“Lovely boy,” murmured Marion. “I hope he’s safe out there in the dark.…”
But Harry was already leading the way up the Tremaynes’ drive.
“Let’s get it over with,” he said flatly. He marched up to the front door and rang the bell. After a few moments’ wait, the door opened and there stood Kate, wearing a simple white cotton dress.
“Hello, Harry,” she said. “For once, you’re the last person to arrive.” She smiled at Marion. “And you must be M. Burns! I read your articles in the Times every week. I could hardly believe our luck when Melissa told us you were coming to dinner.” She took Marion’s hand in hers and shook it warmly.
“Well, thank you, Mrs. Tremayne, it was lovely of her to invite me.”
“Not at all, not at all…”
“Are you going to ask us in?” enquired Harry gruffly. “Or would you like us to chat with you on the doorstep all night?”
Kate smiled.
“I see. It’s going to be that sort of evening is it? Right, come along in and meet everybody.” She inclined her head closer to Harry, so she could talk in a quiet voice. “We are going to do our very best to get on with Mr. Beresford, aren’t we?” she murmured.
“Well, of course!” retorted Harry acidly.
“Good. Just checking.”
They went in, along the hallway, to the sitting room, where they found Melissa and Bob Beresford deep in conversation and Dennis nursing a drink and staring vacantly into space. He leapt up as the newcomers entered and hurried over to them.
“Harry, old man! Nice to see you!” He was obliged to shout because of the presence of some loud rock music blaring out of the stereo. “And er … Miss … er … Burns, isn’t it?” He extended a hand awkwardly and Marion shook it.
“It’s Mrs. Burns, actually, but Marion will do fine,” she chuckled. “I’m very pleased to meet you.”
“Likewise. Can I get you a drink of something? We have sherry, martini…”
“Tiger beer, please, if you have any.”
“Oh yes, indeed we have!” Dennis glanced sideways at Melissa, who thus far had not so much as acknowledged the presence of the people she herself had invited. She was evidently far too enraptured by the conversation of Bob Beresford to even notice that they had arrived. “Melissa,” he snapped. “Can’t you turn that row down a bit? I’m sure Mrs. Burns doesn’t want to be pounded by that terrible din…”
“This is at the top of the LP charts in Britain,” protested Melissa. “Hello, Uncle Harry … Mrs. Burns … besides, Daddy, if you knew the trouble I’ve had getting hold of a copy…”
“That’s not the point, dear. Not everybody shares your questionable taste in music, you know.”
Marion stepped gracefully in to pour oil on troubled waters.
“Oh, don’t turn it down on my account, Melissa. I rather like Jimi Hendrix.”
Melissa’s jaw dropped wide open, as did Bob’s, beside her.
“Golly, Mrs. Burns … how … how the heck did…”
“An old fogey like me know about Jimi Hendrix?” chuckled Marion, completing the unfinished question. “We don’t all go around listening to Mantovani, you know!”
“Oh, gosh, no, I didn’t mean … it’s just unusual, that’s all.…”
Marion reached out and patted her shoulder reassuringly.
“I could go on to astonish you, Melissa. For instance, I could tell you that the New Musical Express recently described Jimi as a major force in the field of contemporary rock, also that his use of improvisation and his dynamic stage shows have set the old school on their heads.…”
Now Melissa did reach out a hand to turn down the volume control. There was a look of awe on her face that suggested she was in the presence of some kind of divine being. Harry just stood where he was in amazement. It seemed that he was learning new things about Marion every time she opened her mouth. She was clearly delighted with the effect her words had produced.
“It’s really quite straightforward,” she chuckled. “You see, Melissa, as well as writing weekly features for the Times, I also handle the music column. You may have read my article on Pink Floyd last week.”
“You? But … the music column is written by somebody called … Suzy Q.”
Marion took a little bow.
“That’s me,” she announced. “Or rather, it’s one of several noms de plume I use. Incidentally Melissa, I get lots of review copies sent to me, more than I can possibly play. Perhaps I could send you some of them, when I get back to K.L.”
