A Dawn Like Thunder (29 page)

Then he said quietly, ‘I'd better get back and sit with him.'

She watched his despair, his sense of loss. ‘What is it? Please tell me.'

He looked at her, although she knew he did not see her. He was somewhere else.

He said, ‘All that way. Then a submarine, a Dutch one, to bring us here.'

There was a small sound from the room and he began to move away. ‘So they took off his bloody arm today. A fat lot of good a medal will do after that.'

The orderly returned and passed them, going into the room without a glance at either of them. From miles away she heard a bell ringing, felt Tucker releasing her. She said, ‘I'll wait for you. As long as you like.'

His face was very calm again. ‘Yes. I'd like that. Just want to be here when . . .' His eyes hardened as a white-coated doctor and another orderly bustled along the corridor. ‘I owe him that at least.'

She found a stone bench beside a fountain and leaned back against it, feeling the roughness pressing through her shirt and into her skin. She wanted to cry, to grieve for him, but knew she could do neither. She could scarcely remember Peter Napier now; his was just another youthful face among so many, like the ones who had whooped and yelled as they had charged over the wardroom table, or the ones who had raised their glasses to a brave enemy they had known only by reputation. Boys into men; and others like Mike Tucker, who held the whole machine together. Faces of war. Like those in her father's old photographs.
Thumbs-up, and you're dead.

It was dark and she was still sitting beside the fountain when Tucker came to find her.

He wore a borrowed uniform. He said, ‘Will you buy me a drink, Petty Officer Mackenzie? I've got no cash till I see the paybob.'

Together they walked out to the car, and she said quietly, ‘Welcome back.'

He squeezed her arm. ‘Jamie's a lucky lad.' Perhaps to give himself time, he asked, ‘Do you have a fag to spare?'

She shook her head. ‘I didn't think you smoked.'

‘I don't. Just feel like it.' He stared past her and saw the faint shimmering gleam of the ocean. Waiting, he thought.

She said, ‘I'll get us that drink.' But still she hesitated. ‘How was it with Peter? Did you manage to speak to him?'

Tucker made himself relive it. She was as much a part of it as they all were. He said quietly, ‘I think he understood. But he just lay there and looked up at me. Then he said,
“Not so much of me for you to carry next time.”
Then he passed out, thank God.'

She slid into the car beside him and switched on the engine. There was the ocean; you were never far from it here. Like the night she had watched the submarine slip away and merge with the dark water.

‘Come and meet my father. I can phone the section from there.'

Tucker watched the gates open to let them through. A nice car, a lovely girl in a crumpled shirt with the same badges as his own. What would Evie have thought about that?

Then he said, ‘He'll blame himself for this, you know. Because of his brother who was killed in Norway.'

He did not need to say it was Ross he was troubled about.

She replied firmly, ‘It's up to us then, isn't it?'

Tucker glanced out of the open window and laughed. It was almost unnerving. He had never expected he would ever laugh again.

CHARLES VILLIERS STARED
through the stained scuttle, watching a mixed procession of harbour craft weaving amongst the anchored shipping.

He said, ‘Do
you
think it can be done?' He turned and saw his companion, like a stranger in his fresh khaki shirt and slacks. ‘I mean, in broad daylight?'

Ross touched the small black and yellow cockade attached to the left pocket of his shirt. Richard Tsao had already informed them that every German in Singapore was required to wear it as a recognition symbol when he was outside their dockyard facilities, or away from supervision. The idea was still hard to accept. The whole of Europe and Scandinavia, apart from Sweden, were under the German heel, where the sight of a uniform would bring at best, caution, and at worst, terror. It was incredible that that same Germany would permit the Japanese to impose a rule of servility, where any kind of German uniform or decoration was forbidden.

Ross said, ‘We cross the wharf and get into the van. Did you see it?'

He saw the disbelief in Villiers' face. ‘Yes. It's one of our old company vans. You can just make out the crest
through the paintwork.' He clenched his fists. ‘God, the whole place must be falling to pieces!'

Ross listened to the thumps and scrapes on deck as the tug's crew prepared to take on coal.

