To Parts Unknown

by John Anthony Miller

  “I don’t know,” he said. “To work, I suppose. Get Bennie. We need help getting Van der Meer aboard. He’s barely conscious.”

  “He’s below deck,” she said. “I’ll help you.”

  Thomas and I raised him out of the water while she pulled from above. We got him safely on deck, and then we followed, gasping from our exertions.

  "We did it,” I said. “We rescued Van der Meer.”

  "Stay where you are," said a chilling voice.

  Three Japanese emerged from the shadows, an officer and two soldiers. Their rifles were pointed at our faces, the bayonets glistening in the moonlight.

  “I’m so sorry,” Lady Jane said. “I couldn’t warn you. They would have killed me if I had.”

  “It’s all right,” Thomas consoled her. “There was nothing you could do.”

  The soldiers searched us, removing our weapons and personal belongings. Then the officer issued a command we didn’t understand.

  They grabbed Thomas roughly and led him into the cabin. Lady Jane was next, followed by Van der Meer. A few minutes later, they came for me. They bound my hands behind my back and then forced me to the floor, tying my hands to my feet. Once my eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, I realized that Adi was there also, bound in the same manner. Bennie was not. Had the soldiers killed him?

  "Lady Jane," I whispered. "What happened?"

  "The patrol boat returned. They were aboard so quickly we couldn’t defend ourselves."

  The officer approached us. "Are you spies?” he asked in halting English. “Like Mr. Van der Meer?”

  His question was met with silence. Why was he convinced Van der Meer was a spy? But then I thought about it: the strange relationship between Thomas, Bennie, and Van der Meer, the detailed knowledge of military strategy, the uncanny ability to know where the Japanese were and at what strength, and the fishing boat with all the unused gear. He might be right.

  “No, I don’t think you’re spies,” the officer said. “You’re far too incompetent. But you may be smugglers. Mr. Van der Meer is well versed in those activities also.”

  It was believable that Van der Meer, Thomas, and Bennie were smugglers. I thought of Thomas with no obvious means of support and unlimited funds, and Bennie, with a fishing trawler that showed no signs of fish.

  “Production has increased at the oil facility since we’ve taken control,” the officer said. “But there’s a dire need for labor. You will suit that need nicely.”

  “You can't do that," I said defiantly. "We're Swiss citizens."

  "I’m not interested in where you came from,” he said. He issued a command to a soldier before turning back to us. “These two men will take you to the oil fields. I suggest you keep quiet until you get there. I have given them orders to shoot you if you don’t.”

  The officer turned and left the cabin and stood on the bow of the boat. One soldier stood at the helm while another watched us. A few minutes later the patrol boat returned and collected the officer. He issued harsh commands to his underlings before departing.

  Once he left, the engine was started and the soldier at the helm guided the trawler to the center of the river. He stood a few feet from me, his eyes trained ahead, and steered the craft forward. His companion stood by the door, his gaze alternating between us and the traffic on the river: barges, trawlers, and houseboats.

  I saw fear in Lady Jane’s eyes, and Adi, the young boy, was also terrified. Van der Meer was bruised and beaten, barely awake. Only Thomas seemed unperturbed. If the soldiers wanted to kill us they would have done so already. Maybe we were doomed to spend the rest of our lives laboring for the Japanese.

  I tried to sleep. After an hour of unsuccessful attempts, I opened my eyes and glanced at the others. Van der Meer slept; Lady Jane and Adi leaned against the wall. Although their eyes were closed, they shifted uncomfortably. They couldn’t sleep either. We were all too scared.

  Thomas’s eyes were open, and he was staring blankly ahead. When he saw me watching him, he nodded towards the engine compartment.

  Bennie was coming up the steps, hiding in the shadows. He held a knife in his right hand.

  CHAPTER 24

  Bennie crept forward, hugging the opposite wall. If either soldier turned, they would see him. Slowly, he moved towards the soldier steering the ship.

  The sentry by the door fumbled for a cigarette. Bennie paused, his back against the wall. The soldier lit the cigarette, exhaled a cloud of smoke, and yawned. Bennie tiptoed towards his companion.

