back from Lumut was in a ‘black area’ and was under curfew outside daylight hours. Tired from too much sun and exertion, they scattered to their messes and their rooms, to get washed and dressed for dinner.
In the RAMC Mess, most gravitated to the anteroom for a beer and a nostalgic chat about the weekend, to the annoyance of those who had had to stay behind and look after the hospital.
‘When’s the Old Man back?’ asked Percy.
Morris signed Number One’s chit for his Tiger before replying.
‘He’s coming up on the night train, but I’ll bet he’ll be holding Morning Prayers as usual, so don’t think of staying in bed.’
The discussion settled, as it often did, on to the colonel’s strange behaviour. Major Martin, the senior physician was there, as his wife had gone off to the Cameron Highlands for a week and he came to eat in the Mess. He seemed genuinely worried about the state of Desmond O’Neill’s mental health.
‘Damned difficult situation, with him outranking us all and being the CO,’ he said gravely. ‘But I think there’s something seriously amiss with him. If it was you behaving like that, Alf, I’d get the Command Psychiatrist up from Singapore and give you a going over!’
‘Why don’t you do a dummy run on Percy Loosemore?’ said Peter Bright acidulously, having suffered much from the dermatologist’s sarcastic humour about his personal affairs.
Clarence Bottomley’s languid accents cut off Percy’s retort.
‘Joan Parnell was telling me that Matron’s concerned about the colonel’s antics, too. It seems he’s been lurking around their mess and the QAOR’s billet at dead of night. When she tackled him about it, he claimed he was concerned about prowlers!’
‘And this business of the armoury is strange,’ cut in Tom Howden. ‘One of my Malay technicians came to me on Friday and asked if I could do anything about the postings. I was going to see you about it, Alf.’
The Administrative Officer grunted. ‘I already know the problem, Tom. What did your MOR want?’
‘He said that two of his pals, who had been on a lot of night duty at the arms kote, had suddenly been posted off to BMH Kamunting, though one had only come down from there two months ago. The other has a wife and kids living in the kampong near here and it was making life very difficult for them.’
‘What’s going on, Alf?’ asked Eddie Rosen. ‘You must have authorized the moves.’
Morris sighed. ‘I tried to put the colonel off, but he insisted. It was he who demanded that they went. I couldn’t get any proper explanation from him, just some blather about weapons security after all the recent trouble.’
John Martin shook his head sadly. ‘The man’s acting very oddly, especially since his wife went away. This business with the Quartermaster is another example, he seems to be getting more and more paranoid.’
As usual, Percy Loosemore seemed to have the best information about this particular problem.
‘I went down with Robbie Burns to the Gunners’ Mess in the garrison the other night. After he’d filled himself up with Johnnie Walker, he started babbling and reckoned that O’Neill was threatening to have him court-martialled over him fiddling the stores. Robbie got very aggressive and began ranting that he’d swing for the bastard one of these days! I had to drag him home before he said something too outrageous.’
Alfred Morris, already with too many problems on his plate, looked even more worried at this. ‘I hope to God that Robbie doesn’t do anything stupid,’ he muttered. ‘With a grudge like that and a few whiskies inside him, he’s not a chap to meet on a dark night!’
ELEVEN
Steven Blackwell was another worried man, as he sat alone in his office early on Monday morning. A Telex had come in over the weekend from the Police Headquarters in Kuala Lumpur, carrying an enquiry from the Assistant Commissioner wanting an update about progress in the Robertson investigation. Usually, the superintendent in Tanah Timah was given a fairly free hand, KL rarely breathing down his neck about cases, but it seemed that this death had come to the ears of the High Commissioner in Government House.
Though Steven had already assured his superiors that this was not a terrorist shooting, the murder of a British planter was being taken seriously by the representatives of Whitehall. The political set-up in Malaya was complicated and was likely to become more so as pressure for independence grew with the run-down of colonialism. The ‘Federation of Malaya’ consisted of nine separate states, though Singapore, Malacca and Penang remained British Crown Colonies. Each state had a Sultan, a nominal head, who took it in turns to be overall ‘king’, but the real administration and the efficient infrastructure was run by the British. Independence was being pushed hard by the Malay population, even though the numerous Chinese and Indians dominated the commercial and professional life. The problem was that many Chinese who, with British help had fought a three-year guerrilla war against the Japanese, now wanted a
The superintendent sighed and mopped his sweating brow as he earnestly hoped that he could continue to convince KL that this incident was purely a local affair and not some renewed outbreak of insurgency. The best way to settle the matter would be to discover and arrest the perpetrator, but that seemed as far away as on the day of James Robertson’s death.
He spent the next hour on routine matters, including a fruitless review of the bank robbery investigation, then decided to go out. His dark blue Land Rover took him and Inspector Tan once more past ‘The Dog’ and up the Kerbau road to Gunong Besar estate, as he had decided that Diane Robertson had had long enough now to be ready for a formal interview. Half afraid that she might still be in her pyjamas at ten in the morning, he was relieved to see her leaning over the verandah dressed in a cream blouse and fawn slacks. For once, there was no glass in her hand, just a cigarette which she waved in welcome as they drove up the slope from the road.
‘I’m afraid this has to be rather official, Diane,’ said Blackwell as they entered her wide lounge. ‘We’ve taken statements from almost everyone else, but I left you until you settled down.’
‘No problem, Steven, I know you have to go through the motions!’
She said this almost gaily, as if he’d come to enquire about the theft of a bicycle, rather than the murder of her husband. Blackwell sat in one of the big rattan chairs and Tan slid unobtrusively into a corner with his notebook at the ready, as Diane went through the ritual of offering drinks and settling for fresh limes all round. After Siva had brought them and then silently vanished, the senior officer got down to business. He went yet again through the movements of Diane and her husband on that fateful night, getting a repetition of what she had said before, with no more definite timing as to when they had both left the club.
‘You took a long time getting back here, Diane?’ probed Steven gently. ‘You said you gave an officer a lift back to the garrison, but surely that would only add another ten minutes?’
The blonde coloured slightly. ‘We stopped for a chat on the way. Nothing wrong with that, is there?’
The policeman shook his head. ‘None at all. We had a word with Lieutenant Crosby, he says he thinks you dropped him off at about twenty to midnight. Would that be about right?’
The widow lifted her shoulders in a gesture of indifference.
‘I suppose it was, if Gerry says so. I didn’t know you were going to interrogate him?’ she added sharply.
‘Just tying up loose ends, Diane. Quite a long chat, though?’
‘For God’s sake, Steven, this is the nineteen-fifties!’ she snapped irritably. ‘We did a bit of necking, that’s all. Not much room for anything heavier in that bloody Austin of mine. The way things were between James and myself, I think I deserved a bit of fun now and then.’
Blackwell looked at her impassively. ‘And how exactly were things between you and your husband?’
The blonde gave him a scornful look as she fumbled another cigarette from her packet. ‘Come on, Steve! You know damn well that we couldn’t stand each other. I’d even been thinking of going back to the UK.’
The police officer wondered if a certain surgeon might now figure in that scheme, but it seemed irrelevant, unless . . . ?
‘We know definitely that this wasn’t a terrorist shooting, so can you think of any reason why anyone would want him dead?’ he asked sombrely.
Diane tapped the ash from her cigarette into a potted plant standing next to the couch. ‘It’s no secret that he’d been getting his leg over a few local ladies. Maybe someone took strong objection to that?’
‘Are you going to tell me who they were?’ ventured Blackwell.