He said, ‘You know Tsao pretty well. What do you think he'll want for all this information he says he's got?'

Villiers said firmly, ‘He's got it all right. He wouldn't risk his life and everyone else's for a gamble.' He seemed to consider it. ‘I always thought him such a quiet, unobtrusive chap. His job wasn't all that important – there must have been more to him than any of us realized.' He recalled the question. ‘Maybe money. Gold. Maybe a firm commitment to get him and his family out of here, perhaps to Australia. He'd be safe there, for the moment anyway.'

The door opened and Richard Tsao stepped over the coaming. He had found time to put on a fresh shirt, and looked remarkably relaxed. He said, ‘We wait for the signal. Then we go. It is not unusual for the
Success
to carry a passenger or two back and forth to Penang.' He handed them two well-worn passes, each with the Nazi eagle embossed on the cover, and added, ‘There will be guards, but they want little contact with the Germans.'

He hesitated, his head cocked to listen to the clatter of derricks and dockside equipment. ‘Well, gentlemen, you saw the submarine. Were you impressed?' He smiled. ‘I could tell from your expressions that you were unaware of their presence here.'

Ross said, ‘A well kept secret.'

Tsao's smile was gone. ‘The Japanese went to some pains to ensure such secrecy. Many of our people have been killed, or have disappeared without trace.' Somebody stamped on the deck overhead and he said calmly, ‘So let us go forth and discover, shall we?'

They climbed a ladder and crossed the vessel's deck,
their shoes scraping on the first layers of drifting coal-dust. Neither the crew nor the dock-workers gave them so much as a glance. Perhaps they really did not care, Ross thought. They were working and being paid: under a ruthless enemy occupation, that was more than most people could boast.

Tsao had lit a fresh cigarette, and handed a worn briefcase to his clerk, a small, bespectacled man who dropped his eyes if either Villiers or Ross looked in his direction.

It was the strangest sensation Ross had ever experienced, walking through the dockside litter, shoulders growing hotter in the dusty sunshine. Like being naked, or completely invisible. He glanced at Villiers: against the moving mass of Chinese and Malay faces he looked even more vulnerable, lost in a place he no longer recognized. Or was it all too familiar even now?

The van was standing with several other battered vehicles, the rear door hanging open to allow some air to enter. A normal precaution, nothing which might arouse suspicion. Ross glanced around. It did not appear as though anybody was interested.

Tsao said quickly, ‘We shall leave tomorrow.' He added, ‘Do not look back. There are soldiers by the gates. Get into the van.' He watched his clerk, probably guessing that the little man was terrified. ‘I will drive. You go to the office.' He called after him as he hurried away, ‘
Walk!
I am depending on you!' In a more contained voice he said, ‘He is useful in many ways, but . . .' He switched on the engine and gripped the wheel. ‘Remember what I told you.
They
are the enemy.'

The van jolted over some old iron tracks and lurched towards the gates.

Ross crouched on a small wooden bench and peered over Tsao's shoulder. He could feel Villiers' tension like something physical, although when he glanced at his
profile he looked surprisingly calm. Then he forgot him and everything else and watched the soldiers. There were three of them, one lounging against a notice-board, alien and yet immediately recognizable. He found himself wishing he still had his revolver, or even his diving-knife. It was like going into a trap. He could feel the sweat around his waistband, but it was cold, like the murdered girl had been.

Tsao breathed out sharply as one of the soldiers stepped into the road and raised his hand. He whispered,
‘Remember!'

Ross saw the soldier peering through the open window, his dark eyes flitting from the official passes on the windscreen to the one Tsao was holding out to him.

Then he looked directly at Ross. It seemed to take minutes before he said something.

Tsao turned slightly. ‘Passes.'

Ross took Villiers' pass and held them out together. It was impossible to guess what the soldier was thinking. Then he nodded to his companions and returned the passes without a word.

Ross waited, counting seconds, expecting that at any moment they would be ordered out of the van. What might Tsao do then? Claim ignorance, or drive on without a backward glance? It was not likely that he would get very far.

