by John Harris
The Governor was quite open. ‘The Foreign Office in London considers the evacuation of useless mouths from the colony to be a sign of weakness,’ he said. ‘Why, I can’t imagine, because in France before Dunkirk it was considered good sense.’ The Governor allowed himself a small smile, as if the ways of the politicians in London were beyond him. ‘And it doesn’t seem to have been considered odd at Shanghai. True, Shanghai was our most isolated garrison. But here we have to look after ourselves, and there can be no more than two battalions to spare to come to our aid. So there you are, Mr Sarth, since the decision has been given to me I’m going to go ahead and evacuate everybody I can. I prefer to take no chances with women and children. They have no idea in London what it’s like out here.’
Willie smiled. ‘Did they ever have?’
Two of his ships, the Cenerentola and the Carpathian Prince, were soon engaged in transporting women and children to South Africa and India. A lot of them were Chinese who had worked with the British and knew that in the event of a Japanese attack they would be on the black list for liquidation. A few were unable to pay their fares and Willie shrugged.
‘Pack ’em in,’ he told his captains. ‘They can pay later.’
The evacuation marked one more step on the downward path. Evacuation might not be a sign of weakness but it was certainly a sign of nervousness. When Willie returned to Singapore he found Nadya had moved into a large rented house on the Bukit Timah road. She was delighted with the place. Singapore was beautiful, a city with green everywhere, with sports rounds, golf courses, parks and gardens, and a glimpse of the sea at every corner. Lying as it did for four miles along the coast, you could always catch a glimpse of a passenger liner, a junk, even a battered Sarth Line freighter, while Singapore River, stretching through the city, was alive with sampans. It was an exciting polyglot place with a tropical smell all of its own – of drains, swamplands, dried fish and spices – which once caught was never forgotten. You could buy anything you needed there from the latest fashions to the newest book from Kelly and Walsh’s store. Women could get a facial at the chemist’s in Raffles Place or meet friends in Robinson’s restaurant, yet the dripping jungle was still only just outside the city and at night the air was stiff with the sound of bullfrogs. You could pick orchids close to the house Nadya had rented or watch the monkeys near the tennis courts of the Tanglin Club, and nobody carried money because everything was paid for simply by signing a chit. There was only one drawback. Polly had still made no move to contact them and Nadya’s only attempt to contact Polly had come to nothing.
‘Leave it,’ Willie said. ‘She’ll come round eventually. In any case, we’re not staying here. You’ve got to learn to talk Australian.’
Nadya’s face changed. ‘But I don’t want to go to Australia,’ she said. ‘I don’t like Australians.’
‘Too forthright,’ Willie agreed cheerfully. ‘They’ll tell you your stuff’s decadent and that you’re charging too much. But that’s just the way they talk. They’re not stupid and they’ll do business. They’re doing business with me without trouble.’
‘William.’ He could see she was angry with him. ‘I’ve given up my home in St Petersburg, in Vladivostok, and now in Hong Kong. I’m not moving again.’
‘Yes, you are,’ he said. ‘Otherwise, I’ll be coming to fetch you out as I did in Vladivostok.’
She looked quickly at him. ‘Will it come to that?’
‘I’m sure it will.’
‘Have you warned Polly?’ Nadya was still unable to reject her stepdaughter, despite her stepdaughter’s refusal to accept her.
‘Polly’s all right,’ Willie pointed out. ‘Elliott’s American. That makes Polly and the children American and, since America’s not involved, she’s nothing to worry about and we can concentrate on our own affairs.’
Once again they began to pack their belongings and arrange to have what furniture they wished to take with them crated up and placed aboard the Cenerentola, bound for Sydney. Eventually Willie accompanied his wife on board the liner Orontes and kissed her goodbye. Her eyes were on his face as though she were afraid she might never see it again.
‘When will you come, William?’
‘When Singapore’s been evacuated.’
‘Will they evacuate it?’
He smiled. ‘Of course they will. They did Hong Kong. Singapore’s no safer.’
