepped on again and bowed to me. He was catching on.

  I tried to have him throw me, as Gloria had. But he was completely new to judo, and it made a big difference. What is simple to the person with a little experience is hopelessly complex to the newcomer, for there are many seemingly minor things to take into account, such as proper balance. He just couldn't get it right. Rather than have him work up a negative attitude, I switched to a simpler technique.

  "Try o soto gari, the major outer reaping," I said. "It works like this: you take hold of your opponent in the natural position, step forward to his side with your left foot, pulling his shoulder up against yours. See, he's half-unbalanced already." I had him leaning slightly back, and I knew he was aware I could put him down easily. A throw is most impressive when you feel its authority; he'd be eager to learn it.

  "Now you lift your right leg high behind him, swing it back and catch his right knee from the back while you shove him backward. It's a glorified trip, like pushing him over a log. He has to fall." And I put him down firmly, hanging on so that he did not land hard.

  Then I talked him through it while he put me down. Of course, his technique was clumsy, but I obliged with an impressive fall, slapping the mat.

  "It really works!" he said, almost as pleased as Gloria. "I thought all that stuff was fake!"

  "It's real," I said. "But of course there are counters. You could not throw me if I didn't cooperate."

  "But I could throw someone who didn't know it?"

  "If you did it correctly, yes. But don't go trying it on all your friends. If you do it to someone who doesn't know how to take a fall, on a hard floor, you'll put him in the hospital." That, of course, was the theory of the judo throw: in a street-fight situation, a person thrown with force and control on his back would be unlikely to continue hostilities with any real enthusiasm. Similarly, someone held in an armlock or strangle would be disinclined to offer further resistance. Thus contest matches were decided in favor of the person who made such a throw or obtained such a hold, or showed his advantage in some other fashion.

  "What are we waiting for! Get on with the lesson!"

  That was not the ideal attitude, but actually the proper attitude can be one of the hardest aspects of judo to master, and many physically competent players fail to advance because of imperfections in attitude. The skipper had found a new interest, however transitory. Well, I believe in judo, karate, or any martial art as entertainment; they are far better than dope or gambling. If he exchanged his dissipated life for the discipline of judo, he would be a better man in every way.

  So I drilled them both in the ippon seoi nage and the o soto gari, keeping it simple. The mat was so bouncy that it was practically impossible for them to hurt themselves, so long as they followed instructions. I kept a close eye on it anyway.

  Theoretically judo is the "gentle" or "yielding" way, and no student should get hurt; but imperfectly applied techniques are dangerous.

  One of the crewmen appeared in the door. "Yes?" the skipper inquired, looking up from the mat, where Gloria had just thrown him, both of them enjoying it.

  "All of you move over to one side," the man said.

  Then I saw he was holding a gun.

  "Hey, what is this?" the skipper demanded.

  "We're hijacking your boat," the man said. He was a thin, college-boy type, no more than twenty, nervous but determined. "We don't want to kill anybody, so just take it easy and the boat's all you'll lose."

  "Do as he says," I muttered. "Only a fool goes against a gun."

  "Hey, I thought you knew how to handle such things!" the skipper said. "What good is a martial art if you just surrender?"

  "It may sound cowardly to you, but it is common sense," I said. "Foolish heroics against a gun can get you needlessly killed."

  Gloria turned on me a gaze of incredulous contempt. "With three of us and one of him—"

  "Never make resistance to a gun unless you have no choice," I said.

  "Listen to the man," the crewman said. "He's right!" Gloria exchanged glances with the skipper. It was obvious my stature had just taken a dive.

  We lined up against the wall. "I'm paying you good money!" the skipper said indignantly to the crewman. "What's the matter with you?"

  "Maybe I'm making a break for Havana, find a better life there," the man said.

  "They put hijackers to work in the cane fields," I said. "You're a fool."

  "I'd be a worse fool to work all my life for peanuts," he snorted. "The dope we move in two, three trips could net us a million dollars. No one will check this pleasure craft. When they start to catch on, we'll scuttle her and sign on another. I expect to retire richer than you are in a couple. of years."

  So it was dope, not escape. Unless that was another lie. Not that it made much difference to us.

  "Scuttle her!" the skipper cried in horror. "The Connie is worth a hundred and seventy thousand dollars, and I'm still making payments on her!"

  "Shut up," the hijacker said. "You'll be put adrift in a lifeboat."

  "We'll die!" Gloria cried.

  He eyed her. "Maybe you'll stay aboard, cutes. Come here."

  She approached him hesitantly. I made ready to move, fast, if he hurt her. But his gun was still dangerous.

  "Get that sweatshirt off—see what you look like," he said, reaching for it.

  Gloria grabbed his arm and spun into the ippon seoi nage. It was the throw I had just taught her.

