Above all, this was a man’s world, free of the complications of women. Of the fifteen men in Douglas Lovell’s employ, only one, Anderson the doctor, was married, and his wife had the flat-chested, striding manner of an Englishwoman who has elected to un-sex herself for the sake of convenience.
Douglas Lovell ruled his kingdom like a natural imperialist restrained by common sense. He threatened to flog bad coolies, but never did so. An army bugle woke the estate every day for muster.
The memory of the rubber slump of the early thirties remained fresh, and Bukit Helang still ran at scarcely half its capacity, filling a fixed production quota dictated by the rubber company in London. There was a large bulletin board in the white-pillared shade of the estate office, where every day a clerk posted the size of the day’s crop, the price of rubber, the number of coolies working and the profit made.
James had never before won approval for his abilities rather than his charm, or felt himself to be engaged in useful, productive work. The experience improved his spirit immensely. Above all, he was admired as a linguist. The basis of this gift was his acute and subtle ear; at Eton he had learned only one foreign language – French – which was taught from books and blackboard by an Englishman with a vile accent that confirmed the boys in the notion that the wogs began at Calais. Now, however, he had no difficulty in learning to speak the oriental languages by listening to the speech of the natives.
‘You’ve got the gift of tongues all right,’ another junior assistant had observed in admiration, as he came upon James one day quizzing Ahmed his houseboy in fluent Malay. James himself had been astonished at the ease with which the new languages around him flowed into his mind. At times he was aware of thinking in a mixture of Malay, Cantonese and Tamil, as he gave his men instructions, or of having forgotten the English word for some familiar object, as he dined and drank with the other assistants. His absorption of Oriental speech was instinctive and completely phonetic, however, and when he came to sit the Incorporated Society of Planters’Tamil examination for the first time, he failed.
Douglas Lovell was concerned. ‘Chap like you saves a manager a hell of a lot of bother,’ he observed from the back of the stocky dun pony on which he made his morning round of the estate.
James walked respectfully by the ambling pony’s side. ‘I’m sure I’ll pass next time. I’ve just got to flog through the grammar, sir.’
Douglas Lovell paused to watch a group of Tamils weeding the avenues between the rows of young trees. ‘Tell’m to leave the young grass,’ he ordered James. ‘Rain’ll wash all the soil away if they clear down to bare earth.’ When James returned to his side he continued, ‘As far as I’m concerned, it’s your Malay that’s most useful. Never could get the measure of the Malays. Language is easy enough, I’m told, but half the time they’re talking in riddles.’
‘It’s their idea of politeness, sir. They think it’s discourteous to ask direct questions. And they have these funny little poems that they all seem to know, and sometimes instead of saying something outright they’ll just make some reference to a poem and everything’s understood.’
‘Hrmph. Not by me, it isn’t. Anyway, as far as the Board are concerned, I can’t promote you if you don’t get the Tamil exam, so you’d better crack on with it.’ They walked slowly onwards and the pony swished its pepper-and-salt tail in irritation at the flies. Next to the young rubber was an expanse of older, almost exhausted trees where a solitary Tamil woman crouched as she emptied the half-full cups of latex into her bucket.
‘When I first came out here,’ Douglas Lovell spoke slowly with light but unmistakable emphasis, ‘my manager told me the best way to polish up my Tamil was to get myself a sleeping dictionary.’
‘A what, sir?’
‘Sleeping dictionary. Native woman. Best place to learn any language is in bed, y’know.’ James looked at his boots to hide what he was sure was a blush, and Douglas Lovell looked resolutely between the pony’s dark-tipped ears. ‘Of course, some fellas don’t find’em very attractive.’ There was a pause.
‘I think some of them are quite beautiful, actually.’
‘You’re quite right. Well, if you see one that takes your fancy, here’s how it’s done.’ Briskly he prodded the pony forward, pulled up by the Tamil woman and felt in his breeches pocket for a 20 cent coin, which he tossed into the half-full latex cup in her hand. When she looked up, he nodded towards James, and indicated with a jerk of his cane that the initiative came from the younger man, who stood by in frozen fascination.
