The Other Side of Paradise (19 page)

‘Hold on to the belt of my frock, Peter. Hold it very tight and I’ll pull you along too.’

She dragged the two children through the water, using all her remaining strength. Just as she thought she could go no further and that all three of them would drown, a friendly little current took pity and carried them gently towards the trees and the swamp.

They clung to a half-submerged branch. The mangrove roots – twisted and sinister – grew deep down into dark and stagnant water, too deep for Susan to stand. Fish kept plopping up to the surface and skittering along spookily on their tails, while crabs scuttled about between the tree roots. Something slithered heavily into the swamp nearby. A crocodile?

She said calmly to the girl in Cantonese and to the boy in English, ‘We must climb up into the tree. We can rest there. You go first, Peter.’

He scrambled upwards and she followed with the girl. There was no place to sit comfortably and so they had to wedge themselves between branches, but it was better than being in the swamp, and the mangrove leaves gave them some shade. They had all been badly sunburned on the raft – especially Peter – and their skin was raw and peeling.

The girl whispered, ‘I’m thirsty.’

Susan was thirsty as well, and Peter must have been too, though he hadn’t complained, or uttered a word.

‘This water is too salty to drink. We’ll stay here until it isn’t so hot, then we can try to swim on a bit and see if we can find some fresh water.’ She smiled brightly at the little girl as she spoke, to show her that there was nothing to worry about. ‘You haven’t told me your name yet. Let me guess. Is it Lee?’

A shy shake of the head.

‘Is it Yim?’

Another shake and a giggle.

‘Is it Chua?’

From his perch on a higher branch, the boy spoke suddenly: his first words to her. ‘It’s Hua.’

‘How do you know, Peter?’

‘She told me when we were on the boat. It means a flower.’

‘So it does. Do you speak Cantonese, then?’

‘My
amah
taught me some. I can speak a bit of Malay, too.’

‘That’s useful. Do you know what your name means in English, Peter?’

‘It means a rock.’

‘Quite right. Everyone can depend on you.’

At the moment, though, they were depending on her. If they didn’t find fresh water, they would die of thirst. And if they couldn’t find a way out of the mangrove swamp, they’d die anyway.

‘How old are you, Peter?’

‘Seven. I’ll be eight in May.’

‘And how old are you, Hua?’

‘I think she’s four,’ Peter said. ‘But I’m not sure. She doesn’t speak very clearly.’

The sun was still high in the sky and it would be an hour or two before it was cool enough to move on. To pass the time for the children, she began reciting some of the nursery rhymes that Nana had taught her and Hua listened entranced, even though she couldn’t understand a word. Susan recited ‘Sing a song of sixpence’, ‘Dame Trot and her cat’, ‘Jack Sprat’, ‘A wise old owl’. Sometimes she pretended to forget the words.

‘
The man in the wilderness asked of me
,

How many strawberries grew in the sea
.

I answered him, as I thought good
– Oh dear, I can’t remember the rest.’

Peter was always able to finish it for her. ‘
As many as red herrings grew in the wood
.’

‘Well done, Peter! You know them all.’

‘Mummy used to read them to me at bedtime. When I was little.’

She progressed to A.A. Milne and he knew those words, too. ‘King John’, ‘Bears’, ‘The Dormouse and the Doctor’ … ‘Which is your favourite, Peter, do you think?’

‘I’m not sure. “King John” perhaps. I feel a bit sorry for him because people wouldn’t speak to him for days.’

‘So do I. He wasn’t such a bad man, was he?’

‘Not really. He only wanted a red ball for Christmas.’

‘And he got it in the end when one bounced in through the window. I don’t think it was from Father Christmas, though, do you?’

‘No, I think somebody else kicked it in by mistake.’

They went on solemnly reciting and discussing English nursery poems, while clinging to a tree in a mangrove swamp on an unknown island somewhere in the China Seas.

Peter said later, ‘I’m awfully thirsty.’ It was a quiet statement, not a whine.

‘Me too. We’ll wait a little bit longer, then we’ll go and find some drinking water.’

