In the Mouth of the Tiger

by Lynette Silver

  Denis didn’t answer me immediately. He got up and walked over to the window, staring out at the blackness, his hands clasped behind his back. He seemed to stand there for ages.

  ‘We mustn’t talk about Chin Peng,’ he said finally. ‘We certainly mustn’t say anything about him having been a British agent.’ He swung around to face me. ‘I want your word on that, darling. You became privy to a secret that perhaps you should never have known.’

  ‘But everything’s changed,’ I said angrily. ‘All bets are off now that Chin Peng’s turned traitor, surely?’

  ‘It doesn’t quite work like that,’ Denis said. ‘If you give that secret away, you’ll put at risk a lot of people who were also part of the plot. People you’ve never heard of, but whom we are still obliged to protect. I do want you to give me your word, Norma.’

  I gave an exasperated sigh. ‘Of course I give you my word. But I hope someone shoots him soon. I didn’t think I was a vengeful person, but the thought that a two-faced murderer like Chin Peng might escape the noose makes my blood boil.’

  There was to be a joint funeral for the Aubreys and the Featherstones at the small Anglican church at Bentong, and we decided to drive down for the service and stay the night in KL on the way home. The service was scheduled for two in the afternoon and so we set off immediately after breakfast, just as the mist was lifting off the jungle. It was a Friday, and we had given the children the day off from school so they stood on the lawn and waved us goodbye, with Ah Khow and the amah smiling reassuringly in the background.

  At Ringlet a convoy was being assembled, with cars and trucks lining up on the side of the road as they waited for the police escort to join them. ‘Shouldn’t we wait and join the convoy?’ I asked. ‘It might be safer than going down the hill alone.’ Most ambushes in the area took place on the narrow, twisting mountain roads, where the overhanging jungle provided ideal cover for the bandits.

  Denis looked at his watch, then frowned and shook his head. ‘If there is going to be an ambush, it’ll be on the convoy. A single car will take them by surprise.’ And we were off, spinning down the mountain between high green walls of vegetation.

  I can’t say I was happy. In fact I was absolutely terrified. I found myself literally sitting on the edge of my seat, both hands gripping the dashboard in front of me as if my life depended on it. Five minutes passed, then ten. As the minutes passed I began to relax. After about twenty minutes I finally sat back and began to breathe regularly again. One can’t hold one’s breath forever, however frightening the circumstances.

  When I had summoned up enough courage to do so, I shook out the newspaper and pretend to read. ‘Not a great deal happening in the world,’ I said after a moment or two, stifling an affected yawn.

  And then it happened, as I had feared it would. We swept around a corner to come upon a double line of men moving up the road, their guns aimed straight at us. I clutched at Denis, frozen with fear in that last moment of life, my mind an utter blank. But the bullets didn’t come, the car purred steadily through the double rank of small green-clad men, and then we had passed them and were around the next corner.

  My mind began to work again. ‘Bandits!’ I gasped. ‘We could have been killed!’ And then: ‘Why didn’t they shoot us?’

  Denis didn’t answer, and in the silence two memories came back to me, like fragments of a jigsaw falling into place. As we had passed the group Denis had lifted his hand, almost as if in greeting. And one of the bandits had lifted a hand in reply. The memories found an echo. A dream I’d had, long ago, in which exactly that had happened.

  ‘We caught them by surprise,’ Denis said finally. ‘They were no doubt expecting to hear a whopping great convoy grinding down the hill.’

  We arrived at Bentong in time for an early lunch at the Bentong Club. Tim and Jan had been a very popular couple in Dunlops, and the club was full of planters and their wives down for the funeral. They were a noisy bunch, dealing with shock and grief in their own way with lots of Tiger beer, forced laughter and stories. Denis knew most of them but he didn’t join them, preferring that we sat out on the verandah by ourselves.

  We had arranged to have lunch with the Reverend Jock McDowell who was to conduct the service, and he joined us mopping his vast, bald pate. ‘Another scorcher!’ he grumbled. ‘Pahang is far too hot for the white man. Always said so. Always will. But nobody takes the blindest bit of notice.’ Exactly how one could ‘take notice’ and change the situation beat me but I grinned sympathetically.