‘If she takes the money, the foreman’ll have her cleaned up at the end of the day and sent round to your bungalow. Make sure you pick a married woman, or there’s a devil of a fuss.’ He turned the pony. ‘Best of luck.’ He cantered fast up the track without looking back.
The woman looked at James with expressionless round eyes, then picked the coin out of the cup of sticky white sap with a hesitant smile.
Despite his total trust in his new boss, and despite knowing that Douglas Lovell was almost an absolute monarch James barely believed that the woman would come, and half hoped she would not. But, as soon as Ahmed had cleared away his dinner dishes and lit his Java cheroot, Damika walked gracefully out of the darkness up to the verandah steps. He was reassured to see that she had dressed up, with a waxy, white frangipani flower in her black hair and ankle bracelets which chinked softly at each barefoot step. For a few moments there was no sound except the shrilling of the night insects and no movement but the flicker of a bat across the light from the kerosene lamp. Then Ahmed in the kitchen quarters clashed some pans, as if to confirm his tactful preoccupation outside, and James threw the cheroot away, stood up and led Damika into his bedroom.
She helped him unwind the length of her sari, showing neither nervousness nor attraction, and he felt her flesh, cool and firm where he had anticipated a hot softness like rotting fruit. She was not embarrassed either by her nakedness or his, but sighed quietly as he fished in the knot of hair at the nape of her neck for the restraining pins.
Suddenly James was filled with a huge surge of desire. It came with the realization that this woman was a creature completely in his power. His first instinct was to extricate his throbbing penis from his clothes and plunge into the acquiescent flesh before him, but he paused, wanting to glory in complete ownership, the simple pragmatism of the transaction, the fact that he did not need to charm or flatter, scheme or beg, to get possession of this body, and that when the act was over there was no harm she could do him.
He made her sit on his canvas stool and spread her hair around her shoulders, feeling its oiled heaviness. He stroked her arms and breasts, moving the lamp closer to see the mahogany tints of her skin. He pulled at her nipples to see if they would harden, licked, then bit them to try their taste. He pushed her thighs apart, using the commanding firmness of a farrier making a horse pick up its feet, and observed the sparseness of her pubic hair, and the unexpected pinkness of the inner flesh which he probed with his fingers. Where her skin wrinkled, it was velvet black and the folds were smooth and even. He felt his blood roaring in his veins like a river of fire which incinerated everything it touched. Unsteadily, he stood up and motioned her to lie down on his bed, then scrambled between her legs and thrust into her with a sensation of instant release like blinding light.
A few moments later he sat up, dazed, and watched her methodically replace her long earrings, check the tiny, metal flower which pierced her short straight nose, and coil her hair. Mutely he searched for the hairpins he had dropped on the polished hardwood floorboards and handed them to her, then watched as she folded her sari fabric into fanlike pleats and wound the garment around herself. She turned and moved towards the door.
‘Are you going?’ he asked, clearing his hoarse throat as he spoke.
She looked confused. ‘I am going, but I can stay if you wish.’
‘Yes, stay. Sleep here with me.’
Without emotion, she returned and unwound the
sari. Young, physically healthy and emotionally maimed, James felt the burning river of lust carry him swiftly onwards. He also felt a guilty gratitude towards Damika which he now showed in a fever of caresses which seemed to surprise her. He entered her twice more, then fell asleep. She slept on the mat at his bedside until 4.30 am, when Ahmed, quiet as a cat, shook her awake and she returned to her husband’s shack to cook their morning rice.
As soon he had finished taking muster that morning, James tracked her down and dropped another 20 cent coin into her latex cup.
That had been two years ago. He had discovered, to his amusement, that she was illiterate and no help to his mastery of Tamil. Occasionally he bought her a tortoiseshell hairpin or a bangle, with which she was gratifyingly happy. During the day he gave her no thought whatsoever, beyond making the decision whether or not to summon her.
