The Name of Valour

by The Name of Valour (retail) (epub)

  ‘Hands up everyone who thinks we should go the long way around and follow the road that’s obviously heavily patrolled by the Japanese?’ asked Sheridan.

  Kerr put his hand up.

  ‘And hands up everyone who thinks we should avoid Japanese patrols by cutting across those hills?’

  Torrance, Rossi, Grant and MacLeod put their hands up.

  ‘Carried,’ said Sheridan.

  ‘The British Army is no’ a democracy!’ protested Kerr.

  ‘Aye, but Dr Sheridan’s a civilian,’ said Rossi. ‘And the military should always bow to civil authority.’

  Kerr furrowed his brow. ‘Is that true?’

  ‘Oh, yes!’ said Torrance. ‘First principal of military law.’

  They withdrew into the trees and traversed half a mile to a point where, after waiting for a suitable break in all the Japanese military traffic rumbling up and down the road, they dashed across to take cover in the trees on the other side. Beyond the road, they crossed the railway, rejoining the bank of the stream a few minutes later and following its course up into the hills. After a wearying slog lasting several hours, they crossed the saddle of a ridge between two thickly forested hilltops and emerged on to a ledge overlooking a small cluster of hills surrounded by limestone cliffs rising hundreds of feet above the jungle canopy a couple of miles away.

  They descended into the trees below, and another hour’s march brought them to the foot of the cliffs. Outcrops of mountain fern clung to the sheer rock, and hundreds of feet above, more foliage overhung the precipices at the foot of the ground that sloped back further up, less steep than the cliffs but not much, just enough to allow thick jungle to grow there in profusion. Following the base of the cliffs, they came to a flight of perhaps three hundred brightly painted wooden steps leading up to a huge opening, a natural arch only a few yards across at its base, the sides of the cave rising more than a hundred feet above before they met overhead.

  ‘This is the Batu Caves,’ said Sheridan. ‘It’s a Hindu shrine. Eric and I came here last summer.’

  ‘Hindus!’ said Kerr. ‘I thought Malaya was a Muslim country?’

  ‘They have Tamils too,’ said Sheridan. ‘There are over six hundred thousand Tamils living and working in Malaya, mostly plantation workers.’

  At the top of the steps they reached a platform below the entrance of the cave where a troop of macaques scampered about, fighting, rutting, and picking lice off one another and eating them. ‘Oh, aren’t they adorable!’ exclaimed Sheridan.

  Torrance nudged Kerr. ‘You never told me you had family out here,’ he said, breathing hard from the effort of climbing all those stairs. Glancing back down the steps, he was surprised by how far up they had climbed.

  Scowling, the lance corporal clenched his fists. ‘Right, that does it. I’ve had about as much of your cheek as I can stomach—’

  Torrance and Kerr were divesting themselves of their packs and webbing when a Hindu priest in saffron robes and a caste mark painted on his forehead emerged from the shadows of the cave to greet them with a namaste. ‘Please do not fight at this shrine, sahibs. It is sacred to Lord Murugan, the god of war.’

  ‘That’s lucky for you,’ Kerr told Torrance.

  ‘Okay, pack it in, you guys,’ said Sheridan. ‘Save it for the Japs.’

  She made namaste back to the priest. ‘I don’t suppose there’s anywhere near here where we can get some food, and a place to stay for the night?’

  ‘The house of Sri Murugan welcomes all who come with goodwill.’

  ‘For a minute there, I thought he was gaunae say Murugan welcomed all who came in peace,’ Rossi muttered to Sheridan.

  ‘Should we no’ leave our guns outside?’ asked MacLeod.

  The others turned to stare at him in disbelief.

  He blushed. ‘Well, you widnae take a gun in church, would you?’

  ‘Murugan’s a god of war,’ said Torrance. ‘He’s not likely to object to two Lee-Enfields, two tommy guns and a Bren.’

  The priest beckoned them to enter the cave. The air was dank and musty, though the relative cool was a welcome relief after the sultry heat of the day. Beyond the narrow opening, it widened out and they descended some steps into a vast, shadowy, echoing cavern. Water dripped constantly from the gnarled stalactites hanging from the ceiling hundreds of feet overhead. Here and there, groups of supplicants chanted prayers before little shrines which had been built inside the cave, where the glow of candles illuminated gaudily painted idols. There were natural openings in the ceiling through which the last rays of the setting sun illuminated some of the rocks above. Two dozen steps led up to another opening, beyond which Torrance saw a vast, sheer-sided natural shaft where ferns clung to the rocks, and a glow of natural light came from somewhere above.

