by Yangsze Choo
The wide, teak-planked veranda runs the length of the bungalow, shielded from the sun by hanging bamboo chiks. On extremely hot days, Ren wets them with water so that the evaporation will cool the veranda. William sits in a rattan easy chair. He wears a cotton singlet and a sarong, a loose piece of checked cloth sewn into a tube and worn rolled at the waist—Malay clothing that many Europeans have adopted at home, though they’d never dream of appearing like this in public.
Like Ah Long, Ren doesn’t wear shoes in the house and his soft-footed approach is so silent that William doesn’t hear him. He’s sunk in thought, an expression of misery on his face. Ren has never seen his new master display much emotion before and wonders if this is a sign that he’s a truly compassionate doctor. A spark of hope ignites in Ren. Maybe he can ask him about the finger—though Dr. MacFarlane said not to tell anyone.
“Whisky, Tuan,” he says.
William picks it up and drains half of it, making a face.
“May I ask, why do you think it was a tiger-killing?” Ren is so polite, so quiet, that William can’t be irritated with him.
“Leopard is a possibility, but most likely it’s a tiger. We won’t know for certain until the autopsy is performed.”
“Will the tiger come back?”
“Don’t worry.” With an effort, William focuses on the boy. “Man-eaters are rare. Most tigers avoid people—it’s usually old or sick animals that prey on humans.” The ice in his drink clinks as he tilts it.
“Tigers who kill people can be divided into two types: man-killers, who kill once or twice because they’re disturbed or threatened, and man-eaters, who routinely hunt humans as prey. It’s too early to know what kind of animal we’re dealing with here, so we shouldn’t panic.” He speaks deliberately, as though he’s making a case to an invisible audience.
“Will there be a tiger hunt?” Ren asks.
“There are always people who want to go on a tiger hunt. Reynolds and Price at the Club, probably. Idiots who can’t shoot straight to save their lives. The last bounty paid for a tiger around here was seventy-eight dollars.”
Seventy-eight Straits dollars is an enormous sum to Ren, more than he can ever dream of saving. He wonders how William is so knowledgeable and asks him timidly.
“Oh, I was quite mad about tigers when I first got here.” Sinking deeper into his rattan easy chair, William is unusually talkative today. “That’s how I got to know MacFarlane; he had some interesting beliefs.”
Ren decides to be bold. “He believed many things. About spirits and men who could turn into tigers.”
“Ah yes. The famous weretigers of Korinchi.” William gazes through the trees to an invisible destination. “He and I actually went looking for them. Did you know that the Malays are often suspicious of men from Korinchi, because they’re believed to turn into tigers? There was a case in Bentong years ago when a tiger was killing buffaloes. Cage traps were set and baited with stray dogs, but they didn’t catch anything.”
Ren shifts his feet, listening intently. The afternoon shadows are growing long, the green silence broken only by the humming of insects.
“One evening, an old Korinchi peddler was traveling through the jungle when he heard the roar of a tiger behind him. Terrified, he ran until he came across a tiger trap. He crawled in and let the heavy door fall behind him. The tiger prowled round, but unable to open it, went away.
“Early the next morning, a crowd of people heard his shouts for help. The peddler asked them to release him, but they said, ‘The tiger was here last night, and now you are in the tiger trap.’ Paw prints leading towards the cage had been partly obliterated by the crowd. It was impossible to tell whether the beast had gone away, or had entered the trap and turned himself into a man. In desperation, the old man begged them to recognize him as the trader they had known for many years. The villagers, however, were unable to decide whether he was a man, or a monster who, if released, would devour them.”
“So what happened?” asks Ren.
“They put a spear through the side of the trap and killed him.”
William falls silent. Ren, still holding the tray, is filled with questions. “Do you believe that a man can become a tiger?”
William closes his eyes and steeples his fingers. “The conditions for a man to become a tiger seem to contradict each other. He either has to be a saint or an evildoer. In the case of a saint, the tiger is considered keramat and serves as a protective spirit, but evildoers are also reincarnated as tigers as punishment. And let’s not forget the harimau jadian, who aren’t even men, but beasts who wear human skins. They’re all contradictory beliefs, and so I’d classify them as folktales.”