“Really? Wow, that would be fantastic!”
Dennis took hold of Harry’s arm and steered him towards the kitchen.
“Come and give me a hand with the drinks,” he suggested.
“What? Oh … yes, of course.”
They went out of the room, leaving Melissa to introduce Bob to Marion. On the kitchen table were ranged a generous selection of drinks and the refrigerator was well stocked with cans of Tiger.
“I say,” murmured Dennis, “she’s marvellous, isn’t she?”
“Who is?”
“Oh, don’t play dumb with me! Marion, of course. How on earth did you come to be mixed up with her?”
Harry poured beer into a glass.
“Simple, really. She’s writing about the tiger and she needed an expert. That’s me. Cheers!”
“Yes, but Melissa told me that much,” complained Dennis.
“Nothing much else to tell, really.”
“Well, of course there is! Like … for instance, how did she come to be staying with you? You know, there’s going to be all kinds of gossip flying around if you don’t watch out.”
“Hmm, yes.” Harry smiled drily. “Much of it from your direction I shouldn’t wonder.”
“Not a bit of it, old chap!”
“Not much! Anyway, it’s all quite above-board. There were no hotels in the area, so naturally Marion suggested that she stay at my place.…”
“She suggested?” Dennis smiled, rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You know, she’s got quite a way with her, that one. You notice that she managed to get Melissa to turn that damned record down and that was without even asking her! I tell you what, old son, that’s more than I can manage if I plead with her on my hands and knees.”
Harry nodded. “Well, Marion is a … very interesting woman,” he said.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Make of it what you will, my friend.”
“No, come on, don’t be so cryptic. Is there anything going on between you two?”
Kate bustled into the kitchen.
“Come along, you two, there’re people dying of thirst out there!” She paused, hands on hips, eyeing the two men suspiciously. “Hello, hello, what’s going on here?” she murmured suspiciously. “When you two get into a huddle, I know there’s something fishy going on. Dennis, Marion’s waiting for that drink.”
“Yes, dear.” With a sigh of resignation, Dennis picked up the glass and went back into the sitting room, whereupon Kate closed in upon Harry.
“She’s an absolute beauty, Harry! How did you come to be mixed up with her?”
Harry sighed. “I think I’ve just had this conversation with your husband,” he said tiredly. “The fact is that Marion and I are … simply … collaborating on a newspaper article. There’s nothing clandestine about it, I can assure you!”
“Well, of course not! I wasn’t for one moment suggesting that.…”
“Good. What are we having for dinner?”
“Well, it’s a traditional British meal … to celebrate going home, really. I gave the amah a night off and made everything myself. We’re going to have a prawn cocktail, then roast beef and Yorkshire pudding with all the trimmings, and finally, an apple pie and a lemon meringue. Oh dear, you do eat English food, don’t you?”
“Yes, of course. Bit of a novelty these days, mind you…”
“Oh, I do hope everything’s alright. Somehow, it all tastes different over here. Ta
ke a simple thing like a potato, for instance. It looks the same as normal, smells, peels, slices just the same. But the end result always tastes … foreign … if you know what I mean. Of course, I don’t suppose you’d remember.…” A furious hissing sound from the cooker told her that a panful of carrots was in the process of boiling over. “Uh oh! Excuse me!”
“Yes, well, you carry on, Kate. I’m sure everything will taste delightful. I’ll go back and join the others.” He made his escape bid, before Kate could trap him and begin a full interrogation. Dennis, he could easily handle, but his wife was rather more of an expert on these matters. He slipped out of the doorway and left his hostess to cope with the carrots. Unfortunately, he ran full tilt into Melissa who was just making her way to the kitchen.
“Uncle Harry!” she whispered excitedly. “She’s absolutely—”
“Yes, I know!” he interrupted curtly. “Marvellous, wonderful, superb! You don’t have to tell me.” He leaned forward, in order to whisper himself. “That’s why we’re getting married. Tomorrow morning. But don’t tell a soul about it, because she’s already got one husband in K.L. and I doubt if he’d approve!” And with that, he brushed past Melissa, leaving her standing transfixed with an expression of sheer amazement on her face. “That’ll give her something to think about,” he mused, with a satisfied smile. Moving back into the sitting room, he noticed with a tinge of annoyance that Marion had struck up a conversation with Bob Beresford, so Harry sat himself down next to Dennis, who had resumed his aimless staring into space.