  ‘I don’t suppose you know if the Japanese are in Kuala Lumpur yet, do you?’ he asked the priest.

  ‘There were no Japanese when I was there this morning. But the British are evacuating. I do not think they mean to hold the city.’

  In front of one of the shrines, an Indian woman in a sari wailed dolefully. ‘What’s the matter with her?’ MacLeod asked the priest.

  ‘Her husband was in Penang when the Japanese landed there. Today she learned he is dead.’

  ‘Silly sod should have got out with everyone else when Penang was evacuated, shouldn’t he?’ said Torrance, though he kept his voice low so the sobbing woman would not hear him.

  The priest gave him a funny look. ‘How could he? Her husband was an Indian.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So when your people evacuated Penang, only the white sahibs were allowed to leave. Malays, Indians, Chinese were all forbidden to board the ferry. Even half-castes were left behind, even if they were the spouses of white people.’

  ‘Cobblers!’ said Torrance. ‘I don’t believe it. That’s just anti-British propaganda, that is.’

  The priest shrugged. ‘I only tell you what I have heard.’

  ‘Well, you shouldn’t spread such rumours, should you? That’s just whipping up anti-British sentiment, that is. You’re doing the Japs’ work for them. Whose side are you on?’

  The priest showed them to a patch of dry ground where they could spread their groundsheets. ‘I will see to it that food is brought.’ He made namaste again and faded into the shadows.

  ‘Free grub?’ asked MacLeod. ‘That’s nice of them.’

  ‘Aye, well, I’m sure they’ll be expecting a contribution of some kind in return,’ said Rossi. ‘There are hundreds o’ religions in the world, but they all have one thing in common – an eagerness to separate their worshippers frae their hard-earned ackers.’

  ‘Teach you that in college, did they?’ asked Torrance.

  ‘You’ve been to college?’ MacLeod asked Rossi in surprise.

  ‘Oh, he was a bright boy, was our Gino,’ Torrance added before Rossi could get a word in edgewise. ‘Humble background, but he done good at school. They gave him a scholarship so he could go to college, that’s how bright he was.’ He turned to Rossi. ‘The capitalist system you so hotly deride paid for your education! So he goes to college, gets his head filled with all this commie claptrap about how the evil British Empire exploits the native populations of the countries it’s supposed to protect…’

  ‘Listen, pal, I didna have to go to college to know I was a socialist!’ said Rossi. ‘I learned that at my father’s knee, growing up in the slums of Glasgow, seeing every day how decent working folk are oppressed by their capitalist masters!’

  ‘So what does he do then?’ Torrance asked the others. ‘Goes out on a protest march, gets into a riot, and biffs some poor bobby on the nose. Thirty days in chokey and he’s kicked out of college.’

  ‘That proves my point! D’you think if I’d no’ been a scholarship boy, but a gentleman like Mr Erskine, they’d’ve given me thirty days? Aye, or kicked me out of college? But the dean just shakes his head, mutters something about how you canna make a silk purse out of
a pig’s ear, an’ that’s me out the door, isn’t it? It just goes to show you how the capitalists keep the working classes oppressed. I never stood a chance—’

  ‘You had every bloody chance! More of a chance than most of us get! You got a bleedin’ scholarship, didn’t you?’

  ‘Look, pal, I earned that scholarship.’

  ‘Yeah, and then you pissed it away!’ Torrance turned to the others. ‘And what does he do then? The ultimate hypocrisy… after all those years of complaining about the evils of the British Empire, he only bleedin’ joins the army so he can defend it!’

  ‘See you, it’s no’ so easy to be a man o’ principle when you’ve no job, no money and no prospects!’ Rossi tapped himself on the chest. ‘At least I’ve got principles, no’ like some I could name!’

  ‘Who takes first turn on stag?’ asked Torrance.

  ‘Jimmy and me will go first,’ said Grant. ‘Remember to save some of the grub for us.’

