The Rose of Singapore (46 page)

Seng Yew's thoughts suddenly turned from all the madness that was taking place around him to his own peaceful, beautiful little home in Johore Bahru. Sighing wistfully, he thought of his adoring wife, and of the three perfect children she had borne him. Sighing again, he wished he were with his family now instead of being here driving through the centre of Malaya. As chauffeur to his master, he was often away from home for several days at a time but a whole month would be the longest period ever for him to be away from his wife and family. He was, however, content with his lot. He owned a villa near the water's edge in a lovely area not far from the Sultan of Johore's palace. His two elder children, both boys, attended school and were learning fast. And his salary was certainly enough to clothe, feed and entertain his family well.

Smiling to himself, he thought of how, out of all her eagerness and passion, and from such a little body, she bore for him twins, two sons; and two years later, a daughter that was the image of her mother. He wondered whether the child she now carried within her belly would be another daughter. He sighed wistfully, wishing he were home instead of driving up this dangerous mountain road.

Suddenly, a single rifle shot brought him out of his reverie. Shocked, he saw a uniformed figure tumble from an open army lorry two vehicles ahead. Almost immediately all hell broke loose as simultaneously three Bren guns opened up firing long bursts. There was rapid fire from almost thirty rifles, blasts from shotguns, plus loud, sharp explosions from tossed hand grenades.

Traumatized by what he was seeing and hearing, Seng Yew's eyes opened wide in amazement and his mind became numb. Closing his eyes and shaking his head, he brought himself back to reality, to distinctly hear the exploding grenades, which on detonation momentarily drowned out the noise from the guns firing all around him. When there were no exploding grenades, he could hear the loud, long bursts of fire from the Bren guns above the rapid fire from the rifles. He winced when sharp fragments of glass tore into his face and hands as the car's windshield shattered. Above the din, many screams rent the air. Appalled, he saw a blonde-haired lady, the driver of the open-topped little blue sports car ahead of him, suddenly slump over her steering wheel. Horrified, he watched as the car, now out of control, veered across the road, paused as if undecided at the edge of the cliff, then slowly toppled over. Moments later, caught in the embrace of the jungle below, the car exploded into a giant ball of fire.

“Ambush!” gasped Seng Yew. “What shall I do?” He reached for the pistol, which he always kept in a pocket of the driver's door but he felt no safety as he held the inadequate weapon tightly in his hand.

The terrorists had allowed the leading vehicle in the convoy, the armoured car, to pass the ambush position unscathed, and it had already turned the next bend in the road before the guns opened up their terrific barrage of fire. The driver of the second in line, the armoured army lorry, most probably never heard the long burst of fire from a Bren gun that shattered the so-called bulletproof windshield, killing him instantly. The vehicle, with no one steering it and still travelling at twenty-five miles an hour, struck rocks at the edge of the hillside, careered from off these, struck the hillside again, to finally stop, broadside across the road, its front wheels wedged between rocks. Immediately, the whole convoy was forced to slow down and then come to a standstill.

Both Warrant Officer Perkins and the driver seated at his side in the leading open-backed RAF Bedford lorry were killed instantly by the first hail of bullets. The lorry they were in, on striking the armed army vehicle ahead, glanced off it and toppled over the cliff's edge. Slithering at first, it then bounced and rolled over and over, to somersault down the steep, jungle-clad slope, with supplies and equipment, and the three airmen who had been seated in it, hurtling in all directions from the open back. A couple of hundred feet down the mountainside the lorry hit rocks and disintegrated. The second RAF Bedford also struck the army lorry and became wedged, its driver sitting at the steering wheel, dead.

The horrified driver of the oncoming empty army lorry swerved and braked to avoid colliding with the two stalled, wedged-together lorries the same moment as a hail of bullets smashed into his cab killing him instantly. With a dead driver in the cab, the army lorry hurtled off the road, plunged into the abyss, and followed the path the Bedford had taken, until it, too, was swallowed up by the tangled mass of greenery far below.

