In the Mouth of the Tiger

by Lynette Silver

  Denis and I set off for KL in cool of the morning, topping up with petrol at Kuantan before turning onto the Temerloh road. As soon as we were properly on our way I told Denis about Malcolm’s accusations at the Kuantan Club.

  I told him everything, as clearly and succinctly as I was able. I told him how the police had searched but failed to find any record of his birth certificate, or his attendance at Taunton, or his degree at Aberdeen. I told him how they had been puzzled that he had a valid passport in the name Denis Elesmere-Elliott, and how the authorities in London had rebuffed their efforts to find out how he had obtained it. I told him about the police suspicion that he was a member of the Comintern, and that they knew the head of the Malayan Communist Party had visited him at Ampang Road the night before the attack on Batu Arang.

  Denis heard me out without a word, his face calm and expressionless, his eyes firmly on the road. When I finished there was a long, long silence, and I thought that perhaps he was not going to say anything at all. But finally he reached across and took my hand.

  ‘Thank you for telling me, Nona,’ he said. ‘I know you must be puzzled, but if you don’t mind I won’t comment on what Malcolm has said. Except to tell you that I really am who I say I am, and that I am not a Communist.’

  I sighed with relief. ‘That is good enough for me,’ I said. ‘In fact, it’s rather better than good enough, because I would still have loved you even if you had been a Communist. But what are we going to do about Malcolm? You can’t have him going around maligning you as he is.’

  ‘We’re going to ignore Malcolm completely,’ Denis said. ‘He can be a silly ass at times, but he’s a decent sort and I think we should forgive his silliness.’ He turned to me and smiled. ‘Now, it’s a beautiful day and we’ve got a delightful run ahead of us. Let’s forget poor old Malcolm Bryant and concentrate on enjoying ourselves.’

  I remember that drive so well. We were now a couple in every sense of the word, relaxed in each other’s company, smiling at each other about little secret things, finishing each other’s sentences. Near Mentakab we began singing together, the very songs I’d played on my gramophone when I’d been sick. We sang my favourite, ‘I Wish I had a Talking Picture of You’, over and over, till tears of happiness came into my eyes and we had to stop.

  We stopped in Bentong and shopped for a picnic lunch, strolling arm in arm through the Chinese stalls but finally settling on ham, bread and lemonade from the local Cold Storage. We ate sitting in the car with the hood up for shade, and a young English couple came and asked us if they could photograph the Alvis. It was a sought-after and rather elegant model, nicknamed a ‘duck-tailed’ Alvis because the boot was flared upwards like the tail of a duck. Of course we obliged, and then they insisted on photographing us standing by the car.

  Denis raised the bonnet for the man, and while they peered in at the engine, the girl and I sat in the car and chatted. Like us, they were returning to KL from a visit to the East Coast. Spontaneously, she dug out a small notebook and pencil from her bag and wrote out their names and address and telephone number. ‘Please get in touch,’ she said. ‘We’ve only just come out from England and we hardly know a soul. It would be so nice if we could be friends. There are not that many young couples in KL.’

  Denis leaned in through the car window and took the pad. ‘I’ll give you our address too,’ he said. He scribbled for a moment and handed it back. He had given the Ampang Road address, and then ‘Denis and Nona Elesmere-Elliott’.

  As they drove away the man raised his hat and the girl blew me a kiss. I hugged Denis, so happy I felt I would burst.

  I fell asleep on the last leg but woke up just before KL. We were driving through a grove of tall kapok trees, with the filmy kapok falling like fine rain. The kampong Malays believe that kapok trees hold the souls of stillborn babies, and I shivered with a sudden awful dread. The trouble with being in love is that you feel everything so much, and I grieved for all the grieving mothers and their innocent babies who had never tasted life. Denis felt me trying not to sob beside him, and swung off the road. ‘Why the tears?’ he asked, looking at me with concern in his eyes.

  I just shook my head, unable to speak, but as usual he seemed to understand perfectly, and took me in his arms. I told him the legend of the kapok trees, and he wiped my eyes with his handkerchief. I told him lots more, about how happy I was and how sad it was that not everybody could share such happiness. By the time I finished the late afternoon sun had dipped to the horizon, and its rays had turned the white mist of kapok into a soft golden haze. Denis tilted up my head for me to see. ‘Look, darling, it’s not sad any more. The powers that be have turned it into Paradise.’

