In the Mouth of the Tiger (57 page)

We let lunch go down sipping long drinks under the loggia Chu Lun had built for us from coconut logs overlooking the beach. It was a cool, quiet place, shaded by bougainvillea and morning glory, perfect for gentle conversation or a siesta, and I was happy to see Lady Thomas dozing comfortably, a glass of Pimm's tilting dangerously in her hand. The Governor's syce had gone back to Government House for the Thomases' bathers, and at about four most of us had a splash in the sea. I brought the children down, and Catherine looked after Tony while I held Bobby up to the small, sparkling waves.

It was delightful. The children laughed, the adults played the fool with two Malay canoes we kept at the water's edge, and afterwards we wandered back to the loggia and drank tea and nibbled Amah's curry puffs. I remember thinking how extraordinary it was. Here was a group that represented every degree in the Colonial spectrum, from Communists to the Governor, and yet we got on together like a house on fire. I caught Denis's eye and gave a conspiratorial wink. This was turning out exactly as we had hoped and planned.

The Governor and Lady Thomas left about six, and the Pangs soon after. The Kohs were just preparing to go when I grasped Catherine's hands. ‘Stay and see the sunset,' I asked. ‘And then take pot luck with us. I think Amah has rustled up some
nasi goreng
. ‘

They did stay, and Catherine helped me put the children to bed while Denis showed Robert around the darkened garden. ‘You must be so proud of Robert,' I said to Catherine. ‘He virtually runs Tikus Company.' Tikus
(‘Mouse') Company was Dalforce's most elite infantry group, made up of the fittest and best trained of all Dalley's men, and Robert was for all intents and purposes its regimental sergeant-major.

Catherine grimaced. ‘He does look dashing in his uniform, doesn't he?' she said. Then she looked at me a little cautiously from under her eyelashes. ‘To tell you the truth I hate him being in Dalforce. He's the sort of person who would be the first to get killed if there was any fighting. He'd be the one to volunteer to take the commander's message through enemy lines, or lead the charge if things got bad.' She spoke softly, but the emotion in her voice was so powerful that it sent a prickle down my spine.

‘I'm sure things will be all right,' I said inanely. ‘Robert loves you, and that will make him take care of himself.' I tried desperately to think of something more intelligent to say but nothing came.

‘I know Robert loves me,' she said almost bitterly. ‘But that won't stop him. War will come and Robert will make sure he is in the thick of the fighting. If he were to be killed, I don't think I could ever forgive him.'

The next morning, John Dalley rang me, jubilant and profuse with thanks. ‘Your little tiffin party must have really been something,' he said. ‘I've just had the Colonial Secretary, Stanley Jones, on the blower. He wants to tee up an official visit by the Governor next week. We'll do the thing in style, Norma – give the Governor a parade and then dine him in the mess.'

‘You haven't got a mess,' I said, thinking of the warren of abandoned classrooms that made up the Dalforce HQ.

‘We will have by next week,' Dalley retorted. ‘Remember the gymnasium? Think of it with tables covered in white, flags on the walls, a whacking great picture of the King down one end . . .'

As I put the receiver down I thought back to the first few awkward moments of our curry party, and the way Catherine had changed everything in a trice with her charm and naturalness. It could so easily have gone the other way – turned into a stiff and formal charade, like the dreadful receptions at Government House. I decided that I owed Catherine a great deal.

That evening, Denis and I took our usual walk to Mata Ikan through the coconut groves, past Wing Lung's huge, walled-off estate, and then back along the beach. I couldn't help talking about Catherine and Robert all the way. About what a nice couple they were, how much they were in love, and how I'd like to see them again. ‘I'd like Margaret to meet Catherine,' I said as the lights of Whitelawns came into sight. ‘I'm sure they would get on. Could
we perhaps have them around for dinner one night?'

Denis smiled. ‘Why don't we ask them to join us and a few of the others for dinner on the kalang?' he suggested.

The kalang was the product of another of Chu Lun's schemes. About a month before he'd dropped by for a chat, clearly with something on his mind. ‘Tuan, you know I am a cautious man where business is concerned,' he began.