Two
Feelings in Singapore remained very much mixed. Nobody believed that the war could touch them but they welcomed the possibility of help all the same. There had been talk of an aircraft carrier arriving to assist the air defence if it came to that, but, while the idea was welcomed in the bars and clubs, Willie’s naval contact, a commander called Ruffard, who had been at school with Edward, considered the Admiralty and the politicians in London were talking through their collective hat.
‘It’s just a sop to the Australian government, who’ve blackmailed ’em into it,’ he said. ‘But Japan won’t be deterred by the presence of one carrier. She could easily detach four of her modern ships to deal with her. She’s got plenty.’
Nevertheless, in October Willie heard that the additional naval strength was to become a fact. The brand new Prince of Wales, at that moment in Cape Town, would be arriving shortly, and the battle cruiser Repulse, which was in Ceylon, was to join her to form a Far East squadron. Unfortunately, the aircraft carrier Indomitable, which was also to have joined, had been damaged in an accidental grounding, was not available, and was quietly forgotten.
Which, Ruffard observed, left the Prince of Wales and the Repulse entirely without air cover.
‘Charming,’ he commented.
The news of the impending arrival of the big warships made Willie wonder where Edward was. His last letter had indicated that he was still at the Admiralty but was expecting his fourth stripe and a return to sea duties, with the hope of a cruiser or a flotilla of new destroyers. It seemed to bring the war nearer and Thomas seemed to think the same. On Willie’s next visit to Shanghai, his son was waiting for him.
‘I’m going north, Father,’ he said. ‘The Chinese are still resisting and if it comes to a war between us and the Japanese I’d be legitimately involved anyway.’
‘Chungking?’ Willie asked.
‘No, Father. Not Chiang. I don’t trust him. His government’s decaying. There are too many offices available for purchase and too much venality and incompetence. It’s the old warlord system again run by officials instead of soldiers. I don’t trust Chiang. He’s not fighting for China, he’s fighting for his political future, and any man who can breach the Yellow River to stop the Japanese and drown around a million of his own countrymen in doing so doesn’t need my help.’
Willie had heard of the incident. Propaganda had made a lot of Chiang’s ‘sacrifice’, but few details had emerged.
‘I’m joining Mao Tse-Tung,’ Thomas went on.
‘You’ll get nowhere with the Communists, lad,’ Willie warned.
‘I’m not wanting to get anywhere, Father, and the Communists are at least fighting the Japanese. I just want you to look after Fanny and the boys.’
An anxious Fan-Su and the two boys, both sloe-eyed and black-haired like their mother, were placed aboard the Cenerentola bound for Sydney, and a cable was sent to Nadya asking her to find them a home. Willie was glad to see them safe.
‘They’re best out of here,’ he told Da Braga. ‘The bright days for Far East businessmen are over. Once the last of the treaty port system’s disbanded, it’ll never exist again.’
The Japanese had already more than once blockaded the foreign concessions on one pretext or another and, though it was still possible to move out, even through the Japanese lines, it was only at the cost of exhausting waits and humiliating searches. The Japanese were virtually in control.
‘What’s even worse,’ Willie growled, ‘are the smiles of the Chinese. They’ve no cause to love the Japanese – and it’s my guess they’ll have even less before long – but they know the
y’re putting down the mighty – us – who’ve lorded it over the East for so long.’
He visited Abigail’s grave and stood at its foot for a while. Dear loyal Ab. He could only remember her with the deepest affection. She had been a splendid wife, backing him up in everything he did, supporting his wilder dreams, forgiving him his trespasses, giving all and asking nothing.
Later he called on Da Braga and George Kee. Outside the shops in the Old City, even in parts of the International Settlement, were pictures of Chiang exhorting the Chinese to greater effort. The Japanese simply ignored them and they were a little pointless, anyway, with the Japanese everywhere in the city and allowing German supply ships to refuel in the river – swollen from lighters owned by Americans. Most of the Europeans and Americans had gone, though, their homes closed, their wives and children returned to their homelands, to India or South Africa, the few husbands still remaining hanging on to watch the businesses they owned or represented, living in hotels or on their own in their echoing houses.
