Exasperated, Colonel Mason said, ‘Major Rance, answer my question, what was your CO’s reaction to your idea?’
‘There was no reaction at all, sir.’
‘How can that be so? There must have been a reaction. How can there not have been one?’
‘Because it was his idea, sir, not mine.’
‘His idea? Do you know why?’
Again Jason did not answer.
Colonel Mason, normally a placid man, exploded, ‘For heaven’s sake, answer me.’
‘Sir, he told me he would not allow any of his Gurkhas to go on such an operation so I had no choice but to re-plan.’
The Director of Infantry realised that Jason had been in a quandary and his silence was merely loyalty to an order he was in no way responsible for so he immediately calmed down. He stayed silent as he thought out the enormous strain that would attend Jason. Calmly he asked how Jason visualised contact with any guerrilla.
‘Sir, if I tell you, you will indubitably forbid me. Wouldn’t it be better to let you know after my return how I managed to bring back the Emissary?’
It was now Colonel Mason’s turn to be in a quandary. It was a situation that he had never previously encountered. He temporised. ‘Aren’t you being over-theatrical in giving me such an answer?’
‘Sir, you will, I expect, have read Sun Tzu,’ Jason began to his superior’s amazement. ‘You will recall that he wrote “Supreme excellence in generalship consists of breaking the enemy’s will without fighting.” I am basing my plans on that theme. If you can keep this to yourself and not stop me from going, I will grasp the nettle and let you know how I will manage.’
‘All right, go on then. In my job I know how to keep secrets.’
‘Sir, once we are on the ground, we will wear guerrilla kit, shirts, trousers and caps. If we meet anyone hostile on the way up we will not be Security Forces. I will be a turncoat from the government trying to join the MCP in Betong so ask for free passage so I can be taken as a comrade. I’ll have my face covered so won’t be recognised. I have no fear linguistically so it will also be “in plain sound”.’
The Colonel listened, eyes button bright. ‘And on the way down?’
‘Say I am a Russian pretending to be an Englishman coming to infiltrate the government as a double agent. I travelled from Moscow to Peking and on down to Betong, where I have just left.’
The Colonel’s eyes probed him like a scalpel as he considered the implications. ‘And that is the only way you think you can manage?’
‘Not “think”, sir, but “know”. Under those circumstances, nothing else came to my mind, sir. There is a Nepali proverb, “the goat to be sacrificed has had the gods enter it by sprinkling it with water; all that remains is for something to go wrong”,’ and his face was lit by a fleeting smile.
The Colonel digested this piece of esoteric Nepali folklore before saying ‘I must ask this. Who else knows of what you have decided?’
‘Only three, apart from you. One is Ismail Mubarak, Head of Special Branch, Seremban, who had to be told to get the CT kit ready, and one is Mr C C Too. Let me explain. I felt that to ask these four SEP to undertake such an operation with no recompense was asking too much. I needed authority to give them a bonus and permission to let them off the SEP list and be free men once again.’
‘Yes, I go along with that. You said three others. Who’s the third?’
‘My Company 2 ic, sir, my Gurkha Captain.’
‘Why him particularly?’
Again Jason hesitated before answering, ‘to write to my mother explaining everything in case I don’t come back.’
Some way along from the camp at Betong along the path to Ha La was a track that led south towards the border. The Bear’s squad reached it towards mid-afternoon. By then the Emissary was tired. Although he had regained his strength after his arduous journey, he was no longer a fit man and by now he was lagging. The Bear knew that the only reason he himself was still alive after so many years of jungle living and so many near misses was because he took nothing for granted. He didn’t believe that anyone from the camp would follow up but one could never be sure. He had travelled along that track so many times he knew it like the proverbial back of his hand and knew that about half a mile ahead was a north flowing stream. Once there he would take his group up it for a few hundred yards then jink back to the track until he found a place they could spend the night. That way, were there anyone following them, they would be safe.
The Emissary didn’t like getting his new footwear wet – the others went bare-footed – but kept quiet about it. Back on the track the Bear found a place where they could spend the night. He had divided some basic rations, rice chiefly, among his men, and, with their parangs, they constructed rudimentary shelters by cutting branches, which they covered in leaves and topped with sheets of waterproof material to keep out the rain.
After their meal logs were collected, a fire was lit to keep animals away and, taking a risk of not bothering about sentries – after all, they were not at war in Thailand, were they? – they drifted off to sleep.
21 February
Colonel Mason was quietly shocked at what he had learnt about Jason’s change in plan and felt it was in everyone’s best interests to say nothing about how matters had developed. He was in two minds to ring the CO of 1/12 GR but decided against that until, when? Until Major Rance had gone on leave? He had had his Deputy, a major, arrange the heli and transport for the five men. He had also arranged for Police Field Force boats – originally he had said only one but better to have a spare with such a tight programme so two had been ordered – to arrive at Fort Tapong the previous night but he himself thought it would be a gesture of solidarity if he himself went to see the group off.
The Royal Air Force ‘Whirlwind’ helicopter pilot was the same person who had lifted Jason, some Gurkhas and the same SEPs out of the jungle previously. He waved to them as the crewman ushered them inside and told them to belt up. The engine was switched on and the rotors started turning. No one bothered about the sack Jason carried. When all was ready it lifted off, Colonel Mason waving as it did, Jason’s Nepali proverb running through his mind.
Ah Soo Chye heard the heli in the distance. Must be something to do with the plane I heard yesterday. There’ll be someone somewhere along the river. On, on.
22 to 25 February
The Bear’s group with the Emissary found the going hard. It was not just the terrain that was getting rougher, steeper and colder but the nearer the line of mountains that formed the border the more it rained. Meng Ru didn’t grumble, he wasn’t that sort of man, but he slowed everyone down so it was lucky that the meeting on the border was not scheduled until the 25th. Wild animals were the only threat and the noise the group made – much too loud for the Bear’s professional standard – was, if anything, a bonus as it scared the forest creatures.
The helicopter ride took more than half an hour as Fort Tapong is a good way up the Sungei Perak. The Police Field Force had been alerted to marshal the heli and once it had landed, Jason and his men, having been bare-headed in case their hats blew off and damaged the rotors as they exited, quickly deplaned. Once they were clear the marshaller gave the sign for take-off and away it flew.
The OC was a Malay Inspector and his number 2 was a fine-looking Sikh. ‘Welcome, sir, welcome to Fort Tapong. It is not often we have people landing by heli.’
‘Thank you for marshalling us in so successfully,’ Jason answered, his smile open and friendly. ‘Let me introduce my men’ and, in Malay, told the policemen their names. They shook hands.
‘Would you like a meal before you move off in the boats? Both came last night. They want to move off as soon as you are ready but a quick meal will not harm matters.’ He looked at his watch. ‘It is only half past nine. I’ll tell the crews to be ready to caste off at ten o’clock.’
Jason asked his men, still in Malay, if they’d like a meal – ‘we don’t when we’ll see hot food again’ – and the offer was eagerly accepted. ‘For me a cup of coffee would go down very well,’ he added. ‘I’d like a word with you while my men are eating.’
‘Come along in,’ said the Inspector. They went to the upper floor where the open windows caught a breeze. Coffee was brought and Jason asked how much of his operation they knew.
‘All we have been told that there is a top-secret operation with the planning name of “Emissary”, nothing else.’