He opens his eyes again. They’re disconcertingly sharp, as though he’s snapped back from wherever it is that he’s gone. “You shouldn’t worry about today’s incident. The last thing we need around here is a superstitious panic. Forget it. God knows,” he adds under his breath, “I wish I could.”
William unpacks himself from the rattan chair and stands up, stumbling slightly. Ren feels profoundly relieved. The tight band of worry around his chest dissipates; he tries not to think that there are only twenty-two days of the soul left. This new doctor is so reasonable, so sane. Everything he says makes sense. Obediently, Ren follows him into the house.
12
Ipoh
Friday, June 12th
Sleep wouldn’t come to me that night. When I thought about the mysterious Y. K. Wong, with his narrow jaw and thin eyes, my head tightened. Who was he, and why had he tried to follow me home? I didn’t buy his story about an ancestral heirloom. That single finger made me uneasy, like a missing piece from a set of five digits. A reminder of unfinished business. On and on my mind ran, like a mouse on a wheel, but the wheel turned into a giant snake that turned to engulf me. And then I was panting, struggling breathlessly as I fell and slipped and slid down the tunnel into the world of dreams.
* * *
Unlike the first dream, I didn’t come floating down the cool river. This time I burst out on the riverbank, thrashing through bushes and sharp-bladed lalang, to find the river running next to me. The sunlit water, clear and shallow at the edge, grew mud-colored towards the middle.
And then I saw it. The same small railway station with deserted benches, the same stalled locomotive, only this time the train had stopped a little farther, as though it was about to pull out of the station. The carriages were empty: there was no one inside, not even the little boy who’d waved at me so happily last time. When I reached the station, however, he was sitting there on a bench. He smiled, a quick flash that showed his missing front tooth.
“Ah Jie,” he said, politely addressing me as “Older Sister.” “I didn’t think I’d see you again so soon.”
“What are you doing?” I sat down next to him.
“Waiting.”
It was cool and peaceful under the station’s thatched roof. “What for?”
He swung his short legs. “For someone I love. Is there anyone that you love, Ah Jie?”
Of course there was. My mother, Ming, and Shin. Even Hui and my school friends, though I’d avoided them recently out of pride—many girls from school had gone on for teacher training, while others had married—and I’d been so bitterly disappointed at my lot that I couldn’t bear to face them.
“Because if there’s someone that you really, really love,” he said seriously, “it’s all right to wait for them.”
Sitting next to him, my anxiety melted away. The breeze from the river was pleasant, the sunlight sparkled off the water like fish scales.
“If you see my brother, please don’t tell him that you’ve met me.”
“Do I know your brother?” My head felt heavy. I could barely keep my eyes open.
“You will when you see him.” The little boy turned, his eyes widening in alarm. “Please don’t fall asleep! If you do, you’ll fall through.”
“Fall through to what?” I was having difficulty understa
nding him.
“To the level below. This is Station One, you see. Oh please don’t! Wake up!”
He was making quite a racket. The banging got louder and louder until I forced my eyes open blearily.
“Wake up! Ji Lin, wake up!” It was Mrs. Tham, hammering on the door of my room.
Light streamed in through the slats. Disoriented, I found myself lying in bed. Mrs. Tham burst in, her feathers ruffled. Something was up; she was positively simmering with excitement.
“He’s downstairs. Your brother, that is. I think he’s come to take you home to Falim.”
“He is?”
“I told him I knew that he was your brother and why didn’t he say so yesterday? He’s waiting for you in the front room.”
“Is my mother all right?” Fear gripped me. Something must have happened, otherwise why would Shin come to fetch me away?
I’d always been afraid of receiving a message like this and the terror must have shown in my eyes, because Mrs. Tham said quite kindly, “No, there’s nothing wrong. That was the first thing I asked him. It’s just a family get-together to celebrate.”
