We were a people waiting for only one thing: news of the progress of the war and its approaching end. Just how much this obsession dominated all my own thoughts became vividly clear to me one day in the kitchen. Walking through the dining hall, I passed an elderly woman missionary scanning with great eagerness a letter in Chinese script which she had received from Peking. (A very few letters came into camp, almost all from the cities of North China.) As I walked by, she looked up at me with real excitement and said, "Oh, I've just learned the most wonderful news! Come and hear all about it!"

Thinking her Chinese friends had told her of some new Allied military victory we had not yet had wind of; I stopped abruptly and asked hungrily, "What is it, for goodness' sake!"

"Oh, it's wonderful! Thirty souls were saved last week in Peking at our church revival!"

I walked away, laughing at myself. "You are a pagan, Gilkey!" I thought. "There's only one kind of news you want to hear, and that has little enough to do with heaven or hell!"

Fortunately news of the events we hungered to hear of came to us in a variety of ways. For some unaccountable reason, the Japanese continued to publish and send out to old subscribers the English-language newspaper in Peking. That event beloved of the Japanese news service, the dispatch of the entire American fleet to the bottom of the sea, was regularly depicted in lurid detail on its pages. These bizarre reports retained, however, one aspect of the truth which gave us our main clues to the war's progress. They always mentioned the spot at which the Allied defeat had occurred. When we read that fifty American ships had been sunk successively at Guadalcanal, Kwajalein, Guam, the Philippines, and finally Okinawa, we had a pretty clear picture of how things were going. And when we learned that thousands of United States bombers were being shot down regularly over Japanese cities, we knew the end was not far off.

Another source of news was even more reliable since it was the only way in which we could hear of events the official news service wished to suppress.

The Chinese guerrilla bands in the nearby hills tried to relay to us whatever news of importance they had picked up by radio from Chungking. Since no Chinese had any direct contact with us after the guards took over the black market, this was no easy task. Actually the way it was done had a charmingly "Cloak-and-dagger" air to it.

The only Chinese who came into camp were the coolies who emptied the septic tanks, carrying out the precious "night soil" in large buckets at either end of a long pole. These coolies had to be very careful since the guards watched them closely to see they made no contact with the internees. But they managed to find loopholes.

At the end of each block of rooms was a large wooden garbage box, equipped with long handles so that two men could carry it, and a wooden cover. Each day two male internees would carry their box out the front gate about fifty yards to a rubbish pile where it would be dumped. There, to our everlasting discomfiture, hungry Chinese outside the walls would pore over its sorry contents hoping to find some luxurious morsel among our garbage. It was by way of these boxes that the coolies managed to get news to the camp. One day I chanced to watch this fascinating process.

At a prearranged time the coolies marched along the street of the camp bearing their lush burden. At the same moment, two internees could be seen preparing to cart their garbage box out of the camp. Just for a moment, they left the cover off the box.

One guerrilla coolie who had made a great point of spitting on his march—and spitting is no rarity among the Chinese—spat into the open garbage box as he went by. The cover was snapped shut by the men who had been lighting their cigarettes. Then they, too, started their leisurely walk to the garbage dump. When they reached the pile, they sifted more carefully than usual through the mess in their box, and sure enough, there, somewhere inside, was a damp and crumpled note. The message was then rushed to the camp translator, usually a discreet missionary. If important, the contents would be divulged to the nine-man committee. In turn the committee would decide its value and probable reliability, and about the wisdom of disclosing the news to the camp in general. Such precautions regarding officially published news were deemed necessary because the Chinese air waves were full of wildly optimistic rumors and there seemed no point in building up hopes unnecessarily.

The news of the first negotiations about the armistice reached us through the coolies on Monday, the 12th of August, 1945. We knew that the end was near in the Pacific. But knowing nothing yet either of the atomic bomb or of the Russian entry into the Asian war, we had no idea it would come as quickly as it did.

I first heard the news through Albert Hoskins. The most respected missionary among the camp's general leaders, Hoskins had served on the Labor Committee a couple of times and was now the official liaison man with the guerrillas and the translator of all their messages—including the one that bore the great news.

On that Monday I happened to step out of the kitchen yard into the main street when Bert hustled by. He stopped and came to me, looking very nervous and excited. He asked in an un-usually intimate whisper, "Can you keep a secret?"

I had no idea what it might be about. I was, in fact, a little bored with this drama, which seemed so unlike him, so I said, "Can I tell Matt or Stan?"

