by Shaun Clarke
Marty squeezed Ann Lim’s hand. She squeezed his in return. The palm trees to their left rustled in the light breeze; the sea to their right murmured soothingly. A huge moon shone upon them.
‘We didn’t see her again until after the war,’ Ann Lim said, almost whispering. ‘We stayed all alone in the house for about a week, until the food ran out. Only then did we go and see relatives who lived close to us, in George Town, to tell them that our mother had been taken away and had not yet returned. Our relatives contacted our father, where he was still hiding out in his friend’s rubber plantation in Ipoh. When he heard what had happened, my father instantly returned, ignoring the danger to himself, and collected us and took us back to his friend’s plantation. There we managed to survive, unmolested by the Japanese, until the war ended. Then my mother was found in an army brothel that the Japanese had fled from just before their surrender to the British in 1945. The British sent her back to us.’
Ann Lim stopped walking, kicked up more sand, watched it fall over her bare foot, then glanced back to where Tone and Kathy were following, pausing every now and then to embrace, though both were still holding their drinks. Turning away, Ann Lim started walking again, her hand still held by Marty.
‘My mother had changed terribly. She was out of her mind. By then I was four years older, fourteen, and her condition frightened me. She never told us what had happened to her, refused to talk about it, just stayed in her room, a virtual recluse, sobbing a lot and talking to the walls – real talk, not whispering. Often she had very bad nightmares, which led to a lot of screaming. She never talked about the brothel, but one of her friends did: a younger woman, single, who’d been taken when she was only seventeen and just about survived it. She told us that the captured women had been used from dawn to dusk. The Japanese soldiers queued up to have them. The women had to do anything asked of them. If they refused, or if they failed to satisfy someone, if even a common soldier complained about them, they would be killed or punished in terrible ways; dreadful punishments that were often carried out in full view of the other captured women, to let them see what would happen to them if they failed to satisfy. So not only were they raped from dawn to dusk every day, but they had to live with the knowledge that each day could be their last. That, as much as anything else, drove a lot of them mad. My mother was one of those driven mad and that’s how she came back to us.’
She shuddered briefly, as if slapped by a freezing wind, and Marty, touched only by the warm breeze, felt his heart go out to her. The breeze was gentle, crooning through the palms and papaya trees, blowing the sand in languid clouds towards the glittering, moonlit sea, whipping Ann Lim’s long hair across her face. Her head was bowed as she studied her own feet, but her profile was exquisite, the black hair falling past it.
‘War is vile, isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ Marty said, not wanting to admit that he enjoyed it.
‘Did you ever do anything that awful?’
‘No,’ Marty said, though he knew that he was probably capable of it, as most men are.
‘A few months after being brought back home,’ Ann Lim continued, still speaking softly, hypnotically, ‘my mother committed suicide.’ She stopped walking and nodded toward the Malacca Straits. ‘She waded in there in the middle of the night and was found a few days later, washed up on a beach miles away.’ She started walking again, still letting Marty hold her hand, taking comfort from it. ‘Naturally, we were all devastated. My father nearly had a nervous breakdown. Then he pulled himself together, went back to exporting rubber, and soon had put enough money aside to send us to a private school. But three years later, just as we were beginning to feel safe again, the Chinese communists went into hiding in the ulu and only emerged to torture and murder the rubber plantationers – even their own kind. Remembering the Japanese, not seeing too much difference between them and the CT, my father moved us off the mainland, found us the house in Tanjung Tokong, and then put us, for our own protection, into the English convent.’
‘A wise move,’ Marty said.
‘Yes. He greatly admired the English, but feared his own kind, the Chinese. He wanted to keep us out of harm’s way and make us as English as possible. So that’s why we have English names and will soon be going off to Paris, to become fine young ladies. Also, at least so my father hopes, to find good husbands in Europe. Now you know it all, Marty.’
‘I don’t want you to go to Europe,’ Marty said, feeling choked up by what he had heard. He squeezed her hand again, then lightly tugged at it, making her stop walking and turn in towards him. ’Not unless it’s with me.’
