The Plantation

by Di Morrissey

  ‘He was a quiet man. That generation didn’t talk a lot. You had to get them on their own. Mother could be a bit bossy. She called the shots, around the house anyway, but Father had the final word on outside things, like spending money, going away, making the big decisions. I remember one holiday we had, we rented a holiday cottage and he let us go out with him prawning and fishing at night. We lit a little fire on the beach. Mother was convinced we’d get washed away in the surf in the dark, or that a shark would grab us by the ankles, and she refused to go down to the beach at night. Margaret didn’t like the dark, so she went back to the cottage. Father caught a couple of small fish and we cooked them on the fire and picked them clean with our fingers. Tasted wonderful. We pretended we were castaways.’ Bette smiled. ‘I sometimes thought, even when I was older, that I’d like to go back to the beach with Father but we never got the opportunity again.’

  ‘So you have happy memories. He was kind and loving and proud of you,’ said Tony.

  Bette straightened up. ‘Yes. I think he was. He once told me that he was proud of what I had done for Philip. He used to say, “You’ll be all right in this world, Bette.”’

  ‘Hang onto that,’ said Tony softly.

  ‘I know I should have made more of an effort to visit, but I can’t forgive the offhand way Margaret has told me. As though he’s not my father, too. As though she deliberately wanted to hurt me.’ She looked at Tony, her eyes filled with anger and pain. ‘You know, I don’t think that she will ever forgive me for being the one to save her son, strange as that sounds.’

  Tony put his arms around his wife. ‘Bette, I’m sorry that you weren’t there for your father’s passing or the funeral, but you know that he admired you. Remember that.’

  Bette buried her head in Tony’s shoulder and the tears fell. She looked up at him. ‘You won’t ever leave me, will you?’

  ‘No.’ Tony kissed her. ‘You are more to me than every breath I take.’ He stroked her hair. ‘I will always be here for you and when I’m not, my spirit will watch over you, be close to you.’

  Bette felt calm and a warmth spread through her. She drew a slow healing breath. ‘Is that a Buddhist thing?’

  ‘No. Just a Tony Tsang thing. Because you and I are one,’ he said lightly.

  Bette smiled. She felt a great sense of peace and comfort. No matter what happened, Tony would always be there for her.

  Changes began to sweep through the country. In 1957 Malaya gained independence from Britain and became the Federated States of Malaya. Bette and Tony’s marriage continued to be happy and harmonious, and Tony’s business interests continued to prosper.

  One evening three years after independence Bette sat alone in the cool twilight of the side courtyard and heard Tony returning home. She burst out laughing when she saw him trot along the pathway in white baggy shorts, a white T-shirt and soft tennis shoes. His hair was awry and his face shiny with exertion.

  ‘What have you been doing? Trying to look like Marlon Brando?’

  ‘I’ve been talked into joining the Hash House Harriers. They’ve restarted a club here. They go for runs around the waterfront.’

  ‘Who are the Hash House Harriers?’

  ‘The group was started in KL before the war by a group of crazy British officers. The idea was to run to get rid of a hangover while building up a thirst for the next one.’

  ‘It sounds insane, darling, running for miles in this hot climate, but if it makes you happy,’ Bette said laughingly as she looked at her enthusiastic if somewhat unfit husband.

  ‘I’ve come home to change and to take you out for dinner with some of the harriers and their wives.’

  ‘That’s fine, and remember we have dinner plans for tomorrow night,’ said Bette.

  ‘As if I could forget.’ He sat beside her and put his arm around her. ‘Ten years together. And every day a joy.’ He kissed her. ‘What would you like me to give you for this special milestone?’

  ‘No more expensive gifts,’ said Bette. She looked at him, and suddenly her eyes filled with tears.

  ‘Is everything all right?’ he asked softly.

  ‘Yes. It’s just that before you came in, I’d been sitting here and thinking . . . about the camp. I think that I would like to go back to Sarawak and see what has happened to the POW camp.’

  ‘Settle a few ghosts, perhaps?’ said Tony.

  Bette nodded. ‘Sort of. I can’t explain why, I just feel drawn to it.’

  ‘Then we must go. I will make arrangements,’ he said firmly. ‘We shall make it our wedding anniversary trip.’

