They opened up their hard tack, cooked a brew of tea and, before settling down for the night, talked amongst themselves as only soldiers can. They then settled down, covering their face against the many mosquitoes as comfortably as they could and drifted off to sleep.
Sometime later they were woken by a dog barking. They sat up and, in the dark, Jason and Kulbahadur grabbed their weapon, their lives in the tip of the index finger of their right hand. Spiders of alarm ran a web over their skin. They saw a torch light flashed and heard Chinese voices. ‘Ah, here’s a place we can spend the rest of the night. What a god-forsaken place this is. Nothing worth taking.’
‘No, and I expect there are no women either.’
‘You ham saap kwai. Can’t you ever take your mind off horizontal refreshment?’ asked the other man with jovial affection. The four men in the hut froze. ‘Shh,’ whispered Jason. ‘Leave this to me.’ Later, thinking over how he reacted, he gave himself full marks. In a shrill falsetto, in Chinese he squawked ‘No women, did you say? How could you forget me? So, you have come at last? How long have I been waiting for a really ham saap kwai to satisfy me?’
There was a yelp from outside, a silence then, ‘Are you real?’
‘Come and find out for yourself. But first tell me who you are. You don’t sound as if you come from the south and your unveiled instincts are not those of a decent comrade. You are not bandits, fei toh, are you?’
‘Them? Kung fei, Communist bandits? We spit on that kind of person. We are Nationalists, never kung fei.’
This time it was Jason who was surprised. This was the last complication he wanted, cursing himself as being too foolhardy. I must get rid of them but how?
Still using his falsetto and giggling, he said, ‘I’ll give you a test before you can have me. Are you afraid of snakes?’ getting his krait out his pocket as he said it.
‘Snakes? I can hear you moving around. What are you doing? Waiting for our short snakes?’
‘Taking off my knickers for you. But before I allow you to uncoil your snakes, shine your light at the door of the hut.’
As he did so Jason threw his dummy krait on the ground so it could be seen and hissed loudly as he did.
There was a joint yelp as the intruders ran away as fast as they could. ‘Kulé, get that snake back quickly. Up, you others, and we will have to move out and hide some distance away. They may come back.’
They got out and moved off a hundred yards or so and sat with their backs to some trees. Not long afterwards they heard people returning to the hut. Three rifle shots were fired, the hut was set on fire and the prowlers made off.
Shortly afterwards there was a horrific cloudburst and there was nothing to do but sit, get wet through and shiver violently. When it was light they started on their way back. They passed through some marshy ground with a salt lick they had noticed on their way in when there were no animals – but now! A herd of almost black, great wild bison – bulls, cows and calves – the bulls enormously horned and dangerous, standing six feet at their shoulders and nine feet long from nose to tail – were grazing.[2] In Malaya Jason knew them as seladang. Pawing the ground as they smelt men from about two hundred yards away, two bulls charged at the four men. ‘Gaur,’ Kulbahadur yelled.
Sprinting to some nearby teak trees with sturdy liana vines strong enough to bear their weight, they clambered up, just high enough to be out of reach of the angry animals’ horns.
‘Saheb, we’ve won out again,’ said Kulbahadur approvingly between pants of breath as the two bulls angrily pawed the
ground below.
Jason smiled back. ‘I have come across pink-coloured buffaloes that dislike Europeans’ smell but don’t seem to mind Nepalis’. I have had to escape from them but these creatures! Is it the same with them or is it their mating season I wonder?’ There was no answer from the others who merely made themselves more comfortable as they got their breath back again. ‘We’ll have to wait a while for these animals to leave us alone,’ which they did about twenty minutes later.
Jason looked at his watch. ‘Time to move. We must hurry. Top gear all the way. No need to take any security precautions now so no need to keep quiet.’
It started to rain heavily and, making best time, they reached their patrol base just before last light, soaked to the skin, hungry and dead tired – but at least they were safe.
Gurkha Lieutenant Pahalsing Gurung welcomed them effusively. He had been on tenterhooks since they had left. ‘Saheb, there’s not much tactically to report,’ said Jason tiredly. ‘I’ll tell you what happened after a good night’s sleep.’
‘Hunchha Hajur’ replied the Gurkha officer then, to Kulbahadur almost under his breath, he said, ‘No need now to be reborn as a dung beetle.’
They changed their clothes, lent the two wartime men some spare kit, made a fire of logs, got warm, dried their clothes and the two men with Kulé had a drink of rum. Jason, not liking the stuff, had a mess tin cover of tea. After their meal they had an early bed, being tired out.
The OCs briefing next morning did not take long. ‘It was hardly worth the trouble but to find Nationalist Chinese soldiers as far south is something people should know about. I’ll tell them when we get back.’
His senior Platoon Commander looked at him knowingly and, with the quiver of a smile, said, ‘Not if you are as wise as you normally are, Saheb.’
Jason looked at him sharply. ‘Meaning what, Saheb?’
‘Letting people know that you have broken all international laws by entering another country without any authority, armed and in uniform. That’s trespassing, isn’t it? A court-martial offence!’
‘O-ho, Saheb. Sorry,’ and he twisted his ears emulating being punished by a superior. ‘I can say the two men we met came over the border and told us about it.’
After their meal he asked his two guides ‘So, what will you do now? Have you made your minds up?’
