by Rory Marron
Ota considered his options. Shirai was now a wanted man. But the man was not his enemy… His indecision showed. Shirai slowly looked down at his lap. Ota followed the gaze. Under a map a pistol was pointing at his chest. He suspected that the others were similarly prepared. If he tried to stop them he and several of his men would die pointlessly. He would not risk it, not over a fugitive kenpei.
Shirai gave him a pitying look. ‘You’re risking your life for the British. Just what are you expecting in return? A few easy weeks on Rempang and then a ship back to a barbarian-ruled Japan?’ Rempang island, south of Singapore, was the main confinement area for tens of thousands of Japanese.
Ota met Shirai’s stare but said nothing.
‘Well take it from me,’ Shirai said almost gloatingly. ‘There’s no food on Rempang. Men are dying every week. Some are escaping and coming to Java and Sumatra to join the Indonesian cause. They prefer to die in battle with honour than from hunger. Think about it, Ota. You still have time to redeem yourself and your family’s honour. If you change your mind, you’ll find me near Magelang.’
‘I have made my choice, Shirai-san.’
‘Yes, I see you have…’ Shirai’s eyes were cold. ‘Next time I shall not hesitate to kill you.’
Shirai nodded to the driver and the car sped away to catch up with the column, which was by now labouring up hill. Ota watched helplessly as the car nestled audaciously behind the last vehicle for a short time then turned off unchallenged as the road forked.
In the back of the lorry the ride was hot and jarring, the passengers hemmed in by sacks and boxes. Kate sat with her eyes closed with her head on Juliette’s bony shoulder
‘Are you all right, ma cocotte?’ Juliette whispered.
Kate pretended to be asleep. For the first time since the end of the war, Kate was feeling miserable. Meeting Ota at the roadblock had proved disconcerting. She had been longing for the chance to talk with him before she left Java and above all to part as friends. Countless times she had pictured the scene in her mind: a whispered word of best wishes, a gentle embrace followed by a warm smile of farewell. She craved a happy memory of them both safe and sound. In itself it was so simple… Yet when she saw Ota she had been thrilled, with a strength of feeling for him that had disturbed her. She would have talked with him much more but she had noticed the questioning looks from Marja and Anna. Embarrassed, Kate had forced her smile into a pinched, bloodless line and spoken sharply. Ota’s hurt expression had turned a knife in her stomach but she had not been able to stop herself. Her sudden fear of gossip and scandal had been too great. Now she was full of regret.
Juliette gave her shoulder a squeeze and she opened her tearful eyes. ‘How much longer?’
‘Just a few kilometres now,’ smiled Juliette.
Kate stared blankly, hardly seeing the valley scenery below. She was facing an uncomfortable truth. Peace had brought with it the return of convention and propriety. So far she had ignored it, though already in Tjandi the old snobbery was raising its head. Kate had scoffed at first but now she realised she too was being dragged back, if unwillingly, to her place in the old order. Once again she was the daughter of Pym and Marianne van Dam of Magelang. Marja’s critical looks had said it all. Surely Kate van Dam would not show friendliness toward a Jap?
All her assumptions about life after the war had swiftly crumbled. Three months before, all that had mattered was survival for herself and her mother, survival by any means. In the camp she had dared to dream of how she would live if she were free. Now, after just days of that freedom, she felt others controlling her, caging her dreams. Worst of all, she was helping them to close the cage door.
West Semarang
The night air was heavy and clinging, so the two men drove with the jeep’s windscreen down. It had been a long day and they were chatting about their families. Neither the driver nor his passenger noticed the tiny slivers of reflected moonlight across the road ahead.
They hit the taut, thin-steel wire at nearly forty miles an hour, slewing off the road and slamming into a palm tree. Vapour hissed from the smashed radiator. Petrol began to spill from a broken linkage.
The driver’s body hung out of the jeep, blood spurting from the stump of his cleanly severed neck. Back on the road, his severed head rolled many feet before catching in a rut, eyes fixed in a blank, uncomprehending stare.
His passenger lay sprawled and unconscious over the bonnet. One side of his face had been sliced off from below the chin to the ear. Blood sprayed from a severed carotid artery. In a few seconds he, too, was dead.