‘Bloody glad you’re back, Gerald. It’s been a blasted nuisance keeping an eye on your patch for six months,’ shouted James over the pandemonium of the railway station at the capital, Kuala Lumpur. A swell of people and luggage surged below the pointed arches of white stone. The two men pumped hands and slapped shoulders happily, then turned to follow the porters who were carrying Gerald’s battered trunk and two new suitcases through the throng. The length of the train was divided by race, with the Tamils milling around the third class, Chinese families greeting each other at the second class, and Europeans summoning porters to first class; a Malay rajah, his retinue and his polo ponies occupied two special carriages. At the front of the engine a group of Tamil sweepers with baskets and buckets were swabbing the remains of a wandering goat off the buffers amid gently rising steam.
‘Not there,’ bellowed Gerald at the porters’backs as they swerved towards the exit. ‘James, get them over to the left luggage office. No sense putting up anywhere if we’re to be back at Bukit Helang in the morning.’
James passed Gerald the luggage receipts and the two men strolled out into the early evening bustle of Kuala Lumpur, always called simply K. L. by the British. They climbed into a rickshaw pulled by a sweating Chinese and Gerald looked fondly around him, as he brushed railway smuts from his crumpled white trousers.
‘Damn sight prettier than Victoria Station,’ he said, indicating the cream and white minarets of the railway terminus. ‘My God, it was cold back home, I’d forgotten how cold. Are we going to the Dog?’
‘Where else – the fatted calf for the prodigal son.’
‘Not prodigal for long now, old boy.’ Gerald screwed his freckled face into a hearty wink. ‘There’s a little girl back home with my ring on her finger, choosing her trousseau and packing her trunks …’ James let out a yell that momentarily startled the sweating rickshaw puller, who half-halted and flung them forward.
‘You clever sod, Rawlins, you’ve cracked it.’
‘Did just what the tuan besar advised, old boy. Put up at my aunt’s in Guildford, had tea every day in a little tearoom opposite the hospital and bingo! Got myself a nice little nurse in ten days flat.’ He sat back on the oilcloth-covered seat, grinning, and James thumped his knee in congratulation, knowing how eager Gerald had been to find a wife.
At the club, James ordered champagne and they settled into rattan chairs on the verandah. On the playing field a cricket match between two teams of police cadets was drawing to a close.
The Dog, formally the Spotted Dog, or even more formally the Selangor Club, was an ever-growing complex of bungalows fronted with black and white, mock-Tudor timbering. Its verandahs faced the spacious, green cricket field, and beyond the far boundary the mellow sunlight burnished the pink and white façade and the copper domes of the palace of the state ruler.
‘Spotted’ suggested the Club’s character; albeit a smart establishment, it admitted both tuan besars and juniors, and was technically open to Asiatic members as well, although they were few in number. Most of the European clubs in Malaya were either strictly for whites, or specified either big or little tuans only, to avoid the embarrassment of social exchange among non-equals. Britain had transplanted its class system to the Empire, along with its notions of business, government and social service.
‘So, when’s the wedding?’
‘Betty – she’s called Betty – is booked on the boat in six weeks’ time, so she’ll be out by October. Mother’s as pleased as a cat with two tails, running round Penang arranging the wedding and firing off letters all over the show.’ Gerald’s family, for three generations employed in the East, was scattered across half the globe. ‘I’ve bought her a present,’ he went on, fishing in the pocket of his creased, cream jacket. ‘Picked it out at Simon Artz in Port Said. You know about this stuff, d’you like it?’ He produced a small, blue velveteen case and prised it open awkwardly with his blunt, freckled fingers. Inside was a cocktail watch of silver metal, its ornate bracelet encrusted with sparkling stones.
‘I say, isn’t that splendid.’ James picked up the watch and unobtrusively searched for a hallmark. ‘Your Betty should be absolutely delighted. It’s charming, first-class.’ The watch was not hallmarked, the stones were marcasites at best and Gerald was yet another of the suckers to have found a glittering bargain at Simon Artz’s renowned general store on the Suez Canal, but James was too much of a gentleman to say so.
