by Alec Waugh
‘When?’
‘Soon after I came into this country.’
‘Why?’
‘I did not feel safe. Indians were foreigners and were not liked.’
‘Where did you buy it?’
‘At a Chinese shop. Ah Ming’s.’
‘Will Ah Ming remember selling it to you?’
‘Ah Ming is dead.’
‘Who runs the shop?’
‘The shop exists no longer.’
‘Where was the shop?’
‘On Nelson Avenue, opposite the post office.’
‘What happened to the shop?’
‘It was pulled down when they built Barclay’s Bank.’
‘What happened to Ah Ming’s family?’
‘He had no family in Karak. His wife and children were in China.’
‘So there is no one who can confirm that you are telling the truth when you say you bought this revolver at Ah Ming’s?’
‘I do not think so. No.’
Forrester made a note to check if there had been a shop owned by a an Ah Ming, where Barclay’s Bank stood today. But he knew that was an unnecessary precaution. This man would have got his facts right.
‘Why did you bring that revolver with you to your work today?’ Forrester continued.
‘Because the Crown Prince’s fiancée was to visit us.’
‘What did you intend to do with it?’
‘Fire a shot over her head, to warn her that we did not want her here.’
‘Who do you mean by “we”?’
‘The democratic elements in Karak.’
‘You did not intend to kill her?’
‘No, I am a Buddhist; my religion forbids the taking of life.’
‘You did not intend to injure her?’
‘Buddhism forbids the infliction of pain.’
‘Your intention was only then to give a warning.’
‘Yes, to tell her to go back to her own people, that she has no place here: that we do not need kings and queens; we, the people, want to govern ourselves.’
‘I see.’ There was a pause. Forrester looked friendlily at his prisoner. Better let him talk. Let him get it off his chest.
‘I am interested in your ideas,’ he said. ‘I want you to explain to me why you feel that the rule of this island by a king is against the island’s interests. Myself, I believe that at the present stage of its development, Karak is better governed by an hereditary king. I should like to hear why you feel differently.’
‘A king talks about his land, about his subjects. We are not his people, we are not his subjects. The land is not his, the land is ours. …’
Forrester nodded, encouragingly. But he did not listen. It was a familiar rigmarole. It had been said in England six hundred years ago—‘When Adam delved and Eve span who was then the gentleman’—and in the ancient world it had been said six thousand years ago. This Indian spoke as though an eternal verity had been discovered yesterday; and as far as he was concerned it had; because he had discovered it for himself. The only trouble was that he did not realize that his particular arguments had been tested by the experience of six thousand years. Let the fellow talk, however. He was not going to argue with him. This talk was part of the softening-up process that he was planning.
The Indian went on talking for twelve minutes before Forrester cut into a convenient pause.
‘That is most interesting, most illuminating. You have stated your position clearly. Tell me now, where did you form those views, here or in India?’
‘In India.’
‘In India the situation was different. In India a British emperor was placed over an Indian people. Here you have a Kiarak king placed over a Karaki people.’
‘The principle is the same.’
‘Is it? I am not so sure. But we will leave that till later. I want to know more about your coming to this country. When did you come?’
‘Ten years ago.’
‘1949. Let me think now; was that before or after India’s independence?’
‘After.’
‘Then you came here with an Indian passport. Have you become a Karaki national?’
‘No.’
‘You have a permit to reside and work here?’
‘Yes.’
‘Such permits were easy to obtain, weren’t they, when you came here?’
‘Very easy.’
‘Why did you come here?’
‘Life was difficult in India. I had heard that it was easy here because of the discovery of oil.’
‘Had you any friends here?’
‘A cousin.’
‘What is his name?’
‘He is dead now.’
‘All the same, I should like his name and where he lived.’ Forrester wrote them down. ‘Through this cousin of yours you made friends in Karak. Were they mostly Indians?’
‘They were mostly Indians.’
‘Did they share your political opinions?’
‘Some did.’
‘You discussed these matters between yourselves?’
‘We did.’
‘There is a club here, the Democratic Progress Club; you have heard of it?’
‘Of course.’
‘You know several of the members?’
‘One or two.’
‘Which ones?’
Rajat Singh mentioned three. Two of them were already known to Forrester. They were Liberals, little more than left of centre. ‘Did they suggest to you that you should join the club?’
‘They did.’
‘Why didn’t you?’
‘I did not completely agree with their point of view.’
‘In what way did you not agree?’
‘They were not definite enough.’
‘I see what you mean, I know two of the three men whom you have mentioned. They are Constitutionalists. They want to see a republic established by the vote of the people; by the abdication of a monarch, not by a revolution. They would not, for instance, have approved of your warning the Crown Prince’s fiancée by a revolver shot that she was not wanted here. On the other hand there are a number of people here who would approve of what you did. Tell me now, what did you expect to happen after you had fired?’
‘Is that important?’
‘To me it is. You were risking your life. You might have been killed there on the spot. There were guards with rifles. If you had been killed, what good would your death have done?’
