by Tan Twan Eng
I called out to my father, I called to the prisoners on either side of my cell, but they had not heard of Noel Hutton. It was only on the day they took me to face the Tribunal set up to hear my crimes that I saw him.
I was grieved by his appearance. He walked like an old man, with small, tentative steps, no longer sure of his path. But when he was placed next to me, he gave a shadow of his old smile and asked, “You did what had to be done?”
“Yes, Father. Did they hurt you?”
He shook his head. “They treated me with great civility. Largely, I think, due to Mr. Endo’s intervention.”
The Japanese never did things in half measures. Throughout my association with them I had seen the lengths they would go to just to prove their point. So it was with my punishment.
Hiroshi decreed that the evidence against me, which consisted mainly of Goro’s testimony, was overwhelming. I had passed information to the enemy and I had played a part in the murder of Saotome, whose body had been thrown into the entrance of the Kempeitai headquarters in Ipoh even while I had been wandering around lost in the jungle. I was to be executed in the field outside the Fort. Noel Hutton was to be imprisoned for harboring me, for being the father of a traitor.
I steeled myself to receive the expected judgement with equanimity for my father’s sake. When I turned to look at him he nodded once to himself and I saw in his face the same expression he always had whenever his commercial negotiations reached an impasse. During those negotiations he would often find a solution, but not now. There was none.
“I’ll find a way to get you out,” he said.
I wondered if his mind had been affected. His eyes were extraordinarily bright, shining with a certainty I felt was misplaced. He spoke to Endo-san. “You know the war is as good as over, yet still you persist in carrying out this travesty—this perversion.”
“My duty continues right to the end of the war,” Endo-san replied, before we were led out into the sun and taken back into the lightless world of the Fort.
Endo-san visited me daily. I asked to be allowed to see my father but I was refused. On the last evening of the day before I was to be executed, I knew the restraints I had bound over my emotions would soon break. I felt time draining away and there was nothing I could do to halt it.
Endo-san came later than usual that day. The lock rattled and the door was opened. I stood up from the wooden pallet that was my bed as Endo-san entered.
“Let me see him,” I said.
“You will see him tomorrow,” he said. “Do not worry about your father. He is well. I have been speaking to him these past few days. I have just come from his cell.”
“What did he say? Did he have a message for me?”
Endo-san shook his head.
In spite of myself I had been hoping that my father could somehow put everything right again, as he had done when I was a child. But I was on my own now.
“Will you make sure he is safe? That no harm comes to him?” I asked.
“I will ensure that he has what he requires,” Endo-san said.
“I do not want to see him tomorrow,” I said. “I do not want him to be there. Can you at least see to that?”
“I will try,” he said. “I have also requested the return of your sword to me.”
“I never used it to kill,” I said. I should have, I thought. I should have sliced Yong Kwan’s throat. Perhaps then Kon would still be alive.
“That is good,” Endo-san said.
“So it is ending the way it always has,” I said. “In a way, you will be killing me again.” I had to fight with all my strength not to collapse under my fears but he saw my struggle.
“Would you like me to stay here with you tonight?”
“Yes,” I said. “I would.”
Chapter Sixteen
News travels fast in a small place like Penang. I remember how everyone used to be related, or connected, or knew each other. Somehow we always knew if a man was having an affair or if a woman loved her drink too much. Once I played truant and spent the day in the streets of Georgetown. When I returned home that evening my father was waiting for me. I had been seen and the news was passed to someone who then felt bound to let him know.
I was certain the Jipunakui had also helped in letting the people know of the fates of the last of the Huttons. On the day I was brought to the field outside Fort Cornwallis a crowd had already gathered, restless and eager. My father was there, and my heart sank. So Endo-san had failed me in spite of my pleas.
The crowd’s reactions were mixed. Many perceived me as a traitor who had collaborated with the Japanese. These jeered and threw stones at me and were immediately dragged out by the Japanese soldiers and beaten. Once again, I thought, how could we ever understand these savage, cultured, brutal, yet refined people?
There were some in the crowd whom I had helped and they stood in silence. In the mass of faces I thought I saw Towkay Yeap’s and I wished I could tell him about Kon, how he had longed to come home.
I shifted between times, seeing my mother as she lay dying beneath her sheets, seeing Aunt Mei smile at me as we sat in her house. I saw Endo-san the day he took me to his island but we rowed on and on and then he was gone, and I was left alone on my boat, the oars somehow in my hands. I closed my eyes and attempted to harness whatever strength remained in me.
When it was read out that I had passed information to the secret societies the jeers were silenced and, like the whisper of a breeze the crowd started chanting our family name. The sound swelled and filled the sky, strong as the monsoon winds. Goro fired a few shots into the air but the sullen silence that descended was even more powerful than the chanting.
The once immaculate padang where people had played cricket was littered with stones and bald patches of sand showed through the dry grass. In the middle of it was a square of blinding-white sand, perfectly raked. A wooden post had been planted in its center, jutting out like a desiccated tree trunk in the desert. I was made to kneel on the sand and Goro tied me to the post. I held my father’s eyes in mine and whispered, “Forgive me. You shouldn’t be here.”
