“They knew he was somewhere in the town—an informer must have seen him fall, wounded. So the Japanese asked for him, and when no one spoke, they began to kill our children, then our fathers, then our mothers and the priests. I speak of these things not in anger, because in war a killing-madness comes over men, and it has always been so, in this place and other places. But Nambum Ga was my village, and my people were dying. So at last—I gave them Emmett Claye.”
Durell waited a moment. When Ingkok remained silent, he said, “Did they execute him?”
“I thought so. Colonel Tagashi held him a prisoner, to question him, that night. In the morning, Emmett was gone, and the Marauders came back and drove the Japanese away in complete defeat. But everyone in the village shared my guilt. No one spoke of it. And it has not been spoken of for all these years. You are the first to hear it from my lips.”
“Did you tell any of this to Paul Hartford when he questioned you two weeks ago?”
“Not all of it. Enough so he understood.”
“And what happened to Paul?”
“Perhaps I am a cowardly man. But if I could choose death for myself and save Nambum Ga from more terror, I would deliver myself as hostage to Major Mong. But life does not permit us the easy path at all times. A man must pay and pay again for the same humiliation.” Locke said bluntly, “One moment, Boh Ingkok. Are you trying to tell us that you turned Paul Hartford over to the Lahpet Hao?”
The Burmese nodded slowly. “In a way. They found him yesterday, when my daughter went to the place where I kept him as a—a hostage. Erena has not returned. And Hartford is gone, too.”
The man sat down and covered his eyes with his hands. Durell shut the door so the men in the corridor could not see Ingkok’s momentary collapse. A large fly buzzed angrily into the room from the veranda and flew out again. Durell looked at Simon Locke, who shook his head mutely.
Then Ingkok whispered slowly, “I am all alone here. I need help. I need advice. I think they have killed my daughter, and it is all my fault. Where can Erena be? My sin is being punished. One is supposed to accept his ordained fate, but my heart cries out that she be not punished for my sake.”
“Where exactly did she go?” Durell asked.
“She went into the hills to release Paul Hartford.”
“Where you kept him a prisoner?”
“I thought of keeping him as a hostage, to give to Major Mong to prevent atrocities against my people. Yes, I am a poor sort of a man, Mr. Durell. What I did years ago to Emmett Claye, I was prepared to-do again, to save my town.” Ingkok shook his head slowly. “I knew that Tagashi was helping him. Perhaps Tagashi knows what happened.”
Durell was startled. “Tagashi? The Japanese colonel you mentioned before?”
Ingkok nodded. “Yes, the same man. A peaceful man at heart, unsuited for military life from the beginning. A devout Buddhist, a gentle man. He let Emmett go when the Japanese were defeated here, and when he found himself alone, his troops scattered, he wandered in the jungle as a sick man, and finally was found by a woman who cared for him and healed him. He settled down in the hills with her and became a farmer.”
“How did he survive against your people’s hatred?”
“I ordered that no one was to go near him, not to help him and not to molest him. He survived, with the woman.”
“I want to talk to him,” Durell decided.
“But the Lahpet Hao are in that area now.”
“But you want to learn what happened to your daughter, and you say that Tagashi may know. And if Tagashi knows what happened to Paul Hartford, too; he may even know what really happened to Emmett Claye. Tagashi is the man I must see.” Durell stared at the Burmese and said quietly, “Let us help you, Pra Ingkok. Help us to help you.”
Ingkok shook his head. “It is too dangerous in the daylight hours. The Lahpet Hao have eyes everywhere. But when it grows dark, it may be possible to contact Tagashi safely.”
“That may waste valuable time,” Durell objected. “Listen to Ingkok,” Simon Locke interrupted. “He knows best, Sam. Whichever way you look at it, this may be your break.”
Durell hesitated, then spoke to the Burmese. “How many men can you muster to attack the Lahpet Hao tonight, while they are waiting to take control here by intimidating all the local leaders?” Durell spoke more urgently. He felt that all his arguments might be in vain if he failed to sway the chief now. “Boh Ingkok, you could turn the tables on the Lahpet Hao by a surprise attack. You could push them back across the border where they came from, if you hit them now. They feel sure of themselves, accustomed to your passive submission. But all you need is the will to fight back, to be free of their terror. You have reason enough: there is your daughter, and your people, your own self-respect—”
But Ingkok got to his feet. He looked tired, and his eyes were haunted.
“I am a man of peace,” he said quietly. “I must do what I think best for my people. You may be right, Mr. Durell. Perhaps the only way to be free is to fight now, today or tonight. But I cannot bring myself to do it. All my life, I have been taught to submit to fate. To kill is abhorrent to me. I cannot agree to your plan to attack the Lahpet Hao."
He turned and walked out, and Durell stared after him, feeling a hopeless weight of defeat settle about him.
Eight
Erena Ingkok had known only peace and tranquillity in her father’s house all her life. Whenever violence in any form had touched the town, she had been safe in the shelter of Pra Ingkok’s basha. She had been educated by missionaries and had even gone to Rangoon for more schooling, and she knew that the world could be a cruel place, full of pain and misery. But until today, such knowledge had only been academic, and did not directly concern her.