‘As I fired my shot, I should have shouted, “Down with royalty! We want no king in Karak.” I should have made my protest.’
‘Is that what they told you?’
‘What who told me?’
‘The people who gave you that revolver, who told you to fire at Miss Marsh.’
‘No one gave me a revolver. I have explained that to you. I bought it as soon as I arrived.’
‘I’m sorry, I forgot; but surely you must have discussed an act of such as this with someone: you could not have decided to do something so dangerous, so dramatic, without taking somebody’s advice.’
‘But that is what I did. I wanted to make my protest: my own personal protest.’
’ What good did you think that would do?’
‘The raising of one voice is not forgotten; not when there is so much risk.’
‘The risk was great. The reward was small. If you had been shot down by a guard; or if the crowd had set upon you, as it might very well have done, nobody would have heard your protest. Are you sure that you did not intend to kill the Crown Prince’s fiancée?’
‘Have I not told you that the taking of life is forbidden by the Buddhist faith?’
They were going round in a circle. It was time he brought this to a head, Forrester told himself.
‘I cannot believe you,’ he said. ‘Several points in your story are improbable, but we will leave those aside for the moment. I will tell you why I do not believe you; I was warned ten days ago that an attempt was to be made against Miss Marsh’s life. It was becaus
e of that warning that I took the extra precautions that led to your arrest. I should not have received that warning unless there had been a plot against Miss Marsh. Several men were in the secret. You may yourself have only met one man; the man who is the link between those plotters and yourself. I want to know that man’s name.’
‘There is no such man.’
‘But I know there is.’
The Indian made no reply. Once again they were going round in a circle.
‘You realize, don’t you, that we have methods here for making a man talk?’
‘What use are those methods when I have told you all I know?’
Forrester rang the bell under his desk. It was answered by a sergeant.
‘This man is lying on at least one point,’ he said. ‘He has told me that it was his own idea to fire at Miss Marsh. I know that he received his instructions from a certain man. I want you to persuade him to tell me that man’s name. There is no hurry. But we must have that name.’
He spoke in exactly the same tone of voice that he had used throughout the interview. He did not shout or threaten or abuse. Some police officers could use such methods with effect. He was not one of them. He had his own technique.
He rose and walked over to the window. It had been a long day and he was tired though he had managed to doze off for a few minutes in the car on the way back from Kassaya. It was close on seven. Not too late to go round to the British Club for a drink or two. He was curious to know how his compatriots would take the news. Most of them would have heard by now in a world where coconut wireless operated faster than a jet-propelled machine.
There were, however, only a half-dozen men there: nobody was playing billiards, nobody was playing bridge. How different it had been forty years ago when he had come out as a cadet. Then there was a fixed routine: offices closed at four o’clock; two hours on the tennis court or golf course; then three hours in the club over pahits and stengahs: pahitsl who would order a pink gin in these days of Frigidaires? Then round about nine a move to dinner: an elaborate five-course dinner at which nobody had done more than peck. By ten o’clock they had been all in bed. That was the formula before the cities of the Far East had become filled with foreign embassies; and with U.N.E.S.C.O. missions: before aeroplanes and air-conditioning had made it easy to bring wives out. The modern routine was the cocktail party with not so many more men than women at it; while the British Club, here as in Bangkok and Rangoon, had become a morgue at night, with only sandwiches served for the few who needed them.
I shouldn’t have come, thought Forrester. I should have gone to the Sports Club. I’m losing touch; living in terms of the ‘twenties and ‘thirties, forgetting how people live today. A wave of self-distrust struck at him. Was he out of touch? Ought he to make way for younger men? If one lost one’s sense of the daily routine of the people whom one was watching and protecting, one missed the clues to where the danger lay. Better finish his stengah quickly and go home to the old Prima Donna … and then across the room he saw, coming slowly through the door, surmounted by a rubicund complexion, the red, black and yellow of an I.Z. tie. It was a long time since he had seen ‘the other Colonel’. It was lucky he had come here after all. ‘Hi there,’ he called. ‘What’s yours?’
Colonel Kingsford came slowly over.
‘What’s this I hear about a shooting up at Pearl?’
‘You’ve heard then, have you?’
‘Who hasn’t? What’s it all about?’
‘That’s what I am trying to find out.’ Or rather what his sergeants were trying to find out. They had their methods. He remembered how horrified he had been the first time that he had seen those methods put into practice. He had had the British point of view about third degree; and this was more than third degree. His superior had shrugged, ‘You’ll get used to it. This isn’t Europe. They expect it. Did you notice the way that fellow sat back against the wall and turned up the soles of his feet? It’s a face saving with them. They stand as much as they can, then blurt it out. Their consciences are clear. Now and again you get a fanatic; when you do, it’s just too bad. But it’s not so very often.’
Forrester had soon learnt to adopt the customs of the country. He hoped Rajat Singh would not prove to be a fanatic.