He shook his head gently. “You did what you had to do, what you could do.”
“I’m so, so sorry.” I felt the closeness of tears behind my eyes and I resolved not to let anyone see them.
Endo-san walked up to me. Time seemed to turn around again, for was he not in the very same clothes I had seen him wearing, when I was deep in zazen, as he prepared to cut me centuries ago? The black robes with the beautiful gold trimmings looked similar; only this time his hair was short, he did not have a top-knot, and in his hand he held his Nagamitsu sword.
He stood before me. It was true. It was happening, time was running backward. There on his face was the same expression I had seen then. I felt faint, yet there was no fear, only a recognition that he had been right all along. He said to me: “Your father will die. But you will live.”
“No! That was not what I asked of you!”
He turned to look at my father. I saw them exchange glances and I knew that another agreement had been made, one that had excluded me. They brought my father next to me and he knelt heavily; I could even hear the popping of his joints. I pulled at my ropes and screamed at Endo-san.
“It’s no use shouting. There’s nothing you can do to change this,” my father said softly. “Show some dignity before the people of Penang.”
I stopped my struggle. “Why?”
He gave me his beautiful smile but he chose not to reply. Instead he asked, in an almost childlike voice, “Will it hurt?”
“No,” I said. From the depths of my knowledge, of my lives lived, I could say to him, “It won’t hurt. They’ll do it properly.”
And then the crowd began to whisper our name again, like a wave beginning far out at sea, growing in strength as it surged toward the shore. Endo-san gave a warning to Goro and the Japanese soldiers not to fire their weapons. The chanting “Hutton! Hutton!” rolled on, increasing in volu
me and emotion.
“Listen to that!” my father said. “Make our name live on. Let it always have those qualities associated with it. Only the good.”
Endo-san removed my father’s chains and made him comfortable. Goro, feeling cheated, protested but Endo-san said, “He dies a free man.”
My father squeezed his wrists and then placed them behind his back. How often had I seen him walk, enjoying his garden, with his hands clasped behind him? He straightened his back and lifted his chin.
Endo-san stood up, bowed his head for a moment and unsheathed his katana. It came out silently, like a ray of sunlight piercing through a bank of rain-cloud and just as brilliant. He bowed low to my father. “I would be honored if you would allow me to complete this.”
My father dipped his head in assent and then opened his eyes, which blazed brighter than I had ever seen them. He looked up to the sun, now rising rapidly, feeling its warmth for the last time. The clock tower struck half past nine as the morning wind cooled our burning faces and lifted his hair.
He reached across and stroked my head. “Never forget you are a Hutton. Never forget you are my son.”
Endo-san bowed again and raised his sword. I recognized that stance. Happo. Both hands brought to the right shoulder, feet planted firmly on the ground, the sword raised like the purest voice to Heaven. The chanting of the crowd quickened and I found my lips moving along to the cadence of our name.
I forced myself to watch. I told myself that I would not turn away, that I would be with my father to the end. Endo-san took a breath in and brought the blade down. The crowd was silenced. High up in the sky, unseen, a squadron of Halifaxes could be heard on their daily run.
Endo-san arranged for my father to be buried in the grounds in Istana, next to William’s memorial stone, and not displayed publicly as Hiroshi and Fujihara had wanted. Days after his death I was led out of Fort Cornwallis, weak and half blinded by the light reflecting off the walls, the godly light of Penang that I loved so much. I had not eaten anything and the water left daily by Endo-san had stagnated as I lay curled in a corner. I did not speak to Endo-san during his visits and left his questions unanswered.
I was released and placed under house arrest, which meant I was restricted to Istana and in Endo-san’s custody.
“Did Hiroshi order my release?”
“Hiroshi-san is dying. I issued the order.”
As we drove to Istana I wound down the windows and, for the first time in days, I breathed clean, true air. I still could not feel anything of the layers of events piling upon each other.
I had slept badly in my cell, pursued by vivid dreams and memories. Now, as we drove along the winding coastal road I felt my wounds being soothed by my old friend, the sea. How many times had I made this journey with my father? He was often a source of the most bizarre information—”There’s that tree where the branch fell on the resident councillor’s car and broke his wrists”—”That house there has an underground secret passageway leading to the beach”—”That stall serves the best assam laksa money can buy.”
Everything I knew of my home I had learned from my father.
And I would never see him again.
Endo-san put his hands on my shoulders and turned me around. I tried not to flinch, but he saw my swiftly hidden expression and let go of me. I went out to the balcony outside my room, its tiles still hot from the day, pleasurable under my feet. The sea was turning red as the sun dropped and his island lay innocent, fired by the light like a pot placed in a kiln. Clouds of birds circled it, flying in from the corners of the sky. Brahminy kites floated on the heated air. Reluctant to return home, they soared endlessly like mythical creatures that never needed to touch the earth, not even once in all their lives.
“Thank you for arranging the funeral,” I said in a formal tone, and bowed to Endo-san. In my mind I still saw those kites in the sky and I envied them.
From within his yukata he removed an envelope. “Your father requested writing materials the last time I visited him.”