Now it seemed as if the end of her life had come in one brief hour of bloody torment and humiliation. She wished they had killed her, and not let her live or set her free to decide for herself.
Every step along the downhill trail toward home was one of torment. When she stumbled and fell, she did not want to rise again. But she did. The trail seemed endless. She trembled, and her legs threatened to collapse tinder her. She had to stop often to rest.
At one such stop, Erena could see the river and the town, far below. Everything looked peaceful in the dazzling sunlight. There was no sign of fighting. Then she saw Piet’s steamboat at the pier that thrust, like a long finger, into the river below the Circuit House, and she sucked in her breath and made a little whimpering sound and covered her face with her hands.
How could Piet ever look at her again, after he learned what had happened to her with the men of the Lahpet Hao? She touched her body, and her warm sign felt the same as ever through the rips in her longyi. It was she, and yet it was not she, and nothing would ever be the gamp again.
She ached everywhere. Her dark, lustrous hair was matted and tangled; there were dark bruises on her legs and arms, and blood crusted her side. But when the insects found her and started to bite, she got up again and kept walking.
There was only one place to go to think and decide what to do. It was a private place, for herself and Piet alone. She sought out the little stream that tumbled down the mountainside through a dark, shadowed gorge, and followed the narrow trail beside it. It took all her strength to climb across the slippery wet rocks and fight her way through the vines that blocked her way.
It was past noon when she reached the pool with its calm shadows and warm sunlight on the quiet water, its bamboo brush that hid her from the river and the nearby town. She was surprised to find that she was hungry, and the sensation helped ease the memories of what she had seen and endured. She stripped slowly, her whole body aching, and stared at her reflection in the still water, wondering how she could still look the same: her small breasts and slender hips and firm brown legs seemed untouched. Then in the rippling water she saw the bruised reflection of her face, and there at least was a visible change, not just in the puffed lines of her mouth, but in her eyes. Her eye
s did not seem to be her eyes at all.
She lowered herself carefully into the water and washed away the blood stains and the dirt that marked each time she had fallen or been thrown to the ground by the men of the Lahpet Hao.
It seemed to Erena that she would never wash herself clean again.
She did not hear Piet’s approach until he gently called to her from the banks of the pool.
“Erena?”
Turning, she saw him there, blond and smiling, strong and young and untouched by her horror.
“I hoped to find you here,” he called to her. “When they said you were missing in the hills, I was afraid. And then I thought of this favorite place of yours, and here I am. And I’ve found you.”
She remained in the water, sheltered up to her throat. “Go away, Piet. Please, do not come near me.”
“What happened to you?”
“Please, Piet—go away.”
“No. Come out of there—or I’ll come in after you.”
They had often come here to swim in the pool together, on long, hot, lazy, wonderfully ecstatic afternoons when they made love together in die dark green privacy of this place. But nothing would ever be the same again, she told herself. She did not want him to look at her body that had been changed by those men in the hills. She did not want him to see the knowledge of ugliness that had come into her eyes.
But there was nothing she could do. She knew that Piet would never leave until she came out of the pool. She drew a deep breath and climbed out on the grassy bank where he waited. He took her hand and pulled her to him-—and then he paused. She saw the look that came over his face when he saw the bruises and cuts and scratches that marred her brown skin. His blue eyes darkened with anger such as she had never seen in him before.
“What happened to you?” he asked softly. And the softness of his voice was controlled with a terrible feeling of anger. “Who did this to you?”
“It was the Lahpet Hao,” she whispered. “They took me—and—”
She told him everything, weeping uncontrollably.
He listened in silence. When she went to retrieve her torn clothing, he held her slim, wet body close to him. She could not look up at his face, afraid of what she might see there. But his voice was gentle when he spoke.
“We must go and tell your father everything, Erena.”
“I cannot.”
“You must. Where did they take the American?”
“To the monastery, to the Buddhist priest, Yan Gon.”
“And he was still alive?”
“Yes, I—I think so.”
“And Tagashi, the Japanese?”
“They took him, too.”
“Could you lead us to where this Major Mong is camping?”
“He is at the monastery,” she whispered.
“But can you take us there?”
“If my father agrees.”
“When he sees you,” Piet said grimly, “he will agree.”
She was silent. She felt warm and safe in his arms. She knew the difficulties of all the differences between them. They were lovers, but they came from different ends of the earth, and she knew of all the problems they would have to solve if she agreed to marry him. But it was an academic question now. He had asked her once, and she laughed off the question. He would never ask her again, she thought. Not after what had been done to her today. He would never even make love to her again.
And then,_ miraculously, she felt his hands on her body, gently questioning. And still she could not look at him.
He spoke as if he could read her thoughts.
“Erena, nothing has changed with us, you know.”
She could not reply.
“Did they hurt you so much?” he whispered.
“Yes. Very much.”
He trembled. She could not be sure if it was his rage at what had been done to her. She forced herself to lift her head and meet his eyes.
“I love you,” he said.
