must wait, or I will be very angry. You’d better eat some food and drink less whisky.’ Ah Keat thumped the pillow. ‘You need to eat!’
‘Okay. A fish paste sandwich from the little bottles.’
Ah Keat’s nose wrinkled, but he went to the door and bellowed in Chinese to someone in the kitchen. He did not leave the room. Returning to the bedside he said, ‘Okay. You can start to talk now.’
Mac laughed at him and nodded to Yoshiro. ‘It’s a story – they are all stories ye ken? You need to understand if you can. I dinna ken where to start? He looked at Aziz who smiled.
‘Mac, why don’t you tell us all of it - from the beginning? We have a few hours to get through before anything starts here and we, none of us, knows how it was for men like you and John Miller. Call Boise and Kim Seng and - no, don’t be alarmed,’ Aziz said quickly as Mac began to sit up. ‘Boise should hear your story. I for one, want to know how it all happened and why you are here now. I’m sure Boise, Ah Keat and Kim Seng want to know too. They are as near to sons as you have. Why not share this part of your life with them?’
Mac turned to Ah Keat and asked, ‘What do ye think lad? Do ye want to listen to an old man’s rambling?’
Ah Keat looked at Mac and said grimly. ‘You say you are going to die soon. Of course, we want to know about you so we can tell your grandchildren. You got four of them remember?’
Mac took Ah Keat’s hand. ‘I remember. Of course, I do. Bonny babes as they are. Aye, Elsie loved them and so do I. But dinna frighten them. It’s no a pretty yarn to tell when they are abed. Wait awhile until they are grown and can understand, aye?’
Boise came, bringing Kim Seng who carried a tray of drinks and sandwiches. Kim Seng introduced himself to Yoshiro and said, ‘Party time is it?’ Mac beamed at them. ‘Settle ye selves then, and Kim Seng, dinna interrupt like ye usually do, alright?’
‘Who me?’ Kim Seng grinned at Mac.
‘Yes, you. Ye never could keep from asking questions at bed-time. So, behave, do ye hear?’
Suddenly serious, Kim Seng said, ‘Mac, if you get tired, you stop. Okay?’
Ah Keat gave Mac a glass of orange juice with a shot of whisky in it. Mac sipped and sighed in approval. ‘Good lad. Aye ye’re a good laddie.’ He patted Ah Keat’s hand, moved his back a little and settling into the pillows he started. ‘Yoshiro, your father began it, by being kind to me. So, here we go …….’
Captured
‘In November 1940 after two and a half years at university, I came to Kuala Lipis to stay with my father. My father was an army liaison officer to the district officer for Pahang. I had a sister who was married and living in Glasgow, but I wanted to see this new place. My father had been posted to Malaya and I joined him for a holiday. Mother had gone home to Scotland because of the threat of war. Dad had been in Shanghai and Hong Kong before that, and as kids, we had learned to speak Mandarin. I thought Malaya sounded exotic. I’d studied geology and minerology and I was curious about the tin, gold, rubber and stuff coming out of Malaya.’
‘At first, I thought Kuala Lipis was the backside of hell, but after a coupIe of months of boredom, I dropped the Pahang Club lot, and made friends with some of the local lads. We took trips inland, hunting with the aborigines and up the Lipis and Jelai rivers fishing and swimming. They played table tennis in their own club, cricket and football in the Clifford school playgrounds and I was hooked. It all became fun and exciting.’
‘I was supposed to be here for six months but with a little coercion from my mother back in Scotland, my father extended my stay for another six. I think that that one year was the most carefree I have ever been. Yes, there was a war on - but you know, I was young - we young lads knew and yet, we didn’t know. I think youth is like that. It all seemed a bit far away.’
‘When the Japs came, it was a bolt out of the blue to me and my new friends. Not so much for my father. Mother was already home. She expected my father to be back for good a month later. He’d stayed back to help organize transport for the planters, teachers, doctors, nurses, missionaries, civil engineers, government officers and any other westerners to leave for Kuala Lumpur and the small port at Klang, in the west coast of Selangor, where they hoped to get away before the war caught up with them.’
‘However, the Japanese came in from the north like a black cloud. So, the last convoy of cars and lorries made a pitiful drive to Kuala Lumpur. The only way out from Kuala Lipis was on two of the most appallingly twisting roads over the Titiwangsa mountain range. All they could do was to pray that they would reach the city and transport out of the country. Most of them didna make it, of course.’ He paused to sip whisky. Ah Keat added more ice and he continued.’
‘Staunch Brit that my father was, he refused to leave his post until he was satisfied that everyone who could be reached was safe gone. I stayed with him. Big mistake. When the Japs came streaming along the road and down beside the railway tracks on bicycles and a few trucks, he gathered us all together in the British Residence and waited. When he was ordered to surrender, he asked, ‘On what terms?’ When told that there were no terms, he flew into a rage and refused to do as he was told, so the Japs took him out and cut his head off. He, and old Bill Beckford, who was in charge of the police force, were made an example of to others who thought they could rely on war prisoners’ charters.’
Tea was brought for them and Yoshiro helped Aziz to settle Mac so that he could drink his tea and eat the sandwiches Ah Keat gave him. Yoshiro needed the toilet and rose to leave, but Ah Keat showed him to Mac’s bathroom behind a beautifully-carved rosewood screen. When he returned, he turned questioning eyes to Aziz who smiled and said, ‘I think I was followed from KL. We are now in lockdown. Let’s wait and see. The dogs? They’d use darts on them, I would think.’
Ah Keat opened the door to the patio and the dogs walked in and lay beside the bed.
‘My father said you were interred by the army?’ Yoshiro enquired of Mac, who was rooting around in his bed. Mac looked at him and drawled, ‘Well, you cuid say that - I expect.’
‘No cigars!’ scolded Ah Keat.
‘Ah Keat, you are torturing a dying man,’ Aziz said softly. ‘Give him his cigar.’
‘Ah Keat’s face became wooden. ‘Doctor said, no smoking, it will kill him faster.’
‘Perhaps. But happier, no?’
Ah Keat went to the desk and brought the humidor to Mac. ‘Here,’ he growled. Mac rolled his head and laughed aloud at the face above him.
‘You smoke okay. You die soonest.’
The men laughed together. Mac lit up and puffed contentedly as he carried on with his story.
‘Yes. I was, as you put it, interred by the Japs. I met your father when they executed my father. He stood with his back to me but stepped in front of me and said clearly and softly in English, “Close your eyes,” when the sword was lifted. He looked into Yoshiro’s eyes and said, ‘I trusted him from then on. Between us we saved each other’s lives, I think.’
Yoshiro said, ‘I see. Do go on, if you can, but don’t tire yourself.’
‘We were herded into a room at the police station and kept there for two days, then we were
