by Eric Ambler
The General’s only misgiving at that moment concerned his authorisation to kill the white prisoners. It would be annoying if Gani lost his head and killed them prematurely. For a moment or two he considered telephoning the jail and countermanding the authorisation; but he concluded finally that any hint of indecision on his part could be misinterpreted just then. If there were a serious change in the situation at the jail, Gani would obviously report it. Meanwhile, it was best to leave things as they were.
At that moment, in fact, the situation at the jail was changing more rapidly than even Major Gani knew. There had been fighting on the roof, and the jail guards up there had been cornered by the water tank. It was only a matter of time before the enemy winkled them out and gained access to the stairs leading below. With a steadiness and decision which would have surprised the General Major Gani prepared to evacuate the control section and fall back behind the grilles and steel doors of the men’s cell block. What he did not know was that, under cover of the roof fighting, a party had made its way to the rear of the building and was at that moment setting demolition charges in one of the drains.
Orders had been given to remove Sutan and Voychinski from the interrogation rooms and transfer them immediately to cells in the men’s block, when the man who had taped the charges lighted the fuse.
IV
Greg’s cell was less than a hundred feet from the explosion. The blast wave slammed him against the wall, smashed the light fitting, and snatched the zinc screen out of the window embrasure as if it had been paper.
Since the attack had begun, he had been sitting there as wretched and perplexed as a child listening to a quarrel between adults. Outside in the corridor, there had been some confused shouting at first, and then the guards, apparently in response to an order, had all left. The other prisoners in that section had begun to carry on excited conversations in Malay through the door grilles. The exercise yard had been quiet. The sounds had been coming from the other side of the jail. He had started then to worry about Dorothy. If, as it seemed, there were some sort of jail riot going on, she could be in danger.
Now, as he got to his feet and went to the unscreened window, he could see a cloud of dust and smoke drifting across the moonlit yard. At the same moment, there was the crash of a grille opening along the corridor behind him and the sound of running, struggling, shouting men. Then, the air was shattered by a long burst of submachine-gun fire and the shouts changed to screams.
The Committee member in charge of the raiding force was a former army officer, Colonel Oda, whom Hallett had met on one of his trips into insurgent territory. The Colonel had a protruding lower lip which curled inauspiciously at the smallest hint of opposition to his wishes ; but he was not wholly unreasonable, and had been persuaded in the end that the proposal of his second-in-command to kill the American and British Vice-Consuls and commandeer their cars was both politically unsound and tactically unnecessary. On the subject of those in the jail, however, he had been adamant. He and he alone would decide what was to be done with them; prisoners and guards, white or brown. After further discussion he had agreed, reluctantly, to allow the foreign diplomatic representatives to accompany the attacking force. They would go as neutral observers of the justice meted out by the Committee of the Faithful.
The reason for even that concession had soon become apparent. Neutral or no, the observers had been ordered, before the assault began, to park their beflagged cars bumper to bumper fifty yards from the jail entrance, in order to provide cover for the Colonel’s battle headquarters among the trees beside the road. During the early stages of the fighting, Hallett and Wilson had been obliged to crouch behind the cars while carbine bullets from the roof of the jail had ripped through the door panels into the upholstery.
Half an hour after the first P.I.A.T. mortar bomb had been fired, the demolition charge blew out the rear wall of the control section. Two minutes after that, the sound of firing ceased. There was some shouting. Then, the second-in-command appeared at the main gate and called out that the place was taken. The Colonel walked across the road. He took no notice of Hallett and Wilson. They exchanged questioning glances, then left the cars and followed him.
As they went through the main gate the damaged grilles beyond were being levered open by the men inside. Lanterns had been brought. By their yellow light it was possible to see a group of guards huddled by an office door with their hands clasped behind their heads. The bodies of the guards who had been killed in the forecourt were lying face downwards at the foot of the steps. Their blood had drained into a broad puddle. The Colonel did not trouble to walk round it.
The blast of the demolition charge had brought down a great deal of plaster. The dust of it hanging in the air made Hallett and Wilson cough. It did not seem to affect the Colonel. He was talking to his second-in-command. When he saw the captured guards, however, he stopped and glanced over his shoulder at Hallett.
“Do you know where your American and British prisoners are in this place?” he asked.
“I know where they were, Colonel.” Hallett began coughing again.
The Colonel looked at one of the soldiers covering the guards. “Keys,” he said.
The soldier looked at the six terrified guards. Three of them had long key chains at their belts. The soldier grinned and took out a knife. Then, he stepped forward and swung the knife upwards. The guard screamed as the double blade of the knife slashed through the belt and across his stomach simultaneously. As he doubled up in agony, the soldier snatched the belt away and handed the keys to the Colonel. The other two guards with keys hastily unfastened their belts and let them drop to the floor. The soldier with the knife laughed.
The Colonel pulled his lip in and nodded to Hallett.
“You may release your prisoners,” he said; “but do not try to take them away from here.”
“Very well, Colonel.”