  Bette wasn’t sure exactly why she wanted to return to Sarawak. Part of her wanted to revisit the place where the prison camp had been just outside Kuching. But as they flew over the dense jungle canopy and she saw the broad, brown, snaking sweep of the Sarawak River, its protective mangrove wetlands stretching inland, and the pretty township of Kuching strung out along its banks, she felt a great sense of delight.

  ‘Thank you, darling. This is very special,’ she whispered to Tony.

  They settled into the comfortable Aurora Hotel and walked into the centre of Kuching along the riverfront, exploring the township on the way. Bette spotted the Sarawak museum and told Tony that she would like to spend time visiting it. Tony agreed, as he wanted to see someone recommended to him by a business associate in Penang.

  When they met later that afternoon by the river, Bette’s eyes were alight. ‘I met the curator at the museum, Tom Harrisson. An extraordinary fellow! And very interesting. I told him I was going to visit the old camp and we got talking about the war. He recognised my Australian accent and told me that he had been parachuted onto a hidden plateau in Borneo with seven Australian special operatives from Z force,’ said Bette. ‘He said that not only did they provide intelligence reports, but they managed to recruit a thousand blowpiping headhunters who killed or captured about one and a half thousand Japanese soldiers.’

  ‘That does sound interesting,’ said Tony. ‘I’ve heard of this fellow. He’s regarded as being a bit eccentric and very colourful.’

  ‘He’s lived here since the war and says he’s made some amazing archeological discoveries in the Niah caves. He’s found fossils and skulls which he says date back more than forty thousand years. I would so love to go there and see them. He says the caves are huge.’

  ‘You would? I’ll look into it if you like. What about visiting the camp? Is tomorrow morning all right with you?’

  Bette nodded, her bubbling enthusiasm about the museum curator subsiding at the thought of revisiting the internment camp.

  It wasn’t as she remembered, for which she was glad. It was now a peaceful place. Green fields surrounded the original barracks, which were now part of a teacher training college. Grass had replaced dust. There were neat signs, a monument, a flagpole, and some of the occupied buildings were cleaned up and open to the public. There was no sign of the barbed-wire fences or the watchtowers. But the faces of the women and children Bette had seen every day, came clearly to her mind.

  She walked alone towards the buildings she remembered as being her world, her home and her prison for nearly four years. When she walked back to Tony, who stood smoking a cigarette in the shade of a tree, she was smiling.

  ‘Are you all right?’ He embraced her and she clung to him, resting her head on his shoulder.

  ‘Yes. At last I really am all right.’ She looked up into his face. ‘You are my life now, Tony. Everything that happened before I married you, means very little to me any more.’

  He kissed her softly. ‘Then we shall make every day ours.’

  Back in Kuching, Tony took Bette’s idle remark about visiting the Niah caves quite seriously. But when he talked to the museum curator, Tom Harrisson told him that the caves were quite isolated and difficult to reach, and the area was off limits because it was a dig site. Nevertheless, Tom invited them both to come to his house in Pig Lane for a drink and to discuss the possibility of visiting other part
s of Sarawak.

  Bette was fascinated by the cluttered, ramshackle home that Tom shared with his anthropologist wife Barbara, who was currently making a documentary about their work at Niah. The house was like a museum. Walls and surfaces were smothered in the artifacts that Tom had collected over the years he’d been in South East Asia. native woven baskets and hats, ornamental knives, krises, blowpipes and mats were hung everywhere, while the walls were decorated with magnificent, boldly coloured murals. Tom explained that the paintings and carvings in the house had been done by various orang ulu – upriver natives. Bette was intrigued by his collection of pottery pieces and shards of Chinese and Siamese porcelain, which were very much older than the perfect porcelain on display in Rose Mansion.

  ‘This is amazing,’ said Bette. ‘These artifacts are such a contrast to the things that we have in Penang. Just look at those paintings. Fantastic.’

  Seeing her enthusiasm and interest, Tom suggested that since they couldn’t go to the caves, they might like to visit a longhouse, where he had Iban friends.

  ‘Leonard is one of the assistants working at the museum and he’s Iban. I’m sure he’d help you, if you’d like to go,’ said Tom.