  There was a lot of work on at the salon, and to make up for missing work on the Monday I volunteered to start early and work late for the rest of the week. It meant missing my riding lessons, but that didn’t bother me because Denis and I saw each other every evening, even if it was for no more than the few minutes it took him to drive me home. His excuse for picking me up was that he didn’t like me going home alone in the early dusk of the tropics, and he would wait for me outside the Tamarind Building each evening until I came out.

  On the Friday evening the Alvis was not there, and I stood perplexed until I saw Denis’s syce waiting with the company car, a rather staid-looking Ford saloon. ‘Very sorry, Mem, but Tuan had to go to Ipoh on business,’ the syce said, saluting politely. ‘I am to take you to Parry Drive.’

  ‘That would be very nice indeed,’ I said climbing in. I was a little disappointed because we had planned to discuss our weekend, but not worried by the change of plans. The first hint I had that something untoward was happening was when I saw a police car parked outside our flat, with a Malay policeman standing beside it with a rifle on his shoulder. I hurried up the staircase to be met by Mother and Tanya, both looking concerned. ‘You have a visitor,’ Mother said quickly. ‘Mr Bryant, the policeman.’

  We went into our lounge and Malcolm rose from his armchair to greet me, a serious look on his face. He was in the crisp brown uniform of the FMS Police, which told me that he was here on business. My first thought was that something might have happened to Denis, and I felt my heart beating painfully.

  ‘Is it Denis?’ I asked, a hand at my throat.

  Malcolm looked puzzled, then shook his head testily. ‘As far as I know Denis is perfectly fine,’ he said. ‘Nona, I’m afraid I’m here on official business. By rights I should ask you to come over to the police station so that we can take a formal statement, but I’m hoping that won’t be necessary.’

  ‘What on earth have I done – or am I supposed to have done?’ I asked lightly. I had a clear conscience, and now that I knew Denis was all right I was puzzled rather than concerned at Malcolm’s visit.

  Malcolm looked at Mother significantly. ‘I wonder if Nona and I might be left alone?’ he asked.

  As soon as we were alone Malcolm opened his briefcase and extracted a thin sheaf of papers. ‘Sit down, Nona,’ he said, indicating the chair next to his. ‘This could take a little while.’

  I was becoming a little annoyed at his officious manner, but sat down as he had asked. There was an old copy of the Malay Mail beside the chair, and I picked it up and smoothed it on my lap to show my nonchalance.

  ‘So I take it you’re familiar with the story?’ Malcolm asked, pointing to the front page. In fact I hadn’t read a paper for days and looked up at him inquiringly. He didn’t react, so I lowered my eyes and read the headline: ‘Man Dies in Estate Riot’.

  ‘What’s this got to do with me?’ I asked incredulously.

  ‘Why don’t you read the story?’ Malcolm responded. The article concerned a skirmish between Tamil workers and Sikh soldiers on a rubber estate just outside Tanjong Malik. A coolie had been shot and killed and several arrests had been made. It was an incident all too familiar in Malaya in the late 1930s, and many people blamed it on the Indian leader and aesthete, Mahatma Gandhi.

  �
�I still don’t see what it’s got to do with me,’ I said. ‘I’ve never been anywhere near this plantation. Certainly I wasn’t there last Tuesday. I was at work in Mother’s salon.’

  Malcolm selected a photograph from his sheaf of papers and passed it across to me. It depicted an Indian, obviously dead. For a second the man looked completely unfamiliar, but then recognition made me catch my breath.

  It was Rajeev Srinivasan, the Tamil I had met in Dr Mahmood’s office, and whom I had tried to help by offering to pay his bail. I looked at the photograph again. Rajeev’s fierce, sensitive face was smooth in death. They hadn’t even bothered to close his eyes, and they seemed to stare at me, puzzled and uncomprehending.

  The photograph fluttered to the floor, and I looked up at Malcolm, too shocked to speak.

  ‘How well do you know this man?’ he asked.