  Jock McDowell wanted to say something about Tanya and Eugene at the service and was counting on us for information. I told him a lot about Tanya, but I knew so little about Eugene that I couldn’t really help. ‘I think he was originally Armenian,’ I said. ‘But I think he’d prefer it if you didn’t mention that. He liked to think of himself as British. He was very British towards the end. He’d even got the accent down pat.’

  ‘Lot of them in the East,’ Jock said with a tinge of contempt. ‘More British than we are. Fall apart in a crisis, of course. Once a Wog, always a Wog.’

  ‘Eugene was an officer in SOE during the war,’ I said stiffly. ‘He was behind German lines half the time, blowing up enemy soldiers.’ I was suddenly furious, my hands trembling in my lap. ‘What exactly were you doing in the war, Jock? Writing sermons?’

  Jock pulled himself upright in his chair. ‘Steady on, Mrs Elesmere-Elliott.’

  ‘Jock was in Changi,’ Denis said evenly. ‘We all did what we could, so let’s not throw brickbats at each other.’ He turned to Jock. ‘Eugene was a perfect gentleman, Jock, and I hope you say as much when the time comes. He was an honest businessman, a loving husband and a doting father. He died in the most damnable way. I rather think your God has something to answer for.’

  The exchange had cleared the air a bit, and over coffee Jock even offered a rather clumsy apology. ‘We all have our inbuilt prejudices,’ he said gruffly. ‘Sorry I implied that your friend was . . . well, less than sound. I didn’t mean it that way. I have no tact or sense of timing, which is probably why I’m still an up-country parson after forty years in the ministry.’

  The service was a dreadful, dreadful experience. The coffins had been lined up in front of the altar and covered in flowers. There were so many flowers that they almost disguised the reality of what had happened. But the awful truth poked through: three big coffins for Eugene and Tanya and Jan, three tiny coffins for their children. A massacre had taken place. A massacre of innocents.

  Jock’s eulogy was workmanlike. He talked of Jan’s impish humour, and of the loveliness of the twins. He told us that Tim was still in a coma in the Alexandra Hospital in Singapore, but that his spirit was here with us, grieving for his family, and very close to God. He told us of Eugene’s fine war record, and about his business success before the war. And how he had wooed and won Tanya, the loveliest girl in pre-war KL. ‘It is not for us to question the actions of the Lord,’ he said, ‘for they are beyond the understanding of men. But if we rail against the Almighty, even berate Him for what He has wrought, does He not see into our hearts and see our grief, and forgive us for our impiety?’

  Then we went outside into the harsh sunshine and saw the coffins lowered one by one into the red soil of Malaya. There were a lot of people in the dusty churchyard, planters and their families, the three European assistant managers from the Bentong Estate, neatly-dressed Indian clerks, Malay officials in their sarongs, and even a scattering of Chinese businessmen from the town.

  Chinese, I thought bitterly. Probably trying to impress the police with their sense of loyalty. And then no doubt they will go home and count the days until Malaya is a Communist Chinese colony.

  Denis and I stood in the scant shade of a grove of nipah palms, Denis surrounded by planters. He was an ‘old Malaya hand’, and the youngsters wanted to be reassured that all was still well. I watched him for a moment or two as he listened to them, his hands linked comfortably behind his back, his head inclin
ed thoughtfully, occasionally saying something in his quiet, judicious way. Then my eyes strayed to the six red mounds of earth. The remains of so many dreams and so much promise. I felt the tears rising and fought to keep them down, biting down hard on my bottom lip. And then Catherine Koh touched me on the arm.

  I knew it was Catherine immediately, despite the dark glasses and the broad-brimmed sunhat. My first reaction had been to clutch at her for comfort, but then the knowledge of who she had become drove out all feelings except dark, bitter rage.

  ‘I had to come, to say goodbye to my friends,’ she said as if we were still friends. ‘And to see you, because I knew you would be here.’

  ‘How could you kill them?’ I said. ‘How could you, Catherine? What had any of them done to you?’

  ‘It wasn’t the Tigers,’ she said quickly. ‘I promise you it wasn’t the Tigers. It was a squad from central Pahang. My people don’t attack civilians.’