The tide was going out, leaving a band of stinking mud around the edge of the swamp. When they climbed down from the tree, they sank up to their knees in its horrid sliminess. Clouds of sandflies attacked them and the mud teemed with crabs, running about and snapping their claws. The sharp mangrove roots cut their bare feet when they tried to walk so there was nothing for it but to take to the dark and sinister water and swim again.

The water ended, not in a nice sandy beach, but in dense jungle. There was a small patch of boggy green grass above the waterline and Susan made a bed of palm leaves there for the children. The thirst was very bad now and it was getting dark.

‘In the morning we’ll find fresh water,’ she promised them. ‘As soon as it gets light.’

Peter said suddenly, ‘What’s that thing on you?’

‘What thing? Where?’

‘On your leg. There.’

She looked down and saw the leech fastened to her calf – black, glistening, disgusting. Sucking her blood. It was all she could do not to scream.

‘It must have been in the water.’ She pulled it quickly off her leg and threw it into the swamp. ‘Can you see any more on me anywhere, Peter?’

No. That’s all.’

‘Let’s look and see if you and Hua have got any on you.’

Thank God, they hadn’t.

She settled the children down. As darkness fell they went to sleep and she sat beside them, keeping watch for a crocodile, a snake, a tiger. Whatever danger there might be. The noise of the insects was so loud that it filled her head in a pulsating roar, and every so often an unearthly cry or a shriek came from the depths of the jungle. With the heat and the thirst and the exhaustion, her mind kept wandering crazily. She was back in Singapore, sitting on the west verandah in the evening. Her father was sitting in his chair,
stengah
in hand, and Soojal was smiling as he came towards her with the silver tray. She could see him very clearly and reached out to take the iced lime juice – the glass frosted, a pretty slice of lime decorating its rim … but when she raised it to her lips there was nothing there.

During the night, something woke her. She heard the rustle of leaves, the sound of a large animal close by, so close that she could feel the warmth of its breath. She lay motionless and petrified, sensing that the animal, which could easily have been a tiger, was watching her. After a while, whatever it was went away.

By morning a cold and clammy mist had settled over the swamp, blotting out the rising sun. They were a sorry sight – shivering, faces swollen and eyes half-closed from mosquito bites, more bites all over their arms and legs, the cuts on their feet festering, the leech bite on her calf angry and itching.

She made them dip their feet and legs and arms in the salt water – it was worth the risk of more leeches if it helped heal the bites and cuts.

‘We must leave now,’ she told them. ‘We’ll go into the jungle and find a stream with fresh water.’

She wielded a dead branch with both hands to beat a way through the undergrowth. Giant leaves slapped her painfully in the face, sharp stems tore at the flesh of her arms and creepers wrapped themselves round her legs. The jungle floor felt mercifully soft beneath her feet – a spongy carpet of rotting leaves and vegetation. And there was beauty, too: golden sunlight filtering through the emerald-green canopy a hundred feet above, brilliant butterflies dancing on the air and brightly coloured birds flying through the trees. It was better not to think about other creatures that might be crawling about – giant red ants, poisonous snakes, deadly spiders, scorpions.

She found some fruit for them to eat – durians, rambutans, large fleshy berries – which slaked their thirst a little, and she let the children rest while they ate. Peter looked feverish.

‘We must go on now,’ she told them after a bit. ‘We’re bound to come to a stream soon.’

The heat was dreadful now. The bites itched and the cuts hurt and there were new insect stings to add to the misery. Pinpricks of red over their ankles and legs – probably from ants. Around noon she let them rest again for a while, sitting guard while they lay asleep on a mat of bamboo leaves like the lost Babes in the Wood.

Tormented by the discomfort and the thirst, she imagined herself beside the Tanglin pool. Imagined diving into the cool, clear, blue water, swimming its length. Then another length and another. And another.

The boy, Peter, stirred restlessly. He looked worse than ever, poor little chap. Give them a break and get them out, Ray had told her. Well, what chance had the children now? Ship sunk, lost in mangrove swamps and jungle on some unknown, uninhabited island. Thanks to him, they were in this terrifying mess and facing a horrible and slow death. She buried her face in her hands.

And then she heard a dog bark. Not a wild jungle animal but a domestic dog, just like Rex.

She roused the children and they struggled on in the direction of the sound. The undergrowth thinned out and they stumbled out of the jungle into a clearing.

