Big Sunray told the CO to debrief Captain Rance, who was to write a report of ‘what went wrong’ with the marker balloon prior to the bombing, as well as to find out exactly how the ten CT had been killed when they were in an overnight camp. Not only that, how were those captured and sent out by heli able to come so close to Captain Rance’s overnight camp without being spotted? Were Captain Rance’s tactics really that good? ‘Quiz him, get him to include that in his report, and then send it to me,’ were the Brigadier’s orders.
Jason felt that he was being treated with unfair suspicion but finished his report by writing four citations, a Military Cross each for all three platoon commanders and a Military Medal for 21138176 Corporal Kulbahadur Limbu.
At a meeting between the Brigade Commander, his battalion commanders and Head of Special Branch, the talk turned to how Tan Fook Leong could be eliminated. ‘Brigadier, I have an idea,’ said Moby. ‘I have told those four men who surrendered to Captain Rance last month how to eliminate their one-time commander. It is a good plan and I am sure it will work. They are ready to undertake it but, however, there is one stipulation that is not in my hands.’
‘And, pray, what is that?’ asked the Brigadier.
‘Sir, they will only go if Captain Rance goes with them.’
The village of Ha La, in map square VE 2126, was no longer traceable when this book was written. ↵
They were Japanese. About thirty moved to the guerrillas after the war and only two, Hashimoto Shigeyuki and Tanaka Kiyoaki survived and returned to Japan in 1998. ↵
There was a similar case in Seremban in 1958, when a Gurkha pissed on an unsanctified Chinese grave of men the Japanese had killed. In your author’s case a Church of England padre told him that that is what happens when ‘evil spirits were exorcised’. ↵
27 September 1954, Seremban: ‘The SEP will only go back and deliver the radio if Captain Rance goes with them?’ queried the Brigadier with more than a tinge of frost in his voice. Quite ludicrous! ‘Without doubting your word, Mr Mubarak, are you sure you are correct?’ He used the shorthand SEP for Surrendered Enemy Personnel, rather than CEP, captured dittos.
Before being posted to command an active service brigade in Malaya, the Brigadier had served only in Africa and Europe during the war and UK and Germany afterwards, always with British troops. Asians were a ‘closed book’ to him. He was not against initiative but knew that the Army, like the Royal Academy, desired docility in its children and even originality had to be stereotyped. Thus any officer under his command, especially a young one whom he thought had maverick tendencies, was military anathema. His opinion of Rance was ‘too impulsive and too unconventional for promotion above major’.
The good-tempered Moby answered as politely as he could. ‘Sir, if I had thought otherwise I would not have mentioned it.’
‘And why is that a condition, do you think? It is most irregular and I am sure the Director of Operations in Kuala Lumpur would not allow us to risk such a venture.’ Moby said nothing. ‘Henry, what are your views about sending one of your company commanders away on such a far-fetched and irregular jaunt?’ asked with a decided sniff. ‘I’ve never heard such nonsense,’ he added with a pout.
‘Brigadier, I agree with you but, in his own way, Rance is a remarkable man. You may not realise just how talented a linguist he is, far above the normal standard of Chinese speakers. I am told a Chinese thinks he is a Chinese if he hears him and does not see his face. But why the four men are so insistent is beyond me.’
‘Mr Mubarak, will you interview the four men in front of me without Captain Rance being present?’
‘Certainly, sir, if that is your wish. Here and now?’
‘Yes, it shouldn’t take too long if you put a call through on my phone.’ He twisted round in his seat. ‘Henry, send for Captain Rance, will you. We’ll keep him out of sight at first then let them see him.’
As soon as Moby had finished his call, the CO made his to the battalion. ‘Give me the Adjutant,’ he told the exchange operator.
‘Adjutant speaking.’
‘Oh, Peter, CO here. I am in the Brigadier’s office. Get Captain Rance down here quicker than normal,’ and peremptorily rang off.
Waiting for their people to come, the Brigadier asked Moby, ‘what exactly is the plan you have sold to the SEPs?’
‘Sir, the day after the ambush was sprung Ten Foot Long gave his useless portable radio to one of them to get it repaired or to buy a new one. My idea is to get a new radio and put a bug in it so that when it is switched on its location on the ground can be picked up from the air. If we can get a bomber overhead once he has been pin-pointed he, and the men with him, could be eliminated any day suitable to the RAF.’
‘Hm,’ grunted the Brigadier, ‘neat but unsporting. How did you think this one up? Wouldn’t they be suspicious about such a move?’