  ‘Don’t lie to me, Catherine,’ I said angrily. ‘You are a common murderer. All of you are murderers, and I hope you all swing for your crimes.’ I took a huge breath. ‘Why did you really come here? To gloat? Well, if you think I’m not going to give you away you are mistaken.’ I looked around for a policeman and saw three of them not ten yards away, their submachine guns under their arms.

  Catherine looked genuinely astounded at my outburst, and then she must have realised how close I was to giving her away because a spark of fear leapt in her eyes. ‘Listen to me, Norma,’ she said desperately. ‘I don’t blame you for being upset, but remember why we are doing all this.’ She also took a deep breath. ‘There is another reason why I’m here. I need to speak to Denis. It’s desperately important, because we’re being betrayed.’

  ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about,’ I snapped. I was about to shout out, call the policeman over, but something wouldn’t let me. An echo of misplaced loyalty? Puzzlement at what she was saying? I have no idea why, but I simply couldn’t call out to those policemen. ‘Go away, Catherine,’ I said. ‘Go away now, before I change my mind and call out for the police.’

  But Catherine stood her ground. She must have known how close I was to denouncing her because I saw that she was trembling with fear. As the commander of the feared Tiger Regiment, she would have known perfectly well that she would be executed if she were caught.

  ‘Please tell Denis that Lau Yew was betrayed by someone in the Politburo,’ she said, the words tumbling out as she watched the policemen over my shoulder. ‘Tell him we think it was Chin Peng. The MCP made a terrible mistake running off into the jungle, and Lau Yew was trying to correct that mistake. He was going to lead us back into the towns, but he was betrayed and killed.’ She suddenly stepped up to me so that her face was inches away. ‘The only people who knew where Lau Yew was that night were the members of the Politburo. And Chin Peng is the only member of the Politburo who wants us to stay in the jungle. Don’t you see, Norma? Chin Peng is doing what Loi Tak did: betraying those who oppose him to our enemies.’

  It was all double-Dutch to me. And what had all this to do with Denis? I stared back at Catherine, suddenly at an utter loss, and then turned on my heel and walked away. When I glanced back she was gone.

  I cannot for the life of me remember leaving that little churchyard. I must have been in shock because my next memory is of bowling along the KL road. It was unbearably hot and humid, clearly about to rain. All the car windows were open and I remember the terrific racket from the insects along the sides of the road, and that when I took off my cotton jacket its collar was wet with perspiration.

  ‘I ran into Catherine Koh,’ I said. ‘She was at the funeral. She wanted me to pass on a message to you.’

  ‘Whatever do you mean?’ Denis asked. ‘Catherine couldn’t have been there.’ It was rare to see Denis discomfited, but he was certainly discomfited now. I glanced at his profile and saw his lips dragged down in a grimace of surprise.

  ‘Oh, she was there all right,’ I said.

  Denis recovered his sangfroid almost immediately, and when he spoke next he almost drawled. ‘What the dickens was the silly girl doing there, I wonder? Rather walking into the lion’s den, wasn’t she?’

  ‘Don’t you want to know her message?’ I asked.

  Denis glanced at his watch as if concerned about the time. ‘I don’t think I do, actually,’ he said. ‘But you had better tell me.’

  I paused for a moment, arranging my thoughts. ‘She said that Lau Yew had been betrayed by someone in the Politburo. She said that it was probably Chin Peng, because he opposed Lau Yew’s efforts to get the Communists out of the jungle and back into the towns. Oh, and she said that Chin Peng is doing what Loi Tak did: betraying anyone who disagrees with him.’

  ‘And what does she expect me to do about all that?’ Denis asked. ‘If I had my way I’d keep Chin Peng and his thugs in the jungle until hell freezes over.’

  I was so tired that I didn’t say anything. What had Catherine expected Denis to do? She was, presumably, quite sane and yet she’d risked her life to get her message through to him. I shook my head vigorously, trying to clear my brain. But I was too tired for rational thought. And far too emotionally drained.

  I lay back in my seat and listened to the shrill of crickets, and watched the coconut trees flick past.