She stood facing him, close to him, her brown eyes reflecting moonlight, strands of ink-black hair lying like shadows on the gold of her smooth skin. The breeze, he saw with pleasure, was pressing the dress against her body, outlining every curve and hollow: breasts and hips, the flat belly and long legs. He burned up with wanting her.
‘What do you mean by that, Marty?’
‘I think you know what I mean.’
‘But we hardly know each other.’
‘I know all I need to know,’ Marty told her, his voice hoarse. ‘I know what I want.’
‘Even knowing that I might be a woman in search of a white husband?’
‘Is that all this is to you?’
‘Is that what you feel?’
‘What I feel is the opposite.’
‘Always trust your feelings,’ she told him.
‘I do,’ Marty said.
Ann Lim smiled, brushing black hair from brown eyes. She glanced back over her shoulder, along the moonlit beach, to where Tone and Kathy had been following them. But they had disappeared, melting into the trees. Ann Lim smiled again, facing Marty, her gaze steady, then she tugged him closer, retreating into the shelter of the trees, as Tone and Kathy had done, stopping only when she was leaning back against a tree trunk, under an umbrella of papaya leaves that cast their shadows upon her.
She tugged Marty against her, pulling him gently by one hand. She dropped the shoes from her other hand, then placed both hands on his shoulders and pressed her body against him. He felt her lips on his lips. His hardness beat against her. When he parted his lips, she slipped her tongue into his mouth and almost rendered him senseless. Her breasts flattened against his chest as her belly rubbed against him, her hip bones grinding against his, her long legs radiating the heat that made him erect. He kissed her lips and neck. She slid her tongue into his ear. He undid the top buttons of her dress and slid his hand down her silken skin until it cupped her bare breast. She was wearing no brassiere and the heat of her breast blessed his searching hand.
He slid his other hand down her spine, to her rump, and explored it dementedly. She moaned and kept kissing him, his mouth, eyes and ears, and he felt the warmth and softness of her belly inflaming his cock. He undid more of her buttons, all the way down to her waist, then slid the dress off her bronzed shoulders and down to below her breasts. She placed her hands behind his head, pulled him low, bending back for him, letting him cover her bare breasts in kisses and suck on her nipples. They were as brown and hard as nuts – surprisingly hard on the soft breasts. He licked them and sucked them in a delirium that held no thought of stopping.
‘God, I want you!’ he whispered.
She sighed and bit his neck. He groaned and undid more buttons. What the last button was undone, the dress fell off to lie around her bare feet. Almost naked, she was breathtaking, a golden-brown heavenly vision, bare breasts firm above a tapering waist, a flat belly, long legs. He sank slowly to his knees, kissing her breasts and then her belly, tugging her white panties down around her hips to kiss her right there. She moaned and held his head, slightly parting her thighs, and then, before he could pull her panties down farther, she lowered herself to the sand. He lay down beside her, twisting towards her, tugging her panties along her smooth, golden thighs, then down her legs to her ankles. She kicked the panties off and let him draw her into his arms.
&nbs
p; Unbuttoning his shirt, she kissed his chest and then tugged the shirt off. This aroused him even more. He felt his hardness pulsating against her. He reached down to start unbuttoning himself, but then she did the job for him. Pulling his cock out, she groaned. Her squeezing fingers drove him mad. He groaned also, without shame, and rolled over to press himself onto her. She opened her legs to him, breathing harshly, needing air, and he saw the light of total distraction in the brown of her wide eyes.
When he entered her, both of them gasped, and then he moved deep inside her, trying to sunder her, as her legs curled about him. She drew him in even deeper, as if wanting to be sundered, and they melted together, becoming one, moving their bodies as one. It did not last too long, but it was at least intense. She soon shuddered and cried out, holding him tighter, writhing against him, and when she did so, when he felt her and heard her, he too lost control, coming in a series of spasms that made his head reel.
He groaned in helpless release, spending himself deep inside her, and she held him in the soft vice of her limbs until his shaking had ceased. When he was spent, gazing down into her eyes, she smiled dreamily and stroked his fevered brow.
