Each day I accompanied Goro to the
Sook Ching
exercises and he would return from them triumphant. I felt the rage in me burn stronger and I wanted to kill him.
I knew I had saved countless lives through the information I had been supplying to Towkay Yeap. But I could not save all of them. Enough had to go into the fire in order for me to stay unblemished in the eyes of Fujihara and the Kempeitai. The secret police had taken to following me and made no effort to hide themselves. I made a bitter complaint to Endo-san.
“It is for your safety. You are a target for the anti-Japanese groups, you realize that? And besides, you have nothing to hide from me, have you?”
I nodded my head but averted my eyes from his. Did he know of my collusion with the triads? Was he aware of the role I had played in the destruction of the radar station on The Hill? There was no way in which I could elicit anything from him. He was too canny, with the cunning and maturity of a man three times my age. I was outclassed and I realized, too late, that it had been like that from the very first day.
Walking on the beach with him after work, a mile away from Istana, I asked, “You must be aware of what Fujihara-san is doing.”
“Yes, I am.”
“And yet you feel nothing?”
“I feel a great shame and pain. But I have my obligations. And this is war. This is part of the journey we have to travel. And, yes, it is a hard road.”
A squadron of Zeroes flew over us, tiny as mosquitoes above the land they were patrolling.
“When I am gone, what will you most remember of me?” Endo-san asked, his eyes on the planes as they faded into the distance.
I pondered the question. “I don’t know. I don’t even know what to think of you now; how can I even contemplate what to recall of you?”
* * *
The island settled down after the first burst of arrests, watching, waiting. I had become very much feared through accompanying Goro and I felt the hatred of the people as I went about my work.
The streets remained relatively empty as most people were in the jungle or in the countryside, where contact with the Japanese was minimal. In Georgetown entire streets of houses stood empty, their inhabitants either in hiding or taken away by the Kempeitai. Food supplies were hard to obtain and prices on the black market were astronomical. People resorted to planting sweet potatoes and yams in their gardens. Inflation went unchecked and more and more banana notes were printed. I stopped bringing food and supplies home from work, even though I was entitled to, because my father and Isabel refused to touch any of it. That angered me and left me with a growing sense of helplessness. If they did not want to accept my assistance, what was the reason for my involvement with our new masters? I sat mutely as they consumed watery yam broth cooked with the leaves of the sweet potato trees the servants had planted in the vegetable yard at the back of the house. Eventually I spent most evenings at Endo-san’s island. More and more I depended on him for support and I would sit in silence with him, staving off the sense of loneliness and rage. It was ironic, as he was their cause.
“Tell me it will all be fine one day,” I said to him as I cleared away our meal.
“It will be. But to get there you will have to travel across the landscape of memories, across the continent of time,” he answered softly.
“As long as you are there to guide me.”
“Only sometimes. Like now for instance. Sometimes you will be alone; sometimes you will be with others. But I will be there at the end, waiting for you. Never forget that.”
“What if I forget you?”
“You have not so far. You cannot forget what is within you. And I am within you. Look into yourself when you feel lost and you will find me there.”
“I’m so afraid, Endo-san. So very frightened. I’m not strong enough for this,” I said, and he came and hugged me. I listened to the inner sounds of his body, the beating of his heart, the exchange of breaths in his lungs, the roar of blood rushing through his veins. A universe was in there, dying and being renewed every second.
His short burst of laughter was weighed down with irony. “I am afraid too.”
He pushed me away gently and gave me a letter. “I received this today,” he said. “I am sorry.”
I read the letter from Edward. “No,” I said. I felt fatigued, sick with the war. “I’ll have to tell them.”
“I do not envy the burden you have to carry.”
“Some of the burdens came from you, Endo-san. You and your people.” I went outside to the strengthening stars. “I have to go home now.”
“Of course you must.”
* * *
I sat at the breakfast table and waited for my father and Isabel. They saw my face and sat down. I handed the letter to my father. He read it, folded it and said, “Peter’s dead. He was killed trying to escape. Edward thinks he can’t go on any longer. He’s suffering from dysentery and starvation. There is no medicine for them.”
Isabel gripped her fork tightly, pushing it into the surface of the table. I reached out to hold her wrist but she turned the fork and stabbed it into my hand. “Don’t touch me!” she said as I suppressed a cry of pain.
“You can’t blame him, Isabel,” my father said, but the words had a tone that came from duty and obligation, not belief.
“Edward’s dying, and he continues to help those killers, those monsters who’ve killed Peter.” She pushed her chair away. “Get out. Get out of this house. You don’t belong here anymore.”
“Maybe you should stay away for a while,” my father said. “Until you decide where your loyalties lie.”
I watched as the four points of blood from the tines of the fork erupted from my skin, my wounded hand growing cold as though the chill of the air had found an opening to penetrate me. I knew my father’s heart was breaking and, because I loved him, I agreed. “Yes, perhaps that would be better,” I said. I folded my napkin properly, placed it back on the table and left the dining room.
* * *
People refused to let their rooms to me. Hotels and guesthouses told me they were full. And after walking the streets of Georgetown I knew I could not stay there, even if I had been able to find a place. I was too hated by now and the townspeople did not encourage me to linger. Even Towkay Yeap refused me lodgings when I showed up at his gates, saying he did not want it to be known that he was sheltering me. “That is the price of playing both sides. Eventually all sides mistrust you.”