  The slightest noise would be disastrous. I looked at Thomas. He nodded discretely. Van der Meer still slept, but Lady Jane and Adi now watched intently, their eyes wide.

  Bennie crept closer. He eased towards the helm, not making a sound. He was only a few feet away. The soldier at the door stirred, shifting his weight. Bennie paused. We waited tensely.

  He took two more steps, slow and quiet and deliberate. Then he stood behind the driver. He raised his knife. With a rapid, fluid movement, he slid the knife across the soldier’s throat. Blood spurted from his neck and splashed on the window. He collapsed to the floor.

  The second soldier spun around, and Bennie flung the knife. It hit the man in the shoulder, barely penetrating his flesh, and bounced to the floor. Blood spotted his uniform, dripping onto his chest, but the injury wasn’t severe. He raised his rifle.

  Bennie swung his foot forward, his boot catching the soldier’s crotch. The man grimaced and doubled over, but he didn’t release his gun. He pulled the trigger.

  Lady Jane screamed. The bullet imbedded in the wall a few feet from her head. I rolled over onto the floor, certain a second shot would follow, and blocked her body with mine.

  Bennie tackled the soldier, punching him with one hand and searching for the knife with the other. The soldier pushed him away. They rolled on the floor, grunting and panting and swinging their fists. The soldier pushed Bennie down and sat astride him.

  The knife lay on the floor. Bennie swept his leg across the floor until his foot hit it. He slid it forward with his leg. The soldier wrapped his hands around Bennie’s neck until his eyes bulged and he gasped for air. His leg was bent at a crooked angle. He coaxed the knife towards his hand.

  His face started to pale, the veins in his neck protruding. A gurgle came from his throat as if he were choking. But his mouth broke into a wicked grin. He slid the knife forward with his foot. Ever so slowly, inch by inch, it came closer to his hand.

  His long thin fingers stretched forward, inches from the blade. The soldier’s grasp grew tighter. Sweat dripped down his face. All his strength was focused on strangling Bennie to death.

  Bennie moved the knife with his fingertips until he could grasp the handle. Once he held it firmly, he slowly pushed it into the soldier’s stomach. The soldier groaned in agony. He tumbled to the floor, the knife stuck in his torso.

  His grin grew wider each inch the blade was imbedded. He angled the knife upward, plunging it forward.

  Bennie choked and coughed, rubbing his hand over his throat to stimulate the blood flow. When he caught his breath, he pulled the knife from his victim.

  He moved to Thomas and cut his ropes. Then he went to the others. As he freed them, I stared at the two corpses that lay before me, blood spilling from their bodies and forming puddles on the floor. Their eyes were open, staring at me in protest, their lives stolen.

  CHAPTER 25

  Bennie got two lengths of canvas, and he and Thomas rolled the corpses onto them. Then he got two old cannonballs, large globs of cast iron, and placed one on the torso of each corpse, wrapping the arms around it. They covered the corpses with the canvas and tied them securely, wrapping them into tight packages.

  “I knew I would find a use for those old cannonballs,” Bennie said.

  He smiled, which made me shiver. The two enemy soldiers had died brutally; they deserved a better burial. But we couldn’t give it to them. The bodies were eased over the side of the ship, dropped to their graves w
ith only a ripple in the river’s murky waters.

  Adi had started to clean up the cabin, and by the time the bodies were disposed of, most of the blood had been removed. Stains remained, and even though Adi scrubbed them they refused to disappear.

  “When we get back to Batavia I’ll get some lime,” Bennie said. “That should work.”

  I looked at the marks on the floor, remnants of two human lives. They were the first enemy soldiers to die in front of me. When I was in London and the city was being bombed, German planes were downed but they rarely crashed in the city; they normally made it to the suburbs or countryside. It was a different war in the Pacific. It was personal, staring into the face of the enemy, looking in their eyes as they took their last breaths.

  Lady Jane and I tended to Van der Meer, cleaning the bruises and abrasions. He was still weary, his chest battered and sore, his ribs bruised but not broken. He drifted off to sleep.