‘I love you, tuan,’ she said, using the Malay word deliberately, slightly teasing him while letting him know that she meant it. ‘I will alwayslove you.’
He knew then, without any shadow of doubt, regardless of Lesley and the kids, his parents or friends, that he was going to marry her.
Chapter Eleven
Marty had been back in Jahore for just over a month, engaging in regular jungle patrols and thinking a lot about Ann Lim, when B Squadron was summoned to an unexpected briefing in the HQ hut. Arriving there in OGs, jungle boots and soft green bush hats, as instructed, he and the other SAS troopers were informed by Lieutenant Kearney that they were about to embark on what would surely be their most difficult task to date.
‘In our first six months here,’ Kearney explained, ‘we’ve managed to drastically reduce the number of CT in this area, but a hard-core group remains and has to be eradicated before we can move on elsewhere. This particular group, led by one Ah Chan, has tried to put itself out of our reach by entering a swamp near Selangor. Getting them out won’t be easy. Though not exactly impenetrable– the guerrillas are in there, after all – the swamp’s extremely large. It consists of exceptionally dense forest, including belukar, and it’s flooded with rust-brown water, mangroves and glutinous mud. It’s also home to every kind of bug, insect and creepy-crawlie known to man, including blood-sucking leeches. Last but not least, from what our intelligence has picked up, Ah Chan’s guerrillas, who know the swamp back to front, are also experts at every kind of booby trap. So when I say that this is going to be a difficult task, I really mean it will be hell and that we could be in there for a very long time, sometimes eating and even sleeping in the water. Please be prepared for that.’
Realizing that he was not going to see Ann Lim for another few weeks, maybe months, if indeed he survived, Marty felt a stab of pain. He was, however, also filled with excitement at the thought of the operation to come. This realization slightly shocked him, making him face a hard fact: that no matter how much he might love someone, his love for the SAS, a man’s world, was even greater.
‘Insertion,’ Kearney continued, ‘will be by means of a tree-jumping parachute drop from a Beverley transport into the ulu twenty kilos west of the swamp. Once there, we’ll be waist-deep in water all day and sleeping by night in hammocks or on improvised rafts. If absolutely necessary, resups will be dropped by RASC Valettas, but you’ll be supplied with a seven- to-fourteen-day patrol ration, allowing you to operate for up to two weeks without needing new supplies. This operation commences immediately, following the usual routine: quartermaster’s store, armoury and personal preparation in that order. You’re expected out on the airstrip at ten hundred hours. I’ll see you all out there. Okay, men, dismissed.’
Leaving the briefing room, knowing that this was serious, Marty marched with the others to the quartermaster’s store where, in his group of ten, he picked up, along with the usual kit, special waterproof jungle Bergens, cosmetic ‘cam’ cream, dulling paint and strips of camouflage cloth for the weapons, lengths of para–cord to replace the standard-issue sling swivels for the rifles, a plentiful supply of Paludrine, salt tablets, sterilization tablets and a Millbank bag for filtering water. At the armoury, next door, he collected his personal weapons, including an SLR. Other an SLR. Other inch Bren guns with 30-round detachable box magazines. The ‘Originals’, including Marty, were especially fond of this particular weapon because all of them had used it in North Africa and knew it was simple, old-fashioned, and highly reliable. The squadron also took possession of two– and three-inch mortars, fragmentation and smoke grenades, magazines of tracer bullets and flares.
The most unusual weapon picked up, however, and the most recent to be used, was the crossbow with twenty-four lightweight alloy bolts and arrows, used for silent killing, and an air rifle that fired poison darts that could kill or stun.
The blue-eyed, beatifically smiling and, as Marty had come to understand, deadly Taff Hughes was the one who had been chosen for special training with the crossbow and had proved himself to be a natural at it, having already killed enemy sentries by putting the bolt and arrow into his victim’s heart, or through the back or side of the neck, with unerring accuracy. For this reason, Taff had also been given the air rifle and poisonous darts, his special job now being the silent killing of enemy sentries or point men.
