King Rat (22 page)

“My hens are my children, idiot! Hen, child, what’s the difference? Hawkins is a dirty murderer. A murderer, you hear?”

“Look, Colonel,” Grey said angrily. “Hawkins can’t give you another hen. He’s said he’s sorry. The dog got off its leash —“

“I want a court-martial. Hawkins the murderer and his beast, a murderer.” Colonel Foster’s mouth was flecked with foam. “That bloody beast killed my hen and ate it. He ate it and there’s only feathers to show for one of my children.” Snarling, he suddenly darted at Hawkins, his hands outstretched, nails like talons, tearing at the dog in Hawkins’ arms, screaming, “I’ll kill you and your bloody beast.”

Hawkins avoided Foster and shoved him away. The colonel fell to the ground and Rover whimpered with fear.

“I’ve said I’m sorry,” Hawkins choked out. “If I had the money I’d gladly give you two, ten hens, but I can’t! Grey —“ Hawkins desperately turned to him - “for the love of God do something.”

“What the hell can I do?” Grey was tired and mad and had dysentery. “You know I can’t do anything. I’ll have to report it. But you’d better get rid of that dog.”

“What do you mean?”

“Holy Christ,” Grey stormed at him, “I mean get rid of it. Kill it. And if you won’t, get someone else to do it. But, by God, see that it’s not in the camp by nightfall.”

“It’s my dog. You can’t order —“

“The hell I can’t!” Grey tried to control his stomach muscles. He liked Hawkins, always had, but that didn’t mean anything now. “You know the rules. You’ve been warned to keep it leashed and keep it out of this area. Rover killed and ate the hen. There are witnesses who saw him do it.”

Colonel Foster picked himself off the ground, his eyes black and beady. “I’m going to kill it,” he hissed. “The dog’s mine to kill. An eye for an eye.”

Grey stepped in front of Foster, who hunched ready for another attack. “Colonel Foster. This matter will be reported. Captain Hawkins has been ordered to destroy the dog —“

Foster didn’t seem to hear Grey. “I want that beast. I’m going to kill it. Just like it killed my hen. It’s mine. I’m going to kill it.” He began creeping forward, salivating. “Just like it killed my child.”

Grey held his hand out. “No! Hawkins will destroy it.”

“Colonel Foster,” Hawkins said abjectly, “I beg you, please, please, accept my apologies. Let me keep the dog, it won’t happen again.”

“No it won’t.” Colonel Foster laughed insanely. “It’s dead and it’s mine.” He lunged forward, but Hawkins backed off and Grey caught the colonel’s arm.

“Stop it,” Grey shouted, “or I’ll put you under arrest! This is no way for a senior officer to conduct himself. Get away from Hawkins. Get away.”

Foster tore his arm away from Grey. His voice was little more than a whisper as he talked directly to Hawkins. “Ill get even with you, murderer. I’ll get even with you.” He went back to his chicken coop and crawled inside, into his home, the place where he lived and slept and ate with his children, his hens.

Grey turned back to Hawkins. “Sorry, Hawkins, but get rid of it.”

“Grey,” Hawkins pleaded, “please take back the order. Please, I beg you, I’ll do anything, anything.”

“I can’t.” Grey had no alternative. “You know I can’t, Hawkins, old man. I can’t. Get rid of it. But do it quickly.”

Then he turned on his heel and walked away.

Hawkins’ cheeks were wet with tears, the dog cradled in his arms. Then he saw Peter Marlowe. “Peter, for the love of God help me.”

“I can’t, Johnny. I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do or anyone can do”

Grief-stricken, Hawkins looked around at the silent men. He was weeping openly now. The men turned away, for there was nothing that could be done. If a man had killed a hen, well, it would be almost the same, perhaps the same. A pitying moment, then Hawkins ran away sobbing, Rover still in his arms.

“Poor chap,” Peter Marlowe said to Max.

“Yeah, but thank God it wasn’t one of the King’s hens. Jesus, that’d be my lot.”

Max locked the coop and nodded to Peter Marlowe as he left.

Max liked looking after the hens. Nothing like an extra egg from time to time. And there’s no risk when you suck the egg quick and pound the shell to dust and put it back in the hens’ food. No clues left then. And the shells are good for the hens too. And hell, what’s an egg here and there from the King? Just so long as there’s at least one a day for the King, there’s no sweat. Hell no! Max was indeed happy. For a whole week he’d be looking after the hens.

Later that day, after lunch, Peter Marlowe was lying on his bunk resting.