  ‘I met him once,’ I said, ‘in a lawyer’s office in Penang, a couple of years ago. Dr Mahmood was trying to get bail for him, and I offered to help. They only needed ten dollars.’

  Malcolm looked at me for a long moment, then nodded his head slowly. ‘That gels pretty well exactly with what we know,’ he said. ‘There was a letter to him amongst his papers from Lal Mahmood, telling him you had made the offer. And he had written a letter of thanks to you. But not sent it. It was still in its envelope, unposted.’

  ‘How did he die?’ I asked.

  ‘Don’t waste any sympathy on him, Nona,’ Malcolm said. ‘He was a bad hat. A trouble-maker who went from estate to estate stirring up the coolies, getting them all het up about conditions and wages and so on. A real revolutionary.’

  ‘Could you tell me exactly what happened?’ I asked. I felt I owed it to Rajeev to know how he had died.

  ‘Nenasi Estate has had a fairly turbulent time lately. Its manager is a Dutch fellow who has been rather tough on his people. You know the type – prefers to sort things out with his fists rather than waste time talking them through. Rajeev turned up there a month or so ago, and stirred the coolies up with talk about passive resistance and so on. The stuff Gandhi is always going on about. They all went on strike last weekend – simply refused to come out for the morning muster. Jan Boetcher – that’s the manager’s name – stormed down there in a towering rage and roughed up a few of the Tamil leaders. Things went from bad to worse and to cut a long story short we had to send in a platoon of Sikhs to clear the coolie lines. Srinivasan got the Tamils to make a stand. Rocks were being chucked and one of the Sikhs was hit. That’s when they shot the ringleader. Standard practice. Get the leader and you collapsed the whole thing in seconds flat. Saves a lot of broken heads.’

  I sat in stunned silence, picturing the whole awful business in my mind. The shouting Tamils trying to defend their homes, armed with sticks and stones, and perhaps the odd parang, against well-armed soldiers. A scuffle, with a soldier brought down. The young officer in charge can’t afford to let things get out of hand and gives the order to shoot. ‘Standard practice’ means that Rajeev must be picked out and cold-bloodedly killed. It is better that one man die for the people . . . and so on.

  I felt quite sick.

  ‘But why kill him?’ I asked. ‘What had he done to deserve to be killed? It was murder!’

  Malcolm hushed me by placing a finger on my lips. ‘He was a bad hat, Nona. A thoroughly bad hat, always looking for trouble. He’d been arrested before – but of course you know that.’

  I struck Malcolm’s hand away from my lips and stood up. ‘He was killed in cold blood. Had he hurt anyone? Was there any need to kill him, except to remove someone who was trying to stick up for the underdog?’

  Malcolm was suddenly angry. ‘Sit down, Nona. You don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve been an FMS policeman for over ten years now, and I think I know a bit about how to maintain the peace here. Do you know how badly we whites are outnumbered in Malaya? A hundred to one would be a fair guess. We’re like a flea riding on the back of an elephant. We try to control the beast with as much fairness as we can, but sometimes we’ve got pretty few options. Sometimes we’ve got to be ruthless, or fellows like Srinavasan would have us squashed flat in a second.’

  I shook my head. ‘You’re not talking about policing a people, Malcolm. You’re talking about repressing a people. And for whose gain? To use your analogy, is the flea guiding the elephant for the elephant’s benefit, or for the flea’s benefit? If it’s for the good of the flea, I only hope the elephant lies down one day and has a decent roll in the dust!’

  I could tell that Malcolm was furious by the way the tip of his nose turned white. He didn’t answer for some time, sorting out his thoughts, getting his anger under better control. ‘Nona,’ he said finally, getting to his feet, ‘you are talking just like a Communist, do you know that? Just how much under Denis’s influence are you? No – don’t answer that question. I don’t want us to part as enemies, but I do want you to think about some of the things I told you down in Kuantan.’

  I had a sudden suspicion. ‘Did you arrange to have Denis lured out to Ipoh, so that you could talk to me without him being present? You must have known he’s been picking me up every day. I bet you didn’t want him around when you tackled me tonight.’

  Malcolm’s sudden stiffness told me that I was right, and I turned away in disgust.