‘You have the eyes of a bloody hawk,’ Bulldog had told him, ‘and you’re just as deadly. It’s all yours, Geronimo.’
When the weapons had been collected, the men moved along to the radio store where they signed for their No. 88 lightweight wireless communication sets, one for each of the four-man teams. The No. 88s were carried in two webbing pouches, one for the radio, the other for the battery. Finally, each man collected his relatively simple World War Two parachute, an Irvin X-type, which he had to strap immediately to his back, enabling him to carry his packed Bergen rucksack and personal weapons by hand.
Returning to their barracks, the men went to their respective bashas, where they proceeded to properly pack their kit. When this was done, they painted their weapons with quick-drying green camouflage paint, then wrapped them in strips of cloth, specially dyed to match the jungle background. In both instances, they were particularly careful not to let the paint or strips of cloth interfere with the weapons’ working parts or sights. After wrapping masking tape around the butts, pistol grips and top covers, they replaced the noisy sling swivels with para-cord, which made no sound at all.
With the weapons camouflaged, their final task was to camouflage themselves, applying the ‘cam’ cream and black ‘stick’ camouflage to the exposed areas of their skin, including the backs of their hands, wrists, ears and neck.
Camouflaged and heavily burdened, the thirtyeight troopers left the gloom of the barracks and marched into the rising heat of the early morning. A couple of Bedford three-tonners had been driven across from the motor pool and were waiting outside, but before the men could board they were inspected personally by Bulldog Bellamy. Only when he was completely satisfied that all was in order did he give them permission to board the Bedfords. The trucks then transported them the short distance to the airstrip, where a Blackburn Beverley, which could carry seventy parachutists at a time, was waiting to fly them into the interior. When the men and their equipment had been transferred to the Beverley, the pilot lost no time in taking off.
For half an hour after take-off Marty and Tone, wedged tightly together and hemmed in by their kit and weapons, swopped the customary bullshit, but eventually they fell silent, each preparing himself in his own way for what was to come. Luckily, as the aircraft was suffocatingly hot and humid, the flight to the DZ took only thirty minutes and soon they were lining up for the jump, their eyes fixed on the warning light above the open boom door.
Lieutena
nt Kearney went out first as the drifter – the one whose angle and speed of descent enables the pilot to check wind strength and velocity. The others went out after him, on the command of Bulldog Bellamy, in sticks of four from the port and starboard bows, left and right of the boom door.
By now, parachuting had become almost routine for Marty, though he never failed to catch his breath and feel his heart racing when he was swept away on the roaring slipstream, only to escape abruptly and drop like a stone, before jerking the parachute cord and drifting down through a silence broken only by the wind whipping the parachute. This time, when the treetops started racing up towards him, he calmly noted the exact location of the DZ – a relatively clear area of stunted grass and bush – and used the lines of his ‘chute to steer himself in that direction.
Suddenly, the jungle canopy was coming at him, faster and faster, then he was plunging down a deep well of blurred greenery, smashing noisily through branches and foliage, until he landed in a shower of raining leaves on the grass-covered earth, letting his legs buckle and rolling over with the cords of the flapping parachute tugging at him. He reined the lines in, ‘popped’ the ‘chute free, then rolled away and clambered to his feet, still in one piece.
After wrapping up his ‘chute and then burying it in the undergrowth, he unslung his SLR and saw Lieutenant Kearney doing the same with his Owen submachine gun. Bulldog had his Browning twelvegauge shotgun slung across his back, and Taff Hughes, surveying the jungle with his mild blue gaze, looked oddly anachronistic with his crossbow strapped to his Bergen rucksack. The rest of the men were hiding their parachutes in the undergrowth, breaking open the crates of supplies that had already fallen to the forest floor, or climbing back up the trees to disentangle the supply parachutes that had become trapped high up in the canopy. Surprisingly, there had been no casualties during the tree-jumping and all of the men were accounted for.
When the spare weapons, ammunition and supplies had been distributed as evenly as possible among the men, they marched, as heavily burdened as pack mules, in the direction of the guerrilla-infested swamp, which was approximately twenty kilometres away. No one made a sound.
