“Well, of course not! What a ridiculous notion. But look here Doctor Kalim, let me explain something to you, if you’ve got another moment or so to spare. If you like, it’s the simple philosophy of my life, the code by which I’ve lived it so far and the code by which I intend to go on living, however long that might be.” He took his cigar case from the table beside him and ignoring the doctor’s accusing stare, he extracted one and lit it, then settled back in his rattan chair.
“From a fairly young age, I was involved in warfare,” he began, choosing his words carefully. “First, as a young officer in the Burma campaign, I spent months out in the jungle having to command a bunch of frightened kids, while trying not to let them see that I was terrified myself. I don’t know if you have experienced anything of jungle warfare, Doctor— People have referred to it as ‘Green Hell’ and that seems to sum it up fairly well. It was a hostile environment where man was never really meant to go, but there we were just the same. The enemy were always nearby, but you never saw them unless they were dead. And there was malaria and dysentery and beriberi, leeches that sucked the blood from your ankles, snakes that struck at you from the bushes as you were moving along the cattle trails. A lot of fine young men under my command died out there, Doctor, and often we weren’t even able to give them a decent burial; we had to leave them lying in the bushes for wild animals to tear at. People tell you that time heals all wounds, but the faces of those lads come back to me night after night and always with that same helpless expression on them, as though they’re lost and looking for me to find them a way home.…” He shook his head, inhaled on his cigar, his eyes gazing off into the distance, as though reliving things that were best forgotten. “And then, of course, after the war ended, I was sent straight out here, with hardly a break … and it was back to the same kind of fighting. More dead men. More faces that I couldn’t drink away.…” He glanced at Kalim for a moment. “It adds up, Doctor, to over ten years of jungle-fighting, off and on. Oh, as time went on, I rose through the ranks, my involvement was less direct … but right from those earliest days, I swore to myself time and time again, that when it ended and if I was still alive at the end of it all, then I would live my life day by day and as far as possible, I would live it to the full, doing those things that made it pleasurable to me, because after so long giving my youth and my freedom in service of my country, I had grown just the tiniest bit selfish, you understand? I have never since compromised that intention to enjoy life, so long as it injured nobody else. You see, I felt, like many others who went through the war years, that I had earned that privilege. In 1950, I lost my greatest treasure … you never knew my wife, did you, Doctor?”
Kalim shook his head silently.
“Ah, but she was a fine woman. She embodied all the good values that I had to struggle to achieve. She was…” He smiled, shook his head sadly. “But anyway, with Meg gone, there seemed even less reason to change my values. I’ve led a long and a full life, Doctor, and frankly, I wouldn’t wish to extend it by the use of drugs or by prudent living or by special diets. I want to die when it’s time for me to die and if this cigar in my hand should prove to be the last nail in my half-prepared coffin, then I accept it gladly and would not dream of refusing it, given another chance.”
Kalim frowned.
“And if the time for dying should come much sooner than you think?” he ventured hopefully.
“So be it,” replied Harry, with a casual shrug. He gazed out at the garden again and gave a long sigh of contentment. “Such a beautiful day,” he mused. “How could you possibly expect anyone to spend it in a stuffy, grey hospital?”
Doctor Kalim gave a grunt of irritation and he spread his hands wide, in a gesture of futility.
“I give up!” he exclaimed.
“My dear Doctor Kalim, you can’t imagine how glad I am to hear it!”
“How can I be expected to help a man who won’t even take a step to help himself? Mr. Sullivan, I have heard your words, but I cannot be beginning to understand them.” Doctor Kalim tapped his chest passionately. “I am a man who comes from a worl where self-help is the only means of escape. If a man is wanting to rise above the simple world of the kampong, it takes great sacrifices on the part of his family and great amounts of hard work from the man himself. I am one of the few kampong children who has ever been lucky enough to be rising to a position of trust and respect. I was honoured to attain such a rank and since it has been in my power, I have worked hard to administer the gift of healing to all those in need of me … but when I am presented with such … such ingratitude, such disrespect for human life … well, frankly, it is making me wonder if this country will not be a good deal better off when you and your fellow Britishers have gone back to your own world and left us to get on with our own lives!”