“How can you, now?” she whispered.
“You are still the same.”
“No. It is not true.”
“You are. You must be.”
“You are only being kind. Later you will think about it, and it will be different.”
His anger, or his passion, made him disregard the bruises on her body as he lowered her gently to the grass beside the pool. This was their secret place, where they had spent many hours of laughter and love-making. It was incredible that he should want her now, and yet—she needed his love, to prove something to herself, as he wanted to prove it. She yielded to his gentle insistence and let him take her, holding him tight to her.
Nothing, nothing would ever be the same.
Yugi Tagashi knew that his world had come to an end.
All the carefully contrived philosophy on which he had based his pacifist, hermit’s existence had collapsed in a single stroke this morning. He did not know what to do. And not knowing, he considered that the best thing was to sit quietly and watch and listen, and do nothing.
The monastery of Yan Gon was on a high hillside that overlooked the dim, misty-green valley of the Inkagaung. The place was in ruins, a relic of ancient times when strange warrior kings swept down from the Mongol lands through China into the jungle peninsula of Southeast Asia. Vines, creepers, orchids and fig trees grew among the mossy stone walls of the temple. Up here above the heat of the valley the air was cooler, blowing from the northeast and the mountains of Yunnan. The wind rattled the young bamboo trees and whispered through the ruined crannies of the pagoda platform.
Only Yan Gon lived here, existing on the occasional offerings of the people of Nambum Ga who came now and then to pray and talk to the priest. Yan Gon wore the traditional yellow robe and had the shaven head of all Buddhist priests. Strangely, although his food supply was frugal and he lived an ascetic life, he was fat and dimpled, with a round, serene face and wise, knowing eyes. No one knew how old he was. He looked as ageless in his habitual contemplation as the ranked tiers of ancient gilded Buddhas that stood in the shadows of the monastery walls.
But Yan Gon was not ignorant of the world. His retreat from worldly affairs had not been permitted, in a sense, since trouble and violence had come to him time and again, as it had come now.
The Lahpet Hao had set up headquarters in the temple.
There were no more than a dozen of them now, including the leader, Major Mong. The others were detailed in small squads at strategic points overlooking the silent, dusty town of Nambum Ga. Those who were here were cooking their midday rice, watching the trail that led up the hill through the gorges to the monastery.
Yan Gon stood quietly beside Tagashi, his movements silent for a fat man. He spoke in a soft voice.
“The American is awake now. Will you come?”
“Yes,” Tagashi said.
He followed the Buddhist priest into the stone and wood monastery building. The rooms inside were simple and ascetic, with nothing but the most rudimentary necessities. The American lay on a pallet in one of the rooms whose south wall had long ago collapsed under the ageless tugging of growing vines. Yan Gon had bandaged the American’s shoulder and Paul Hartford looked rested, better than at any time Tagashi had seen him before. He looked at Tagashi and wet his lips and smiled.
“Hello.”
“Will you eat now?”
“I want to see Emmett,” Paul said. “Is he here?”
“I will ask him to come,” Tagashi said.
The Lahpet Hao leader appeared in the doorway at that moment. Looking at him, face to face after all the years that had gone by, it seemed to Tagashi that fate and the will of God Himself were designed to make a mockery of all of man’s sacrifices and best intentions. He bowed his grizzled head in silent greeting, and the man who called himself Major Mong smiled sardonically.
“It has been a long time, Colonel Tagashi.”
“I am not an officer of the Imperial Japanese Army now. It has not been so for many years.”
“Y
ou’ve aged,” the man said harshly. “You look old and beaten, like a farmer who has plowed his field with the yoke on his shoulders instead of using bullocks.”
“It is so,” Tagashi said. “I was merely permitted to live.”
“As you permitted me to live?” The Lahpet Hao commander laughed again. “And do you regret it now?” Tagashi lifted his head and considered the man with a long and searching look. He felt remarkably calm. He had expected his heart to thunder and to feel a weakness of the spirit overcome him. But no such thing happened.
He saw what the man whose life he had saved had become, in all these years. Like a tiger in the jungle, once wounded and forever afterward a mortal enemy to all men. The yellow tiger eyes that waited for his answer were the eyes of a beast of prey.
He saw Yan Gon shake his round, bald head in warning. For all of his unworldliness, Yan Gon sensed the irrational fury in the man. But Tagashi was prepared to die.
“Yes, I regret it,” he said. “I let you live in hope for peace You did not accept peace, as I accepted it, with humility and gratitude.”
“A man is a poor man if he is humble and grateful.” The answer came with surprising calm. “Stay here, Tagashi—and you, too, priest—and listen to what I say to the American spy.”
It seemed to Paul that he saw everything with a new clarity he had never known before. After his weeks in the bamboo cage, in the heat and imprisonment of the jungle, this ruined room with its open, broken wall, with the cool mountain wind sweeping in, seemed to clear countless cobwebs from his mind. He felt renewed and fresh. The pain of his shoulder wound did not trouble him; it was as if the weakness of his body belonged somewhere else, and not with him.
Assignment Burma Girl Page 11