But the Colonel was already walking on. “Voychinski can wait,” he was saying to the second-in-command. “The one who matters is our Sutan.”
The guard with the stomach wound had sunk to the floor and was looking down stupidly at the blood pouring over his hands. Wilson picked up one of the belts and took the key chain off it. His face was white as he looked at Hallett.
“If you want to see that Nilsen’s all right,” he said quietly, “I’ll look after the two women.”
Hallett nodded. “Okay.”
He took the other belt and went on down the corridor. The demolition charge had wrecked the building here, and he had to pick his way over piles of rubble to get to the passage leading to the men’s cell block. The soldiers there had seen him with their Colonel and made no move to stop him. In any case, they were too busy stripping the bodies of the dead guards to care much about a white man. He stumbled on, using the flashlight from his car to light the way and shutting his ears to the cries of two men who were not yet dead. From beyond the open grille ahead of him came the sound of prisoners calling to one another and pounding on the doors of their cells. One man was screaming hysterically that the place was on fire and that they would all be burnt alive. As Hallett went along trying to make out the cell numbers, he shouted in Malay that everything was all right and that all prisoners would soon be released. Under cover of the excited cries that followed this announcement he called out quietly: “Mr. Nilsen.”
“Here.”
He had already passed the cell. He went back, fumbling with the flashlight and the keys, and called again.
“Where are you? Keep talking.”
“Right here. Is that Hallett? What’s going on? Is my wife all right? What’s happened?” He was trying, not quite successfully, to keep a tremor out of his voice.
Hallett began trying the keys. “Take it easy, Mr. Nilsen. I’ve got to find the right key. The jail’s been taken over temporarily by the insurgents. The British Consul’s gone along to get your wife and Mrs. Lukey.”
“Is she all right?”
“There was no fighting o
n that side. They may be scared, but I’m pretty sure they’re not hurt. Wait a minute. This looks as if it might be the right one.”
A moment later he had the cell door open, and saw the prisoner’s face livid and desperate in the beam of the flashlight.
Hallett made himself smile. “Dr. Livingstone, I presume,” he said, and then: “Steady, Mr. Nilsen. Sit down a moment.”
“I just want to get out of here.” But he did as he was told. “It sounded as if they’d blown the whole place up,” he added weakly.
“Only a bit of it. Now listen. We’re in a curious sort of spot. Sutan’s friends came to get him. Okay, they’ve got him. They won’t hold this place for long, though. As soon as it starts to get light they’ll be high-tailing it back to the hills. Where that leaves you and Mrs. Nilsen, I don’t know, unless you ask them to take you along. Even if they’d agree, I wouldn’t advise that.”
“You mean we’ve got to stay here in jail?”
“I hope not. I don’t know. I’m just warning you. At the moment it’s all up to the commander of the raiding party, and he’s a tough proposition. I’m taking you to him now. He doesn’t speak much English, so he won’t question you direct, but don’t say anything unless I tell you to. Above all don’t get mad or try to protest. Just keep quiet. Is that clear?”
“I don’t have a protest left in me.”
“Good. How’s your stomach?”
“Queasy.”
“Well, keep close to me and don’t look around too much, or it may give you trouble.”
He led the way out of the cell and back towards the control section. He went quickly, holding the flashlight ahead of him and ignoring Nilsen’s complaints that he could not see where he was going. Hallett judged that the man had reached a point of mental exhaustion at which he could very easily become unnerved. Anger was sometimes a useful restorative.
“Come on/’ he said impatiently; “we don’t have much time.”
“Time for what?”
Hallett did not have to reply. They had reached the main corridor of the administration block and Colonel Oda’s second-in-command was approaching. He was a square, muscular man with a wispy moustache and bright, stupid eyes. He had not forgotten that the Colonel had earlier accepted Hallett’s arguments in preference to his own. He looked at Nilsen contemptuously.
“Is this your American?”
“This is Mr. Nilsen, yes.”
“You will both come to see the Colonel immediately.”
“Very well.”
The second-in-command turned on his heel and they followed him along the corridor. Hallett felt Nilsen’s hand on his arm.
“What did he say?”
Hallett frowned warningly and told him loudly in Malay to hold his tongue. The second-in-command spoke no English and Hallett did not want to irritate him unnecessarily.
The room into which they were taken was the one in which Hallett had last seen Major Gani ; and Major Gani was the first person he saw there now. He was standing against one of the barred windows, with a soldier on either side of him and blood running from his head and left shoulder. Sitting at the table beside Colonel Oda was a man whom Hallett guessed to be Major Sutan. His head was drooping and his face a deathly yellow in the lamplight. It was obviously all he could do to remain upright. The Colonel was talking to him quietly.
Across the table from them was Wilson with the two women. Mrs. Lukey was crying. As soon as he saw his wife, Nilsen went over and put his arms round her. She began to cry, too. The Colonel looked up in exasperation and saw Hallett.
“Ah!” He rapped on the table as if for silence. “I have told Mr. Wilson. Now, I tell you, Mr. Hallett. Major Sutan has confirmed the friendly status of these European prisoners. You may take them with you and go. That is all.”
