The Emissary nodded agreement and they walked back in silence, each immersed in his own thoughts, parting just before camp buildings came into sight.
Early February
Ah Fat and the Bear left for KL as planned on the 6th and in the normal way. Each had two passports, one Thai and one Malayan and they flew from Penang. Before take-off Ah Fat rang Mr Too’s private number and, without introducing himself, merely said, ‘if you are at home tonight I’ll come and take dinner off you.’
‘Yes, do that,’ and the connection was cut.
Both travellers first went home, to the delight of wives and children who saw far too little of them but accepted it as the salary of both meant that the families had enough to eat, could dress properly, pay the rent and send the children to a good school. ‘I have to leave you for a couple of hours,’ Ah Fat told his wife while the Bear told his that he had come on holiday so would stay at home. His son, Wang Liang, a sturdy lad of fifteen years, asked after ‘Uncle Jason’: they had met a couple of months earlier and he had been enthralled by Jason’s tricks. ‘I haven’t seen him since then,’ said his father ,‘but if I do, I’ll tell him you asked.’
Ah Fat told C C Too how the Secretary General, intent on planning what to do next and his move to China, so there was no point in fixing any substitute mole, went on to talk about the Emissary, giving his name as Meng Ru. Too listened avidly, asking for more details than could be given without a much longer debrief. ‘On the face of it I can’t see any enormous difficulties but, with this new government and the British tuans not in the driving seat for much longer, it might be difficult.’
‘But if he is presented as a Surrendered Enemy Personnel would that help?’
Too rubbed his chin as he thought. ‘Just can’t say. It has never happened before and Communists are barred, aren’t they?’
Ah Fat nodded, then said, ‘Even if you get a green light to bring him in as an intelligence prize the one other possible snag to getting him here is that he says he will only come if a fluent, Chinese-speaking British man brings him, him and me, to make three of us without considering any escort.’
‘That should not be an insurmountable difficulty. Let us, for the sake of argument, say that permission is granted to bring him in. How would you get him out of the camp and what route would you take thereafter?’
‘I have given a lot of thought to that, coloured by the request to have a European with him. In all there are three options for the way out. One, we arrange for motor transport on the road nearest. That would mean moving round Gunong Lang onto the road by Kampong Lalang, the same route Jason Rance took with the documents I gave him after I raided the Secretary General’s safe, then on by car to KL. The second is to take him to Ha La almost on the border and then join the Betong-Prai road before driving south. The third is by not using the roads but crossing into Malaya by the pass to the west of Gunong Gadong on the border, a two-day walk along the river till a boat is reached and then on down along the headwaters of the Sungei Perak until either a heli point, a fixed-wing airstrip or the road at Grik is reached. That way would make any follow up from the MCP camp much harder so would be the safest. The pass is, in fact, not difficult to find and has a border stone marked with a hammer and sickle in its stem. We engraved it as we passed into Thailand when we had to evacuate Malaya. I was there at the time.
‘The third option is, as far as any follow-up in concerned, the safest but it is difficult and remote country and could be dangerous as the thirty-odd guerrillas still on the Wanted List working under Ah Soo Chye, with Tek Miu and Lo See as his lieutenants, operate around there. We are not sure if they have a permanent camp in Thailand or Malaya, whether they operate in three small groups, two larger or one much larger one. I do know that they often stay with the orang asli. The leaders have wives in various settlements and it is much easier to be fed there rather than carrying their own rations around. But back to the rescue group: apart from rations, armed escort, communications, etc, what other factors need to be considered?’
‘If I could get hold of any Temiar, the orang asli I’ve friendly relations with, I could count on them for advanced warning of anyone we don’t want to meet. However, contacting them could take too much time to plan on them. In any case they’re furtive as mouse deer and timid as birds and trying to plan anything with them is harder than knitting with eels.’
‘It’s a thorny one, isn’t it?’
‘Our next problem is finding the fluent Chinese-speaking European who can meet the bill. You can try the Chinese Affairs Departments in the various states but even they are not field men, while any university professor will be too unfit even to consider. Not a big choice is there? It would be a pity to have to abort just because we can’t find “the” man.’
‘We need not find him if there is no agreement from up top, need we?”
‘No. True enough,’ Ah Fat countered, then asked ‘Do you know the Director of Operations? Is he still the one we met when it was fixed that Jason Rance come and collect the paperwork I had for him?’
‘Yes, I’ll see if I can get an interview. But before we meet him, both of us if he’ll agree, what do we do if we can’t find a fluent Chinese speaker who can meet the bill working in the Chinese Affairs Department?’
‘You know the answer already. Jason Rance!’
7 February
With the Malayanization of administrative posts, civil and military, consequent on the changing political situation, there had been a considerable exit of British staff but it was not for a few years yet that that post of Director of Operation went to a Malay General. However, the current Director’s MA was new and when Mr Too rang and asked for an interview, he was quizzed. ‘I think you need an official request put in to me by police protocol.’
‘Of course. Yes you are quite right. I am sorry I forgot, quite stupid of me,’ Mr Too waxed, somewhat overdoing it because, even though his English was of a particularly high standard he did not sound like an Englishman when he spoke. ‘But I have the General’s personal word that I can talk to him if needs be.’
‘In that case I’ll pop in and ask him. Your name again please.’
‘Too Chee Chew, a.k.a. C C Too.’
‘Please say that all again, more slowly.’
‘To make it easy, just say C C Too.’
‘Got it! Thanks. The person I took over from didn’t tell me this, sorry. Half a mo’, please.’