  “We’re only an hour from the oil fields,” Thomas said. “I had hoped Van der Meer could guide us. He’s familiar with the area.”

  “He can’t do it,” Lady Jane said firmly. “He’s too badly injured.”

  “She’s right,” Bennie said. “I’ll go with you. I’ve been there before.”

  I looked at Van der Meer, barely conscious, and then to Bennie, who had just killed two Japanese. Somehow, I didn’t think they were the first men he had killed.

  “I vote for Bennie,” I said.

  He grinned and moved to the helm, piloting the trawler through enemy waters. We sat in the cabin, trying to rest, but none of us could sleep. We were weary and afraid, each reflecting on what we were about to face.

  I should have been thinking about the rescue, the enemy we would encounter, the danger, and the mystery man we were about to rescue. But I wasn’t. For some unexplainable reason, I thought only of London. I realized how badly I missed it.

  Lady Jane sat on the floor with her back against the wall. I wondered what she was thinking. But even with her hair mussed, her clothes wrinkled, and a smudge of grease on her left cheek, she looked beautiful to me. I studied her for a moment and felt myself smile.

  “We’re as close as I dare to get,” Bennie said about forty minutes later.

  He and Adi went on deck and lowered the anchor, easing it into the water. We were a hundred feet from shore, hidden behind a small island, maybe fifty feet across, tucked behind the main shipping channel. An oil barge passed in each direction, one low in the water, laden with product; the other sat high, ready to be filled. “What time is it?” I asked.

  “About 3 a.m.,” Thomas said. “The oil fields are just around the bend. We’ll attempt the rescue, but we should try to get out of here before dawn.”

  Bennie motioned us out on deck. "I'm familiar with the layout," he said. "There are several buildings on the site, mostly for field hands. Lady Jane’s friend is probably held in one of those.”

  He drew a map for Thomas on a smudged piece of paper. "Fortunately for us, everything is near the river. But the docks will be heavily guarded."

  Thomas studied the map. "What do you suggest?"

  "You, George, and I will go ashore. If we find him, we’ll attempt a rescue. If not, we’ll use the evening to develop our strategy. Maybe risk staying one more day."

  "Who will guard the boat?" I asked. “The Japanese have already boarded twice.”

  "I don’t know that anyone can," Thomas said. "If the Japanese want to take it, they will. We just have to hope they don’t find us. Or don’t care about us.”

  I looked out on the river. I could see a dozen other fishing boats sprawled across the horizon most near the distant shore. The Japanese might not even notice us, but Lady Jane was still in danger.

  “Are you sure I shouldn’t stay with Lady Jane?” I asked.

  "Adi will,” Bennie said. “We need your help on shore."

  I remembered how casually Bennie had slit the throat of the Japanese soldier and how deftly Thomas had flung the knife into the chest of the officer at the rubber plantation. Now they calmly discussed sneaking into a fortified enemy installation to rescue a man they didn’t even know. I wondered why. I didn’t think it was due to any allegiance to Lady Jane. It was because they thrived on the adventure; it was the life they lived. It was a secret life.

  “And what happens to Lady Jane, Adi, and Van der Meer if the Japanese return?” I asked.

  Bennie looked at me with the same grin he showed after he had killed the intruders. “Then we’ll rescue them, too.”

  We climbed over the side of the boat and slid into the water, paddling quietly towards the shore. Bennie led us to a spot just before the bend that was only a short distance from the trawler. Once we reached the bank, we found the vegetation thick but passable.

  Thomas stripped a foot-long piece of bark from a tree. “I’ll leave a path so we can find our way back.”

  “Mark a tree every five or six yards,” Bennie said. “That should be easy to follow.”

  Thomas repeated the process as we moved through the brush. Thick vegetation was interrupted by small clearings where the moon filtered in to light the jungle. Twenty minutes later we reached the perimeter of the installation.

  A high fence constructed of wooden posts and multiple strands of barbed wire surrounded the facility. Oil derricks stretched into the horizon, their arms swaying as they pumped crude from the ground. Tanks and docks hugged the river, connected to a series of pipes and valves. The area was well lit and patrolled by armed sentries.