  We had booked into the Railway Hotel in KL, and I rang the Alexandra Hospital after dinner and spoke to Tim’s ward sister. Tim was still in a deep coma, and the doctors believed that there was no brain function. ‘I’m afraid that all we can do is to make sure he isn’t in any pain,’ the sister said.

  I know it was wrong but I remember hoping that Tim would never wake up. What did he have to wake up to? Half a life, and knowledge of all that he had lost.

  I had difficulty getting to sleep that night. My restlessness was partly due to KL’s unaccustomed heat after the cooler nights of the highlands, but there was something else as well. Catherine’s message still weighed heavily on my mind, making me toss and turn in the hot, still darkness. Catherine had risked her life to deliver that message. A message that made absolutely no sense at all.

  Unless . . .

  Unless – and the implication shocked me, so that I lay for a moment rigid with fright – unless Denis was still involved with the MCP, and was still in touch with Chin Peng. Which would mean he was a traitor.

  Dreadful thoughts blossomed in my mind with the vigour of lush, rank weeds. But even as they blossomed I realised that the seeds of those thoughts had been with me for a long, long time. Since I had run into Catherine and Wu Sing in Singapore, and sipped teh halia tarik with them. Since Catherine had said that nobody knew better than I did that there might be a need to use guns to bring about a new and better Malaya. Since the visit to Casuarinas by Ivan Sokolov, and the award to me of a Russian medal. Since Malcolm’s words at the Singapore Swimming Club: ‘All they’re waiting for is a signal,’ Malcolm had said. ‘A signal that the Russians, the Chinese, or even a top British traitor is on their side, able to secure their lines of communication.’

  I scrambled out of bed, too agitated to lie still, and went into the little sitting room attached to our suite. I tried to laugh. Surely it was an absurd idea to think that Denis was a spy. After all, he was one of the Linlithgow Hunt, wasn’t he? One of Stewart Menzies’ most trusted men?

  And then an insidious little voice: It’s the most trusted ones who make the most dangerous double agents. They know all the deepest secrets.

  And didn’t Denis know all the secret arms dumps and jungle access points that had kept Force 136 alive during the Japanese Occupation? He should – he established most of them.

  I paced the floor, my heart beating like a drum. So many things were falling into place. Denis’s dealings with Seman Makarov in Australia. Had we really been passing on the secret cables at Stewart Menzies’ request, or had that just been a story to obtain my cooperation? Certainly we’d been well paid for our efforts, and equally certainly the Russians had
benefited. And the Skripkin business. Denis had felt more than sadness that Skripkin had been betrayed, he had felt guilt.

  ‘Can’t sleep, darling?’

  Denis had come into the sitting room, his hair rumpled by sleep, concern in his eyes. I started violently, and when he saw me shake he put his arms around me.

  ‘You are still upset by the funeral,’ he said. ‘I’ve got some tablets that will make you sleep.’

  I woke the next morning and lay in bed feeling refreshed and well, my mind as clear as the sunlight that flooded into our room. It must have been quite late because Denis was already up and dressed, packing our suitcases, and I could hear the mid-morning traffic in the street outside. I lay there for a while, watching Denis as he folded the dark cotton suit I’d worn at the funeral and put it into my case with strong, careful hands.

  The panic and the paranoia of the night before had quite gone, and I felt calm, almost detached as I considered what I should say or do. After all, I told myself, Denis was in a curious business, where the truth was never quite as simple as it seemed. Where one should never take anything at face value. Where one really mustn’t jump to conclusions.

  Denis noticed that I was awake and smiled at me. ‘I’ve arranged for them to bring your breakfast up to you, darling. Go back to sleep for a while – you’ve had a rotten couple of days and it’s taken it out of you.’

  I smiled back. In that instant I realised just how easy it was going to be. Denis loved me – I knew that as a certainty – and he had promised me, at Whitelawns in the middle of the Japanese attack, that he would never, ever deceive me. All I had to do was to ask him if he was in touch with the MCP and with Chin Peng, and he would tell me.

  I flung myself out of bed and went over to him, and kissed him on the mouth.

  ‘What have I done to deserve that?’ he asked, bemused.