The Gift of Rain: A Novel

by Tan Twan Eng

  A willow drooped over a pond, its surface rippling with the kisses of sparkling carp. A figure crouched at the edge of the pond, feeding them. I leaned my bicycle against a tree and walked down the grassy slope toward him. He smiled when he saw me, scattering the last of the breadcrumbs into the pond, brushing his hands against his trousers.

  “What mischief have you been up to now?” he asked.

  He used the exact words my father had often spoken to me and William and I had to shake off the sense that every step of my life had been charted long before I was born. It was the war, I thought. It had fractured and dislocated everything I had known.

  “I need to see you and Hiroshi-san,” I said. Endo-san nodded, and I followed him into the consulate. It was, in comparison with the garden, busy and energetic. Army officers, all in their teal green uniforms, carried documents and walked with brisk purpose. I was led into Hiroshi’s office. He looked up and saw Endo-san behind me and I caught a hurriedly hidden look of triumph in his eyes.

  “I wish to offer my services to your government,” I said. “I believe the ambassador in Kuala Lumpur, Saotome-san, would approve it.”

  I had rehearsed the words all the way from home, muttering them as I cycled, but still it felt difficult to utter them now. They came out from within me, unwilling to take form in the air, only wishing to melt into my breath. I was choosing a path that had the strongest chance of saving all of us, all of my family, and I would take it. There was a war on and surely no one could blame me—or would even remember, when it was all over.

  “We had considered asking you to assist us in the daily affairs of running this island,” Hiroshi said, indicating for me to sit down. I remained standing. “You have the language skills and the understanding of our culture to help implement our policies.”

  “He can assist me,” Endo-san said.

  “I have one request: let my father continue to run his company after you’ve taken over Malaya.”

  “All businesses will be brought under the authority of the Japanese government. But I suppose Mr. Hutton’s expertise and experience will be useful,” Hiroshi said. “We shall see what sort of role he can still play within your family’s company.”

  He came around his desk and put his hand on my shoulder. “Since you are going to be a member of the consulate, the first thing you should do is to show your respect.” He turned me around to the portrait of the emperor that hung on the wall. I knew what was required and so I bowed low and respectfully to it.

  Chapter Three

  My father had told me to make sure that Isabel changed her appearance as much as possible before traveling up to Penang Hill. I stood over her as one of the maids, who earned a little extra money as hairdresser to the other servants, cut her hair in the courtyard outside the kitchen.

  “This is undignified,” Isabel complained as she sat on a high stool, a sheet from the Straits Times draped around her shoulders.

  “Father’s orders,” I said.

  She did not respond. The incident with the two Japanese who had threatened to requisition our home had strained the relationship between us. I still felt the sharpness of her words, how unjustified they were, and found it difficult to forgive her.

  “It’s for your own good. The more you look like a man, the safer you’ll be,” I said. “I’ve laid out William’s clothes in your room. You can put them on when you’re done.”

  I left her and went inside the house.

  With her shortened hair and wearing his clothes, Isabel could have been William, and for a moment we felt his absence sharply. My father said, “Good Lord!” Even Edward was quiet. Isabel laughed weakly to shake us out of our despondency. Peter MacAllister embraced her and I turned away, feeling an emptiness inside. I was feeling anxious about breaking the news of my association with the Japanese government to my father.

  “There’re more refugees fleeing the Jap army,” MacAllister said. He had been spending more time at Istana, talking to my father, who was slowly coming to accept his presence in our lives. “I met some of them on the quay today. Most had escaped with only a suitcase.”

  “We can put some of them up here,” my father offered.

  MacAllister shook his head. “They don’t want to be in Penang.

  They want to get as far away as possible. In fact, they urged us to leave as well.”

  We had been receiving almost continuous reports of Japanese victories. The entire east coast had been taken, as had the northern states of Perlis and Kelantan near the border with Thailand. Years from now historians would reveal how unprepared the British government had been, how carelessly it had disregarded Japan’s plans for invasion. But for now there was only a flood of fleeing refugees, mostly Europeans who had made their homes in Malaya.

  “I’m not leaving, Peter. I’ve told you that,” my father said. He looked at me. “How could I face the people who work for us if we packed up and ran and left them to the Japs?”

  I had noticed a change in the way Endo-san’s people were now referred to. No longer were they the more polite “Japanese,” but “the Japs” or, as was more common now, “the bloody Japs.”

  “Apparently the bloody Japs are traveling all over the country on bicycles,” MacAllister told us. I kept silent, recalling a conversation with Endo-san on the train from Kuala Lumpur as the carriage moved through the damp, sparkling jungles.

  “Nothing can penetrate this,” he had said as the massive columns of trees sped by, wrapped in thick ferns and high vegetation. Many of the fig trees were buttressed at their bases with triangular wedges of roots that grew as thick and high as walls.

  “That’s not true,” I had said. “Many of the locals here either walk or use a bicycle. There are jungle tracks, even though you can’t see them. William once told me you can get good maps of them from the Forestry Department.”

  “Can one obtain those maps easily?”

  “I suppose so. I’ll ask,” I said and a week after I returned from Ipoh I managed to provide Endo-san with the maps.