  ‘Look,’ he said suddenly, grabbing my shoulders and turning me back to face him. ‘I had to interview you, Nona. You must know how tense things are in Malaya at the moment, and you’ve been linked to a man who was killed trying to stir up an insurrection. If Special Branch put you in their bad books, your right of residence in Malaya would be in jeopardy. So I decided to handle things myself. I’ve gone out on a limb for you, Nona, and you’ve no right to treat me like a common cur.’

  I was in no mood for rational argument and wrenched myself free from him. ‘I’m awfully touched by your concern, Malcolm,’ I said sarcastically. ‘But now you’ve satisfied yourself that I’m no firebrand revolutionary, why don’t you push yourself off home?’

  He seemed about to say more but thought better of it. ‘Goodnight, Miss Roberts,’ he said formally.

  I heard his footsteps retreating down our tiled hallway, then his voice in conversation with Mother at the front door. I suddenly remembered Rajeev’s letter to me and hurried to catch up with him.

  ‘You said you had a letter to me,’ I said a little breathlessly. ‘I want that letter, Malcolm.’

  Malcolm looked at me with surprise. I thought at first that he was going to refuse my request, but he opened his briefcase and took out a couple of sheets of paper. ‘This is a copy of the letter,’ he said quietly, handing it to me. ‘You will get the original just as soon as the coroner has completed his inquiries.’

  After he had left, Mother stood in front of me, hands on her hips. ‘What have you been up to, Nona? I never thought the day would come when a policeman would invade my house demanding to talk to my daughter.’

  I knew Mother would throw a fit if I told her that I’d been linked with a revolutionary who had just been gunned down (‘A Communist! My daughter hobnobbing with a Communist!’) so I invented a bureaucratic problem about my residency permit. I was pretty sure that Malcolm would not have told her the real purpose of his visit.

  ‘Your permit is not in order so they are going to throw you out?’ she wailed. ‘I knew it would happen one day! What about me? What about Tanya? Are we going to be thrown out of Malaya too?’

  ‘Nobody said anything about anyone being thrown out, Mother,’ I said firmly. ‘I just forgot to sign my name on the form when I re-registered last year. I’ll go down and do it tomorrow.’

  ‘For why didn’t you do it just now?’ Mother demanded. ‘When Mr Bryant was here?’

  Oh what a web we weave, when once we set out to deceive . . .

  ‘And what was all the talk about a letter, and about a colonel’s inquiry?’ she continued. ‘Tell your mother, Nona. Don’t lie to me.’

  ‘Colonel’s in
quiry’ threw me for a moment until I realised that she had misheard the reference to a coronial inquiry. ‘The Colonel at the Kuantan Club is holding an inquiry into why woman have to pay full subscriptions to join the club,’ I lied blithely. ‘And the letter is from Denis.’ I was feeling quite light-headed at this stage, and was just about to say something even more absurd to garnish my story when common sense intervened. ‘Mother,’ I said firmly. ‘I’ve been working hard and I have a dreadful headache, so I’m going to go to bed.’

  I read Rajeev’s letter sitting on my bed. It was beautifully written and covered both pages.

  My dear young lady,

  I knew when we talked in Lal Mahmood’s rooms that you were an understanding and compassionate person. Your offer to help me was most kind and I greatly appreciated your generous gesture. It was not, however, necessary that you provide any money as I am very well supported by my friends in the Hindu community. Friends who approve my work.

  My work, to which I have dedicated my life, is to help fellow Hindus who have become oppressed by those in charge here in Malaya.

  I am a Tamil of the Brahmin caste, and my family is one of the Wellala families who traditionally lead our community. In other times I would have gone up to University and become a doctor or a lawyer, and been able to make a difference to the world. But my father died of fever when I was a baby, and my education at the Free School in Penang ceased when I was twelve.

  But I have kept up my studies in my own way, reading everything I can and talking to those about me who have wisdom. You see me as perhaps a feckless youth, running around Malaya pursued by arrest warrants and sleeping under the stars. But I have dreams, dear lady, and many people share my dreams. Let me tell you a little of these dreams.

  The English will not always rule Malaya. They have done both good and bad, and judgment cannot be made about them in our generation because we are too close to the pain as well as the glory of their achievements.