The din was awesome. People were jumping and throwing themselves clear of their vehicles, slithering over the edge of the road and down into the cover of the jungle. Several jumped from their vehicles where there was no slope but just a sheer drop-off of hundreds of feet. They disappeared to their death over the edge of the cliff. And all the while the murderous bruuuttttttttt, bruuuttttttt, bruuuutttttt came from the three Bren guns, the rapid fire from the many rifles, the distinctly different blasting noise from shotguns, mingled with the heavier crash of exploding grenades.

A dispatch rider, his service revolver in hand, was bravely firing back from behind the cover of his motorcycle. A grenade hit him in the chest and exploded, causing the petrol tank of his motorcycle to explode in a great flash of flame, leaving no signs of the dispatch rider—his shattered body had been blown over the cliff.

Above the road the ambushing Bren gunners gloated over the sight of so many reeling bodies. Here, no skilled aim was needed. They could not miss. They had only to keep their fingers on the triggers and swing their guns from side to side. When the guns ceased firing because their ammunition was spent, other terrorists were on hand to immediately unload the empty magazines and promptly replace them with full ones of twenty-eight rounds apiece. Then the Bren guns began firing again.

The Silver Wraith's Chinese chauffeur wiped blood from his eyes and face with the sleeve of his jacket. He, like all the other drivers in the convoy, had been forced to come to a standstill. Now, instead of surprise and shock showing upon his face there was fear, not so much for himself but for his two passengers. He was responsible for their safety and wellbeing whilst they were passengers in the car he drove, and he alone would be held accountable should any misfortune befall either. Thrusting the pistol into a trouser pocket, he threw open the door of the car and sprang out onto the road. Wrenching open a rear door, he saw that the
amah,
petrified with fear, had sunk deeply into the far corner of the seat, the child, now sobbing with fright, clasped tightly to her bosom.

“Come, woman!” he yelled at her. “Get out! Get out! And bring the master's child with you. We must go down the hillside to safety.”

The
amah,
as if hypnotized by the terrifying noises all around her, did not move. It was all too much for her. She lay back in the seat as if dead; only the slight quivering of her thin lips betrayed life from death.

Again the chauffeur shouted at her. “For the master's sake, come, give me the girl!”

The
amah
did not move but instead stared up at him, a terrified look on her face. Her mouth dropped open as if she wanted to speak but no sound came.

Hurling himself upon her, Seng Yew wrenched the crying child from the
amah's
arms. The child began to scream but he heeded her not. Dragging the little girl from the car, he picked her up in his arms, hurried to the roadside, and there carefully studied the vertical drop-off, which was at least thirty feet. Below this he could see thick jungle that sloped gradually downward away from the edge of the road. There was no deep drop-off here of hundreds of feet such as he could see further along the road, or which he had seen in many places along the route. Looking down upon the tangled mass of greens and browns, he noticed that directly below him a broad-leafed bushy tree stood higher than all other vegetation, and that clinging to the tree were many webs of tangled vines. The topmost leaves of the tree, though several feet away, grew almost parallel to the road. That tree, he knew, could well be the child's only chance of survival.

“Ah Ho, go to safety. May the master forgive me if I do wrong.” Uttering these words, Seng Yew carefully gauged the distance between himself and the topmost leaves of that tree, and then tossed the screaming child from him. He agonized as he saw her terrified face and her little arms and legs kicking and clawing at nothing as she passed over the chasm and fell among the topmost leaves of the tree. He watched her, for what would be the last time that he would see her, sinking from sight within the sanctuary of the jungle covering. In his mind he measured the distance that she would fall within the shelter of that tree. At the most thirty feet, he thought. But, he told himself, she had to take her chances. She was much safer down in the jungle than up here on the road. Ricocheting bullets and shrapnel from exploding grenades whined noisily near him. Ragged holes suddenly appeared in his beautiful car's bonnet. Loudly he cursed the gunner and dived back inside the car, intending to pull the
amah
from it and throw her, too, into the comparative safety of the tree and the jungle-clad slope below the road. The
amah
had not moved but instead sat as if in a trance.

“Wake up, foolish woman. Let not noise dull thy senses,” he screamed at her.