‘I’m told it was a Communist set-up?’ Kingsford said.
‘That’s how it looks.’
‘I wouldn’t have called this a very good breeding-ground for Communism. There’s no real poverty.’
‘That’s what I’d have thought.’
‘You were there, weren’t you, when it happened?’
‘Yes.’
‘Tell me all about it.’
‘There isn’t much to tell.’
He told him what there was.
‘Do you think the people are against the marriage?’ Kingsford asked.
‘Are mixed marriages ever popular? Don’t people always say “Wasn’t one of our own girls good enough for him?”’
‘Yet don’t you believe that if there had been more mixed marriages between Britons and Malays and Indians, the Empire would have lasted another thirty years?’
‘That’s what they are saying nowadays.’
Indian after Indian had said exactly the same thing, that it was the bad manners of the mem-sahib who had treated high-class Indians as though they were coolies and coolies as though they were scum, that had aroused indignation.
‘Wouldn’t it have been better,’ Kingsford said, ‘if the British had married into the people they were colonizing?’
‘Or if they’d brought out different wives,’ said Forrester. ‘You know how it was in the old days. A man couldn’t marry during his first chukka: when he went back for his first leave, he was out of touch with his old friends: they’d gone four years one way, he’d gone four years another. That made an eight years difference. When he came back for the second time, he had lost touch completely. By then it was high time he married. So he went down to a seaside hotel and picked up a pretty little nonentity who lived in some prim suburb and thought she was the Queen of Sheba when she found herself in a large bungalow with five servants. Nowadays men not only marry young, but they marry girls out of their world: contemporaries and opposite numbers. I don’t think the young wives who are coming out to Pearl today would make the mistakes that the women of our generation did.’
‘Maybe you’re right. Boy, two more stengahs.’
They sipped at their glasses pensively, remembering the past glory of the pukka sahib. ‘Even so,’ said Kingsford, ‘we didn’t do such a bad job here, schools, roads, doctors, basic training. They are beginning to realize, some of them, how much they owe to us.’
‘I wish more of them did.’
Forrester could hear again that monotonous high-pitched voice repeating parrotwise its abuse of British overiordship. He looked at the clock above the door. A quarter past eight. He might as well look in at his office on the way back. ‘Talking of wives,’ he said, ‘young Hallett’s picked a peach. What do you make of him, by the way?’
Kingsford shrugged. ‘A feckless fellow, good by fits and starts.’
‘That’s rather what I suspected.’
2
‘No, sir,’ the sergeant said, ‘he has told us nothing.’
‘Have him brought up here.’
The Indian’s face bore no sign of the ordeal to which he had been exposed, but he swayed the weight of his body from one foot to the other. Forrester looked at him steadily.
‘You are a brave man,’ he said, ‘but it is foolish to be brave beyond a point. There are certain things, certain people, that you should not be prepared to sacrifice—your wife for instance and your child. I have made inquiries. You are a good family man. I am prepared to help you and your family. I will tell you what I can do to help. If you tell me what I want to know, I will send you at once to India, a sum of money will be given you which will allow you to start a business of your own. No one here will know what has happened. Revenge cannot follow you. I
will have your death announced. It would be a good warning to any others who might follow your example. I am offering you a new start in your own country. Would you not rather have your son brought up in India than in Karak?’
He paused. The Indian made no answer.
‘Consider what your son’s future will be, if you do not take advantage of my offer. Your punishment will be penal servitude for life. You may think that the friends who encouraged you to do this will help him; but they will not dare. They will not want their names linked with yours. Consider what will happen to your son if you do not help me.’
He paused again. The Indian’s mouth moved. Another moment, one more argument.
‘The money that I shall give you will not only be enough for you to start your own business, but to return with presents for your family. That is very important. You will return in honour, not disgrace. You will never have such an opportunity again.’
Again he paused. The Indian’s mouth slowly opened.
‘What do you want to know?’ he asked.
‘The name of the man who gave you your instructions.’
‘I do not know his name.’
‘But you were given instructions.’
‘Yes.’
‘Then we have established that.’ He rang a bell. ‘What would you like to drink? Tea, coffee?’
‘Coffee.’
‘A cigarette or a cheroot?’
‘A cheroot.’
‘Sit down, this will take some time. Be comfortable. Have you had anything to eat?’
‘No.’
‘Then we’ll have a sandwich. I’m hungry too.’ He put a call through to his home.
‘Please forgive me. This is another of those occasions. No, I’m not at the club, I wish I were. I’m in my office. How long? I’m sorry I can’t tell. I know, I know. You should have married that young man in Lloyd’s; someone who kept regular hours. But they might have been so regular that you got bored. Can’t have it both ways. What, you say that you’re not getting it either way, after thirty years, well I’m ashamed. I’ll do my best to hurry.’
He shook his head as he turned to face his prisoner. What was it that old Roman said? You can’t live with or without them?
‘Well now, where were we? The man who gave your instructions. What nationality?’