‘I doubt it. How did I think this up? Two years ago it was used by an Auster to locate a renegade British officer of 1/12 GR who was being escorted by the guerrillas up north to the MCP HQ. Captain Rance and his small team of Gurkhas were involved in the chase to re-capture him. Subsequently bombs were not used but a voice aircraft was. I very much doubt if any CT knows anything of such a ruse, as those of the CT escort not killed by Rance’s follow-up are working for us now.’
‘Yes, I can understand that and a fine piece of work it must have been. But my question is how and why the SEP think they can give their one-time leader this new radio with a British officer standing around. I’ve never heard anything like it before. Doesn’t make sense to me.’
Moby gave a large inward sigh. ‘Sir, not to get our wires crossed, please ask the SEP yourself.’
Jason was the first to arrive. The Brigadier had not had a close look at him before and now saw a tall man with a taut, lean body and the indefinable air of a natural commander. On first sight I like what I see: here is a man who keeps himself fit and looks as if he knows his own mind, maverick though he be.
‘Rance, tell me why the four men who surrendered to you won’t go back into the jungle without you.’
‘Sir, this is news to me. I can’t tell you as I have no idea. Sorry.’
Moby came back to say that the four SEP were outside. ‘Shall I bring them in now?’
‘Wait till Captain Rance goes into the ops room,’ and to Jason, ‘Only come out when I call you.’
Dear God, send me some soldiers, wooden ones would do, the frustrated sergeant major’s tag came into Jason’s mind.
The four surrendered guerrillas were brought in. ‘Mr Mubarak, please ask the senior man why he won’t go without this British officer?’
Moby did and was appalled when told that Rance had saved him from being shot. Moby, thinking that Goh Ah Wah was referring to the mock execution in the Police Station, translated it, almost against his will.
‘What does he mean?’ queried the Brigadier, lamenting that he couldn’t understand a word of ‘that damned lingo’.
‘Sir, please call Captain Rance,’ Moby replied, managing to keep his voice even. ‘He can tell you.’
The Brigadier gave vent to his frustration by bellowing ‘Rance’.
When the SEP saw him, they all started talking to him at once, smiles on their faces. Jason answered them with a Chinese proverb, ‘Feigning to be a pig he vanquishes tigers’ and told them to keep quiet. The Brigadier looked on with amazed curiosity.
‘What is this about nearly being shot?’
‘Sir, I heard them coming towards me and hid behind a tree, threatening them with the oldest known Chinese curse, always effectively used by emperors in times past once uttered. They did not try to shoot us and so probably be shot by us but surrendered to me.’ He stared straight into the Brigadier’s eyes, the elder man thinking young pup, that’s almost a case of pre-World War 2 of ‘dumb insolence’.
Moby, breathing his biggest inward sigh of relief ever, took over before the Brigadier could answer, ‘Sir, he says that he knows he will come back safely only if they go together.’
‘And your answer to that, Rance?’ the Brigadier snapped, thinking bloody heathen nonsense.
‘Sir, it is up to you. I am perfectly ready to take a small party of my Gurkhas and go with these four men if so ordered.’
‘Mr Mubarak, tell me how they can know how to meet up with their one-time boss in such a large area of jungle? It doesn’t make sense to me.’ How does a man like this become a brigadier? Moby wondered
Moby put the question to Goh Ah Wah. The answer was a long one and the Brigadier was not good at hiding his impatience.
‘Sir, there is a secret cave he knows that Ten Foot Long uses as a resting area. He told this SEP when he gave him his useless radio to take it and, repaired or a new one with plenty of batteries, go there and dump the package in the cave. The sentries there will give it to him when next he goes there. These four do not want Captain Rance to go into the cave with them or meet any sentries, merely to be with them until they reach it and come back with them because were they to bump into any Security Force unit, being with a British officer would save their lives.’
‘Yes, that last does make good sense, I can see that. And where is this cave?’
There followed a long rambling discourse with many hand gestures and, at last, ‘about three days’ walk north of Bahau, at the top of some high ground. Once he’s in the general area he will recognise it.’
‘Does he approve of what we are doing?’ asked the CO.
‘Colonel, with respect, you have yet to understand these people. Approval doesn’t come into it. They have surrendered to us so are now on our side, not the guerrillas’, and that is that.’
‘I’ll think it over and let you know,’ the Brigadier directed. ‘Take them away and you, Rance, can go back to the battalion.’