Denis said nothing. Nothing was expected of him. Chu Lun had merely articulated the statement to set the scene, to establish his credentials as a man of probity and good sense. It probably meant that Chu Lun was going to try and involve the Three Man Kongsi in something particularly risky or bizarre.

‘I have heard from my cousin, Ah Cheng, from Muar,' Chu Lun proceeded, then sighed deeply. I couldn't tell whether the sigh implied that Ah Cheng was ill, or in need of money. The second option seemed rather likely.

But no, I was wrong. ‘That man has so much money, Tuan, that he cannot sleep at night for fear that robbers will ambush him for his wealth, and kill him and his family. What a dreadful thing to have on your mind, day and night, week after week. It would make a man's life hardly bearable.'

Denis stubbed out his cigarette. ‘Why doesn't he put his money in the bank?' he asked reasonably.

Chu Lun looked slightly taken aback. ‘It is not the security of the money that has had me thinking, Tuan, but the way my cousin made his money.' Ah, now we were getting to the point!

‘Smuggling?' Denis asked, again rather reasonably. There was a lot of opium brought in through Muar. The place was quite often in the newspapers, with reports of drug hauls by the police or the occasional drug-related murder.

Chu Lun shook his head emphatically. ‘Something much more profitable. My cousin has made his money by running a restaurant, Tuan. A very special type of restaurant. It is on a wharf, over the ocean. People come from miles around to sit on my cousin's wharf and eat fresh seafood and other dishes. His wife's cousin, Muh Han, has great skill in preparing food. But it is where the restaurant is, on a wharf, that is the real reason for its success. People like to eat over the ocean. It makes the seafood taste better because as you eat you can watch the waves beneath you. And it is cool over the water. Also, no doubt, there are no mosquitos because mosquitos stay away from the sea.'

We sat on, absorbing this interesting but hardly earth-shattering information. Denis lit another cigarette and offered one to Chu Lun. He was, like me, rather at a loss.

Chu Lun cleared his throat. ‘As a member of the Three Man Kongsi, I thought I should tell you this, Tuan, because our kongsi could also be making such money.'

‘How could we make such money, Chu Lun?' Denis asked. ‘As far as I am aware, the kongsi owns no wharf.'

Chu Lun drew on his cigarette appreciatively, allowing the moment to drag on, our interest to mount. ‘We may not have a wharf, Tuan,' he said finally, with the flourish of a man producing a rabbit from a hat, ‘but we do have a kalang. Or we soon will, for there is one for sale just off Whitelawns, and the owner is asking only a paltry five hundred dollars. It would be the most perfect restaurant in all of Malaya!' As he finished speaking, Chu Lun stood up and gestured seawards to where the lights of a kalang burned a mile or so offshore.

Denis smoked on quietly, then stubbed out his second cigarette. ‘It would not work, Chu Lun,' he said almost regretfully. ‘To run a restaurant you need a licence and all sorts of approvals. Kalangs are dangerous as well as hard to get to. If the sea got up, your guests would be stuck out there. If a storm came and swept away your restaurant, where would you be then? Well and truly in the soup, I'm afraid.'

The Three Man Kongsi did not buy the kalang, but Denis and I did. Not in order to start a restaurant, but for the sheer fun of owning such an extraordinary thing. We let the men from the kampong fish from the kalang and keep the profits, on the understanding that they supplied Amah with all the fish she needed, and that they cooked us a meal out on the kalang whenever we wished. At first, we would simply paddle out in our canoe across the still, black water, and sit at a makeshift table over the sea while one of the fishermen cooked our curry
ikan
over a bed of hot coals. But later, when the magic had gripped us, we organised dinner parties on the kalang. Chu Lun would take out a table and chairs during the afternoon, and set up lanterns, and we would have a fairytale evening as the stars rolled above us and the sea sighed against the poles below. During coffee on these occasions we would douse the lights and admire the phosphorescence, writhing and twisting like sheets of glowing green silk just below the surface of the sea.

I sent off the invitations to our kalang dinner party the next day, writing
them out on parchment paper at the desk in my sewing room. It was still unusual for Europeans to invite Chinese to social functions in their homes and so I added a personal note to Catherine. I didn't want her to think this was a ‘duty' invitation, something to do with my support for Dalforce. In her acceptance, Catherine added her own little note:

I am so glad you have made it clear that the dinner has nothing to do with Dalforce. I love Robert dearly and because of that I will always help him in his work with Colonel Dalley. But as you have obviously guessed, I hate him being involved in war work! I am so happy that we will be meeting just as friends at your dinner party.