The van rolled forward, and when he glanced back Ross saw that the three soldiers had stopped a man who was carrying a large sack from the harbour. He turned away, sickened, as one of the soldiers hit the man with the butt of his rifle; he did not even bother to unsling it from his shoulder. The other soldiers were laughing as he kicked the man, while he lay on the road covering his face as though to protect it. Nobody stopped to protest, or to offer a hand to the victim. It was as though he was invisible. As they had been when they had stepped off the tug.

Tsao said, ‘I told you. There is no love between the Japanese and the Germans. It is your greatest protection.'

Villiers asked huskily, ‘What had that man done, the one they were beating?'

Tsao swerved to avoid a sprawled figure beside the road. Sick, drunk or dead, no one seemed to care. ‘Probably nothing. It is their way. How it has been since the British surrendered here.'

Ross frowned. There it was again: like a barb, and yet without any obvious malice or bitterness. Was he really a friend? They had to trust him, that was obvious.

He saw Villiers' fingers whiten on the bench seat as he leaned forward to watch the passing shops and houses. There seemed to be so much damage left uncleared after the original invasion, buildings no more than heaps of rubble, where mortar and shellfire had speeded the inevitable.

They turned off the main road and Tsao said, ‘We go inland here.' He gestured to the road they had left. ‘Follow that road and you sometime get to Changi, where thousands of your people are prisoners. It is a place of darkness.'

Ross thought unwillingly of Tucker and his companions, wondering if they were in such a terrible place, or even if they were still alive.

Nor could he help thinking of the Mackenzie estate, and the old Colonel opening his heart to him. What would he think if he could see his beloved island now? Where, despite all the rules and unspoken laws of a closed society, he had fallen in love and had paid for it ever since, no matter how he spoke of the ‘old country'. And Victoria? It would break her heart.

He heard Tsao say, ‘You know where we are going, Lieutenant?'

Ross saw Villiers nod, his fingers still gripping the bench as if he would never be able to let go.

Tsao said, ‘You will be strong. Nothing can change what happened. You are not alone.'

Villiers leaned back and said quietly to Ross, ‘My home is a few minutes away. Where my parents died,' he did not try to hide his bitterness, ‘while I was strutting around in my new uniform, looking for somebody to salute me!'

‘Don't be so bloody hard on yourself. It's the war. It happens.'

It sounded almost brutal, and he knew Villiers resented it. He went on, relentlessly, ‘My best friend died because of me. Because of an attack, one that was so important I couldn't see anything else. His nerve had gone.' He was shocked by his own voice, his words. As if he had just betrayed him. Richard Tsao had summed it up better than anybody.
Others follow.
He touched Villiers' arm and felt it tense. ‘So try to find comfort in the hope that something we do might help to end all this bloody misery.'

Eventually Villiers said, ‘Sorry, Jamie. I keep expecting . . .' He ran his fingers through his fair hair. ‘Well, I just do – that's all.'

They were stopped at two more checkpoints, and Ross was amazed that he could accept it without flinching. When one of the Japanese soldiers had tossed him a casual salute, he had acknowledged it with a curt nod and
‘Heil Hitler!'
Even the inscrutable Tsao had given a nod of approval.

‘That is better!'

They entered a weed-choked access road and Tsao stopped the van. ‘We walk from here.' It was then, and only then, that Ross realized it had once been a magnificent driveway, and the pile of blackened ruins, now almost overgrown with creeper, must have been Villiers' home. His mind lingered on Tsao's words.
A place of darkness.
He could smell it, feel the chill and the sickness like the early symptoms of some fever.

They eventually stepped out on to a cleared pathway, where a bungalow stood detached from the rest of the property. Ross wanted to ask Villiers about it, but said nothing when he saw the pain on his face. Where an employee had once lived, perhaps the manager whom Richard Tsao had replaced.

Inside, the bungalow was comfortable and well furnished, with some ornaments and pictures which would not have seemed out of place in the Colonel's house.

Villiers sat down in a leather chair as if his legs had been cut from under him.