‘Can you guarantee our getting back to Nepal?’
‘No, I personally can guarantee nothing but I certainly can say that my Commanding saheb will do all he can. I cannot see you being unsuccessful. And, just, just suppose, although I can’t imagine it, he was unsuccessful, we could always get you back here if you wanted it. All I have to ask you is to say we found you in Rantau Panjang.’
‘Of course, Saheb,’ said with a smile only Hill Gurkhas are capable of.
***
The rest of their stay spent in that area was an anti-climax. Jason reported into HQ at the end of the time, told the Colonel that he had found two wartime Gurkhas in Rantau Panjang who had told them about strange soldiers wearing strange hats and now wanted to be taken back to Nepal and this was what he was going to do once he was back in Seremban.
The Colonel said that strange soldiers in strange hats in Thailand were the Thais’ business not his and did not pursue the matter. He thanked Captain Rance and dismissed him. Before the company left Jason managed to get Rodney Mole to come and have a meal with his men, who put on an impromptu dance, much to the OCPD’s delight. They next day they were away. Thankfully their return journey was without incident.
Back in Seremban Jason handed over the two wartime Gurkhas to the CO and they were almost stultified to meet him. He did not tell the CO about his journey into Thailand, he’d keep the information to himself. What he did tell him was that the unnatural proclivity of one Sergeant Padamsing Rai, a member of the battalion now instructing soldiers in the Gurkha army school, was causing distress and dishonour amongst students. There was also a British sergeant who had similar tendencies.
Jason met the wounded man who was ‘line sick’, recovering in barracks and excused parades until he was fully fit. ‘By the time I’m back within a month you’ll be good as new,’ Jason told him.
The soldier smiled his thanks rather than saying anything, the way it happens in the Hills.
***
Matters moved surprisingly fast: before the Eastern Queen reached Singapore, the British sergeant working at the Gurkha school had been flown back to England and the Gurkha ‘administratively discharged’. So that he could be got rid of as quickly and quietly as possible he was to be escorted back to Calcutta aboard the next ship carrying a leave party, the Eastern Queen.
Jason was told that an officer on the reserve was coming out for his annual ‘refresher’ and he would take A Company over. He turned out to be an Irishman who had served with Gurkhas in the war and had ‘second sight’, although certain circumstances had to pertain. He was Major James McGurk, a small, fey, sour-apple of a man, grey-skinned and shrivelled.
***
Wednesday 29 October 1952, Alipore Park Road, Calcutta: The Rezident had been in Calcutta long enough to have had his ‘scouts’ look around and find that there was a sizeable Nepalese population in the sprawling city. Some of them drove buses or taxis, others were security guards or shop keepers. A number of them had been in the army, ‘seen the world’ and did not want to return to Nepal and live under an undeveloped and authoritarian government, especially having served in the army of a democratic government, something their own country did not have. The most fretful and at odds with their home country were those who had been forcibly converted to Islam by marauding bands of Muslims in the two years before partition in 1947 and, despite repeated requests to be re-accepted by the Nepalese authorities, found themselves as permanent religious outcastes. Some of these were ripe material for Communist recruitment: one in particular had found work in the Nepalese consulate in Sterendale Road so had a direct line to Kathmandu.
Over the weekend this man was contacted and ordered to report to the Soviet consulate. He was told about the coded phone call from Singapore by Chen Geng, of course no details of names being given. On the following Monday a letter explaining about the next boatload of Calcutta–bound Gurkhas being a mutinying battalion of now-Communist Gurkhas sent back to Nepal on disbandment, was slipped into the weekly diplomatic bag to Kathmandu. The message– the Rezident never asked how it was sent – reached King Tribhuvan, who the previous August had overthrown the Rana regime that had ruled the country since 1846, and had imposed direct rule. He reacted most strongly, hating the idea of Communism. He called one of the few men he trusted, his senior General, and told him the bad news. He did not say how he got it but merely from ‘unofficial sources’. ‘How can we absorb so many people who will be against our Government?’ he queried anxiously.
‘Sarkar’, said the General, using the word all royalty were addressed by, ‘this is a grave problem indeed. We could ask for details from the British ambassador but as you have not received it from official sources is there just a chance of it being a malicious rumour?’
‘Rumour or not, we cannot afford to take any chances.’ His Majesty directed that a secret message be sent to the Nepalese consulate in Rangoon telling the Consul on no account whatsoever was he or any member of his small staff to visit that next boatload of Gurkhas passing through. However, if there was a British officer on board he could be asked for background details. The General felt it was not up to him to suggest that the Consul would surely contact some Gurkhas if he went on board to meet any British officer in charge of the draft, so remained silent.
Instructions were readied and shown to the King for approval: such was essential for everything.
***
Wednesday 29 October – Monday 3 November 1952, Kuching, Sarawak: The SS Kimanis had made a leisurely journey, stopping at Jesselton in North Borneo before sailing west along the coast to Kuching. The man calling himself Ah Ho and his friend had return tickets and, before disembarking to carry out their task, they asked the purser when the vessel was returning. They were told that they should be back by Sunday night if they wanted their berths confirmed. Just saying they’d be back wasn’t good enough. The two men agreed they would be back by then. Their travel documents were in order and, having nothing to declare, they left the dock area without any hassle.