  MacAllister gave Isabel a hug. “I can’t see you off tomorrow, darling. Have to go back to K.L. and see to my firm.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ll be with her.”

  “You must look after your sister,” he said. “Can you picture it, a bunch of slit-eyed monkeys on bicycles taking over our country?”

  “Well, they’re succeeding, aren’t they?” my father said.

  My father had insisted that the female staff at home and at the office hide out at our house on Penang Hill with Isabel. Most, though grateful for the offer, preferred to stay with their families but some had decided to come with us.

  “What about Ming?” I asked Uncle Lim as he drove us to the funicular station at the foot of The Hill. My father followed behind us in the Daimler with the maids who had chosen to go up The Hill.

  “She will be protected in the village. It is too far out of town for the Japanese to pay attention to it anyway.”

  “And you?”

  “I’ll stay with Mr. Hutton of course,” he said. His loyalty to Noel was beyond question, but I suspected his real reason for remaining was his obligation to my grandfather, the nature of which he refused ever to tell me despite my most inquisitive efforts.

  At the funicular station we joined a long line of people carrying bags and food. It appeared that we were not the only ones who had thought of sending the women up.

  “At least this lot haven’t run away,” Isabel said.

  I said nothing, although I felt the pain of the awkwardness that had driven us apart. I realized she was attempting a reconciliation but I felt constrained by the residue of my stubborn anger.

  The crowd was made up of English, Chinese, and Malay women. The English women had brought their dogs with them and these barked and pulled at their leashes, adding to the noise of farewells and the tears of the children. My father left us to speak to them.

  “How horrible,” Isabel said as we watched him reassure the women.
“Remind me never to turn into a doting old woman more concerned about her dogs than about people.”

  “Well, you English all turn out the same eventually anyway,” I said without thinking. She punched my arm lightly, as she often did when she feigned disgust at my words and, just like that, I felt a lightening of the resentment against her.

  “I’m sorry about the other day,” she said, looping her arm to mine and pulling me into an embrace. “You were quite right: we should’ve talked them into leaving the house.”

  I waved her apologies away, relieved that the coolness that had developed between us since that day now appeared to be fading. “We were all in a rather emotional state.”

  “Not you,” she said. “I envy you. I don’t have the strong control over my emotions that you have. William always said that you were the most detached, the most unflappable of all of us. The most English, as it were.”

  I was struck silent by what she had said. Was that how I appeared to my family—cold and unemotional, when I had only been trying to hide my uncertainties about my place in the scheme of things? I felt on the point of incredulous, even bitter, laughter.

  My father came back to us and embraced Isabel as the line started to move. “Be careful,” he said. “Once things have settled down, I think you should marry Peter.”

  Isabel held him harder. “Thank you, Father.”

  He pulled away and spoke to the women from our home. “I hope you’ll be safe from harm. I’ll pray for your safety. God be with you all.”

  They thanked him and a few wiped away their tears. He turned to me. “Take care of them. I’ll send a car to meet you here tomorrow morning.” He became quiet. “What I said, the other day . . . when those Japs came into the house ...” he began.

  I stopped him. “You don’t have to say anything more.”

  He looked at me gratefully and then embraced me with an intensity I was surprised to find that I had yearned for from him all my life. “You’re a good boy,” he said and kissed me quickly on my cheek.

  He watched us until we were all packed into the wooden funicular. The doors could not slide shut and one of the women—I recognized her as Mrs. Reilly, a jeweler’s wife—had to get off and wait for the next one. The funicular shuddered, slid back down the slope, and then, as the tram at the top of the hill started to move down, the pulleys began spinning and slowly pulled us up. We hung onto the railings; all the seats had been taken by plump middle-aged women who were fanning themselves furiously, like birds flapping their wings in an overcrowded cage. We rattled over the tracks and I felt the heat surrender slowly to the cooler air as we were hauled up by the downward momentum of the descending tram.

  At the summit, as we were coming out from the station, a formation of fighter planes flew past and dropped down onto Georgetown. I counted more than fifty of them. The sun caught the crimson circles on their bodies and wings and made them look like open wounds. Their silver, piscine bodies darkened into specks as they lost altitude. A few minutes later we saw smoke puff up from the harbor.

  “They’re bombing the town,” Isabel said. “God damn them!”

  The clouds of smoke grew into plumes, black and thick. The planes flew over the town as more bombs were dropped. Out in the harbor the small naval fleet seemed to spin round and round in confused circles, like dizzy ducks in a pond. Some of the ships caught fire, exploded, and began to sink. The women around us became distraught and one of them started to scream, saying she had to go home. “They’ll come for us, they’ll come for us,” she moaned.

  “She’s right. What if they start bombing The Hill?” Isabel asked.

  “They won’t,” I said, remembering the mock-Tudor house Endo-san had been interested in, the house from which one could see all the oceans that surrounded us, especially when equipped with a powerful set of telescopes.

  Isabel heard the certainty in my voice and decided she did not want to argue with me. We made our way to Istana Kechil. After I helped unpack the supplies of food I told her, “I’m going for a walk.”