Stooping over her, in great desperation he grabbed her by the arms and began pulling her towards the open door of the car, when, suddenly, a chill ran in cold shivers throughout his body as he sensed that he was being watched. He now had a feeling that death was close upon him. Lifting his eyes, he looked out of the window and up the roadside embankment but saw nothing there to cause him alarm. He was puzzled but relieved.

“Do not leave me here to die,” he heard the plaintive voice of the
amah
beseeching him. “I am coming with you.”

“Good! Come quickly!”

Whilst pulling her through the doorway, he looked behind him and up the hillside to reassure himself that they were safe, and was startled to see a movement high up among the bushes. He watched as the branches of a low bush parted. Just the wind, he thought. But, no, there was no wind; not even enough to stir a leaf. Troubled, he stared intently at where he had seen the movement then he stiffened and, in great fear, held his breath.

“My God! Be this not my day!” he gasped.

He watched as the skinny figure of a man staring at him out of hollow eyes rose slowly from behind the bush, with arms extended towards him, the hands holding a rifle pointed at him.

Sickened with fright, just for a moment he wondered if it was too late to dodge and to cheat death. With his eyes held firmly upon that lone figure, Seng Yew sank slowly to the floor of the car, his hand feeling for the pistol, hoping, praying, but he was too slow and too late. He heard the loud report of the rifle the same moment as he saw a side window fly into a million fragments and felt a stinging blow strike his chest. Reeling backwards, he clutched at the spot. The bullet had ploughed through his clothing, his flesh, smashed a rib, grazed his heart, and had embedded itself in a lung.

Shaking his head to free himself of the mist that was engulfing him, he told himself, I must not pass out. He tried to get up from the floor of the car but his knees sagged from under him. He was swaying but he did not want to drop. And he could not clear away the mist that was all around him, a bluish, orange and greyish mist. He tried to blow it away, but could not. It encircled his eyes and numbed his brain. He felt himself as if on a cloud, drifting into eternity. His blood, deep red and streaked by white foam crept from the corners of his mouth, to drip upon the plush carpet of his new Rolls Royce; and now blood began to spurt from his nose. He was fast losing consciousness. He felt neither pain nor fear, the cloak of death having cast itself over him and was already bearing him upwards, upwards. A second shot rang out from the rifle. But the chauffeur neither heard the shot nor felt the bullet. His body jerked just once before toppling over and falling across the passed-out
amah.
Seng Yew was dead, the back of his head blown off.

Fong Fook smiled to himself, gave a grunt of satisfaction, patted the rifle fondly, and then again levelled it at the car. He had seen the woman. She might as well join the other in death. He put an eye to the sights, squeezed the trigger and watched as the little woman twitched in her death throes before she, too, became still.

Ping Jie, the faithful, reliable
amah
and nurse to Ho Li Li, a good mother, a grandmother, and a person who in life had caused grief or hurt to no one, was dead. And through a ragged hole torn through her neck her life-blood oozed, where it mixed with that of Seng Yew, the chauffeur, in an ever-enlarging puddle on the white lambs-wool carpeted floor of the new Rolls Royce.

28

When the single rifle shot rang out, followed immediately by the horrendous barrage of terrifying gunfire and exploding grenades, most of those travelling in the convoy, civilian and military personnel alike, froze in shock, and for precious moments did nothing. Many died during those crucial first seconds.

The two airmen, SAC Peter Saunders and LAC Gerald Rickie, were two who sat thus, unable to do anything but stare in horrified disbelief, hearing the agonizing screams of their comrades as bullets thudded into them, and watching as they twitched and died. Precious seconds had already ticked by since the leading RAF Bedford plunged into the abyss to the left of the ill-fated convoy. Both airmen, though, in total shock, sat as if paralyzed and could not even remember being told that if ambushed they must immediately get clear of the lorry and down into the jungle.

Then, amid the chaos around them, and even above the terrifying din, the thunderous voice of Flying Officer Morgan could be heard shouting orders at his men.

“Get out! What the fuck are you doing sitting on your asses? Get out and get down into cover! Come on! You! You! And you! Move, man, move! Move your fucking selves.”