This last long sentence was spat out in a voice that was rapidly losing its temper. Kalim stood up abruptly, jammed his hat back onto his head and, bowing stiffly from the waist, he concluded with a curt “Good day, Mr. Sullivan.”
Harry was genuinely upset by Kalim’s show of temper.
“Oh, now come along, Doctor, don’t be like that! Let’s have some tea and talk a bit more.…”
Kalim hesitated on the steps, then snapped around, and fixed Harry with a glare.
“Much as I would like to be passing the time of day with you, I have other, more appreciative patients to visit!”
And with that, he strode off down the steps and off along the drive, stiff-backed, straight-legged, flinging his arms backward and forward. The dark clothes he wore, combined with his gait, gave him an almost military air, as though he were a soldier of health marching away to do battle with some invading germs.
“Oh dear,” sighed Harry regretfully. “In the doghouse again.”
He watched as the doctor climbed into his vehicle and maneuvered the large rusted car away down the street. The clatter of the engine startled a pair of magpie robins that had been sitting amongst the leaves of one of the banana trees. They soared up into the air and whirled away over the rooftops. Rounding the bend at the end of the street, Kalim’s exhaust gave out an abrupt sooty bang that echoed like a pistol shot in the silence. The sound of the engine’s receding cacophony could be heard for several moments, fading into distance and then everything returned to its former peace and quiet. Harry sat alone and unmoving on the large verandah, staring out at the sunbaked garden. He felt rather sad that the doctor should have misconstrued his words so badly. All Harry wanted was to be left alone. It wasn’t that much to ask for, surely.
As he sat, he was quite unaware that he had slipped his right hand beneath the front of his shirt and was gently massaging a slight ache in his chest.
* * *
BOB BROUGHT the Land Rover to a halt in front of his house. He took his hands off the steering wheel and sat in the seat for a moment with his head slumped forward, his hands hanging limply by his sides. It was afternoon, but only in the last hour or so had he felt capable of driving home from Kampong Panjang. As the shock of his brush with the tiger wore off, his nervous reaction to it had increased and he had spent the morning wandering numbly around the kampong, trying to pull his frayed nerve endings together. Now he felt exhausted, grateful to be alive, and more resolved than ever that he would get the tiger before much more time elapsed. He shook his head and clambered out of the Land Rover.
Lim came running out of the house to greet him.
“Bob Tuan!” she cried. “I was so frightened.… I thought the tiger had eaten you.”
“He nearly bloody well did!” Bob threw his arms around her, for once not caring what the neighbours might think. “Strewth, I need a drink,” he croaked.
“Tea, coffee?”
“Whisky. But first I need a shower—” Bob broke off in surprise. A tall gaunt Malay was standing on the verandah, a strange-looking fellow with piercing black eyes and a thin, pock-marked face. He was naked, save for a sarong and the inevitable rubber flip-flops. “Who the hell
’s this?” demanded Bob irritably. He had had enough surprises for one day. “If he’s selling anything, we don’t want any!”
Lim shook her head.
“This man has come from the bomoh at Kampong Machis,” she explained. “He came this morning, asking to see you. When I told him you were away, he told me he would wait. He would not go.…”
“Wouldn’t he now?” murmured Bob.
The man stepped forward.
“I am student of the bomoh,” he explained. “He ask me come fetch you. He needs to talk wid you.”
“Oh yeah? I suppose he’s going to tell me that he’s the tiger that’s been doing all the killing, is he?”
The man looked horrified.
“Oh no, Tuan, not at all! The bomoh is concerned that many people say he is the man-eater. He want to set record straight; also, give you advice how to catch striped one.”
“Very nice of him,” sneered Bob. “Well look, you just go back to him and tell him that I don’t for one moment believe what I’ve been hearing about him, alright?”
“Just the same, he want to talk wid you. Bid me fetch you.…”
Bob ran a hand through his hair and took a deep breath.
