DUEL IN THE SNOW

This traditional (i.e. routine) war adventure story takes place in 1942 when an Aleutian island has been overrun by the Japanese who are planning to install an airfield there. In the meantime they are sending out daily reports and the transmitter becomes the objective of the U.S. military and one gamewarden McCluire, reluctantly recruited to help in the search. They do find the enemy encampment but the optimistic attack becomes a rout -- one of its casualties is McCluire's old aide, a staunch Indian. But by the close the Japanese have been reduced to only devious Captain Hidaka and the native girl he has annexed. . . . The terrain -- massif and tundra, wolves and caribou -- contributes and where the characters divide off too easily into good and bad (Japanese or American) stamina supplements the concept of courage.