  ‘What the priest was saying about us abandoning the Asian population of Penang,’ said Sheridan. ‘I heard the same rumour.’

  ‘It’s bleedin’ fifth columnists spreading these vicious rumours,’ said Torrance. ‘It’s all bloody lies. The British Empire protects its subjects.’

  ‘Oh, aye,’ said Rossi. ‘Unless they’re having a peaceful meeting in Amritsar, or objecting to having opium imported into their country, or just starving in the streets of Cairo or Delhi. Then they can go to hell.’

  ‘Whose side are you on?’ demanded Torrance.

  ‘No’ the side of the bloody British Empire.’

  When the food came, it was some concoction of goat meat and rice, covered in a tasty curry sauce, and made a welcome change from bully beef. After they had eaten, Torrance pushed himself to his feet. ‘I’m gonna take a shufti around, see what I can see.’

  Sheridan also stood up. ‘Mind if I come with you?’

  ‘Be my guest.’

  ‘Dinna wander too far,’ warned Kerr. ‘Cave systems like this can be pretty labyrinthine, so dinna go exploring any dark and unlit passages. If you get lost, I’ll no’ come and look for you.’

  Torrance and Sheridan made their way up the steps leading to the chamber at the back of the cave. They found themselves standing at the bottom of a sinkhole, with sheer rock walls on all sides leading up to a patch of orange sky, the top of the shaft ringed with treetops so far above it made Torrance dizzy to gaze up at them. There was another cavern leading off to the left, but when he entered it to investigate, he found it led nowhere.

  ‘This ain’t good,’ he said.

  ‘No?’ said Sheridan. ‘I think it’s kinda magical myself. You can see why the Hindus look at a place like this and think it’s holy.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant. It’s a rat-trap – only one way in and one way out.’

  After midnight, Torrance found himself taking a turn on stag at the entrance to the cave complex with Rossi. ‘D’you have to wind up Primsie so much?’ asked Rossi.

  ‘No,’ said Torrance. ‘But it’s fun. Anyway, he winds me up. I don’t know what the army was thinking of when it gave him a tape.’

  ‘It was probably thinking it would rather give you one, if only you had some respect for authority.’

  ‘That’s rich, coming from a bleedin’ commie.’

  ‘How many times do I have to tell you? I’m no’ a commie, I’m a socialist.’

  ‘Same difference.’

  ‘My arse. A socialist disnae believe that all men should be rewarded equally, regardless of how much or how little work they do, and a socialist accepts that some areas of an economy are better served by competition. And unlike you, socialists accept authority, as long as it’s properly constituted. You joined the army o’ your own free will, same as me – you should accept that means putting yourself under the discipline o’ NCOs like Primsie, even if you don’t always agree with the decisions they make. If you’re no’ prepared to take responsibility yourself, you’re in no position to criticise the decisions others make on your behalf. Anyway, we’re in it now. If we’re gaunae get back to our mob, we’re gaunae have to work together.’

  ‘Cobblers,’ said Torrance.

  Perhaps it was the creepy surroundings of the cave with all its strange Hindu idols, or perhaps the curried goat disagreed with his digestion, but that night Torrance was disturbed by strange dreams.

  When he woke up, Rossi was shaking him by the shoulders. ‘Grab your tommy gun and pack and shift your arse. The Japs are here!’

  Twelve

  Rossi grabbed the Bren and Torrance grabbed MacLeod’s pack, which he knew contained the spare magazines for it. Sheridan sat up, rubbing sleep out of her eyes. ‘What’s happening?’

  ‘Japs,’ Torrance told her curtly.

  There were no worshippers present at any of the shrines: Torrance and his companions had the place to themselves. He made his way with Kerr and Rossi to where Grant and MacLeod were back on sentry-go. Though it was not yet dawn, the lightening sky to the east silhouetted the mountains clearly, while the plain of plantations to the west seemed to fade into the indigo of night. Crouching at the top of the stairs, Kerr clutched his Thompson, watching five vehicles parked at the bottom, a good hundred feet below: three Bedford lorries, a Humber wireless truck and a Riley Kestrel, of all things. Japanese soldiers poured out of the Bedfords and charged up the steps. It would take a minute or two for them to reach the top.