"No," replied Bert, "but you'd better hear it anyway. I promised the committee to tell no one except my wife, but it's no fun to tell things like this only to your wife, for you can't get at the politics involved. So come on, let me tell you!"

"Okay." I was now less bored and quite willing to listen.

"All right—hang on, 'cause it's big!" He paused for the effect to sink in. "The war is over! It just came through the coolies from Chungking. This time it looks like the real thing. We don't dare tell the camp until we get some check. Someone might take it into his head to pay an old score with a guard. Before we hold power, that could be fatal. We don't know what the Japs will do when they hear this. So don't tell a soul."

I can still feel the shock, the thrill, the tremendous excitement mingled with incredulous unbelief when I heard this. Could it be true? Was the world that good? Was the war really over, the worries gone and a new life possible? With these thoughts a wave of sheer joy surged through me.

How completely certain kinds of news—that a loved one has died, that a war has begun, or that a war is over—can stop one world and begin another! Nothing one is doing today will, because of it, be relevant or possible tomorrow; aware of it, one gasps at the sheer contingency of things, how they and all their works can so quickly pass away.

The minute I heard that news, the whole camp looked, felt, and even smelled different. Now it was over, and all that was left was the getting out, and much that had worried us for the future receded quickly into the past. Bert and I hurriedly discussed the political possibilities for our future: would they land in Tsingtao, would the guerrillas take over the camp, and so on. I went back into the kitchen as into an unreal world. I found men debating, as we had done endlessly for two years, how long it would be now that the attack on Kyushu seemed certain to come soon.

The news, of course, seeped around quickly enough. That night I went as usual to Matt and Edith's for supper, wondering how to deal with this "thing" about which I knew I must talk soon or go wild. Finally I said, "I have been told something I promised not to tell you."

"So have I, on the same conditions," laughed Matt. And so, legalists that we were, we spent the evening happily discussing "it" without ever breaking our not too solemn promises.

By the next day, everyone knew that negotiations were underway. On Wednesday, further word came to us of an offer of peace by the emperor. Rumors had, however, flashed across the war sky like lightning since December 8, nearly four years before; more confirmation was needed before anyone could rest easy.

On Wednesday evening, more or less by unspoken word, all the adults gathered outside the commandant's office hoping to hear some bulletin, if one came. If one did not, we intended to demand official word of some sort from the Japanese, for they had refused to utter one syllable on the subject since the first tidings had come in on Monday. While the whole camp was standing there, jovial but very tense and excited, Mr. Watanobi came out of his office. He was a well-hated but secondary official, small, arrogant, and mean. At one time or another about everyone had sworn to himself to beat him black and blue when the war was over. When Mr. Watanobi saw this immense crowd, he turned ashen. Then all in unison bellowed, "There he is, get him!"

Struck with terror, Watanobi turned in panic and fled toward the Japanese quarters, his small sneaker-clad feet twinkling white over the ground. The sight of this hated tormentor transformed before our eyes into a fleeing rabbit caused a howl of delight and laughter to rise. With that metamorphosis of our rulers, all threats on the lives or the limbs of the guards vanished. Nothing was said officially that evening, but Watanobi's terrified flight was generally regarded as the most promising clue to the real state of things that we could have had.

Although the coming of victory had been the glorious event for which all longed, it also had its serious implications to those few who dared to ponder them. Who knew how an enraged Japanese soldiery might behave on the eve of certain defeat? Allied forces were one thousand miles away by land; we were a hundred miles from the nearest seaport. Did the Allies know we were here? Did anyone in authority care that we were? Could troops get here in time if they did?

What was about as gruesome to contemplate—assuming the guards left us alive and simply departed—was the question as to whether we would continue to receive supplies, and above all, protection before rescue came. We were sure that if we were left alone we would starve quickly enough with no help, and that with no weapons we would be quite defenseless against marauding army bands. In view of at least the first of these problems, our leaders had made a valiant effort to save and to hide at least four days' stock of flour for such an emergency. Strangely, nothing at all resembling what actually happened ever seemed to have occurred to us when we stared anxiously into the future.

Thursday, the day after Watanobi's flight, was weird. Everyone expected the end of our world to come; yet, for the moment, we were still absorbed in the trivia of camp life. Then on Friday, the end came in as glorious a Parousia as the wildest biblical scenarist could have devised.