Our family almost never had get-togethers, let alone celebrations. If we did, they were stiff affairs in which my stepfather’s friends were invited over and the men would sit and talk for hours while my mother and I served them endless cups of tea. Shin knew perfectly well how I felt about them; I couldn’t imagine that he’d come to fetch me away to such purgatory.
“If it’s a special occasion,” said Mrs. Tham, “why don’t you wear something nice? Show your mother what you’ve been learning.”
Despite her fussiness (or perhaps because of it), Mrs. Tham was a talented dressmaker and a shrewd businesswoman. Sending me off nicely dressed was good advertising for her shop. Now she was busy inspecting the clothes I’d made, twitching them off hangers and muttering, “No, not this one. Maybe this one. Here. Show the other girls in Falim what Ipoh clothes look like.”
It was a Western-style frock, a deceptively simple yet elegant design that Mrs. Tham had copied from a magazine picture. She had good taste, I had to admit.
“And if anyone asks you about your dress, be sure to give our shop’s name!” she said on her way out. “Oh, and fix your face!” she hissed, pointing significantly at my eye.
I washed up and packed a simple overnight kit. What could possibly be happening at home? Pulling back my bangs, I stared gloomily at the small round mirror above the washstand. My black eye was still vaguely purple and yellow. I couldn’t possibly show this to my mother, so I did my best with a little pan-stick makeup and a smudge of kohl.
I could hear Shin’s low voice in the front room of the shop. Clutching my rattan basket, I stood hesitantly in the doorway. It was embarrassing to be so dressed up early in the morning, but Mrs. Tham jumped up, dislodging her little dog, Dolly, from her lap, and greeted me with a cry of delight.
“Isn’t it lovely?” she said, turning me to one side and then the other. “This pattern turned out so well. And your sister is as good as a professional mannequin. I always like her to model my dresses.”
I signaled Shin with my eyes. Time to leave! But he was enjoying himself at my expense.
“I can’t tell,” he said. “Make her twirl a bit more.”
To my horror, Mrs. Tham actually started to spin me around. Dolly barked hysterically.
“No, no. He’s just joking. And we have to leave now.”
“But Mr. Tham has just gone to the coffee shop to buy some char siew bao!” she said, forcing me to sit down. I glared at Shin as he bit back his amusement.
“Now!” said Mrs. Tham, fixing us both with a beady eye. “Which one of you is older?”
“I am,” I said quickly.
“We were born on the same day.” Shin hated being my younger brother and would deny it at every opportunity.
“So you’re twins!” Mrs. Tham looked pleased. “How nice for your mother.” I was about to tell her that Shin was my stepbrother but she chattered on relentlessly. “Twins are special, I suppose. Especially boy-girl dragon and phoenix twins. Do you know that the Chinese believe that boy and girl twins were husband and wife in a former life? And that they couldn’t bear to be separated, so they were reborn together?”
That seemed both silly and rather tragic to me. If I loved someone, I wouldn’t want to be reincarnated as his sibling, but it wasn’t worth arguing with Mrs. Tham. She had an uncanny knack of sucking you into her orbit. Shin, too, seemed to have had enough. Smiling, he said that it was time to get going as we’d miss the bus.
* * *
“So why are you here?” I asked him as soon as we were away from the shop. “Did anything happen at home?”
“No.”
I had to run a little to catch up with Shin’s long stride, as he suddenly seemed to be in quite a hurry and was heading in the wrong direction for the bus.
“We’re not taking the bus,” he said. “We’re taking the train. Don’t look so worried—it’s nothing to do with home. In fact, they think I’m in Batu Gajah.”
It was half a mile to the railway station from Mrs. Tham’s and Shin showed no sign of slowing down as we turned up Belfield and took a left on Hugh Low Street.
“What’s the hurry?” I asked as we cut in front of a bullock cart, narrowly avoiding a cyclist who rang his bell angrily at us.