Chinese refugees from the fighting were trying to crowd into the city bullied by the Japanese with their long swords and wooden revolver holsters, slapped, beaten, their possessions kicked and scattered, the few British troops still there powerless to do much beyond put in an appearance. The Japanese were still tolerating the British and the Americans, but, in fact, they were rarely seen. The Shanghai Times, trying to sit on both sides of the fence, was being sympathetic to them while not being unsympathetic to the Chinese. Japanese civilians were everywhere in their frock coats, striped trousers and spectacles, sometimes with Germans or Italians in uniform, and there were said to be German submarines in the estuary.
It looked grim, and the blockhouses containing British soldiers didn’t convince Willie, any more than the defiant magazines and the Pathé and Movietone news in the cinemas that the place was safe. So much so, he even sent a warning to Emmeline. After all, she was British and a woman and he had once been her lover. He had no affection for her at all these days, but the appearance of the city was sufficient to make him feel forgiving.
‘Tell Emmeline to get out,’ he asked Da Braga.
It got them nowhere. Da Braga showed him the reply. ‘Tell Mr Sarth to go to hell.’
‘She thinks we’re after Mason and Marchant’s,’ Da Braga said.
When Willie returned to Singapore, there was still no sign of any general evacuation. Singapore looked and smelled the same as it always had, with its vivid tropical colours, the laundry hanging from bamboo poles, the fish in the native quarters drying on the pavements, each portion the target of a million noisy flies.
The fact that London didn’t believe in everlasting peace was obvious from the troopships that kept arriving and the long columns of khaki-clad men who clambered aboard the waiting lorries in the docks to drive through the bedlam of straying chickens, rickshaws, natives and fast traffic to their camps.
Willie watched them with Commander Ruffard from the bund.
‘Think the build-up helps?’ he asked.
Ruffard was a cynic. ‘It doesn’t seem to the people here to presage turmoil and war,’ he smiled. ‘It merely adds an interesting ingredient to their existence.’
The soldiers themselves seemed totally unworried and even arrived in a holiday mood. After being penned up in the United Kingdom with its rationing and black-outs. Singapore was a paradise. They were young and for the most part untrained, and when Willie gave them lifts in his car, their naivety startled him.
‘It’ll all right,’ he was told. ‘The Nips are only little and they’re frightened of the dark. Besides, everybody knows they have bad eyesight. That’s why they’re such rotten pilots.’
‘Who told you that?’ Willie asked.
‘Everybody knows it. They’ve collected all their old kettles and kitchen utensils to turn ’em into aeroplanes, and their guns go back to 1900.’
The first acts of the new arrivals were to start inter-regimental battles, English against Scots, Scots against Australians, and they were totally ignored by the residents, who seemed even worse than the Shanghailanders in their indifference to what was happening. Since they spent all their time delivering snubs to the troops, the troops inevitably turned to the natives, who disliked the European residents as much as they did. Working about the camps, they questioned the new arrivals enthusiastically about their training and weapons, and proudly counted them as they paraded. Considering the posters, THE ENEMY IS LISTENING, that were displayed, it seemed to Willie that somebody had got things a little wrong and that the natives, some of them probably even Japanese, were doubtless passing on the information they picked up. Though sentries were warned of Fifth Columnists and told to shoot if they saw an eyelash moving, the natives were quite unconcerned and continued to smile and walk past them without fear. No one was shot.
Half-expecting to be asked to co-operate in an evacuation of women and children, Willie was surprised to find there was no sign of an attempt to remove the useless mouths. The Sarth Line had placed ships at the disposal of the authorities, but they were sailing practically empty. In fact, the authorities seemed to be against evacuation. The British women and children in Malaya were many times more numerous than those in Hong Kong, but, while it had been agreed that anyone who wished could leave voluntarily, with no discrimination of race or creed, no compulsory order was made, and remarkably few people were choosing to go.
Once again, Willie found people coming to him for his advice, which was always the same as it had been in Hong Kong – ‘Go while you can.’ There even seemed no sense in not evacuating the Chinese and Indians because they didn’t wish to travel to Britain, Australia, South Africa or India, which required large ocean-going ships. Most of them wanted only to reach the Netherlands East Indies, but, though there were plenty of suitable craft for such short coastal trips, they were not made available, and nobody took any positive steps to organise an evacuation.