Hallett’s eyes met Wilson’s. The latter shrugged resignedly.
The Colonel frowned. “That is all,” he repeated sharply.
“Thank you.” Hallett bowed slightly. “May I ask where you suggest they should go to?”
“That is their affair. They are free to go.”
“Just a moment, Colonel.” Hallett went forward to the table. “You asked Mr. Wilson and me to come here as neutral observers to witness the administration of justice by the Committee of the Faithful. You say now that Major Sutan has confirmed the friendly status of these persons. Yet you are prepared to send them away from here, without protection, to be re-arrested by the Central Government, put back into prison like common criminals, perhaps shot as your collaborators. Is that the justice of the Committee of the Faithful?”
“They are free to go. I do not understand what you want.”
“He understands all right,” Wilson said in English. “I’ve just finished explaining it to him.”
Hallett kept his eyes on the Colonel. “It has been instructive to see how the Committee of the Faithful keeps faith with its friends,” he said. He put a sarcastic inflection on the word ‘Faithful’.
The second-in-command stepped forward. “You do not have to hear these insults, Colonel. Give the order and I will see that they cause no further trouble.”
The Colonel ignored him. “What can we do?” he demanded angrily. “What do you expect?”
“A safe conduct for these persons to the airport, and permission to embark on the first Malayan Airways plane to Penang or Singapore.”
“You are a fool or mad.”
“I don’t believe so.”
“This is a raiding force, not an army of occupation. Only General Iskaq could give such a safe conduct.”
“I know that.”
The Colonel laughed shortly. “Then you must know also that you are wasting my time. We have released these persons. They are in your care. We can do no more.”
“You can obtain a safe conduct for them from General Iskaq.”
“Impossible.”
“Is it? Why not ask Major Gani?” Without waiting for a reply Hallett looked across the room at the man by the window. “Major, do you think that General Iskaq values your services highly enough to grant a safe conduct for Mr. and Mrs. Nilsen and Mrs. Lukey in exchange for your release unharmed?”
He saw Gani’s eyes flicker. Then, there was a crash as Colonel Oda stood up quickly and his chair shot back against the wall.
Wilson started to move towards Hallett. The second-in-command snapped back the cocking handle of his machine pistol.
Hallett looked from the machine pistol to the Colonel’s lower lip and shrugged. “Violence is the fool’s answer for every difficulty,” he remarked. “I did not think it was yours, Colonel.”
“Get out, before we think too much.”
Hallett inclined his head. “Very well. It is a pity. I had hoped that Mr. Wilson and I could have been of help to you.”
The Colonel’s lip curled proudly. “We did not need your help to take this prison. We will not need your help to take all Labuanga when we wish.”
“Maybe not. But you will find that taking Labuanga is easier than keeping it. One day, soon perhaps, you will proclaim an autonomous government here and declare your independence of Djakarta and Medan. It is then you will need the help of friends.”
“These are our friends.” The Colonel tapped his pistol holster.
“They will not win your government recognition. Think, Colonel. The Central Government will denounce you as brigands and bandits and destroy you as they destroyed your comrades in Celebes. To whom will you appeal for justice? To the United Nations? The Central Government is there before you. To the Soviet Union? You are anti-Communist. The only ears that will hear you are in the United States and Britain. Our countries, Mr. Wilson’s and mine, admire good fighting men, but they also value moderation. No doubt Major Sutan has been vilely ill-treated by this man Gani. But how will you explain that, merely in order to have your revenge by torturing and killing Gani, you endangered the lives of two Americans and a British subject? Supposing General Iskaq puts them back here tomorrow, has them killed, a
nd then tells the world that they were savagely murdered by you when the jail was attacked. How could you deny it?”
“You would know that was not true,” the Colonel said indignantly.
“Would I? It seems to me that there is a very small difference between that and what you are planning. And how foolish that plan is. Simply by using Gani as a hostage you could not only cause General Iskaq to lose face, but also show yourselves as humane and honourable men, infinitely more worthy of governing Labuanga than these lackeys from Djakarta. These things are not forgotten. When the day comes on which you need the friendship of the United States and the nations of the British Commonwealth, which memory will you prefer-that of killing Major Gani or that of having saved American and British lives?”
The Colonel stared at him for a moment and then sat down again. He looked at Sutan inquiringly.
Sutan’s haggard eyes looked up at Hallett. “Captain Voychinski has died from the beating this man gave him,” he said slowly in English. “Perhaps the gentleman does not know that. Voychinski was a white man. Perhaps, if the gentleman saw Voychinski’s body, he would not feel so merciful.”
“It’s not mercy he’s asking for,” Wilson put in; “but some protection for these people who came here to do business with you.”
“They came at their own risk.”
“Oh no. They came because you wanted them to. They were told there was no risk. Personally, I feel they were unwise, but I also feel that you people have a responsibility. Besides, have you thought about what would happen to your future arms deliveries if you turn these three persons over to the authorities? You wouldn’t be able to buy a bow and arrow after that.”