“Dennis, I’ll talk to you on one condition.”
“Certainly, old boy, what’s that?”
“The words ‘beauty,’ ‘treasure,’ and ‘marvel’ are henceforth abolished from the conversation; furthermore, we shall agree to restrict ourselves to those subjects that pertain only to you and your family.”
“Fair enough,” agreed Dennis, with a dry chuckle.
The remainder of the time leading up to dinner passed without great incident. Harry and Dennis talked mostly about the Tremaynes’ imminent departure to Britain. Now that the time was so close at hand, Dennis was experiencing very mixed feelings over the matter. While he was, for the most part, looking forward to his homecoming, there was a strong part of him that would miss Kuala Hitam and the regiment of which he had for so long been a part. Marion, meanwhile, was quietly weighing up Bob Beresford. She thought him an affable enough young fellow, rather attractive in a loose-limbed, macho sort of way. She could quite understand why Melissa was interested in him, a fact Marion had deduced from her first glance of the couple in conversation. But, she noted, there was a less agreeable side to the man, a swirling undercurrent of arrogance, that he himself seemed unaware of. “A man who’s always had his own way,” she concluded. “He may have a little growing up to do.” She had also noticed that the only two people who had not acknowledged each other’s presence the whole evening were Harry and Bob. The feud between them was almost painful to behold and a person could spend hours looking into the reasons for it; but it seemed to her that if anything, the resentment stemmed more from the older man than the younger. When Bob mentioned Harry, it was with a certain guarded reverence in his voice; he used exactly the same inflection a short while later, while mentioning his father.
“So that’s it!” thought Marion, momentarily surprised by the sharpness of her own intuition. “Bob sees Harry as a patriarch, the nearest thing to his dead father. He only wants to impress Harry, the same way any son seeks to impress his old man; and Harry, whether it’s conscious or unconscious, is reacting against being placed into that mould. He doesn’t want to be admired or consulted, he just wants to be left in peace … so he snaps back, his resentment turns to dislike. Bob, in turn, having been rejected, goes along with the feud, but deep down, that’s not the way he feels at all. And the only way … the only way he can prove himself, to Harry, to his father, to the world at large, is by killing that damned tiger!” Marion took a long rewarding drink of beer.
“I should have been a psychoanalyst,” she said loud.
“Pardon?” enquired Bob, halting in mid-conversation.
Marion smiled sheepishly.
“People seem to like talking to me,” she said, by way of explanation. “But do go on with what you were saying.…”
In the kitchen, Melissa was trying to explain to her mother that Uncle Harry was intending to commit bigamy the very next day.
“I think he must have been pulling your leg, dear,” she replied calmly, as she poured batter into a tin tray.
“Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you, that’s all!”
Half an hour later, everybody was seated at the long table in the dining room, and the meal was under way. Kate and Dennis sat at the long ends of the table, with Harry and Marion seated on one side of it and Bob and Melissa on the other. Thus far, the conversation had been sporadic and centered mainly on the food, which despite tasting vaguely foreign as Kate had feared, was nonetheless rather successful.
“Of course, there are some people in Malaya, who eat this kind of stuff all the time,” observed Kate. “Really, they wouldn’t dream of eating ‘local.’”
“Damned disrespectful if you ask me,” muttered Harry. “To go to a country and not eat the local delicacies … well, it’s ignorant. Of course, it’s perfectly alright to remind oneself of your own traditions now and then … but to completely ignore the ways of the people who’s country you’re sharing, that’s just not on.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” said Dennis, “but honestly, you’d be surprised at the number of servicemen I come into contact with who will only eat English food— Did you know that they’ve opened another fish and chips shop on the coast road, just beyond the barracks?”