  Tom also introduced Bette and Tony to his ‘children’, and Bette was fascinated. Kept in cages out the back of the house and roaming around inside, demanding constant attention, were several baby orangutans. Tom explained that they had been rescued from illegal traders trying to smuggle them out of the country. Barbara was rearing them and trying to prepare them to be released back into the wild.

  ‘Can they look after themselves if they’ve been hand reared?’ asked Bette, as a small orange-furred creature took hold of her hand and swung into her arms, its saucer-shaped eyes studying her face closely, before it rested its head on her shoulder.

  ‘We’ve created a small, sheltered camp where the orangutans live in cages for a month. After that we leave the cage doors open so that they can come and go as they like. Hopefully, when they get used to their surroundings, they will mate and live with the wild orangutans,’ said Tom.

  ‘They are amazing. Aren’t they lovable creatures, Tony?’ said Bette.

  ‘Yes, at this age, but an adult male might be a different matter,’ said Tony.

  Tom was a boisterous, boastful, heavy-drinking, entertaining, knowledgeable raconteur. Bette was not surprised when he was able to arrange for them to go upriver with Leonard to visit the orangutan camp.

  Tony was not comfortable roughing it and he was amused at how well Bette took to travelling in the canoe with its clunky outboard motor driven by Leonard at a high incautious speed. They drew up at a small landing on the edge of the jungle. From here they walked through the swampy river fringe into the jungle to Camp Salang. The small clearing contained tents, a hut, cages and a feeding platform for the orangutans. Two Iban women brought fruit each day for the apes. A young German woman was on field duty, making notes, taking photographs and keeping a record of the comings and goings of the primates.

  ‘This is pioneering work,’ Leonard told Tony and Bette. ‘But it is also sad for me, because I believe that one day these orangutans will have nowhere to live.’

  ‘But look how much jungle there is!’ exclaimed Bette.

  ‘It’s being eaten up every day,’ said Leonard. ‘The timber industry and land clearing are destroying it.’

  Bette looked at him. ‘Surely the government will protect the forests?’

  ‘The government and businesspeople see more dollars in wood than in orangutans,’ said Leonard.

  ‘It’s true,’ said Tony. ‘There is very big money to be made from tropical rainforest woods like ramin, and I don’t believe there are enough restrictions and regulations in place, yet. You know the meeting I had in Kuching the other day? It was with a man who wanted me to go into the timber industry with him.’

  ‘But you’re not, are you?’ said Bette.

  ‘No. I told him that I preferred to pursue other opportunities,’ said Tony.

  ‘I’m glad. I’d hate to think we were party to hurting these wonderful animals,’ said Bette.

  Once Bette and Tony became familiar with the area, they were left to their own devices. They liked to walk quietly through the jungle staring into the trees, waiting to spot the orangutans, eating, playing and courting. Bette spent hours quietly waiting and watching, occasionally making quick sketches in her notebook.

  Tony watched her and smiled. ‘I’m so pleased that we made this trip and you have laid to rest the ghosts of the war. All I want is your happiness. Will you be okay on your own for a while? I want to go to the village and talk to the headman.’

  ‘Of course. I’m sorry if you’re bored. I could stay here for hours. We’ll have to come back for a longer visit. Leonard says we can go to his village upriver and stay in their longhouse.’

  ‘Would you like that?’ asked Tony. ‘I could never have imagined that you would be so swept up by this very different culture. I know that you enjoy studying Chinese and Peranakan history and culture because that’s my family background, but your thirst for knowledge seems prodigious. You want to explore all around you and I love you for that.’

  ‘Thank you, darling. I’ll meet you back at the boat in, say, an hour or so?’ She glanced at her watch.

  ‘Fine. Leonard will take me to the headman and come back for you.’

  But later, as Tony talked with the village chief at the river landing, Bette came hurrying towards them looking distraught. She pulled Tony aside and quietly told him what she’d seen. As soon as Tony had finished speaking with the headman, he found Leonard and said, ‘My wife says there are two men with guns trying to shoot the apes.’

  ‘Poachers. The orangutan camp is a target for them because the apes are tame. Quickly, can you show us where you saw them?’ asked Leonard. Bette pointed to the direction where she had seen the men, and Leonard set off at a fast jog, with Tony and Bette following him.