  It seemed such a long time since I had been up here with Endo-san, proudly showing him the beauty of The Hill. Now that his actions were clear to me, I felt a hollow sense of loss. Strange that I could feel no trace of anger toward him, only despair. It felt almost as though I had been expecting it. He had betrayed my innocence, but at the same time had replaced it with knowledge and strength and love. I wondered if there was some deficiency in my own being that I could accept his treachery with such calm or whether my training in zazen had been more effective than I had thought, rendering me unflappable as Isabel had pointed out.

  I went off the road at the junction leading to the mock-Tudor house and made my way carefully down a grassy slope. Even here, I could still see smoke from the harbor and parts of the town and I tried not to worry about my father, hoping he had gone

  straight home as he had promised. I crawled and half crouched as I came to the back entrance. The gate was rusty and vines had woven their way into the metal fence. I shook it, saw that it would hold, and climbed over.

  The house appeared empty but I waited, hidden behind a rose bush, straining to hear the running pads of dogs. After a minute I ran to the wall of the house and leaned against it. I peered into the darkened windows but could not see within. I continued to edge along the wall until I came to the corner, and there I stopped. There was a large metal structure, almost like a tiny crane, on the lawn. A square meshed antenna spun endlessly on it, like an untiring flycatcher. I knew, however, that this thing was not to catch insects and pests but radio signals. Beside the antenna was a pole, from which a flag fluttered, like a fish’s tail. The whiteness of the flag only made the red circle on it brighter, more menacing.

  The doors to the balcony diagonally above me opened and I heard footsteps, the click of a lighter and then voices. The faint smell of tobacco drifted down to me. From my hiding place I could just see two men; they appeared to be civilians.

  “Has the fleet received the message?”

  “Hai, Colonel Kitayama,” a younger man’s voice replied.

  “The bombing was a success?”

  “Hai, Colonel Kitayama.”

  “Inform General Yamashita.”

  I decided I had heard enough and quietly went out the way I had entered.

  I left early before dawn after saying good-bye to Isabel. On the previous evening she and I had sat in the candlelight and talked through the night, something we had never done before.

  “What does it feel like to be in love?” I asked her. “You’ve been in love so many times now, first with that boy from the Straits Trading Company, then with that American writer, and then with that farmer from Australia ...”

  “The list is endless, isn’t it?” she gave a wry smile. “What I once felt for them—it’s a far cry from what I feel for Peter now,” she said. “Peter has a lot of faults—we all do—but love makes you overlook them, and try to see what is good. I couldn’t have done that before—at the first sign of weakness I dropped the men I thought I loved. It’s different now. By the way, I should apologize for his remark about slit-eyed monkeys.”

  I waved it away and poured her another glass of wine. Being Isabel she had ensured there was a generous supply of the good things in life, even while hiding from the Japanese.

  “What do you see in someone who is so much older than you?” I asked.

  She took some time to craft her reply. I could see the various forms she wanted it to take, before she discarded them and created a new one. “I’m attracted by his wisdom, his sense of already knowing who he is and what he wants from life. I don’t want his money, though he’s got plenty of that.”

  “Love’s not love / When it is mingled with regards that stand, / Aloof from th’ entire point,” I said, quoting one of our father’s favorite lines.

  “At least one of us managed to absorb something during those long evenings when he read King Lear to us,” she said with a sideways glance.

 
; I made the choice then to tell her about my decision to work for the Japanese, certain she would understand. But she was first aghast—and then furious. “How could you? Knowing what kind of savages they are?”

  “I think I can safeguard our family’s interests.”

  She sat quietly for a while and I was afraid that the state of tension which we had resolved at the funicular station had arisen between us again. Then she sighed. “You’re a fool, little brother,” she said—not unkindly—and I saw pity in her eyes. “I would die before I’d even consider working for them.”

  We parted the blackout curtains and went out into the garden, our bare feet crushing beads of dew on the lawn, sending up the tangy scent of the night, as though we had walked across a carpet of spices. For one moment I felt as if the war had not begun and that we were here on holiday again.

  The lights of the city down below had been extinguished and the only illumination came from the fires which were still ravening. Now and then, as they found a new source of energy to feed on, there would be a surge of flame and the light would reach higher into the sky, tainting it crimson, burning out the clusters of stars.

  “I hope they’re safe at home,” Isabel said. I pulled her shawl around her shoulders. She looked up into my eyes and leaned against me.

  “They’ll be safe,” I said and I repeated the words, as though to reassure myself. “They’ll be safe.”

  My father and I waited a few days before trying to get to the office for we had been warned not to do so until the situation had stabilized. The policemen, dockworkers, and public servants had already disappeared and looting was rife.

  It was one thing to see the smoke from The Hill and another to actually see the damage inflicted on the town. The roads into Georgetown had been badly damaged. Rows of shophouses had gone up in flames and fires still burned, for the fire station had been bombed. Bodies were scattered in the streets, many of them people who had come out to see what the noises from the sky were, only to be torn to pieces by machine-gun strafing. Rats ran unhindered, without their usual fear. There was a terrible smell that clung to the air, mixed with the smoke of burning timber and cured rubber that lay thick along the harbor. I was hardly able to endure the stench.