The day, August 17, 1945, was clear, blue, and warm, as such a day should have been. We all began our chores of cooking, stoking, and cleaning up slops as usual. About the middle of the morning, however, word flashed around camp that an Allied plane had been sighted.

Two or three times during the course of the war, we had seen one of "our" planes flying way up in the upper atmosphere, a fast-moving silver speck far out of identification range. We felt sure they were Allied because of their solitary height and their speed, a vivid contrast to the antiquated Japanese planes that chugged overhead, burning, as one wag put it, "coal balls." Those lonely high fliers sent an electric shock through the camp on those two or three occasions, for they were, from the beginning of the war to its end, our only contact with Allied military might. Yet at that distant height they seemed, like Aristotle's god, to be wholly indifferent to our presence in their world, indeed, if they knew about our existence at all.

The plane that had been sighted on that Friday was evidently quite different—or so the boy who spread the word made clear as he ran through the kitchen yard screaming in an almost insane excitement, "An American plane, and headed straight for us!"

We all flung our stirring paddles down beside the cauldrons; left the carrots unchopped on the tables, and tore after the boy to the ballfield.

This miracle was true: there it was, now as big as a gull and heading for us from the western mountains.

As it came steadily nearer, the elation of the assembled camp-1,500 strong—mounted. This meant that the Allies were probing into our area, not a slow thousand miles away! And people began to shout to themselves, to everyone around them, to the heavens above, their exhilaration:

"Why, it's a big plane, with four engines! It's coming straight for the camp—and look how low it is! Look, there's the American flag painted on the side! Why, it's almost touching the trees! . . . It's turning around again. . . . It's coming back over the camp! . . . Look, look, they're waving at us! They know who we are. They have come to get us!"

At this point, the excitement was too great for any of us to contain. It surged up within us, a flood of joyful feeling, sweeping aside all our restraints and making us its captives. Suddenly I realized that for some seconds I had been running around in circles, waving my hands in the air and shouting at the top of my lungs. On becoming aware of these antics, I looked around briefly to see how others were behaving.

It was pandemonium, the more so because everyone like myself was looking up and shouting at the plane, and was unconscious of what he or anyone else was doing. Staid folk were embracing others to whom they had barely spoken for two years; proper middle-aged Englishmen and women were cheering or swearing. Others were laughing hysterically, or crying like babies. All were moved to an ecstasy of feeling that carried them quite out of their normal selves as the great plane banked over and circled the camp three times.

This plane was our plane. It was sent here for us, to tell us the war was over. It was that personal touch, the assurance that we were again included in the wider world of men—that our personal histories would resume—which gave those moments their supreme meaning and their violent emotion.

Then suddenly, all this sound stopped dead. A sharp gasp went up as fifteen hundred people stared in stark wonder. I could feel the drop of my own jaw. After flying very low back and forth about a half mile from the camp, the plane's underside suddenly opened. Out of it, wonder of wonders, floated seven men in parachutes! This was the height of the incredible! Not only were they coming here some day, they were here today, in our midst! Rescue was here!

For an instant this realization sank in silently, as a bomb might sink into water. Then the explosion occurred. Every last one of us started as with one mind toward the gate. Without pausing even a second to consider the danger involved, we poured like some gushing human torrent down the short road. This avalanche hit the great front gate, burst it open, and streamed past the guards standing at bewildered and indecisive attention.

As I rushed by, I caught a glimpse of one guard bringing his automatic rifle sharply into shooting position. But his bewilderment won out; he slowly lowered his gun. It was the first of several lucky breaks that day, when split-second decisions had to be made in the face of absolutely new situations to which no page of the Japanese soldier's manual applied. By some quirk of Providence, as in this instance, the decision was the right one.

Oblivious to all this danger, yelling and shouting, jostling and pushing, we rushed through the narrow streets of the neighboring village and out into the fields. So intent were we on finding our parachuted rescuers that we scarcely had any time to savor the sweet feeling of freedom that colored so vividly those earliest moments.

Suddenly we had become part of the wider world; even the Chinese village of eight clay huts huddled near the walls of the camp held mystery and fascination for us; its rude dirt street was beautiful. Every sight, every smell, every sound was etched on our consciousness. These sensations of freedom were like a tonic, building up our excitement to an ever higher pitch.

Human beings, however, react variously. I laughed when, rushing by a small Chinese hut, I saw dear old Joe Lieberman haggling with a farmer's wife over the price of a large melon. Joe was a moderately successful businessman from Tientsin. A good worker and an able cook, he was a man whose round face and body and spindly legs belied his energy and agility.

