He felt the orderlies gently manoeuvring his broken body onto the bamboo stretcher they’d set on the ground beside him, then picking him up and carrying him quickly across the clearing.
‘We really thought you were gone, Ellis,’ the doctor said cheerfully in the hospital hut, leaning over him. ‘I sent the chaps over to collect a corpse, but amazingly you’re still hanging on. You’ve got malaria. And dysentery, too, by the looks of it. And you’re more than half starved. It’s unbelievable that you’re still alive. Now these men will clean you up, and we’ll give you some food. You’ll soon be on the road to recovery.’
Tom felt tears stinging his eyes at the sound of the doctor’s reassuring voice. All he had heard since the death of his friends was the abuse of the guards.
‘Now, Ellis, luckily you’ve got what we call “gate fever”. Something to live for. It doesn’t matter what it is – could be a woman, kids, some sort of ambition. Whatever it is, it sees people through. And that’s the reason you kept going when you were in the pit.’
He closed his eyes and let the men cut his filthy shorts from his legs and wash his body with rags dipped in a bucket of cold water. But when they came to take his shirt he grabbed it back.
‘What’s the matter, mate?’ asked the orderly gently.
Tom was still unable to speak. He pointed to the breast pocket of the shirt, his eyes pleading.
‘Something in there, mate?’
The orderly drew out the picture of Joy and stole a glance at it.
‘Is this what kept you going in there?’ he asked softly. Tom nodded, swallowing the lump that was rising in his throat.
‘I can see why. Now I’ll just put it under your pillow so you’ll know it’s there.’ The orderly slipped the photograph under the folded rice sack that served as Tom’s pillow. Once again, his eyes filled with tears at this act of kindness.
They brought him boiled water and a small bowl of rice flavoured with fish. One of them spooned it into his mouth, and he managed to force it down his swollen throat. Then he lay back on the rice sack, panting with exhaustion. His back and torso still ached painfully from the beatings, and his whole frame was protesting at being crammed into the same position for all those days.
He felt the fever coming on him again. He began to shiver and his head throbbed, feeling as if it would explode. The men brought more rice sacks to put over him, but he still lay there, shivering, his teeth chattering uncontrollably, sweat pouring from his brow.
His mind wandered again to his past. He was back in Singapore with the rest of his depleted platoon. They were marching defiantly over Johor Causeway to the sound of shells and gunfire and explosions as the Japanese bombarded the mainland defences. Smoke billowed from the naval base to the east, and a cloud of dense black smoke from the oil depots that had been set on fire during the shelling hung over the island.
The whole army had withdrawn from the peninsula to the island, and after the last troops had crossed, the causeway had been blown. Places that had previously just been points on a map now gave their names to notorious defeats. The sound of these names struck fear in the hearts of the Volunteers. They knew all about the brave fighting by the British and Indian Divisions at Kampar and the Slim River. They had heard all about the battle of Johor, where the Australian Eighth Division had put up a stubborn defence, and of the defeats at Maur and Gemas. The Japanese had been wily and fearless in battle, cutting off divisions by going behind them. And they had superior equipment. They had tanks, whereas the British had none. Japanese planes dominated the air. But at least there was some hope, the Volunteers had been told, of holding Singapore.
Tom felt filthy and dog-tired. He had not had a shower or a proper night’s sleep for weeks. It was either steamy and hot under the canvas or, if it was raining, the tents leaked and the soldiers were soaked to the skin. They were permanently wet, either soaked in rainwater or bathed in their own sweat. They had been camping for several days in a rubber plantation on the edge of the city, listening to the shelling on the north coast, waiting for the Japanese to cross the narrow stretch of water and make their final bid for the island.
The plantation ran along the edge of one of the main roads into the city. Opposite was a line of buildings that had been bombed during an air raid. The roofs had caved in, the front walls were crumbling and the insides were blackened with smoke. The road was strewn with smashed-up vehicles, abandoned rickshaws and, worst of all, the putrefying bodies of several Malays and Chinese who had been struck down by the blasts. From where Tom sat on the edge of a storm drain that ran round the perimeter of the plantation, he could see the clouds of flies buzzing around the bodies in the heat of the day. He stared in horror. He could hardly believe that these stiff shapes were human bodies.
His eyes smarted constantly from the black cloud of smoke that was ever present. When it rained, black soot from the cloud poured down on them, staining their uniforms and streaking their skin. Tom felt strangely calm now. Having seen the horrors of the raids on the air base and the battle at Selangor River, he realised that it was possible to survive. He might just come through this alive.
Now they were waiting for orders. Which part of the city would they have to defend against the invaders? Every so