“It’s later than I thought.” Shin seized my traveling basket, and there was nothing to do but hurry after him.
Though I’d taken a train only a few times in my life, everyone knew the railway station. Famously known as the Taj Mahal of Ipoh and designed by a British government architect who’d come to Malaya by way of Calcutta, it was an enormous, sprawling white building that looked like a wedding cake or a Moghul palace. Domes and minarets topped curved archways that led to marble-tiled corridors, a hotel for travelers with a bar and café, and tunnels and stairs that went up and down and led to railway platforms.
Shin headed straight into the station. Breathless, I caught up with him at the ticket window.
“Two tickets to Batu Gajah,” he said, sliding the money across the counter.
I was filled with unreasonable excitement and delight. Why were we going? Not wanting to ask too many questions in front of strangers, I squeezed Shin’s arm instead, my face bright.
“Honeymooners?” said the ticket seller, looking at my smart frock.
I dropped Shin’s arm as though it burned. A crimson stain appeared on the back of his neck, all the way up to his ears, but he didn’t say anything.
“Platform Two. Ten minutes till the train leaves,” said the ticket seller. We ran down the marble stairs under the tracks to the other side and then into the train that was already beginning to blow steam.
“It’s a third-class carriage, I’m afraid,” said Shin.
I didn’t care. I was so excited that I had to stop myself from jumping up to look at everything, from the hard wooden seats to the windows that slid up and down. Amused, Shin put my basket on the rack above the seat and I noticed for the first time that he’d brought nothing with him.
“Were you in town last night?” I asked. “Mrs. Tham said she saw you.”
“I stayed with a friend.”
I wondered who it was—maybe a woman—but felt I shouldn’t pry.
“So why are we going to Batu Gajah?” I’d been there once to visit one of my mother’s relatives. It was a pretty little town, sleepily satisfied with its position as the center of colonial administration for the Kinta district. “It’s not because of the finger, is it?” My face fell.
The train gave a final, ear-splitting whistle. “Of course it’s because of the finger,” said Shin. “Don’t you want to find out where it came from?”
I considered telling him about narrow-faced Mr. Y. K. Wong, but couldn’t explain without mentioning the dance-hall part. Instead, I nodded.
“Anyway,” said Shin, “I went down to Batu Gajah early on Monday. They’re a bit short-staffed
and were glad enough to have me.” He was looking out of the window, but I understood, without his saying anything, that Shin couldn’t stand being in the same house as his father. No doubt that was why he’d stayed in Singapore during the last holiday break.
“How is it?” I asked.
“I’m bunking with another orderly—he’s friendly enough. The first thing I did was to look up that salesman, Chan Yew Cheung. His aunt said he’d been close to a nurse at the hospital, so I tried to find out if he’d been a patient. Unfortunately, the patient registrations are locked up in the records department. But I lucked into something else.”
“What? The nurse who gave it to him?” Knowing Shin, that would be a fairly easy job.
“No, the pathology department. It’s run by a doctor named Rawlings. They’re fixing up that part of the hospital, and there are boxes of records and specimens to move. He asked me to work overtime and finish it this weekend. It’s just donkey work, but I jumped at it. Also, he said to get some help. I said I knew someone who’d do it for cheap.”
“Is that me?” I asked indignantly.
“Don’t you need a part-time job?”
For a heart-sinking moment, I thought he must have found out about everything—my mother’s debts, my dance-hall work—but he was only joking.
It wasn’t as though I didn’t trust him; I knew he had a soft spot for my mother. But I was sure, down to my very bones, that getting Shin involved would be trouble. One of these days, either he or my stepfather would kill the other. It had very nearly happened a couple of years ago.
* * *
That evening, I’d been over at a friend’s place for dinner. On my return, I was surprised to find all the neighbors standing in the street in front of the shophouse. The fading light dyed everything in cold blue shadows. Not a time to be out chitchatting, as I noted in alarm. Someone was saying that they ought to call the police but my mother was begging them not to. It was just a family disagreement, she said, and it wouldn’t happen again.