Passage of Arms (27 page)

"You mean we've got to stay here in jail?"

"I hope not. I don't know. I'm just warning you. At the moment it's all up to the commander of the raiding party, and he's a tough proposition. I'm taking you to him now. He doesn't speak much English, so he won't question you direct, but don't say anything unless I tell you to. Above all don't get mad or try to protest. Just keep quiet. Is that clear?"

"I don't have a protest left in me."

"Good.
 
How's your stomach?"

"Queasy."

"Well, keep close to me and don't look around too much, or it may give you trouble."

He led the way out of the cell and back towards the control section. He went quickly, holding the flashlight ahead of him and ignoring Nilsen's complaints that he could not see where he was going. Hallett judged that the man had reached a point of mental exhaustion at which he could very easily become unnerved. Anger was sometimes a useful restorative.

"Come on/' he said impatiently; "we don't have much time."

"Time for what?"

Hallett did not have to reply. They had reached the main corridor of the administration block and Colonel Oda's second-in-command was approaching. He was a square, muscular man with a wispy moustache and bright, stupid eyes. He had not forgotten that the Colonel had earlier accepted Hallett's arguments in preference to his own. He looked at Nilsen contemptuously.

"Is this your American?"

"This is Mr. Nilsen, yes."

"You will both come to see the Colonel immediately."

"Very well."

The second-in-command turned on his heel and they followed him along the corridor. Hallett felt Nilsen's hand on his arm.

"What did he say?"

Hallett frowned warningly and told him loudly in Malay to hold his tongue. The second-in-command spoke no English and Hallett did not want to irritate him unnecessarily.

The room into which they were taken was the one in which Hallett had last seen Major Gani ; and Major Gani was the first person he saw there now. He was standing against one of the barred windows, with a soldier on either side of him and blood running from his head and left shoulder. Sitting at the table beside Colonel Oda was a man whom Hallett guessed to be Major Sutan. His head was drooping and his face a deathly yellow in the lamplight. It was obviously all he could do to remain upright. The Colonel was talking to him quietly.

Across the table from them was Wilson with the two women. Mrs. Lukey was crying. As soon as he saw his wife, Nilsen went over and put his arms round her. She began to cry, too. The Colonel looked up in exasperation and saw Hallett.

"Ah!" He rapped on the table as if for silence. "I have told Mr. Wilson. Now, I tell you, Mr. Hallett. Major Sutan has confirmed the friendly status of these European prisoners. You may take them with you and go. That is all."

Hallett's eyes met Wilson's. The latter shrugged resignedly.

The Colonel frowned. "That is all," he repeated sharply.

"Thank you." Hallett bowed slightly. "May I ask where you suggest they should go to?"

"That is their affair. They are free to go."

"Just a moment, Colonel." Hallett went forward to the table. "You asked Mr. Wilson and me to come here as neutral observers to witness the administration of justice by the Committee of the Faithful. You say now that Major Sutan has confirmed the friendly status of these persons. Yet you are prepared to send them away from here, without protection, to be re-arrested by the Central Government, put back into prison like common criminals, perhaps shot as your collaborators. Is that the justice of the Committee of the Faithful?"

"They are free to go. I do not understand what you want."

"He understands all right," Wilson said in English. "I've just finished explaining it to him."

Hallett kept his eyes on the Colonel. "It has been instructive to see how the Committee of the Faithful keeps faith with its friends," he said. He put a sarcastic inflection on the word 'Faithful'.

The second-in-command stepped forward.
  
"You do not have to hear these insults, Colonel. Give the order and I will see that they cause no further trouble."

The Colonel ignored him. "What can we do?" he demanded angrily. "What do you expect?"

"A safe conduct for these persons to the airport, and permission to embark on the first Malayan Airways plane to Penang or Singapore."

"You are a fool or mad."

"I don't believe so."

"This is a raiding force, not an army of occupation. Only General Iskaq could give such a safe conduct."

"I know that."

The Colonel laughed shortly. "Then you must know also that you are wasting my time. We have released these persons. They are in your care. We can do no more."

"You can obtain a safe conduct for them from General Iskaq."

"Impossible."

"Is it? Why not ask Major Gani?" Without waiting for a reply Hallett looked across the room at the man by the window. "Major, do you think that General Iskaq values your services highly enough to grant a safe conduct for Mr. and Mrs. Nilsen and Mrs. Lukey in exchange for your release unharmed?"

He saw Gani's eyes flicker. Then, there was a crash as Colonel Oda stood up quickly and his chair shot back against the wall.

Wilson started to move towards Hallett. The second-in-command snapped back the cocking handle of his machine pistol.

Hallett looked from the machine pistol to the Colonel's lower lip and shrugged. "Violence is the fool's answer for every difficulty," he remarked. "I did not think it was yours, Colonel."

"Get out, before we think too much."

Hallett inclined his head. "Very well. It is a pity. I had hoped that Mr. Wilson and I could have been of help to you."