  *

  The subsequent events were defining moments for Bette. Her heart ached, and she tightly held Tony’s hand as the boat sped back down the river towards Kuching. The death of the mother orangutan and the disappearance of its infant had shocked and saddened her, and she vowed that somehow, one day, she would try to teach people the value and uniqueness of these gentle creatures.

  When Bette and Tony told Tom about the poachers, he was furious.

  ‘Things are changing so rapidly around here, it’s difficult to exercise control over poaching and illegal logging,’ he said.

  ‘I expect that things will be better if Sarawak becomes one of the Federated States of Malaya,’ said Tony.

  ‘I don’t know,’ replied Tom. ‘I know that the communist Emergency has ended on the Malay peninsula, but they are still causing trouble for us on the Indonesian border.’

  ‘On the peninsula, independence has changed things, and I think for the better. Malayanisation is taking place rapidly as the British move out and their places are being taken by the locals,’ said Tony.

  ‘I don’t think everyone is happy about it. Three years ago my Chinese friends were upset at the British going and leaving a Malayan government in their place. I kept out of the way when the flag came down,’ commented Tom.

  ‘We went to the padang, the open space on the Penang waterfront on the eve of independence and there were thousands of people of all races celebrating,’ said Bette. ‘I was amazed. It was quite moving and very respectful.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Tony. ‘My hope is that the different races will work well together. The ruling Alliance Party is made up of Malays, Chinese and Indians, and they want to spread the wealth and responsibility among everyone.’

  ‘Well,’ said Tom, ‘when things change here, I think I’ll try to stay out in the jungle and at the caves as much as possible,’ he grinned.

  Tony nodded. Later he told Bette that he didn’t imagine there’d be a lot of opportunities for the hard-drinking, bossy, sometimes arrogant Englishmen for much longer. T
o Tom he said, ‘The British have left behind a lot of goodwill, and I think that the transition has been quite well organised.’

  Bette glanced at her husband, knowing that already his company had taken advantage of Malayanisation to buy into big, former British industries and trading houses, and especially the tin mines. The house of Tsang seemed to be doing well under independence.

  When they thanked Tom for his hospitality, he said, ‘Come back any time. I’m not going anywhere.’

  Several years later, Tony’s optimism about the future direction of Malaya changed. For Bette, Tony was his usual loving self, but he spent long hours at work and often people came to see him at the house, where he closeted himself in his study with them. Bette noticed that frequently the cars that came belonged to high-ranking government officials and even to the sultans. Finally she asked Tony about what was going on.

  ‘It’s to do with this Malayanisation,’ he said. ‘The government is insisting that Malays have preferential treatment. This policy has created power struggles between the Malays and the Chinese, and, to a lesser extent, the Indians. Now that Singapore has chosen to become independent from Malaya, many Chinese businessmen have decided to move there, but I have decided to stay here in Penang and adjust. I have promoted Malays onto my board.’

  ‘What do you think will happen?’ asked Bette.

  Tony sighed and kissed her cheek. ‘We have to hope commonsense will prevail, and all this ethnic rivalry will eventually stop and everyone will work in the best interests of the country. Unfortunately, a lot of these problems are to do with the control of the rich natural resources of this part of the world. It always comes down to power and money and who can manipulate others for their own ends.’ He rose and drew her to her feet. ‘The children are all away, we have no appointments. Let’s take an afternoon rest before we go out to dinner.’

  May 1969

  Bette’s life continued to be busy and happy. Even though the two eldest children, James and Eunice, were married, she was still involved in their lives as well of those of Connie and Toby, the younger ones. Bette cherished the closeness they now all shared. Madam Chang was ageing, but not gracefully. She still played mah jong each week, and she insisted on running the household in the same disciplined manner she always had. She went to the market each day to haggle for fresh produce, taking the young kitchen maid with her to carry her basket. Although she took to sleeping each afternoon, first she did a tour of inspection of the house and woe betide any servant if she found dust in a corner or a dead leaf on the ornamental trees. When Bette quietly tried to manage things behind her back, giving discreet instructions to the staff, Madam Chang chose to ignore it all.