Cautiously the ambushers emerged from the thick vegetation along the side of the road. Some went to the jeep while others took down the wire. One retrieved the head and tossed it into the back of the jeep. The corpses were stripped. Pistols, uniforms, underwear, socks and belts were taken, as well as cash and cigarettes. A briefcase was upended and the contents scattered.
One man opened a document wallet stamped RAAF. He cursed when he found no cash, only scraps of half-burnt pages and handwritten notes. Disappointed he dropped the wallet and its contents back into the jeep. He stepped back as the vehicle and bodies were doused in petrol. A match was struck and thrown. Instantly the jeep was engulfed in roaring flames. Long before the petrol tank exploded the ambushers had vanished into the night.
Chapter Six
The Ambarawa Road
From Srondol the relief convoy travelled only ten miles before one of the commandeered Japanese lorries started to overheat. Wing Commander Ball called a halt outside a small, hillside village. The passengers dismounted and sat in small groups while the mechanics went to work.
Ball, Mac and Meg got out of the car for a cigarette. Afterwards the two men went to check the progress with the problem engine.
Meg was enjoying the view back towards Semarang and the sea. They had climbed steadily and they were now on the lower slopes of Mt. Oengaran, which rose to a steep, green, six-thousand-foot pinnacle at her back. White-painted buildings shone in the heat and the sawah rice terraces shimmered blue-green. She noticed that few others showed any interest in the panorama. A few feet away, Miller was talking with Rai and another Gurkha. She took her opportunity for an impromptu interview.
‘Major, will you introduce me to Corporal Rai? I’ve heard a lot about him.’
‘Of course,’ said Miller. He explained who she was to Rai.
Rai seemed shy. ‘Pleased to meet you, Madame.’ His English was slow and a struggle.
‘Oh, is it so obvious?’ Meg grinned. ‘War really is hell. I started it a Miss!’
Rai frowned in confusion but Miller interpreted. Meg patted his arm to put him at ease. ‘Sorry, I was being unfair. May I ask him some questions…with your help, of course?’
‘Of course,’ said Miller, “freedom of the press” and all that. By the way, we don’t have corporals in the Indian Army. His rank is naik. It’s the equivalent though.’
‘I see!’ Meg said. She turned to Rai. ‘First, Naik Rai, why did you join the British Army?’
Rai listened to Miller’s translation and replied hesitantly. ‘My father was soldier. Father’s father soldier.’
‘I see, a family tradition,’ said Meg. ‘So why do you want to serve in the army of a foreign country?’
Miller cleared his throat and gave Meg a slightly affronted look before translating. Rai seemed confused by the question but did not hesitate. ‘Army very good!’ He grinned again.
Meg tried a different tack. ‘Where are you from?’
Rai reverted to Urdu. ‘The valley of the Dhud Kosi,’ Miller interpreted. Rai looked at her as though he expected her to know it well.
‘It’s in eastern Nepal,’ explained Miller.
‘That doesn’t help me too much, Major! Oh well, hmm, how do you get to be a Gurkha?’
Miller and the other Gurkha laughed at Rai’s reply. ‘He said he walked a long way! You see Gurkha recruiting posts are in India not Nepal. We are not allowed in. Nepal i
sn’t part of the British Empire. Recruits have to come to us. They walk for days to sign up.’
‘Days? How many days, Naik Rai?’ Meg asked.
‘Twenty-four,’ Miller said enjoying her look of surprise. ‘Remember Miss Graham. In the Himalayas there are few roads or bridges. It really is quite a feat!’
Meg turned to the other Gurkha. ‘Where are you from?’
Smiling, the man spoke quickly and excitedly. Miller hesitated. ‘He says he walked for thirty days from the east of the Tambar river. Technically that means he’s from Tibet.’ He shrugged. ‘Our recruiting officers don’t ask too many questions in wartime. In fact, we’ve got men from Sikkim, Bhutan and Burma as well.’
Meg was amazed. ‘Really! I’ve only heard of the French having a Foreign Legion!’