The General came on the line. ‘Mr Too. I know you never try and contact me unless it is something valuable that probably no one else has and most likely needs a decision one way or another in a hurry. Am I correct?’
Too chuckled his answer back. ‘When have you not been, sir?’
The General chuckled in return. ‘Now or face-to-face?’
‘Not on the line, please. I have someone who you have met before and you listened to in earnest about a tall man, one who was Ten Foot Long. I am sure you can recall that.’
‘Yes, I can indeed. Office or at my place?’
‘Sir, the fewer people who see my friend in official places the happier we are.’
‘In that case, you know where I live, don’t you? Come around just after six, just as daylight is fading.’
There were five of them who sat in front of the desk in the General’s office at Flagstaff House, each with a glass of something to their taste in their hand. On arrival they had been met by Colonel James Mason, the Director of Intelligence. He had met Too and Ah Fat before when planning the hand-over of secret MCP documents to Captain Rance. So irregular had that been that the General and the Colonel had ‘not wanted to know’ when or how the operation was to be carried out. They shook hands and grinned at each other. Before they sat down the General said, ‘Now that last lot’s all over and done with, may I congratulate you on your success, Mr Ah Fat?’
Ah Fat bowed his head. ‘I was only half, sir. The other half did just as well.’
‘Yes, yes. Of course he did. That I know well.’ They sat down. The General wiped his brow although there was air-conditioning in his study. He looked tired. ‘So, what horrors have you come up with this time?’
Mr Too said, ‘Sir, I’ll ask Mr Ah Fat to open the bowling,’ and, with a nod from the General, Ah Fat told him ‘chapter and verse’, slowly and coherently. The MA, new to it all, had sat goggle-eyed, his drink forgotten. The General, a tall man with imposing features that, at first blush, were intimidating, yet had a kindly smile soon dispelled that impression. He wore a ‘walrus’ moustache and had a deep voice. He listened intently, at times raising his eyebrows and looking with wide-opened eyes, at times just staring dully ahead. When the story had finished, the General said, ‘Mr Ah Fat, I’m only so glad you and I are on the same side. This needs careful thinking about. On the face of it, this Emissary could be of great use. Of course, until he is fully debriefed we won’t know if our mine is gold, silver or bronze but it just has to have some sort of metal in it of use to us. As to whether the government authorities will accept his grandfather’s story, or even his grandson’s version of it, is something none of us can say. The worst that can happen is a disappointed man being returned to China but once there won’t live long, I expect. Too bad, as he is most certainly a brave man. Can you give me his name, please?’
‘Yes, and I can give you his photo,’ which he handed over.
‘That is most useful,’ the Colonel said. ‘We might get some temporary pass for him.’
Ah Fat asked for a piece of paper and a ball-point and wrote 孟儒, Meng Ru but pronounced Mang Yu in Cantonese, and gave it to Colonel. I’d love to be able to speak, read and write Chinese but I’d never have any time for proper soldiering had I done so, he thought. ‘Have you any other points?’ he asked Ah Fat.
‘Yes sir, my own personal position in the MCP organisation, as a non-voting Politburo member. If both the Emissary and I disappear together there will be an almighty large hue and cry’ – I learnt that phrase in school but have never used it till today. Glad I remembered it. ‘I can manage the Emissary’s disappearance by getting him to say he wants to go back to China as he came, individually, rather than wait and go back with the Secretary General who is waiting for permission to go and live there. I could even volunteer to take him to the nearest road, towards Sadao to cross the border into Malaya at Danok rather than east to Ha La or to Songkhla but I expect they would want, even for protocol purposes, to have more than only me to take him there.’
He was interrupted at that piece of news of Chin Pen’s intention of going to China as none had yet heard it. He was asked for more details, gave them, including that Ah Hai, now returned from China cured of his tuberculosis, would be the Deputy Secretary General remaining in Betong. Ah Fat continued. ‘I am still held in high regard by Chin Peng who does not in any way suspect what I am doing here. I don’t like the task I’ve set myself but I can’t renege now. In other words, once I have returned to Betong I cannot leave of my own accord. That means I cannot escort the Emissary.’
‘So how will you get round that problem without him changing his mind?’ It was C C Too who asked.
‘I have only one option and that is to get the Bear, sorry, my deputy Wang Ming, to take my place but only as far as the border. If there is an affirmative reply to his request I think the Emissary will accept him. I might just be able to start him off if I am allowed to take him to where my printing of that newspaper Red Tidings was done at Ha La. I have to go there in any case as it will no longer be published now that the peace talks have failed and I will have to get the equipment brought back. Even then I’ll have a working party with me.’
‘Not easy. Let’s hope he accepts your deputy,’ said the General, adding, ‘Now, Mr Too, what about his Chinese-speaking Englishman? Any ideas?’
I’ll answer this in a roundabout way. ‘Sir, the Chinese Affairs Departments in the states and here in HQ must have Europeans who can manage the language but their jobs are sedentary. They may be fit enough for a set of tennis or a game of squash but other than that, no, they won’t be fit enough to cover the ground that we have chosen.’
‘Not even being met by car on the nearest road?’ queried the General.
‘They will have to meet the Emissary in Malaya at the border but even though he came from China on a passport, the countries he passed through were Communist but Malaya surely won’t accept a Chinese passport with no visa.’
‘Then that puts the road journey right out of play?’ said the General. ‘It looks like being the jungle or nothing. Yet quite how we fix his documents if he is allowed in is something we here can’t answer. That means the jungle route is the one we have to take whether we or he likes it or not.’