The cricket match ended in a ragged round of muted applause and the white-coated umpires presided as the stumps were drawn out of the coarse turf. The light of the tropical day faded quickly and they moved into the bar. James saw a familiar, gangling figure in the doorway.
‘Treadwell! Just the man we need. Come and toast Gerald’s future happiness, he’s got himself hitched first shot. Boy, another bottle here, if you’d be so kind.’
‘You’ll never get it right, Bourton,’ the lanky Australian folded up like a collapsing deck-chair as he sat, ‘your la-di-dah manners don’t cut any ice with the natives, y’know.’
Like many bachelor friendships, the oddly matched threesome passed much time in ritual insult, lest anyone should suspect there was affection between them.
‘When I want a lecture on etiquette from a bloody convict I’ll ask for it. To the bridegroom!’ They clinked their Selangor pewter tankards and gulped champagne.
‘Now listen, Bill,’ James leaned forward, realizing he’d better get important matters out of the way before they were too drunk to remember anything, ‘I need your help. Can you spare me a couple of your Chinese lumberjacks for a day? Our fellows got spooked by one of those blasted spirit-house trees and I need a pair of decent, sensible men from outside to fell it.’
‘Sure, I’ll find you a pair who’d chop up their own grandmothers for ten dollars.’
‘Good man, I knew you’d be able to help.’
‘Not much good sweating out my life in the lumber trade if I can’t help out my pals, is there?’ For all his studied lack of pretension, Bill Treadwell was a botanist, an expert in the diseases of hardwood trees, employed in a research project for London University. James, with no desire to get married, had seen no need to return to England for the vacation at the end of his first tour of duty, and instead had spent some time in the forest with Bill.
The two men’s friendship had been founded on month-long treks into the jungle; they had lived off rice, fern-tips and what James could shoot; they had attempted to catalogue the hundreds of birds and insects which had fluttered or crawled across their tracks; they had followed tantalizing pathways made by the jungle animals which had abruptly vanished in the walls of vegetation; they had leaped back in terror from the sweeping horns of a selandang, the Asian wild ox, enraged when they disturbed it at a hidden wallow; they had strained eyes and ears in vain for an elephant or a tiger and surmised that the distant patter of falling leaves was the step of the tiny mouse-deer. Humbled in the hushed cathedral of nature, they had shared the natives’ superstitions and lain unsleeping in the night, telling each other what they knew of the folklore and mythology of the Malayan people. The Australian’s erudition and h
is taste for serious talk had fed James’s hungry mind and stimulated the fine intellect which his own native culture had stunted.
A boy slipped past with a salver of curry puffs, reminding them that they could drink more if they lined their stomachs. James ordered some.
‘So there’ll be no tempting you on one of our jungle hikes now, I suppose?’ Bill stuffed the corner of a spicy patty in his mouth and bit it off, waving the remaining fragment at Gerald.
‘No, I’m going to settle down and be an old married man,’ he replied.
‘Shame!’ James shouted.
‘And there’ll be no popping down to old Mary’s tonight, I take it?’ Bill swallowed down the rest of his curry puff, crinkling his shrewd, blue eyes.
‘Well,’ Gerald knitted his pale eyebrows, ‘I don’t think I’ll get carried away with this marriage thing just yet – no sense in too much of a good thing is there?’
‘I’m relieved to hear it. You had me worried there for a while.’ Their custom was to meet in Kuala Lumpur once a month and, emboldened by drink and each other’s company, to end the evening at a dilapidated whorehouse in the Chinese quarter whose official name was the Bright World of Much Happiness, but which was widely known as Mary’s.
The curry puffs made them thirsty, and James ordered more champagne, which made them thirstier still, so they ordered stengahs. There was a rowdy commotion as two groups of men started a pitched battle around the doorway of the reading room, spitting whisky at each other from between their teeth. Behind James, a trio of French planters drew closer together in disapproval and carried on discussing whether sex was more important to men or to women.
Pearls Page 9