‘Well, we don’t see it quite that way,’ Miller said uncomfortably. He nodded to the two Gurkhas who moved away politely. ‘Let me try to explain. Our treaty with the Kingdom of Nepal is long established. Gurkhas have fought as part of the British army for over a century. I suppose in this day and age it might seem unusual but it works well and both countries gain immensely.’
Meg cocked her head. ‘Do they get the same pay rates as British soldiers? The same invalidity allowances?’
‘Not exactly,’ Miller said flustered. ‘But for people in Nepal the pay or pension is very high.’
Meg became conciliatory. ‘Look, Major, I’m not trying to give you a hard time. I’m after an angle for my story, that’s all. I know there’s blatant racial discrimination in the US military. Some of the ideals we professed to be fighting for are missing from our own backyard. Take the coloured regiments for example. Did you know that before Pearl Harbor the US Navy would only permit coloured men to serve as cooks?’
Miller shook his head. ‘I had no idea.’
‘Well now it’s possible—in theory—for them to become officers. But you know what, I don’t know if I can write about the Gurkhas. Most Americans just wouldn’t understand the relationship. They’d probably see them as underpaid imperial mercenaries doing the dirty work for peanuts and a few shiny glass beads.’
An engine turned over then sprang into life to sarcastic cheers from the waiting soldiers. Miller ordered the remount and walked Meg back to the car. He closed the door after her.
‘Miss Graham,’ he said earnestly. ‘These are the bravest, most loyal soldiers in the world.’
Meg nodded. ‘I believe you, Major.’
Beyond Oengaran the road was poor. Potholes and debris from landslides made it a jerky, slow descent into Ambarawa. Miller, ever wary of ambush, called frequent stops while Nagumo’s platoon scouted the jungle and ridges ahead.
Ball was concentrating on the road and was unusually quiet, so Meg lost herself in the landscape, enjoying the cooler, drier air in the mountains but not the fumes from the lorries in front. Her guidebook described Ambarawa as having ‘nothing of interest for the tourist’. The town sat at the southern foot of Mt Oengaran, facing a small, lush valley hemmed in by majestic volcanic peaks. Below them lay a small lake fed by a meandering river that shone blue-white. Across the valley, farming hamlets nestled in the foothills. It looked peaceful. Meg thought of the guidebook and smiled. Only in Java could something so beautiful merit no comment. ‘May be nothing of interest for the journalist either,’ she said under her breath.
‘Hmm?’ Ball grunted and looked at her.
‘Oh, I was just thinking aloud,’ said Meg.
Ball pointed across the valley. ‘See those two villages? The one to the south is Banjobiroe; to the southeast is Salatiga. The Japs say there’s a camp at each. In any case, we’ll need more supplies.’
They rounded a sweeping bend.
‘About time!’ Ball said.
Meg glimpsed a few colonial-style houses and the white steeple of a church before the road bent again and the buildings were hidden. Soon the more modest structures and huts of a kampong appeared on either side of the road. Apart from a few farmers in fields, she had seen few Javanese on the journey. Now they passed them in their dozens, standing outside their houses and staring blankly at the troops. Most were dressed in rags or fraying sackcloth. Babies and toddlers went naked, their thin limbs and bellies distended from malnutrition. Bare-breasted teenage girls stood and watched as some of the Gurkhas gestured and waved.
Soon the kampong buildings petered out and the convoy headed down a leafy, residential road lined with once fine but now dilapidated bungalows. Beyond it was a wide expanse of open ground.
‘This reminds me of some of the hill stations in India,’ said Ball. ‘I suppose wives and children would come up here to escape the worst of the heat. Husbands would join them for the weekend then go back to Semarang or Surabaya. Mustn’t have been a bad life….’
Meg was about to add ‘for some’ when they passed through the high wooden gate of the Ambarawa camp. ‘Jeez!’ Meg stammered as she saw the pallid, fearful-looking women.
As soon as the vehicles pulled up the internees surged forward. Many were laughing and crying at the same time.
‘They’re so thin….’ Meg sighed. She found herself forcing a smile at two scruffy boys who had jumped on the running board of the car and were pressing their faces against the window.
Ball nodded. He had seen it all before. ‘Yes, but it’s amazing what two weeks of increased rations will do.’