  Grant set up the Bren as best he could. It had not really been designed for firing down a flight of steps – the bipod fixed to the underside of the barrel was useless in such circumstances – and he had difficulty getting comfortable. Torrance crouched by the balustrade at the top and pulled back the cocking handle of his Thompson, while Rossi worked the bolt action of his rifle.

  ‘Wait till I give the word,’ ordered Kerr.

  Between the Bren, the two Thompsons and the two rifles, they had sufficient firepower to wreak havoc on the Japanese climbing the steps, at least until their ammo ran out. But the closer they let the Japanese get before opening fire, the more Japanese they would kill and the less ammo they would waste. If they could inflict enough slaughter on the first wave, the men of the second wave would not be in such a hurry to make an attack. After all, they did not have to attack, provided they could spare enough men to guard the foot of the steps for a few days. The stairs were the only way in or out of the caves, and five men could hold them just as effectively from below as from above. And the men below had the luxury of being able to call on extra ammunition if they needed it, not to mention food.

  The Japanese soldiers, who had started up the stairs at a run, had now slackened their pace to a walk as exhaustion began to take its toll. It was a longer climb than it looked from below. There were a dozen of them: another two dozen waited by the trucks. Whoever was in command of this lot was evidently no fool, holding the bulk of his men in reserve.

  ‘How did they find us so quickly?’ wondered MacLeod.

  ‘Enough people saw us arrive,’ said Rossi. ‘Any one of them might have tipped off the Japs.’

  While the soldiers charged up the steps, a handful of officers had gathered by the Kestrel. There was something familiar about one of them, though at such a great distance Torrance could not be sure. ‘Lend us the binns a moment, Primsie.’

  ‘Get your own bloody binoculars! What d’you want them for?’

  ‘One of the blokes standing by the black car… is that who I think it is?’

  Kerr raised the field glasses to his eyes. ‘Bloody hell! It’s Funf! What the hell’s he doing here?’

  Torrance remembered the geological survey in his pack and felt a cold, uncomfortable stirring in the pit of his stomach. Was that what Ziegler had been looking for when he got the Sakai warrior to lead him to the wreck of that aeroplane they had found in the jungle? He wondered if he should say something to the others, and decided against it. At best they would demand a share of the gold, at worst start making ridiculous suggestions l
ike handing the survey over to someone in authority. ‘Beats me, Primsie.’

  The ascending Japanese made no attempt at concealment, not that the steps offered any: possibly they had not yet noticed the five Argylls awaiting them at the top. From below, in the dingy light, their khaki uniforms would have shown up as no more than shadows against the pale rock behind them.

  Kerr waited until they were only thirty steps away before giving the order. ‘Open fire!’

  Torrance started firing short, controlled bursts from his Thompson while Grant swept the Bren left and right, scything the Japanese down. A couple of them threw themselves flat and tried to return fire with their rifles: Torrance saw the flash of their muzzles in the gloom and heard the bullets sough over his head. When there were only a few left standing, they turned and tried to run back down the stairs, but it was hopeless: Torrance and Kerr left them for Rossi and MacLeod to pick off with their rifles, which they managed effortlessly, leaving a dozen shapeless huddles sprawled on the stairs.

  ‘That should give ’em something to think about.’ Torrance unclipped the spent magazine from his Thompson and took a fresh one from a utility pouch, slotting it on to the receiver in front of the trigger-guard. Now the immediate danger was past, he became aware of an uncomfortable pressure in his bladder. He wondered if the others would mind if he disappeared back into the caves for a moment to relieve himself.

  One of the Japanese lying on the steps wailed something in his own language.

  ‘Sounds like one of them’s only wounded,’ said MacLeod. ‘Should I put him out o’ his misery?’

  ‘Can you tell which one it is?’ asked Torrance.

  ‘No…’

  ‘You’d better save your ammo, then, hadn’t you?’

  ‘What happens now?’ asked Rossi.

  ‘We wait, I suppose,’ said Kerr. ‘Not much else we can do. The ball’s in their court.’

  Torrance did not like that. This was not a game of tennis, and he knew the advantage could be taken by whoever was willing to seize the initiative. He craned his neck to look at the cliffs above them. ‘Is there any way up there, d’you reckon?’