  She did not perform it well, but she caught him completely by surprise. The gun fired and he stumbled to the side, not actually falling. But that was all the leeway. I needed. I leaped across the cabin and caught him with an atemi blow to the side of the neck. I hit the nerve-center complex astride the carotid arteries with my bunched fist. The blow inhibited his respiratory reflexes, and he fell down as if poleaxed. Many people, even judokas, do not know that judo utilizes blows too, and atemi waza. These are so dangerous that they are taught only at black-belt level. They are similar to but superior to the karate blows.

  "That's enough!"

  It was the other crewman, also with a g
un. I saw at once that he was an entirely different type, and not merely physically. He was short and stocky, with a very wide, strong neck and big arms—the build of a wrestler, a weight lifter.

  "Your friend's unconscious," I said. "His respiratory reflexes have been stunned by the nerve blow I used. He will die unless I perform katsu—"

  The gun swung on me. "Get away from him!" the man snapped. "You can't bluff me!"

  I moved away, still protesting. "It's no bluff! He has to be shocked into breathing again, now."

  "You'll be shocked into not breathing, by a bullet, if you touch him," he said. "You only want a hostage."

  But the first crewman was obviously in a bad way. His accomplice jogged him with one foot. "Come on, Bruce, snap out of it!"

  But the unconscious man only shuddered. Then his eyes opened. It was not recovery; it was death.

  "You bastards!" the gunman cried. "Now you'll walk the plank, if I don't shoot you first!" He aimed at me.

  Then the skipper made his move. He jumped for the gun. It was a well-timed effort, but the hijacker was cat-quick. The weapon spun around and fired. The skipper stumbled to the floor, wounded in the thigh.

  The gunman stepped back. "Now you can try your treatment—on him," he said to me, allowing himself a flickering, humorless grin. "Get him out on deck. Next one who tries it gets it in the chest."

  I knelt beside the skipper. I peeled back his trouser leg. It was a nasty wound through the great muscle of the thigh, but clean; the bullet had passed right through, missing both bone and artery. The wound was bleeding slowly from both ends.

  "You're damn lucky," I told him. "Small-caliber, high-velocity bullet—I know it hurts like hell, but you'll survive. He's not bluffing; he had time to shoot you in the gut, but he aimed for the leg instead. I told you not to resist a gun!"

  The skipper was ashen-faced. "You told me, all right."

  "You bastard!" Gloria flared at me. "He did it to stop you from getting shot!" She knelt beside the skipper. "Move over—I'll tend to it."

  I moved, slowly standing. The gunman's eyes were on Gloria, whose loose sweatshirt was now hanging open at the neck as she leaned over, affording the familiar view of her bosom. Some girls just can't seem to avoid displaying their assets; no doubt it takes years of practice until it becomes automatic and unconscious. It was a godsend now.

  I gave the kiai yell with all my power and launched myself into a forward roll. My head and shoulders went down, my feet up, as I flipped over toward my antagonist.

  The gun went off again, and I felt the searing passage of the bullet across my back. Not serious, I knew; a couple inches lower would have finished me, for it would have caught my spinal nerve. He had aimed for the chest, as promised, and hadn't reacted quickly enough to my unexpectedly low attack. I flung my feet out, and they struck something, hard.

  I was incredibly lucky, for the second time in as many seconds. I had caught his arm with one heel and knocked the gun loose. That was what I had tried to do, but I had rated my chances for success at about five-to-one against. The only reason I had initiated my action was that I was now certain he meant to kill us. He merely preferred to make it look like an accidental drowning, just in case there should ever be an investigation. I had hoped to entangle him before he could fire again, and fight for the gun.

  As it was, I rolled to my feet, coming up fast in front of him. He was trying to swing his fist at me. I caught his shirt in two hands, hauled him close to me, then spun around and thrust out my leg in the tai otoshi body-drop throw.

  He should have stumbled over my leg and fallen to the deck. But the man just stood there, his stomach hard as a rock. He was tough, and he had had experience. I could not throw him. A failed throw is an invitation to disaster, and so it was in this case. His arms snaked upward under my armpits and behind my head in a wrestler's full-nelson. He applied pressure, shoving my head forward, my chin down into my chest, until it seemed my neck must break. Which, of course, is the general idea of a nelson. I tried to break the grip by lifting my arms and lowering them fast while dropping to one knee. But his arms were too strong. I resisted with all my strength, but it was not enough. My head was lowered more and more against my chest, and I knew that my neck was going to be broken. The pain was awful, and I could feel the creaking of the vertebrae in my neck.

  I went for another atemi waza blow. I raised my right foot, then brought my heel down as hard as I could on the top of his right foot near the base of the big toe. This attack is called sokuchu, to the metatarsal bone. This gives a nervous shock that is potentially fatal.

  But he was wearing sneakers, so the effect was only partial. Still, he cried out in anguish, loosening his hold on me and falling to the deck. I was free, and it would take only a moment to finish him off.

