Fear Drive My Feet

by Peter Ryan

  Confronted with this, the luluai was silent, and with downcast gaze curled his toes up in the dust with embarrassment.

  We were furious that all our gear should have been entrusted to those crazy rafts, and we had had such an uncomfortable crossing, when it all might have been accomplished with speed, safety, and comfort. However, we restrained our anger, for we dared not antagonize the people, or they would refuse to carry for us next day. With a few general remarks expressing our low opinion of liars, we moved off up the path to the village, followed by the people carrying our cargo. The motive in concealing the canoes was plain enough of course: they had grown tired of maintaining the ‘ferry service’ at Kirkland’s, and now that it had been discontinued they sought to prevent its re-establishment by hiding the canoes.

  Chivasing, with a population of about five hundred, was built on a strip of slightly rising ground about a mile from the river. Round about the village the people had planted thriving coconut-groves, which supplied them with much of their food, fuel, and building material. The houses stood in lines, radiating, like the spokes of a wheel, from a large open space worn bare and smooth by the passage of many feet. They were well built, designed for this hot region with the rooms well above ground and largely open at the sides. These neat dwellings were another example of the mastery over their environment achieved by these ‘backward’ people. I remembered the reflection of Joseph Conrad, looking for the first time upon the Bangkok of his day, that in all the habitations he saw in that city ‘there was probably not half a dozen pounds of nails’.

  As soon as we had found a house to sleep in, and seen the gear safely stacked beneath it, I had a look round the village, though it was now nearly dark. I always studied the surroundings of a new camp – a precaution that saved my life, a couple of months later, in this very village. A broad, clear creek, from which the villagers drew their water, flowed across the north end of the clearing. The farther bank was covered with dense jungle and vines.

  As there would be a moon shining in the early hours of the morning we decided not to wait for sunrise but to leave at about four-thirty. The luluai was told, and we arranged for the sentry to call him in the morning.

  ‘Do you reckon it’s worth unpacking the cooking gear for a meal?’ Les asked.

  ‘I don’t think so. What about just having a tin of bully beef and some biscuits?’

  ‘Suits me all right. We’ll have the milk of a green coconut to drink, too. I don’t fancy that water unless it’s boiled.’

  We squatted in the dark on the edge of the veranda and ate the rough meal in our fingers. Then, stripping off our wet clothes, we rolled beneath mosquito-nets and slept.

  VII

  I SEEMED HARDLY to have fallen asleep when I felt a hand on my shoulder and heard the soft, husky voice of Constable Nabura:

  ‘Master! Four o’clock! You-me go now.’

  A grey light filled the village, and I thought for a moment that we had overslept and that it was already morning. The watch, however, showed exactly four o’clock, and we saw that the overcast sky and a slight misty rain had diffused the moonlight, giving it the appearance of the dim light of early dawn.

  We tossed the mosquito-nets aside, shivering slightly as we pulled on our damp boots and clothes. The stillness was being broken by the grunts and yawns of sleepy men as the police went from house to house rousing the carriers. Here and there flickering lights appeared as almost-cold embers were blown into a blaze, and one by one the men wandered over, yawning, rubbing their eyes, and hitching their loincloths about their waists.

  By the light of torches of flaming coconut-fronds the cargo was lined along the track and a man told off for each load. Half a dozen women were coming with the party, not only to carry food for their men but to help them with the carrying. Accompanied by Kari and the luluai Les went along the line, checking each load and making sure that it was securely fastened. Then, at the command ‘All right, walkabout!’ the long line of natives picked up their loads and headed north along the narrow track through the kunai, towards the mountains.

  We passed the last house of Chivasing and made our way between the tall rows of coconuts. Two towering palms at the end of the row looked like gateposts against the grey-silver sky. They were, in another sense, like a gate, for each time I crossed the Markham on my way to the mountains I felt I had passed through a door into another life. The door closed behind me, and the life on the far side of it was forgotten. The whole universe seemed to be contracted to a few score native villages and their black inhabitants.

  We hoped to reach Sintagora village, in the Middle Erap, that night. There we would be well into the hills, off the flat country, among a dense population where carriers would be readily available, and whose foods were plentiful and easily purchased. This first day’s journey was the most hazardous, for in a few hours’ time we would cross the important foot-track which ran the whole length of the Markham Valley, and which the Japanese were now using for increasingly frequent trips from Madang to Lae. We would have to pass right through a place where they usually camped – namely, the old Wawin rest-house, in peacetime a sort of half-way house for the patrol officer making his way from Lae to the Upper Markham. The surrounding country was so flat and devoid of cover that an enemy reconnaissance plane, or a sentry on one of the low foothills, could scarcely fail to see us. Nabura and a couple of the local men hurried ahead to the Wawin rest-house – if there were any signs of the enemy they would return and warn us, otherwise they would wait at the junction till we arrived.