From time to time Willie’s thoughts dwelt on Polly. He had not contacted her even now and he often wondered if she had ever regretted her decision never to have anything to do with Nadya. Was it simply because she couldn’t lose face? Face was important in the East and Polly had lived there long enough to have absorbed the idea behind it. In the end, he decided to chance it and drove out to her home. She met him with a suspicious look in her eyes, a grim determination not to give way, but then her expression crumpled and she ran forward and flung her arms round him, and he could hear her weeping.
‘Oh, Pa,’ she said. ‘It’s been so bloody long.’
‘Come off it, Poll,’ he said. ‘Some people go a whole lifetime without seeing their parents or their children. Especially out here.’
‘Yes, I guess so.’ He noticed her accent was becoming American, but that was natural enough because she’d been married to young Wissermann a long time now.
‘How’s Elliott?’ he asked.
‘Bit worried about the situation.’
‘He’s not the only one. Where is he?’
‘He’s in the States. He wants to transfer all Wissermann Far East operations to Hawaii or even San Francisco, but it’s not long since they were transferred from Shanghai and he’s afraid the shareholders won’t stand for it. He’s gone to try to convince them.’
Willie knew the way his son-in-law was thinking. The Japanese would inevitably want to move towards the British, Dutch and French areas of influence and, with France and Holland flat on their backs and Britain fighting for her life, the time was surely ripe.
Polly sighed. ‘He thinks nobody will believe there can be hostilities between Japan and the United States, and the shareholders won’t agree to a gap in trading and a loss of profits. I must admit, with talks going on with the Japanese in Washington, it doesn’t make much sense.’
‘It doesn’t have to, Polly.’
She gave him a worried look. ‘What’s going to happen, Pa? Will there be fighting here?’
Willie shrugged. ‘Japan’s only just to the nort
h, Poll, and that’s the best place in the world for an attack. And they’ve been building ships like hell’s delight for years. I know that for a fact. Everybody operating a tuppenny-halfpenny freighter knows it. They’re ready, even if we aren’t.’
‘Won’t we be all right. We’re Americans now.’
‘A bomb can’t read passports, Poll.’
‘But the British would never let Singapore go, Pa, would they? It’s the naval base for the Far East.’
‘Poll, I’m not trying to frighten you–’ Willie paused ‘–yes, by God, I am! I’m trying to frighten you like hell! Have you seen what we’ve got here to stop them? Out-of-date aircraft. A few old ships. Guns facing the wrong way.’
‘How can they be? They’d have to come from the sea.’
‘Suppose they come down the peninsula and in by the back door? You should be packing, Poll, and preparing to go to the States.’
‘I can’t, Pa. I’ve got to wait for Elliott to come back. I’ve got to be at his side.’
‘Poll, you said that in Yangpo and you had to run for your life. At least, send the kids away. Elliott’s mother would take them and they’d be a lot safer in San Francisco.’
He had obviously made her think and she frowned. ‘I’ll talk to Elliott about it when he gets back, Pa,’ she said.
‘Talk hard.’
‘It’ll soon be Christmas, Pa. Why don’t you come round? It never seems the same having Christmas without Santa Claus, a big turkey and lots of booze, but that seems silly here. In this climate, we’d all fall asleep with our heads on our plates.’ She paused. ‘But what about–?’
He could see she was uncertain, after all she’d said about Nadya. She probably found it hard to take it all back and wasn’t sure how to deal with it. He made it easy.
‘Nadya’s in Sydney,’ he said. ‘And I’m going to join her for Christmas.’
The two great ships which had been expected appeared at the beginning of December. Half Singapore turned out to watch them arrive. Despite Commander Ruffard’s pessimism, to Willie their sheer size seemed enough to frighten off any enemy. As they headed for their berths a squadron of Brewster Buffaloes howled overhead, snub-nosed heavyshouldered machines which, so rumour had it, looked a great deal better than they were.