“But you trust me, don’t you?”
He merely looked at me, then closed his door.
* * *
I made my way to Aunt Mei’s home and, like the other time I visited her, she came to the door reluctantly and closed it quickly behind us. “I told you not to come here until everything was safe,” she said, not hiding her anger. I felt something was wrong for she looked as though she was hiding something. I opened my senses, sending my
ki
outward, and sensed she had a visitor.
“I cannot give you a place to stay,” she said.
“How did you know I wanted a place to stay?” I asked.
“I—I heard word on the streets, that’s all,” she said. “Now you must go. Your presence here is not good.”
As I left her I glanced up and saw a figure hiding in the shade of the veranda upstairs. Isabel. I stood under the sun, willing her to come out. The figure moved and she looked down at me. We stood that way for a long time. I lifted up my hand in a half wave. She closed her eyes and returned to the darkness of the house.
I walked to the end of the road and summoned a trishaw. I would ask Endo-san for shelter. It was the first place I should have gone to.
* * *
Endo-san had never named his island and I asked him the reason for that lapse.
“I never wanted to give a name to this island,” he said. “Look around you. What name can you give to something like this?”
We had been swimming in the sea after my lesson with him and were now resting under the shade of the curving coconut tree, its spiky leaves rustling like a thousand beetles as the wind shook it. We sat in a shared silence for some time, watching the cormorants dive for fish.
My hands touched the rock on which I had, a long, long time ago, carved my name. I found it difficult to fathom the swiftness of time, to accept that it was already two months into 1945. The Japanese had been in Malaya for four years; I had known Endo-san for almost six. He and I had drifted into a comfortable routine, although I remained worried that I would give away my role as Towkay Yeap’s informer.
I thought of Kon for a moment and said a prayer that he would be safe. I wondered where Tanaka was and, thinking of him, I recalled him telling me how he had followed Endo-san to Penang.
“Tell me why you came here,” I now said to Endo-san. “I’ve asked you once and you never answered. Let me know now, please.”
He shook his head. “Some other time, when this is all over.”
My disappointment showed and he said, “I promise you I will tell you, when the time is right.”
I thought of that moment on the ledge, of letting go, trusting him. That feeling would always be there, giving me strength again and again, whenever his actions affected me.
“I will hold you to your word,” I said.
But he was looking at the cormorants and appeared not to have heard me.
Chapter Ten
Something in the air had changed, something indefinable, as though a new element had been dipped into it, slowly spreading like the coming of a different season. We received radio reports relayed from India and Australia and we knew that Japan was suffering badly in its engagements against the United States in the Pacific Ocean. When I walked to town to make purchases, people’s faces were lighter, stronger. Shopkeepers began to sound defiant to me.
Attacks on the Japanese increased, driving Fujihara into a frenzied rage. He would go on daily raids, hunting down the hidden radios and transmitters that relayed fragments of news. Even so, a network of anti-Japanese groups existed in Penang, passing news and information across the country, providing accurate details to the guerrillas in the jungle. Most of that information had been provided by Towkay Yeap, who had obtained it from me, but I was sure he would have other informants, all working in different areas of the government.
On the days of the arrests Fujihara would come back to our office expressionless if he found a forbidden transmitter set, or in a vile mood if his searches had failed to produce anything. But, whether he found any or not, he would often have a group of prisoners and then he would disappear for a few days to the square in the police headquarters. Goro would accompany him and return looking like a contented tiger.
“You should join us,” he said. “Sometimes I use them for practice. “He made punching motions in the air. “Nothing so real and satisfying as hitting a live person.”
I read the documents that came over daily on the telex and a single name began to recur like a hardy weed. It became clear that amongst the scattered groups of resistance fighters, one calling itself the White Tiger had the highest success rate. Eventually General Yamashita made it known that this particular group had to be stopped.
I knew it had to be Kon’s group. I sat in my little cubicle and wondered if I had made a terrible mistake, if in fact the path of my life should have been with Force 136. Then my father and Isabel and everyone else on the island would not have seen me as a traitor.
I missed them, and I missed Istana. They occupied my mind during all the minutes and hours of my days. I tried not to show it to Endo-san and pretended all was well. Every evening I stood on the landward side of his island, gazing at the imposing structure that had once been my home, at the solitary casuarina tree planted when I was born that stood out from the bluff, so alone. Sometimes, when the gods of light decided to favor me, I would see a figure moving about on the lawns and know it was my father, and a deep chasm of loss would open up inside me.
* * *
Fujihara came into my office and Uncle Lim followed behind. I felt fearful immediately. He had aged so much. His hair was almost completely white and his clothes hung loose as withered leaves. I felt the guilt of Ming’s death, fresh as though it had been the day before.
“Is this not your driver? He says he has some useful information for us,” Fujihara said, the anticipation of a prey’s fresh blood making him vibrate with excitement.
“Uncle Lim, whatever you are going to say, I hope you’ve thought carefully of the consequences,” I said, trying hard to remain calm.
He did not answer me, but in a firm, steady voice that only shook once before he controlled it again he said, “There’s a radio transmitter in Istana. I believe the daughter of the house has been using it to pass information to certain people on the mainland.”
“He’s lying,” I said quickly. “He’s been affected by his daughter’s death.”
“Let us see, then,” Fujihara said. “I think you should come with us.”