“There’s only one place I’m going right now and that’s to bed,” he snapped irritably. “So you go back to the bomoh and tell him that maybe I’ll look him up later on, when I’ve had some rest.…”
But the man shook his head adamantly.
“He tell me not return without you. I wait here for you. You sleep.” The man crossed his arms and took up a resolute stance on the verandah, his legs slightly apart, his dark eyes staring out toward the garden.
“But— I may be asleep for hours,” warned Bob.
“No matter. I wait.”
Bob stared at the man for several moments in silent antagonism. He felt too tired to attempt throwing the fellow off the verandah, and it was quite plain that it would take more than a few well-chosen words to move him on.
“Well, suit yourself!” snapped Bob at last. “You’ll soon get fed up with it!”
And with that, he turned and strode into the house, slamming the door behind him. Lim met him with a large tumbler of iced whisky, which he drank down in one gulp.
“What happened?” she asked him, but he silenced her with a wave of his hand.
“Tell you about it later. First I need to sleep. Forget the shower, I’ll have one after.” He thrust the empty glass back into her hand and left her standing where she was, dumbfounded by his abruptness. He strode into his bedroom, stripped off his clothes, and clambered into bed. Lim came to the door. She stood gazing at him thoughtfully. “Is there anything you need?” she asked him.
“No. Just sleep, that’s all. Leave me be, will you?”
She nodded sadly, moved away.
The moment Bob’s head touched the pillow, he was asleep, but it was not a peaceful slumber. He sank quickly into a vivid and particularly disturbing dream.
He was in the jungle again and it was nighttime, dank and humid. Rising from the rotting vegetation below came thick rolling banks of choking vapour and where he sat, high up on the uncomfortable machan, it enveloped his vision, obscuring his view of the jungle all around him. He took a deep breath. His clothes were sticking to his sweating body, as though they were made of nothing more substantial than blotting paper and he craved for a drink of cold water. Peering through the vapours around him, he could just dimly perceive the half-eaten corpse, stretched out on the forest floor below him. It was the corpse of an old woman, mostly eaten away at the legs, and for the first time he noticed that she was carrying a leather water bottle around her shoulders. Bob’s attention focused on the bottle. From its neck, he could see a steady rhythmic drip of icy water splashing onto the ground below. He licked his lips. They felt as dry and rasping as a piece of sandpaper. To take the water would be tantamount to robbing the dead, but, he assured himself, the woman could have no need of it now.
After a few moments’ hesitation, he clambered down from the machan, lowered himself from a thick branch and dropped the remaining few yards to the ground. It was much clearer down here, the mist seemed to hover some feet above his head. Glancing quickly about and keeping his rifle ready for firing, he made his way over to the corpse. It was horribly disfigured, but happily the woman’s eyes were closed. He stood and reached out a hand to take the water bottle. In that instant, with horrible abruptness, the woman’s eyes snapped open. She grabbed Bob’s wrist in her own gnarled hand and began to pull him down against her. Bob cried out in pure terror. He tried to pull away, but she was extremely powerful. She began to pull his face down to meet hers. A dry rasping cackle emerged from her lips.
Wildly, Bob lifted the barrel of his rifle and brought it down with all his force onto the crone’s wizened face. His movements were slow, laborious, like a man underwater, but the metal barrel connected with the woman’s forehead and gouged a large red hole in it, smashing through flesh and bone alike. The woman, however, did not relinquish her hold. She pulled at him with renewed ferocity, and he began to rain down a series of vicious blows on the upturned face, smashing it into a bloody red pulp. Still her vice-like grip held his wrist and still that hideous cackle bubbled out from behind a mask of blood. Bob paused, mid-blow, with a cry of horror; for now, the broken face was rearranging itself and it was no longer the face of an old native woman at which he gazed, but the rounder, more recognizable features of his own mother. The cackle became a full-throated laugh of triumph.