Always cheerful and accommodating, Joe still had about him just the slightest aura of shadiness. One could not help liking him. But also one could not help suspecting that some of the supplies that vanished from the kitchen fled with the help of Joe's shift.

Joe had a dollars-and-cents approach to life: every experience and most people were viewed through the distorting spectacles of money. When Joe heard the war was over, he got very excited. Surprised at this strong reaction to an event unrelated to financial matters, I asked him why. His answer was classic: "Boy, can I get some nifty bets in the kitchen on the day and hour of the end of the war!" Then he rushed off to cut himself in on the assured profits presented to him by the armistice.

And now this. Joe saw me watching him, and running to me with enthusiasm written all over his smiling round face, he said: "Boy oh boy! You should see the prices you can get on melons in this village!" So could the highest ecstasy in the life of humans be strained out into a shopper's bargain!

About a half mile farther on, we came to a field high with Chinese corn. My first sight of an American soldier in World War II was that of a handsome major of about twenty-seven years, standing on a grave mound in the center of that cornfield. Looking further, I saw internees dancing wildly about what appeared to be six more godlike figures: how immense, how strong, how striking, how alive these American paratroopers looked in comparison to our shrunken shanks and drawn faces! Above all, their faces were new! After two and one-half years, we had come to assume subconsciously that everyone in the world looked like the fifteen hundred of us—we were our world. I had forgotten that more variety than our camp features provided was possible.

Meanwhile, some of the more rational internees were trying to fold up the parachutes. Most of us, however, were far too "high" for the task. We just stood there adoring, or ran about shouting and dancing. Our seven heroes were concerned with other matters. They had descended into the fields with their automatic weapons at the ready, anticipating a Japanese attack at every moment. The last thing they expected to find was this onslaught of ecstatic internees whose dancing about was making it impossible for them to deploy safely in the gao-liang field as they had planned.

In any case, after gathering up their gear and talking to enough of us to get an idea of the situation, they asked to be guided to the camp—so they "could take charge there." This casual, matter-of-fact statement of intentions sent us into another transport of rapture. The Japanese would no longer rule us! With this word, our cup of ecstasy ran over. The internees picked up their discomfited rescuers on their shoulders, and in a wild cheering procession reminiscent of a victorious high school student body bringing home the winning coach and team, the internees wound their way back to the camp.

As we approached the camp, the effect with its contrapuntal motifs was a mad confusion. Below there were the joyous, abandoned internees singing and yelling like Maenads in a bacchanalia, conscious only that the Lords had come and wishing only to shout hosanna. Above, on their shoulders, were the grim, watchful American soldiers, their arms at the ready, alert for any hostile move on the part of the twenty gaping Japanese guards who stood by the gate as we approached.

This time the tension was even more marked. The guards had to decide whether to fire on the seven parachutists or not. At point-blank range, they eyed one another for a brief moment. Then, as the triumphal procession, unmindful of the military drama being enacted above their heads, proceeded to the gates, a Japanese guard saluted—and the gates were opened.

We first grasped the military aspect of the capture of the camp when the procession came to a halt just inside the gate. At that point, the young major in charge leaped to the ground and asked, "Where's the chief military officer of the camp?"

Somewhat awed, the internees nearest to him pointed to the neighboring yard where the Japanese administrative officers were. With a fine sense of drama, the major, who had a service pistol on each hip, drew them both, checked them out carefully, and then strode toward the head office. In his figure, every internee saw the embodiment of the righteous marshal striding fearlessly through the swinging doors into the barroom where a hated outlaw awaited him.

The scene that ensued was in the same great tradition—so we were told afterward by the major's interpreter. With both guns leveled, the major entered the room. There sat the Japanese officer, his hands spread out on his desk, awaiting his antagonist. Neither knew what the other intended to do, nor just what he himself would do in response—again it was touch and go. Through his interpreter, the major demanded that the Japanese officer hand over his gun and recognize that the American army was now in full charge.

This must have been a hard decision for the chief officer. Probably the Japanese had been taken so unaware by the parachuting a bare twenty minutes earlier that they had had no chance to communicate with their superiors in Tsingtao. Moreover, the chief himself probably had no accurate information as to whether Japan had really surrendered or not. If it was true, then to fight these seven men and possibly to kill them, would make it go all the harder for the chief and his men. But if Japan had not yet given up, then to surrender his well-armed force of fifty men to seven paratroopers would have been an act of cowardice and reason to commit hara-kiri.

