'Too right I'd like an egg.'
'Make yourself at home.' The King could afford to be hospitable. 'Now let's get down to business. We'll close the deal this afternoon.'
'Na.' Timsen shook his head. 'Not t'day. Tomorrer.'
The King was hard put not to beam.
'The heat'll be off by then,' Timsen was saying. 'Hear that Grey's got himself out've hospital. He'll be eying this place.' Timsen seemed gravely concerned. 'We got to watch out. You an' me. Don't want anything to go wrong. I got to watch out for you, too. Don't forget we're cobbers.'
'To hell with tomorrow,' the King said, feigning disappointment. 'Let's do it this afternoon.'
And he listened, shouting with laughter inside, listened while Timsen said how important it was to be careful; the owner's scared, why he even got beat up last night, and why, it wuz only me and my men what saved the poor bastard. So the King knew for sure then that Timsen was bleeding, that the diamond had slipped through his slimy mitts, that he was playing for time. Why, I'll bet, the King told himself ecstatically, that the Aussies are going out of their skulls trying to find the hijacker. I wouldn't like to be him — if they find him. So he allowed himself to be persuaded. Just in case Timsen did find the guy and the original deal stood.
'Well, okay,' the King said grudgingly. 'I suppose you got a point. We'll make it tomorrow.' He lit another cigarette and took a drag and passed it over and said sweetly, still playing the game: 'On these hot nights few of my boys sleep. At least four of them are up. All night.'
Timsen understood the threat. But he had other things on his mind. Who, for the love uv God, who bushwhacked Townsend? He prayed that his men would find the buggers quick. He knew he had to find the bushwhackers before they got to the King with the diamond, for then he'd be out of luck. 'I know how it is. Just the same with my boys — lucky they're so close to my poor old pal Townsend.' Stupid bastard. How in the hell could a bugger be so weak as to allow himself to be jumped and not holler afore it was too late? 'Man can't be too careful these days, either.'
Tex brought in the eggs and the three men ate them with lunch-rice, and washed it all down with strong coffee. By the time Tex took out the dishes, the King had the conversation just where he wanted it.
'I know a guy who's in the market for some drugs.'
Timsen shook his head. 'He's got an 'ope, poor bastard. Ain't possible!
Too right.' Ah, he thought. Drugs! Who'd that be for? Not the King, certainly. He looks healthy enough, an' not for resale either. The King never deals in drugs, which is all right, for that leaves the market in my hands. Must be for someone close to the King, though. Otherwise he'd never get involved. Drug trade's not his meat. Old McCoy! Of course. I heard he wasn't so well these days. Maybe the colonel. He ain't been lookin' too well either. 'I heard of a Limey who's some quinine. But Jesus wept, he wants a bloody fortune for it.'
'I want some antitoxin. A bottle. And sulfonamide powder.'
Timsen let out a whistle. 'Not an 'ope!' he said. Antitoxin and sulfa!
Gangrene! The Pommy. Christ, gangrene! And the whole pattern fell neatly into place. Got to be the Pommy! Not through cunning alone had Timsen cornered the drug market. He knew enough about drugs from civvy street, where he had worked as an assistant druggist, which no bastard but him knew, because then the bastards would've put him in the Medical Corps, and that would've meant no fighting and no killing, and no self-respecting Aussie'd let his country down and dear old Blighty down by being just a stinking noncombatant medical orderly.
'Not an 'ope,' he said again, shaking his head.
'Listen,' the King said. 'I'll level with you.' Timsen was the only man who could get it in the whole world, so he had to get his help. 'It's for Peter.'
'Tough,' Timsen said. But inside he sympathized. Poor bugger.
Gangrene. Good man, lot of guts. He still felt the smash the Pommy'd given him last night. When the four of them had fallen on the King and the Pommy.
Timsen had found out about Peter Marlowe when he had been taken up by the King. A man can't be too careful and information's alw'ys important.
And Timsen knew about the four German planes and about the three Nips, and he knew about the village and how the Pommy'd tried to escape from Java, not like a lot who'd meekly sat and taken it. And yet, when you thought about it, it was pretty stupid to try. So far to go. Yes. Too far. Yes, this Pommy's a beaut.
Timsen wondered if he could risk sending a man into the Japanese doctor's quarters to get the drugs. It was risky, but the quarters and the route had been pegged. Poor bugger Marlowe, he must be sick with worry.
Of course I'll get the drugs — and it'll be done for free, or just for expenses.
Timsen hated selling drugs, but someone had to, better him than someone else, for the cost was always reasonable, as reasonable as possible, and he knew he could make a fortune selling to the Japanese, but he never did, only to the camp and really only for a slight profit, when you thought of the risks involved.
'It makes you sick,' Timsen said, 'when you think of all that Red Cross medical supplies in the godown on Kedah Street.'
'Hell, that's a rumor.'
'Oh, no it ain't. I've seen it, mate. On a work party I was. Stashed full of Red Cross stuff — plasma, quinine, sulfa — everything, from floor to ceiling and still in their cases. Why, the godown must be a good hundred yards long and thirty wide. An' it's all going to those bugger Nips. They let the stuff in all right. Comes through Chungking, I'm told. The Red Cross give it to the Siamese — they turn it over to the Nips — all consigned for POW's, Changi. Christ, I've even seen the labels, but the Nips just use it for their own monkeys.'
'Anyone else know about this?'
'I told the colonel and he told the Camp Commandant, who told that Nip bastard - what's 'is name, oh yus, Yoshima - and the Camp Commandant, see, well, he demanded the supplies. But the Nips just laughed at him and said it was a rumor and that was the last of it. No work parties 'ave ever gone again. Lousy fuckers. Ain't fair, not when we need the drugs so bad.
They could give us a little. My cobber died six months back for want of a little insulin - and I saw crates of it. Crates.' Timsen rolled a cigarette and coughed and spat and was so incensed he kicked the wall.
He knew there was no future in getting upset about it. And there was no way to get at that godown. But he