Meg looked around her. ‘It looks a bit like Tjandi,’ said Meg. ‘I mean the main building. Was this a school as well?’
Ball nodded. ‘Yes. The Japs used a lot of schools as camps.’ He looked at her and grinned. ‘Well, here goes… It’s the same every time. First they love me, and then when I haven’t got enough food they loathe me!’ He opened the door and soon disappeared as the women rushed him smothering him with kisses and hugs.
Caught up in the joyous mood, Meg got out after him and saw the same happening to Miller, Mac and the delighted Gurkhas. She saw that the Japanese did not dismount but were watching the jubilant scenes in studied silence.
A small hand slipped into Meg’s and she looked down at a naked, fair-haired boy of about three who was as thin as the children in the kampong. She picked the toddler up and he said something to her in Dutch that she did not understand. All she could do was smile as tearful women embraced her one after another. ‘Thank God you’ve come,’ said one hoarsely. Meg patted her back and felt the protruding bones of her rib cage and spine.
‘What took you so long?’ asked another, trembling with emotion.
The boy’s mother boy reached for him with a beaming smile. ‘This last two weeks has been the worst of all,’ she said. ‘We only had a bit of rice each day. Bandits stole the rest. We couldn’t stop them. Look, the bastards are still there!’ She pointed at the low hills and Meg saw figures on a ridge overlooking the camp. Beside her a woman began to sob.
Meg embraced her. ‘It’s over now,’ she said gently. ‘The soldiers are here. You’re safe.’
In hectic shifts, the Gurkha field kitchens fed fifteen-hundred excited internees with small portions of cabbage soup, rice and tinned beef. While the cooking was under way, Miller assigned sentries and sent patrols into the mountains to see off the bandits. To the amusement of the internees, he assigned building repairs and latrine-digging duties to the Japanese.
Meg wandered aimlessly around the camp. Though it was much smaller than Tjandi she found a host of similarities: the rice sacks cut up for clothing; the duty rosters; the stench of the latrines; double lines of barbed wire; feral-looking children roaming in packs; and, beyond one low perimeter wall, row upon row of unmarked graves. Inwardly she shuddered.
Some two miles beyond the graves, on a hill overlooking fields of knee-high ripening maize was a convent. Its high, grey-white walls and bell tower were tranquil symbols of another time. Ball, Mac and the volunteers from Tjandi had gone there with medical supplies for the clinic run by the nuns. Suddenly Meg craved quiet. She left the camp and ambled up the gentle slope in th
e late afternoon sun, pulling at a head of maize between her fingers.
The pathway took her half-way around the hill. A single-storey building came into view. A faded hotel sign advertised twelve private rooms and hot-spring baths. Excited by the possibility of a bath, she started down the drive.
Meg halted in disappointment when she saw the Japanese lieutenant from the convoy on the veranda, directing some repairs. High above his head, painted on the white stucco gable was a bright red circle. The effect was to make the front of the building resemble a giant Japanese flag. Her anger rose at the thought of the soldiers enjoying comforts when a stone’s throw-away women and children had been living in utter filth and squalor. She sighed, surprised that she had let her emotion run unchecked. ‘Snap out of it, girl,’ she said to herself. ‘It’s only a dab of paint!’
With an effort she put the Japanese out of her mind and carried on walking up the hill. Ten minutes later she stood before a weathered, iron-studded door.
St Agatha’s Convent
Meg followed a white-robed nun along narrow, stone corridors. A strong scent of disinfectant hung in the air. She was relieved when they finally entered a courtyard. Its shaded cloisters were crammed with patients on thin mattresses. As in the camp below, the atmosphere was joyous.
Inside the hospital wing it was quiet, orderly and spotlessly clean. Nuns moved quickly and efficiently along rows of beds and mattresses, changing dressings and bedpans. Here and there the carbolic was not quite strong enough to mask the cloying smell of sickness. Meg’s nostrils wrinkled in distaste.
She saw two of the Tjandi girls carting medical supplies and flirting with Mac at the same time. She caught his eye and she winked, indicating the girls. He shrugged and grinned.