  "Murderers!" a high-pitched female voice cried. I looked up, and there was another woman. She must have been a stowaway. She stood just in front of the open hatch to the engine room—a disheveled, thin, blue-eyed blonde. I was reminded of the girl member of the Bastard Bones. She held in one hand a ball, or fruit.

  Fruit? No—it was a grenade!

  "I'll get you!" she screamed, lifting her arm high in a woman-fashion throw.

  There was a shot. The skipper had picked up one of the guns and fired at her. The girl collapsed and fell backward into the hatch.

  "God, I shot her..." the skipper said, appalled.

  Then there was a tremendous explosion below. The grenade had detonated. Almost immediately flames shot up, as gasoline spread and burned.

  "We've got to get out of here!" the skipper cried. "Before the main tank goes!"

  I leaned down, caught him under the arms, and dragged him out onto the deck. "You get the lifeboat down!" I yelled to Gloria. "I'm going back for the man!"

  "You're crazy!" the skipper screamed. "No time—"

  "I've got to try!" I said, turning.

  Then I was stumbling over the rail. As I fell into the water, I realized that Gloria had shoved me. Then she put her arm around the skipper, supporting him as well as she could, and they both jumped. After the splash, we all moved away from the boat, and the gas tank blew.

  Burning debris showered down around us. The yacht was done for, already sinking, her hull ripped apart. Gloria had saved my life, for I would have been in that explosion if she had not pushed me.

  We were lucky, again. We were alive, and all three of us could swim. Land was not far off. Our chance for survival seemed good. Better than for those aboard the burning, sinking Connie.

  Then the sharks came. Well, one shark—but that was much more than I liked. It circled us curiously. "Keep on swimming!" I cried. "Not all sharks are maneaters. We can make it." But the skipper panicked. The shark brushed against his wounded leg, attracted by the blood. The skipper started screaming and thrashing, and the fish kept cruising in diminishing circles. Suddenly the fin veered off and came at me. I flexed legs and arms together in one powerful thrust that lifted the top third of my body clear of the water, and punched downward with my right fist on the top of its head where it broke the surface. My aim was good; my blow scored, and it had all my strength behind it.

  Ouch! It felt like hitting a board set with sandpaper. My fist was badly scraped. Sharkskin is tough, as though little teeth are set all over its body.

  The shark shot away. I don't think it was hurt, just surprised. Despite their reputation, sharks are not eager to do battle on an even basis. They close in cautiously, and retreat if there seems to be danger. So a good bash on the snout can discourage even a large specimen; he doesn't want more of the same. It's better if you have a sharp rod, of course, and even then nothing is certain. Sharks are like people: some are tougher than others.

  I was no longer optimistic about our chances for survival; in fact, I was plain scared. But I kept that to myself, and I intended to fight it out.

  Gloria screamed as the fin came at her. I had sent the shark away from me, only to bother her! I stroked toward her,
but her scream had already made it veer off again. Very cautious fish. "Stay close to me!" I gasped. "Splash a lot!"

  Then the skipper screamed. "My leg!"

  We moved toward him, but already I saw blood on the water. Not a little—a lot. The shark went mad. There was a frenzied thrashing.

  I dived under and saw the shark worrying at the skipper's leg. The predator had bitten an enormous chunk out of it. I swam under the shark's belly and struck it with my spear hand, the fingers stiff and together. But the water impeded my movement, and I succeeded only in annoying the creature. It flicked its tail and sent me tumbling through the froth.

  The blow almost knocked me unconscious. My whole side felt numb. Now much more than my fist was scraped.

  By the time I regained my orientation, it was too late for the skipper. The shark had dragged him under.

  I gestured before Gloria's frightened face, pointing toward land. At this point there was nothing we could do but save ourselves. We swam, side by side. The shark was intent on the carnage behind, giving us some respite. But Gloria could not keep the pace. I had to slow to keep her from falling behind, and slow again. She was panting and choking, obviously in trouble. But at any time the shark would complete its grisly repast and seek new prey—us.

  "Hang on to me!" I cried.

  Gratefully she came up to me, and I realized one source of trouble. She still wore the heavy sweatshirt. Waterlogged, it was hampering her movements and dragging in the water, draining her strength. "Get it off!" I cried. "Strip!"

  To set the example, I stripped myself. My own gis weren't any asset either. Then I helped pull off her sweatshirt and slacks. Naked, we were both better off. Then she clasped her arms around my neck from behind, and I moved ahead with the breast stroke, frog-kick combination—slower than the crawl, but powerful. Breast stroke: no pun intended, but when she slid off my back to one side or the other, my shoulder did stroke one of her breasts. I am never too busy to notice such things.

  "Shark!" she cried.

  Sure enough, another fin had spotted us. This shark was a monster—a good fourteen feet. It circled twice, then came directly in. It didn't have any doubts about its ability to handle the situation. And why should it?