“Excuse me, sir.”

Peter Marlowe looked up and saw that Dino was standing beside the bunk. “Yes?” He glanced around the hut and felt a twinge of embarrassment.

“Uh, can I speak to you, sir?” The “sir” sounded impertinent as usual. Why is it Americans can’t say “sir” so that it sounds ordinary? Peter Marlowe thought. He got up and followed him out.

Dino led the way to the center of the little clearing between the huts.

“Listen, Pete,” Dino said urgently. “The King wants you. And you’re to bring Larkin and Mac.”

“What’s the matter?”

“He just said to bring them. You’re to meet him inside the jail in Cell Fifty-four on the fourth floor in half an hour.”

Officers weren’t allowed inside the jail. Japanese orders. Enforced by the camp police. God. Now that’s risky. “Is that all he said?”

“Yeah. That’s all. Cell Fifty-four, fourth floor, in half an hour. See you around, Pete.”

Now what’s up, Peter Marlowe asked himself. He hurried down to Larkin and Mac and told them. “What do you think, Mac?”

“Well, laddie,” Mac said carefully, “I dinna think that the King’d lightly ask the three of us, without an explanation, unless it was important.”

“What about going into the jail?”

“If we get caught,” said Larkin, “we better have a story. Grey’ll hear about it sure enough and put a bad smell on it. Best thing to do is to go separately. I can always say I’m going to see some of the Aussies who’re billeted in the jail. What about you, Mac?”

“Some of the Malayan Regiment are there. I could be visiting one of them. How about you, Peter?”

“There are some RAF types I could be seeing.” Peter Marlowe hesitated. “Perhaps I should go and see what it’s about and then come back and tell you.”

“No. If you’re not seen going in, you might be caught coming out and stopped. Then they’d never let you back in. You couldn’t disobey a direct order and go back a second time. No. I think we’d better go. But we’ll go independently.” Larkin smiled. “Mystery, eh? Wonder what’s up?”

“I hope to God it isn’t trouble.”

“Ah, laddie,” said Mac. “Living in these times is trouble. I wouldn’t feel safe not going — the King’s got friends in high places. He might know something.”

“What about the bottles?”

They thought a moment, then Larkin broke the silence. “We’ll take them.”

“Isn’t that dangerous? I mean, once inside the jail, if there’s a snap search, we could never hide them.”

“If we’re going to get caught, we’re going to get caught.” Larkin was serious and hard-faced. “It’s either in the cards or it isn’t.”

“Hey Peter,” Ewart called out as he saw Peter Marlowe leaving the hut. “You forgot your armband.”

“Oh, thanks.” Peter Marlowe swore to himself as he went back to his bunk. “Forgot the damned thing.”

“I’m always doing it. Can’t be too careful.”

“That’s right. Thanks again.”

Peter Marlowe joined the men walking the path beside the wall. He followed it north and turned the corner and before him was the gate. He slipped off his armband and felt suddenly naked and felt that the men who passed or approached were looking at him and wondering why this officer was not wearing an armband. Ahead, two hundred yards, was the end of the road west. The barricade was open now, for some of the work parties were returning from their day’s work. Most of the laborers were exhausted, hauling the huge trailers with the stumps of trees that were dug with so much labor out of the swamps, destined for the camp cookhouses. Peter Marlowe remembered that the day after tomorrow he was going on such a party. He didn’t mind the almost daily work parties to the airfield. That was easy work. But the wood detail was different. Hauling the logs was dangerous work. Many got ruptured from the lack of the tackle that would make the work easy. Many broke limbs and sprained ankles. They all had to go — the fit ones, once or twice a week, officers as well as men, for the cookhouse consumed much firewood — and it was fair that those who were fit collected for those who were not.

Beside the gate was the MP and on the opposite side of the gate the Korean guard leaned against the wall smoking, lethargically watching the men who passed. The MP was looking at the work party shuffling through the gate. There was one man lying on the trailer. One or two usually ended up that way, but they had to be very tired, or very sick, to be hauled back home to Changi.

Peter Marlowe slipped past the distracted guards and joined the men milling the huge concrete square.

He found his way into one of the cellblocks and began picking his way up the metal stairways and over the beds and bed rolls. There were men everywhere. On the stairways, in the corridors, and in the open cells —f our or five to a cell designed for one man. He felt the growing horror of pressure from above, from below, from all around. The stench was nauseating. Stench from rotting bodies. Stench of unwashed human bodies. Stench of a generation of confined human bodies. Stench of walls, prison walls.