For a full moment the commandant considered. Then slowly he reached into the drawer in front of him, as the major's trigger finger twitched. With a deliberate motion, the chief brought out his samurai sword and his gun, and solemnly handed them over to the major, who was astounded, relieved, and somewhat touched. At that remarkable gesture, the major handed back these symbols of authority, told the chief that they would work together, and stalked from the room. With that confrontation, the camp passed into American hands; henceforth, Japanese soldiers and G.I.'s alike took orders from the American officers.

When gods come to visit the children of men, it is only to be expected that the men will readily obey their slightest wishes and also that the women will be enraptured with them. Taken for granted in the pliable realm of mythology, such fantasies also turn out to be true in our mundane world when the moment is ripe. These seven men, who ruled the camp for the next two weeks, were like gods among us. They were, in fact, as a group, large in physique, handsome, and capable.

I suspect that whatever they had done as our rulers, it would have been the same. Had they not come from the clouds to save us? Had they not braved incredible dangers to do so? Did they not represent massive and unbelievable power? Were they not the fighting men who had won the war for us, while we were cooking and stoking behind walls? Were they not tellers of wondrous tales, of marvels undreamed, of rockets and landing ships, of radar and of atom bombs, to us who knew nothing of the technology of the war? Did they not look so strong and healthy, so virile, so different from the shrunken humanity we knew? And finally, did they not promise us that we would all be flown to our homes in China, America, and England as soon as the planes were available—the "salvation" for which we had yearned? The only frame of reference in terms of which their status among us and their effect on the camp can be understood was that of deity.

One result was that the experienced British leaders of the camp, who in other circumstances would have had little use for such youths— and American youths, in particular—treated these men like emperors. These usually impressive figures could be seen rushing about, doing silly little errands, compiling useless statistics, ever ready to accede to the slightest need or wish of the liberators. Middle-aged bankers, who were in frequent contact with the heavenly court, could be heard retailing the wonders of their wisdom to the little groups of awed fellow internees who were not fortunate enough to deal with the newcomers directly.

It was, however, the women of the camp who most instinctively recognized their divine status. Of all ages, whether from high society or low, married or single, proper or not so proper, all wanted nothing better from life than to adore. They followed the pleasantly surprised soldiers everywhere, staring at them in rapture, edging up to get a word from them, fighting for the chance to wait on them, and pushing their equally adoring children aside so as to be able slyly to touch or stroke them. As always, it was wonderful to have gods in your midst—unless, like the writer and a few others, you lost a girl friend in the process!

With the paratroopers' arrival, everything changed. A Chinese delegation from Weilisien city showed up the next day to offer all the vegetables and grain we could use and substantially more meat than we had ever received. And this, after the Japanese had told us over and over that such items were unobtainable. As carts of food began to roll into camp, all rationing ceased. From then on we were plagued by stomach upsets only because of the rich food. During that first week, we could not eat a full meal without vomiting—but valiantly we kept on trying.

The walls in effect came down as we found ourselves free to walk outside the camp and, within limits, to explore the villages and towns round about. Now, when the day's work was done, one could go on a picnic by the river some two miles from camp, or take the three-mile hike to Weihsien city for a Chinese dinner.

It was amazing to me, however, to find how quickly one slips back into the old indifference. I can remember on my second trip to Weihsien city telling myself to wake up and enjoy myself. This was stupendous, just what I had longed for! And yet, already I was taking it for granted and not feeling it at all.

So it was with most of these newly found good things. We should have gloried in them for months, considering how we had longed for them for years. But somehow the second or third time around, they became as ordinary as if we'd had them all along. When we had been hungry, our one thought had been for three square meals a day. Lacking sweets, we had dreamed of chocolate and candy. Besieged with rumors, we had longed for news of the end of the war and of our release. Now we had all of these delights in abundance; yet we continually had to remind ourselves of this fact in order to appreciate them. We were not really any happier. Our wants and desires had only become a little harder to satisfy. Instead of freedom we now wanted "home"; instead of enough to eat, we now dreamed of cocktails and seafood. Now that we had the necessities of life, we tended to take them for granted and look for the luxuries—such are the insatiable desires of the human animal. Ironically, it is quite true that man does not live by bread alone; as soon as his craw is filled, his restless appetite will yearn for cake.

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