Amah and I had tremendous fun planning and arranging the evening. We had a proper table and chairs taken out to the kalang, and rigged a canvas shelter in case of rain. I bought fifty Chinese lanterns, and arranged for one of the fishermen's daughters to tend them on the night. Finally, we decided on the menu. It was to be based on freshly caught fish, of course, and to make sure it was cooked to perfection we hired one of the Raffles' seafood chefs for the evening.

My one great worry was that rain might spoil things for us, and when a sumatra blew up during the afternoon on the day of the party, I almost took to my bed with mortification.

‘It
is
July, darling,' Denis chided. ‘We have a sumatra most afternoons at this time of year.' It didn't help to be told that our kalang plan had probably been a silly idea to begin with.

But the wind fell, the rain stopped, and by five o'clock the sky was a glorious cobalt dome and the sea a sheet of burnished bronze.

We met for drinks on the verandah at Whitelawns, then ambled down to the beach where a large motorised sampan waited to take us out to the kalang. Our guests were the Deans, the Kohs, Tanya and Eugene, and the Lyons. Chu Lun had spread cushions in the sampan, and as I reclined in the stern I couldn't help thinking what a picture we made as we motored out to sea, the men in black bow ties and bum-freezers, the ladies in their dinner gowns. I wore the blue dress I'd bought in Bond Street, the sleeves now removed for coolness.

The kalang had been transformed, with a forest of paper lanterns swaying in the evening breeze and the table glittering with our best crockery and silver. There was to be no fishing that night so we had the deck to ourselves. It was
delightful sitting out in the open, the only sound the soft muttering of the sea amongst the piles and the creak of the bamboo decking as the structure swayed with the tide.

Margaret and Catherine hit it off immediately. They were both interested in photography and Catherine had brought her camera with her, so the two of them put their heads together planning an exposure shot of the evening shoreline. I took the opportunity to catch up with Tanya.

‘Are you happy?' I asked quietly, and her open smile told me she was very happy indeed.

‘I didn't think life could possibly be like this,' she said. ‘And I owe it all to Eugene.' She suddenly looked up into my eyes. ‘Surely there must be a price tag on such happiness?'

‘I think there probably is a price,' I said thoughtfully. ‘But I think – I hope – that one can pay it in small instalments. Perhaps by giving the sort of happiness one has received to someone else.'

Tanya sighed. ‘I know what would make Eugene happy. If I were to give him a baby. But I still can't, Nona. I just can't. Do you think that makes me a selfish beast?'

‘Of course not,' I said. ‘You can only give what you have to give.'

‘You are being far too serious, ladies,' Ivan interrupted. ‘Denis has opened a very fine bottle of real French champagne. I know it is real French champagne because I had the foresight to bring it along myself. It is my command that you try a glass.'

The party began to liven up, materially assisted by Ivan's Bollinger. Someone started telling jokes and laughter rang out over the water. ‘Shush!' Alec said suddenly, and when we had all shushed he pointed out across the black water. ‘We'll attract every German U-boat this side of Suez!'

Conversation turned to the war, as it was bound to, and I turned to Catherine. ‘I know you hate Robert being tied up with the army, but surely you feel proud as well? He looks awfully dashing in that uniform of his with the red flashes on his shoulders and the Tikus badge.'

‘To tell the truth, if I had half a chance I'd get all his army stuff – his uniform and his silly tin hat – and I'd burn the lot in our compound,' Catherine said. ‘And then I'd tell him to grow up and stop playing soldiers, and be a good architect instead. You know that he is a very good architect? But he doesn't have time to finish his exams because of all the time he spends at Holland Road.'

‘Before I can concentrate on being an architect, I need to help build a new Singapore,' Robert said. ‘And if that means fighting, then of course I must do my share of fighting. Not for glory, Cath. Because it's my duty.' Catherine didn't answer him but I saw her bite her lip so hard one could see the mark she made.