With a scream, Bob lashed out at the arm that held him and the heavy gun tore through decomposed flesh and brittle bone. The arm went sailing lazily away from him, and snatching up the water bottle, Bob backed slowly away from the corpse, sobbing helplessly. When he felt he was safely beyond its reach, he unscrewed the cap of the bottle and put it to his lips. Then he coughed, spluttered, flung the bottle away with an oath. It was full of sand.
Time passed while he squatted alone on the jungle floor, waiting. He glanced back to the machan occasionally, but it was shrouded in mist and was somehow terribly forbidding.
Then, from the corner of his eye, he saw a shadow moving through the trees to his left, and a long evil rumbling growl reminded him why he was there. He took a deep breath, stood up and turned to face the direction from which the tiger was coming. He could see a violent swishing in the long grass in that direction and lifting his rifle, he grabbed the bolt in his right hand, intending to punch a new cartridge into the chamber. The gun fell apart in his hands.
He stood gazing down at the various pieces of machinery scattered on the floor at his feet. Another growl, louder, nearer, seemed to shake every bone in his body. A great striped shadow burst from the cover of vegetation to his left. His one hope was to make it back to the machan. He turned and began to run, in terrible, agonizing slow motion. The grass seemed to wrap itself around his ankles, the hard earth had turned to sticky, clinging ankle-deep mud. The tiger was a hideous shadow at his heels, he could almost sense the hot-meat breath of the creature on the bare flesh of his neck. The trunk of the tree seemed a universe away from him, but somehow he got there before the tiger’s claws fastened into him.
He threw himself at the gnarled wood and began to climb, flailing desperately with his arms and feet and miraculously, he found holds that should not have existed, was able to pull himself up into the mist. The tiger did not seem to be following him. He emerged by the main fork of the tree and with a sigh of relief, he managed to pull himself up onto the machan. He lay on his back for a few moments, regaining his breath. Glancing down, he could not see the tiger anywhere below him.
At any rate, he was safe up here. He would wait till daylight before venturing down to the jungle floor again.…
A sudden movement on the machan startled him. Glancing up, he saw to his surprise, that a man was standing on the wooden platform beside him, his face turned away. The man was a native, naked to the waist and wearing a sarong. It could have been the penghulu fr
om Kampong Panjang, but what he should be doing here was anybody’s guess.
“Hey, who are you?” demanded Bob irritably. His voice echoed hollowly in the silence. “What do you want?”
The native made no reply and Bob was abruptly filled with a sense of trepidation. He got hesitantly to his feet.
“You’d better be careful,” he warned the man. “There’s a tiger below.”
The man’s only reply was a hideous rasping chuckle of amusement, that seemed to freeze Bob’s blood in his veins. Slowly, he began to approach the man. The tiny machan seemed to have transformed its size into a vast aerial platform and it took Bob some considerable time to reach its far end. The native still had his face turned away. Bob reached out a trembling hand and tapped him on the shoulder. The man turned.…
And then Bob was backing away, screaming at the top of his voice, for the man’s face was a hideous travesty of humanity, half man, half tiger. The round flat head was covered with a tawny stubble, the nose had degenerated into a thick dark snout. A pair of inhuman yellow eyes blazed hatred and the open, slavering mouth bristled with long misshapen teeth. The man’s hands came up to tear at Bob’s throat and they were obscene arthritic claws that fastened deep into flesh with terrifying power. Bob threw his own hands up to cover his face, but then he was falling, with the weretiger’s jaws only inches from his face and the green clinging foliage of the jungle floor was rushing up to smother him in its dank embrace.…
Bob woke, sobbing violently. He was sitting up in bed in the darkness of his room, his own arms wrapped protectively around his body. Above him, the metal blades of the electric fan clicked rhythmically around, disturbing the humid air. With a gasp, Bob groped for the switch of his bedside light and flicked it on for reassurance. He sat blinking in the glare for a moment, but the dream had made even the mundane seem irrational. The room looked alien, unfamiliar, as though he were seeing it for the first time. He fumbled for the pack of cigarettes that always lay beside the bed, extracted one and lit it with shaking fingers. Then he took a long drag, blew out smoke and slumped back onto his pillow.
Tiger, Tiger Page 26