The
kampong
was only a few hundred yards away – a group of attap huts built on bamboo poles beside a river. Chickens and goats, fish laid out to dry in the sun, fishing boats drawn up on the bank. The barking dog was by the river and some native boys were throwing a stick for it. When the boys threw the stick into the water the dog would paddle off, fetch it back in its mouth, drop it and then bark for them to do the same thing again.

Susan held the children by the hand, one on each side of her, and they walked towards a hut where a woman was sitting on the steps stirring something in a bowl. When she saw them she put down the bowl, ran to another hut and disappeared inside. Presently an old man appeared. The headman, Susan decided, judging by the
kris
tucked into his sarong and the
tanjak
folded round his head, as well as by his very dignified bearing. She let go of the children, stepped forward and bowed to him politely, addressing him in Malay.

‘
Tuan, boleh tolong kami? Anak-anak lapar, hendak chari maken minum dan tempat tidor
.’

She had asked his help for the children – food and water for them and a place to sleep. He was unlikely to refuse – the unwritten law of the East obliged him to help a stranger in need – but one could never be absolutely certain, especially in such a remote place. He looked at them for a moment and then nodded.

‘
Yah, saya boleh tolong
.’

She bowed again and thanked him. ‘
Terima kaseh, tuan
.’

The woman fetched a jar of water and coconut-shell cups which she filled and refilled several times until they had drunk enough. A little crowd had gathered round to stare – other women and children, the boys who had been playing with the dog. Dark-skinned, soft-eyed, curious. They kept pointing and whispering behind their hands.

The headman spoke sharply and they retreated. The woman beckoned to Susan and she took the children by the hand again and followed her up the steps into the hut. Inside, the floor was strewn with rushes. Women brought water for washing and green ointment to rub into all the cuts and bites and sores. The first woman, whose name was Salmah, returned with rice and fish in rough wooden bowls. Hua fell asleep over her bowl and Peter ate nothing. Susan tried to coax him but he turned his face away. When she felt his forehead it was burning hot.

Salmah put her hand on it too. ‘
Budak ini sakit
.’

‘
Ya, budak ini ada demam
.’ There was no doubt about the fever.

The woman went away again and came back with a coconut shell full of liquid which she held to Peter’s mouth, urging him to drink. ‘
Minim La! Obat ini yang bagus
.’

He took a sip at a time, screwing up his face at the taste, but she made him go on and when he had finished it all she lowered him gently to the floor.

When Peter had gone to sleep, Salmah padded softly away down the steps and Susan lay down on the rushes between the two children. Very good medicine, the native woman had said. It was probably made from something disgusting like ground cockroaches, but that didn’t matter so long as it made Peter better. And whatever the green ointment had been, it was certainly helping the soreness and itching already. But Peter’s breathing sounded frighteningly fast and harsh. She had no idea what was wrong with the boy, other than some kind of fever. It was very easy to be struck down suddenly by sickness in Malaya. A spider could have bitten him during the night, or a scorpion, or a snake? Or was it malaria? Or perhaps dengue fever? Without a proper doctor he might easily die.

The dog was barking again and she could hear the boys shouting and laughing by the river. It was a comforting sound – the sound of human beings close at hand. She rested her cheek on her palm and slept.

Peter was no better the next day, but at least he was no worse. Salmah came again with the evil-tasting medicine and other women carried in more food and took away their clothes to wash them, leaving sarongs and
bajus
instead for them to wear. Hua went outside to play with the village children while Susan stayed with Peter, sponging his burning face with water. There was little else she could do except be there whenever he woke up so that he could see her and she could smile and say encouraging things to him and urge him along. You had to fight a fever or it would win. She had seen that happen with one of the
amahs
at home who had lost interest in the struggle to live and so had died. When Peter opened his eyes, she talked to him – recited more of the nursery rhymes and poems and asked him about his lessons at school. What was his favourite subject? Who was the nicest teacher? Who was the horridest? And so on. It was a very one-sided conversation but it seemed to do some good because by evening he looked better and his breathing was easier. By the next morning she could tell that the fever had passed, and when Salmah brought more of the medicine he refused to drink it.