I received the envelope with both hands. He continued, “You are of course still under house arrest. You are not allowed to leave Istana without my authority. I have your sword in my care. You are not allowed to carry it. Please see to it that you obey these orders. I would find it difficult to intercede on your behalf again.”
He put his arms around me once more and held me in a strong embrace. And then he left me there on the balcony, alone except for a scattering of evening stars.
He appeared on the beach moments later, walking stiffly, leaving smudges on the sand behind him. He pulled his boat down to the water, climbed in, and rowed across to his home.
I opened the envelope and read the shaky writing and the unwavering words.
Fort Cornwallis Prison
Penang
31st July, 1945
My dearest son,
There are so many things unspoken between us and now time has decreed that we shall never have the moment to voice them.
I was initially distraught at your relationship with Mr. Endo and with the Japanese. They are a cruel people—perhaps no more cruel than the English or the Chinese, some would argue—but I will never fully comprehend them or their unnecessary savagery. My distress at your closeness with Mr. Endo was somewhat lessened by the influence he has had on you: learn from him, for he has much to impart, but make your own decisions. Do not let your ties to the past—or fear of the future—direct the course of your life, because, however many lives we have ahead of us to redeem and repair our failings, I feel we have a God-given duty to live this life as best we can.
I have known for some time of some of your humanitarian activities—the father of your friend often kept me informed of the good you have achieved while working for Mr. Endo. Thus, on the day of my death, I can walk out with my head held high, secure in the knowledge that none of my children—not one—ever took the easy road; that they strove to keep sanity, reason, and compassion alive and burning in these tragic times.
Mr. Endo and I have spoken much during these last days. I have finally gained a sense of who and what he is and was and I feel I can trust him with my life. Such different beliefs we have! But having spent all my life out here in the East, I sense more than a grain of truth in his.
I have made a pact with him. He has informed me that he is only able to give one of us a reprieve, because apparently you did strike a terrible blow against the Japanese. I am aware of your repeated requests to see me, but I have asked Mr. Endo not to allow it, for I fear you will sense my eventual intention.
So, time runs on. Already I can hear the crowd outside. I know that in time they too will know the extent of our sacrifice and forgive us our ties with the Japanese. I have never regretted staying behind to defend our home. We have done the right thing and I know that History will judge us fairly and kindly.
My son, grieve if you must but not for too long. I fear for you and the burdens imposed on you by your duty. In the last fragments of my life I truly wish, in spite of my Christian faith, to believe that we will all live again and again so that I may be blessed, perhaps in some future life on the far side of a new morning, to meet you again and to tell you how much I love you.
With the greatest of love,
Your father
I heard his voice clearly, so full of the love he had felt for me, for all his children. I leaned against the balcony railings, all my strength snuffed out as suddenly as a candle flame. The hollowness in me expanded; I shivered all over and clenched my fists as I finally let myself grieve.
Chapter Seventeen
I had to wait a few days after our dinner at the restaurant before Michiko felt strong enough to show me where my father had hidden his collection of keris. She now spent all of her days in my house and I had taken to shortening my hours at the office to have more time with her.
“It was cruel of me to show Endo-san’s sword to you. I did not know he had used it to execute your father,” she said one e
vening after I had finished telling her of Noel’s death. Both of us were in a somber mood. I had not thought about it in such a long time, yet every detail remained so clear.
“I never saw it again after that. I never knew what he had done with it. To hold it in my hand again, after all this time, was a shock to me. I wanted you to leave immediately.”
“And what changed your mind?” she asked.
I took a long time to find a reply that made sense. “I felt that there must have been a reason why you showed up here. And to turn you away seemed a grave disrespect to Endo-san’s memory.”
There was also something else that I had wanted to ask her, and now I felt we knew each other sufficiently well for me to do so. “The bags that you arrived with, they are all that you have left?”
“Yes. I have tidied up all my affairs. My husband’s company is in good hands.”
“It must have been difficult to let it all go.” I was thinking of the time when I too would have to do the same. I had been making the requisite arrangements to trim away the unnecessary strands of my life but I was faltering, not yet ready to take the final step.
“It was necessary,” she replied. “That is what growing old consists of, mostly. One starts giving away items and belongings until only the memories are left. In the end, what else do we really require?”
I examined her words carefully, and the answer came slowly but without any equivocation. “Someone to share those memories with,” I said finally, surprising myself. I had never actually made the decision not to discuss my activities during the Japanese Occupation. The stagnation of my memories and my unwillingness to voice them had happened naturally, coagulated over the years by a combination of guilt, loss, a sense of failure, and the certain knowledge that no one could ever understand what I had gone through.
And at that moment I realized that the corollary to that state of affairs was the loss of my ability to trust, the very cornerstone of aikido. When training as a student in Tokyo I insisted as often as I could on being the nage, the one receiving the attack and the one controlling the outcome. This contravened the etiquette of all dojo, which requires the equal sharing of opposing roles. It made me unpopular with my fellow pupils, although I viewed my preference as being only the extension of a strong personality, something in which I took pride. When I became an instructor I never ceded the role of nage to anyone and I was never again the uke, the one who was thrown, where once I had reveled in flight.