Peter Marlowe found Cell 54. The door was shut, so he opened it and went in. Mac and Larkin were already there.

“Christ, the smell of this place is killing me.”

“Me too, cobber,” said Larkin. He was sweating. Mac was sweating. The air was close and the concrete walls were moist with their own wall-sweat and stained with the mold of years of wall-sweat.

The cell was about seven feet wide and eight feet long and ten feet high. In the center of the cell, cemented to one wall, was a bed — a solid block of concrete three feet high and three feet wide and six feet long. Protruding from the bed was a concrete pillow. In one corner of the cell was a toilet - a hole in the floor which joined to the sewer. The sewers no longer worked. There was a tiny barred window nine feet up one wall, but the sky could not be seen because the wall was two feet thick.

“Mac. We’ll give them a few minutes, then get out of this bloody place,” Larkin said.

“Ay, laddie.”

“At least let’s open the door,” Peter Marlowe said, the sweat pouring off him.

“Better keep it closed, Peter. Safer,” Larkin replied uneasily.

“I’d rather be dead than live here.”

“Ay. Thank God for the outside.”

“Hey, Larkin.” Mac indicated the blankets lying on the concrete bed. “I don’t understand where the men are who live in the cell. They can’t all be on a work party.”

“I don’t know either.” Larkin was getting nervous. “Let’s get out of here…”

The door opened and the King came in beaming with pleasure. “Hi, you guys!” In his arms were some packages and he stood aside as Tex came in, also laden. “Put ‘em on the bed, Tex.”

Tex put down the electric hot plate and the large stewpan and kicked the door shut as they watched, astonished.

“Go get some water,” the King said to Tex.

“Sure.”

“What’s going on? Why did you want to see us?” said Larkin.

The King laughed. “We’re going to have a cook-up.”

“For Christ sake! You mean to say you got us in here just for that? Why the hell couldn’t we have done it in our billet?” Larkin was furious. The King merely looked at him and grinned. He turned his back and opened a package. Tex returned with the water and put the stewpan on the electric stove.

“Rajah, look, what-“ Peter Marlowe stopped.

The King was emptying the best part of two pounds of katchang idju beans into the water. Then he added salt and two heaping spoons of sugar. Then he turned around and opened another package wrapped in banana-leaf and held it up.

“Mother of God!”

There was a sudden stunned silence in the cell.

The King was delighted with the effect of his surprise. ‘Told you, Tex,” he grinned. “You owe me a buck.”

Mac reached out and touched the meat. “Mahlu. It’s real.”

Larkin touched the meat. “I’d forgotten what meat looked like,” he said in a voice hushed with awe. “My bloody oath, you’re a genius. Genius.”

“It’s my birthday. So I figured we’d have a celebration. And I’ve got this,” the King said, holding up a bottle.

“What is it?”

“Sake!”

“I don’t believe it,” Mac said. “Why, there’s the whole hindquarters of a pig here.” He bent forward and sniffed it. “My God, it’s real, real, real, and fresh as a day in May, hurray!”

They all laughed.

“Better lock the door, Tex.” The King turned to Peter Marlowe. “Okay, partner?”

Peter Marlowe was still staring at the meat. “Where the hell did you get it?”

“Long story!” The King took out a knife and scored the meat, then deftly broke the small hindquarters into two joints and put them into the stewpan. They all watched, fascinated, as he added a quantity of salt, adjusted the pan to the absolute center of the hot plate, then sat back on the concrete bed and crossed his legs. “Not bad, huh?”

For a long time no one spoke.

A sudden twist of the door handle broke the spell. The King nodded to Tex, who unlocked the door, opened it a fraction, then swung it wide. Brough entered.

He looked around astonished. Then noticed the stove. He went over and peered into the stewpot. “I’ll be goddamned!”

The King grinned. “It’s my birthday. Thought I’d invite you to dinner.”

“You got yourself a guest.” Brough stuck out his hand to Larkin. “Don Brough, Colonel.”

“Grant’s my Christian name! You know Mac and Peter?”

“Sure.” Brough grinned at them and turned to Tex. “Hi, Tex!”

“Good to see you, Don.”

The King motioned to the bed. “Take a seat, Don. Then we got to go to work!”

Peter Marlowe wondered why it was that American enlisted men and officers called themselves by Christian names so easily. It didn’t sound cheap or unctuous — it seemed almost correct — and he had noticed that Brough was always obeyed as their leader even though they all called him Don to his face. Remarkable.