  An hour or so out from Chivasing, in a hamlet comprising about a dozen houses, we paused for a few moments to allow the stragglers to catch up. It would soon be daylight. Already the darkness seemed to be less intense, and the drizzle of rain had ceased.

  We had made a further mile or two on our northward journey when the sun rose, an indistinct yellow blot in the grey sky, and the oppressive, steamy heat of the Markham day began in earnest. At a quarter to seven Constable Nabura suddenly materialized out of the bushes beside me.

  ‘Master, road belong Markham close to now!’

  ‘Japan ’e stop? You lookim leg belong ’en?’ I asked.

  There were quite a number of enemy footprints, he said, made by the well-known rubber shoe with the heavy tread on the sole. None of the prints seemed to be very recent.

  The two local men who had gone ahead with Nabura were immediately posted as sentries on the road, one on either side of the junction.

  By the time Nabura had finished his report Les had moved up, and I repeated swiftly to him what the native had told me.

  ‘That’s good. But I don’t think we ought to stop here, do you?’

  ‘No. We ought to push on and cross the road, and keep going for at least an hour before we have a spell.’

  We called all the police together and told them they were to keep the line tight and compact and allow no straggling. We wanted to cross the danger spot as quickly and inconspicuously as possible.

  In close order, the line moved forward. From this point onwards there was no track to Sintagora, and we either had to break our way across country through the kunai, or follow the bed of the Wawin River. Deciding to go by the river, we plunged in and began plodding upstream against the current. In the lower reaches
we often sank to our waists in the soft ooze, and had to be extricated by the boys. Higher up, where the bed was more solid, fine gravel worked its way into our boots and socks, chafing every inch of skin from our feet, which were softened – almost as if they had been parboiled – by long immersion. In spite of these disadvantages it was an excellent route for us under the circumstances, for we were walking in the bed of the river some ten feet below the level of the plain, and were thus hidden from observers on the ground, while the trees which lined the banks and overhung the water gave perfect concealment from patrolling aircraft. Moreover, we left no tracks behind.

  Shortly after midday Les came splashing up to me. ‘Do you notice how the banks are increasing in height?’

  ‘Yes – it’s almost a gorge we’re getting into.’

  ‘You might say we’re into the foothills, in fact. There are small tributary streams coming in from the sides now.’

  With every mile we advanced, the stream became more and more a mountain river, and the valley walls grew higher and steeper, while the water became cooler on our legs.

  About four o’clock the luluai and a couple of the older men held a brief conference, and it was decided to leave the Wawin and follow one of the small tributaries which joined it from the east. This stream rose up steeply, its bed rough and boulder-strewn. Half an hour’s climbing brought us out on an open kunai spur, which we ascended to the top of the ridge, and Sintagora came into view, a further half-hour’s walk round the ridge.

  We had seen no Erap natives: unless they had spotted us earlier in the day our coming would be a complete surprise to them. When we entered the village at sunset surprise was hardly the word to express the looks on the faces of the people as they saw white men and a long line of carriers approaching from that unexpected direction.

  When they had recovered their composure, however, they proved to be friendly, and showed us the way to the house-kiap and then helped the exhausted Chivasings with their burdens.

  Sintagora was a lovely place. It was, we estimated, a couple of thousand feet above sea-level, and commanded a splendid view of the Markham Valley. We could just see Salamaua across the blue waters of the Huon Gulf.

  Scarcely had we asked for food when the open grassy space in front of the house-kiap was filled with women carrying bilums of excellent sweet potatoes, bananas, and papaws. Several natives ran up with English potatoes from the gardens.

  It was too late for the Chivasings to return home – they were too tired to make the journey, anyhow – so we bought a lot of food for them and asked the tultul of Sintagora to see that they all found a place to sleep. We were tired too, after thirteen hours on the track, and after a quick meal we turned in, rolling ourselves in three blankets, so cool was the night, and not bothering about mosquito-nets, for there was no sign of the pests.

  Early next morning the Chivasing people assembled in front of the house-kiap and were paid for their day’s work. Each man received a shilling and a razor-blade, and the women who had accompanied the line were each given a strip of calico for a loincloth. These were substantial presents in those days of scarcity, and the natives were delighted. The luluai, too, came in for a little extra present, and with a smart salute he led his people quickly away, to get as far as possible along the track before the sun became hot.

  We decided not to move farther that day, but to remain among the people, making friends with them and learning all we could of enemy movements and propaganda. As far as we could discover there had been no visits by the Japanese to the area, and the people seemed to know very little about them. Of course, they knew that Lae and Salamaua were in enemy hands, but that was the extent of their knowledge. We were uneasy when they told us that a native mission teacher who was living in the vicinity had run away into the bush and would not come to see us.