“Another one? Good lord…”
“Mind you, they’re not short of customers, either. Every time I drive past, I see people queueing in there.”
Harry smiled grimly.
“Well, there won’t be very many customers for them in a few weeks’ time,” he pointed out. “No doubt, they’ll have to find something else to sell.”
“I’ve had fish and chips from there,” announced Melissa unexpectedly. “I really enjoyed them.”
There was a brief, uncomfortable silence during which Melissa gazed rebelliously around the table, ignoring the admonishing glares of her parents.
“Well, I suppose once in a while isn’t so bad,” murmured Dennis defensively.
“I’ve had them lots of times,” persisted Melissa. “I can’t see anything wrong with them myself.”
Marion hastily changed the subject. “Mr. Beresford, are you having much luck in your attempts to shoot the tiger?”
“Evidently not,” muttered Harry acidly, in a voice that was just loud enough to be perceptible to everyone present.
Bob frowned, shook his head. “He’s a clever old devil and no mistake; the nearest I’ve come to him is a couple of wild pot-shots in the dark. The fact is, he’s come closer to getting me. Chased me up a tree the other night … or rather, he jumped into the tree in which my machan was fixed. He came sneaking up behind me. The first clue I had about his being there was turning around to see him staring me in the face.”
“My God!” Melissa was suitably impressed. “How did you get away?”
“I shoved my rifle butt into his mouth. I know it sounds crazy, but it was the only thing I could do. He just snatched it out of my hands, flung it away; but luckily, it gave me a few seconds to climb and I went up that tree like a bloody monkey with his arse on fire.” Bob reddened a little, sensing a rebuff from Harry, but Marion threw back her head and laughed merrily.
“That’s fantastic,” she gasped. “But honestly, is it common for things like that to happen?”
“That I couldn’t tell you Mrs. Burns. I’m a self-confessed beginner in the tiger stakes … but I’m sure Mr. Sullivan there could tell you.”
Marion smiled. Again, the unmistakable traces of respect. She turned to Harry
. “Well?” she inquired.
Harry chewed methodically on a mouthful of food for a few minutes before replying. “No, not common. But then, man-eating itself is comparatively rare. I’ve said before, this is a wily old brute. It’s going to take a fair deal of wit … and a large slice of luck … to bring him down.”
“One way or another, I intend to do it,” replied Bob without hesitation; and Marion was slightly disturbed by the tone of rigid fanaticism in his voice.
“Of course,” offered Dennis, “if you were to believe what the locals are saying, you could bag the man-eater very easily on two legs instead of four; though you’d have to be prepared to face a murder charge afterwards.” The three men chuckled and Marion stared from one to the other. Like any newspaper reporter, she resented not being in full possession of the facts.
“Somebody elucidate,” she demanded. “Otherwise, heads will roll!”
“It’s simply a bit of local legend,” explained Dennis. “The local villagers are convinced that our man-eater is really a weretiger. No doubt, you’re familiar with the myth?”
“Oh, surely. There’s always some kind of changeling haunting every kampong.…”
“Ah, but in this case it’s slightly different. There’s a hot suspect—an old bomoh who lives out beyond Kampong Machis who has always claimed that he has the power to turn himself into a tiger. Of course, it’s complete nonsense but…”
“I’m not so sure,” interrupted Bob, and his voice sounded so odd that everybody turned to look at him. “I went out to the old fellow’s hut a little while ago. He sent for me … seems he was worried about the bad press he’s been getting.” Bob went on to recount his experiences in the bomoh’s hut. There was a curious apprehensive expression on his face as he told the tale, and it was plain to the others that he was in some sense reliving the adventure. Bob had not been able to forget that night and the memory of it had troubled his dreams ever since. “I know it sounds ridiculous,” he concluded, “but right there and then, I swear I thought I saw his face change into … something … not human. Of course, he was burning all kinds of incense and dope in there, I expect he could have made me see anything.… But I don’t mind telling you, I was scared half to death at the time. I got out of there like … like…”
Tiger, Tiger Page 34
