‘Yes, that makes sense. And, if he has to join the Politburo in the jungle, he’ll need to wait for an escort. It could be sometime next year before he gets back.’
Ah Fat could hear cups being put back on their saucers. ‘Another cup?’ Chen Geng asked.
‘No thanks. I’d better go. I have other matters to look into.’
‘Yes, so have I. Let’s say good bye and leave. I’ll pay.’
Ah Fat heard them get up and leave their cubicle. Peering through the gap in the curtain he saw them move out into the road. I’ll wait a while. Let them get right away.
Finding a phone would not be easy so he risked asking at the bar if he could use theirs. ‘Only for local calls. I’ll time you and you can pay me at the end.’ He still had some local currency, so he agreed. He knew Reggie Hutton’s number and rang it.
It rang for quite a while and Ah Fat was on the verge of putting the phone back on its cradle when, to his relief, Reggie Hutton answered it. ‘9928 speaking.’
Ah Fat turned his face away from the bar man and, speaking softly, said, ‘Mr Hutton, have you your hat on. Is it inconvenient if I come and see you?’
‘No, certainly not. Do you want to be picked up?’
‘It would be expedient. I am now in a café near the dock area. I’d like to be picked up where you picked us up before. Give me half an hour.’
‘Is that necessary?’
‘I think so. Tell you why when I see you’ and rang off. ‘How much is that?’
The barman told him, and Ah Fat paid. ‘Does a bus from anywhere near here go to the railway station?”
‘No,’ and the barman told him where to go to find one that did.
Ah Fat thanked him and left. He flagged down the first empty taxi he saw and told the driver to go to the railway station and once there, waited for Reggie Hutton’s car to pick him up.
At Reggie’s place it was talk, talk, a meal, talk and, finally, bed time. Reggie was overwhelmed with what he was told. This is much larger, broader, bigger and more frightening that I had ever thought,’ he said. ‘What do you think will happen to Sobolev and Tsarkov?’
‘Oh Reggie. That’s beyond me. I have no idea.’
‘Well, from what I know of their system I expect that certainly the Rezident will disappear and the other punished. And that unfortunately named Indian, Vikas Bugga?’
All Ah Fat could say was ‘your guess is as good, or as bad, as mine.’
‘And your friend Jason Rance. His future? Will he be chased by Soviet representatives over here, do you think?’
‘He was billed as Jason Rance being a working name, he being a closet comrade. I can’t imagine anything unpleasant happening to him. There’s one cool man who can look after himself.’
‘So now you will go back to your jungle base. Oh, what happened to your Bear? You haven’t mentioned him.’
‘There was only one ticket for me, nothing for him, so I sent him back to his family. I’ll catch tomorrow’s day train to KL, pick him up and back to base it is.’
‘And C C Too. Will you meet him?’
‘Originally I had intended to but that means a delay and really I should show my face as soon as I can now. Is there any way of your briefing him, even though all I’ve told you is outside his territory.’
‘I’d rather you did if you could. There are some questions I might not be able to answer.’
So, Ah Fat agreed and, it being bed time, both of them turned in, Ah Fat glad that the bed was still and not moving.
At KL Ah Fat met up with his Bear. He was tempted to spend a few days with his own family. He went and saw C C Too and gave him a detailed briefing and it wasn’t till the following Wednesday that the two of them moved north. On Monday 22 December, fortunately having met up with a courier and escort, the two men reported back to the MCP HQ. They were delighted to see them and agog to learn what he had found out and what would the future now hold.
It only now occurred to Ah Fat whether to tell them the truth or let them live in false hopes. ‘I’ll brief a Plenum, Comrade Secretary General, as soon as you can arrange one. But now, so delighted am I to be back, please let me relax for a day or so.’
They fixed a Plenum for two days later. That gave Ah Fat plenty of time to consider what to say. He realised that they would not have heard the false news of mutinying Gurkhas nor about the Barrackpore coolies. He’d merely talk about the meeting in the consulate. In fact, whatever he did tell them, as far as he and Jason were concerned, both Operations Tipping Point had been a success. Yes, and for them let it be a failure.
Having made up his mind, he knew how best he would manage the Plenum. There was a smile on his face when he went to sleep that first night – and on the second. And a broader one, a grin, after the Plenum, there being an inverse ratio to their gloom and his inner joy.
***
Monday 22 December 1952, Seremban, Malaya: Captain Rance travelled by day train to Seremban so it was evening by the time he reached the battalion. The meeting in Singapore, which everyone had judged a success and had congratulated him on his wonderful display of knowledge, had been hard work but worth it. But back in Seremban, in the battalion lines once more, Jason really did feel like coming back home. He put his kit in his room and went to visit A Company, had a talk with Major McGurk, who garrulously kept the conversation to his weird experience and how stimulating the men were before going round the barrack rooms and letting the men know he was back, little realising that they knew that already.
That night in the Mess he was asked by all and sundry how matters had panned out. ‘Lucky devil,’ one said, ‘Bugger all to do except sun bathe on the First Class deck. You were really on leave, both ways, with the Queen paying your fare, board and
lodging.’
‘Quite right, but jealousy will get you nowhere,’ was Jason’s laughing reply. ‘Tell me what’s been happening around here.’ Anything to keep away from my doings! It was a happy evening, banter and counter banter. The Adjutant told him that the CO would like a word on the morrow, after orders,
around 1215.
The CO welcomed him back. His main interest was the two wartime Gurkhas Jason had rescued. ‘Yes, the Singapore High Commission had approached the Indian High Commission because the two men were in the Indian Army when they were captured. They, in turn, contacted GHQ Indian Army for their repatriation. I gather GHQ will contact their Record Office to find out details of back pay. It will take a while to work out how many years they will get it for. Until Indian Independence or when? The two men were especially allowed to go back by air. They could well have overflown you as they went.’
‘I am delighted to hear that sir.’
‘And the journey to India and back? No trouble?’
Jason thought out his answer. ‘I spent a pleasant night with Muggy Day. I met the Attaché in Rangoon: as our first CO in 1948 that was a pleasant bonus. I am sorry I couldn’t get back earlier but the symposium kept me down in Singapore.’
‘Yes, of course I agreed to what they asked. What was your main point?’
Jason thought back over the past month while the CO waited for his answer.
‘We discussed many tactical issues and I was asked a number of questions about how I had managed with my men. I think I gave adequate answers. And then I had a brainwave. Not that I would or could write a book about any of what I’ve managed to do.’ The CO gave his company commander a quizzical smile – OC A Company’s written reports weren’t up to staff work standard. ‘I’d dedicate it “To the Security Forces, especially remembering those whose home ground Malaya is; Malay troops, Malay Police and especially our Gurkhas, whose skill and tenacity reached the tipping point in the Emergency in our favour.”
‘Isn’t that premature?’ asked the CO, dubiously.
‘Only that from the way matters are going in Indonesia and French Indo-China, Malaya will be the only country where the Communists will have lost on ground of their own choosing.’[4]
The CO asked Jason what examples he had given and he said, ‘I mentioned various points about Janus. You may think I finished up a bit pompously.’
The CO smiled. ‘Well, let’s hear it so I can judge.’
‘I said, if ever I’d write a book about it, which of course I never will, I’d dedicate it thus:
And should you ask, where do they live