  “We could spend days searching the workman’s huts let alone the outbuildings,” I whispered.

  “We knew it wouldn’t be easy,” Thomas said. “We’ve come this far,” Bennie said. “Let’s at least give it a try.”

  We continued further inland away from the river.

  After traveling two hundred feet, we found an area cast in shadows from a missing light. It was near the last of the outbuildings.

  Bennie told us to remain in the underbrush while he moved to the fence. The soil was sandy, and he used a flat rock to start scooping the dirt from underneath the fence. In a matter of minutes he had dug an area large enough for us to scoot through. He slid into the facility and then motioned us to follow.

  “Where should we begin?" Thomas asked. He eyed the rows of thatched huts.

  "We may as well start with the closest one," I suggested.

  My heart pounded as if it was about to burst. Bennie and Thomas appeared calm as if going on an evening stroll.

  “That’s fine with me,” Thomas replied. He turned to Bennie. “George and I will search in that direction.” He pointed away from the fence.

  “I’ll go towards the river,” Bennie replied. He looked at his watch. “Let’s meet back here in fifteen minutes.”

  Thomas and I moved towards the barracks, remaining in the shadows. We had barely passed the first hut when we heard footsteps behind us. I turned, expecting the enemy. Instead I saw a young Sumatran boy. He faced us confidently, not yet a teenager, and wore a look of awareness and curiosity.

  Thomas knelt beside him and spoke in a pidgin that sounded like a mixture of Dutch and Chinese. They conversed for a moment; at one point their discussion became animated. I was afraid their hushed whispers would alert the Japanese, but their discussion was brief. They apparently reached an understanding, and the boy disappeared into the shadows.

  "Come on," Thomas said. He led me to a dark corner behind the last hut close to the hole we had dug under the fence.

  "What are we doing?" I asked.

  "We’ll wait here,” he said. “The boy will bring us the stranger.”

  “Can we trust him?

  “I think so.”

  “What is he doing wandering around in the middle of the night?”

  “He’s working,” Thomas said. “The Japanese captured some local orphans.” “But he’s a child,” I said.

  He shrugged and eyed me curiously.

  “Why is he helping us?”


  “I offered to rescue him too."

  “They don’t care.”

  I heard the crunch of footsteps on the small tufts of grass that sprung from the sandy soil. I froze and grabbed Thomas’s arm. He tensed. We listened intently.

  There was almost total silence, only the swish of the sliding arms of the oil platforms audible in the distance. An occasional bird screeched in the jungle, complimented by insects humming in the night. But for the most part it was quiet. We slowly relaxed.

  A moment later we heard it again, but the sound was more distinct and pronounced. I was certain it was footsteps, but they seemed uneven, as if their owner stepped carefully, trying not to make noise.

  I started to whisper my suspicion, but Thomas stopped me, holding his finger to his lips. He pointed to the other side of the hut. He signaled for me to follow and then carefully took a step forward.

  Just as he reached the edge of the building, a sentry rounded the corner. He was startled, but recovered quickly. He issued a harsh command and motioned upward with his rifle. We had no alternative but to raise our hands.

  The guard yelled for help. An astonished companion appeared, and the two looked at us closely. The first soldier spoke to the second who ran from the area.

  Seconds later the young Sumatran arrived, accompanied by a dark-haired man with a small goatee. He was dressed in clothes that were far too expensive for the jungle, brown slacks and a tweed jacket that didn’t seem to fit the man or the locale. He stood tall and straight, his posture rigid and his air a bit pretentious, as if he were temporarily subjected to a situation far beneath his social standing. He seemed annoyed, but patient. Unfortunately, they rounded the corner of the hut and passed directly in front of the soldier. Fearful of a coordinated assault, the guard frantically ordered them to join us. He watched nervously while waiting for assistance.

  "Who are you?" Thomas asked.

  "I’m Sir Gregory Millburne,” he replied. “Who are you?"

  I was prepared for the answer, but Thomas wasn’t. “It’s Lady Jane’s fiancé from India,” I interjected.