  A lot more food was brought in during the morning, and we paid for it in salt, which the people craved for. It was well that we had brought three big drums of it. The slightest amount spilt on the ground was at once carefully scraped onto a leaf by some thrifty mother and carried away as though it were a rare gem.

  Les looked at the pile of native food with satisfaction.

  ‘It’s good to see the food situation’s O.K. I think we only brought one bag of rice for our boys, didn’t we?’ he asked, drawing reflectively on his after-breakfast cigarette.

  ‘That’s right – only one,’ I replied. ‘It’ll do for a while if we have to hole up and remain hidden. We can all feed from it without having to approach the villages for food.’

  ‘Not only that, of course – we may easily be forced into an uninhabited area where we can’t buy food anyhow.’

  I spent the morning giving medical treatment to the natives of Sintagora and surrounding villages. There were many bad cases of yaws. I treated the huge, sickening ulcers by injecting an arsenical preparation. In a few days this would dry up the open, running sores as if by magic. The natives, no doubt, imagined that it was magic, and elderly men who hadn’t a sign of a sore presented themselves for a ‘shoot’ – not with the idea of having any disease cured, but to keep themselves strong and virile. I suppose I gave a hundred injections that day, besides doing dozens of dressings for tropical ulcers and minor wounds.

  Towards evening Les set up the radio to test it for the first time. We were quite tense with excitement as he called Port Moresby and then switched over to see if we had been heard. The usefulness of the patrol depended entirely on effective radio communications. If they failed we had taken the risk of coming to live in the mountains for nothing.

  The voice of the operator in Moresby was clear and loud: ‘You’re coming through well, old chap. Go ahead and pass your message.’

  Les shot a quick, smiling glance of triumph at me, and then bent intently over his Morse key. Although we could receive the powerful Port Moresby station clearly, the transmitting power of our little set was so small that we had to send our messages in Morse. Les tapped out a brief message, merely telling Moresby where we were, and that all was quiet.

  ‘All O.K., AVL, all O.K. See you again,’ replied the Moresby operator – thereby breaking all formal rules of radio procedure.

  The air was fresh and very cool when, with a sigh of contentment, we rolled into bed. We were into the mountains; the natives seemed friendly; food was abundant; our communications were in good order. What more could one ask? With a shout to Corporal Kari to make sure a sentry was posted, we pulled the blankets about us and were asleep.

  The next stage of our journey was to Fi, a village eight or ten miles north. We started at dawn, with Sintagora people and men from all the surrounding settlements bearing the cargo. The Erap, swinging round to the west, lay across our path, as formidable a stream in the mountains as it was on the flat country. Assisted by the local men, who knew almost every stone in its bed, we made the crossing without accident, clutching a stout vine that was stretched from bank to bank. There could have been no more dangerous enterprise than trying to cross this stream without the assistance of the people who lived on its banks.

  We were established in the house-kiap at Fi by two o’clock, before the afternoon rain began. Our meal was prepared by Tauhu, the substitute cook, for we had sent Dinkila on a visit to his home village of Bivoro, to pick up any gossip about the Japane
se. The alacrity with which he seized the opportunity to call at his home town suggested to the other boys that he had a girlfriend there, and they made countless ribald jests about it. Dinkila only gave a rather smug smile, which seemed to say: You’re jealous – you wish you were coming with me.

  About four o’clock we set up the radio to hear the weekly talk in pidgin English. This was designed as a propaganda service to natives, who could not, of course, speak English. This day the talk was given by John Murphy, a leading expert in pidgin and the author of the first pidgin dictionary with any claim to completeness.

  Murphy’s talk was listened to intently by our police and other boys, but the natives of Fi gave it only a perfunctory hearing, and sat there without the slightest glimmer of enthusiasm, or even understanding. No doubt these broadcasts had a certain value in some areas, but as far as we were concerned they were a failure.

  When the talk was over I wondered whether the natives were having a sly joke at our expense when they asked us to see their tame cockatoos. The birds seemed to have a large vocabulary of their own, but when I tried some pidgin on them I caused much amusement. ‘Cocky savvy talk-place, master! No savvy talk pidgin!’ the kanakas said, laughing heartily.

  Another pet in this village was a tame hornbill. He sat calmly in the branches of a breadfruit-tree, catching with unfailing accuracy in his enormous beak the bits of banana we threw up to him. He seemed to understand the local tongue, and would fly down to be petted whenever they called him.

  Fi showed no sign of enemy influence, and in the morning we walked eastward to Sugu, across the steep valley of the Nambuk River. The Sugu people showed us to the rest-house, and we stopped, astonished, when we saw it.

  ‘Hey, look at that!’ exclaimed Les.