The Colonel's lip curled proudly. "We did not need your help to take this prison. We will not need your help to take all Labuanga when we wish."

"Maybe not. But you will find that taking Labuanga is easier than keeping it. One day, soon perhaps, you will proclaim an autonomous government here and declare your independence of Djakarta and Medan. It is then you will need the help of friends."

"These are our friends." The Colonel tapped his pistol holster.

"They will not win your government recognition. Think, Colonel. The Central Government will denounce you as brigands and bandits and destroy you as they destroyed your comrades in Celebes. To whom will you appeal for justice? To the United Nations? The Central Government is there before you. To the Soviet Union? You are anti-Communist. The only ears that will hear you are in the United States and Britain. Our countries, Mr. Wilson's and mine, admire good fighting men, but they also value moderation. No doubt Major Sutan has been vilely ill-treated by this man Gani. But how will you explain that, merely in order to have your revenge by torturing and killing Gani, you endangered the lives of two Americans and a British subject? Supposing General Iskaq puts them back here tomorrow, has them killed, and then tells the world that they were savagely murdered by you when the jail was attacked. How could you deny it?"

"You would know that was not true," the Colonel said indignantly.

"Would I? It seems to me that there is a very small difference between that and what you are planning. And how foolish that plan is. Simply by using Gani as a hostage you could not only cause General Iskaq to lose face, but also show yourselves as humane and honourable men, infinitely more worthy of governing Labuanga than these lackeys from Djakarta. These things are not forgotten. When the day comes on which you need the friendship of the United States and the nations of the British Commonwealth, which memory will you prefer-that of killing Major Gani or that of having saved American and British lives?"

The Colonel stared at him for a moment and then sat down again. He looked at Sutan inquiringly.

Sutan's haggard eyes looked up at Hallett. "Captain Voychinski has died from the beating this man gave him," he said slowly in English. "Perhaps the gentleman does not know that. Voychinski was a white man. Perhaps, if the gentleman saw Voychinski's body, he would not feel so merciful."

"It's not mercy he's asking for," Wilson put in; "but some protection for these people who came here to do business with you."

"They came at their own risk."

"Oh no. They came because you wanted them to. They were told there was no risk. Personally, I feel they were unwise, but I also feel that you people have a responsibility. Besides, have you thought about what would happen to your future arms deliveries if you turn these three persons over to the authorities? You wouldn't be able to buy a bow and arrow after that."

The Colonel hammered on the table with his fist. "We are not turning them over to the authorities," he shouted.

"In effect you are." Hallett had taken over again. "That is unless they have a safe conduct out of the country."

The Colonel turned to Sutan.

Sutan shrugged wearily. "Gani learned nothing that matters. Do what is best."

The Colonel looked with disgust from the white men to Major Gani. His eyes hardened.

"We had good plans for you, Gani," he said. "Perhaps, if your General does not love you enough, we shall still carry them out. Or perhaps, if you stay in Labuanga, there will be another day."

"Perhaps," said Major Gani,

The Colonel motioned to the telephone. "Then see if your fine General will speak to you."

VI

General Iskaq had not been unduly worried by the absence of news from the jail. An explosion had been heard in that direction; but the sounds of firing had later ceased. He had assumed that the situation at the jail was now similar to that at the power station. When he heard Gani's voice on the telephone, he was prepared to be calm and matter-of-fact. By making no reference at all to Gani's hysterical behaviour earlier, he would emphasise its absurdity far more effectively than by drawing attention to it.

When he heard what Gani had to say, a spasm like an electric shock seemed to jolt him from his heels to the top of his head. His ears began to sing.

Through the singing he became aware of Gani's repeating urgently: "General! General! Can you hear me?"

He controlled himself carefully before he answered: "You say you are a hostage?"

"Yes, General.
 
You see, sir, the position is this . . ."

"Answer my questions!" He had heard the brisk self-assurance flowing back into Major Gani's voice, and, in a sudden rage, shouted the order.

"Certainly, General.
  
But you see . . ."

"What steps were taken about the white prisoners?"

"Unfortunately, Captain Voychinski died. The others are alive. It is about those persons . . ."

"And Sutan?"

"Major Sutan is beside me, sir, and Colonel Oda."

"Why have they not killed you?"

"If you will permit me to explain, sir."

He explained.

The General listened with mounting bitterness. Fantasies began to crowd into his mind. He would countermand his standing orders about night operations and the Inner Zone, take his armoured cars and field guns out, and blast the jail into a heap of rubble. He would kill everyone in it, including Major Gani. The anti-tank weapons of the raiding force would be crushed beneath the wheels of the armoured cars. There would be a holocaust. Or, simpler, he would refuse the safe conduct, tell them to kill Gani, and then hang the three whites publicly in front of the Stadhuis. Or, wiser, more cunning, he would put a cordon round the jail area, cover it with the field guns, and starve them all into submission. He knew that none of those things was really going to happen, that he could never be sure that the power station and jail attacks were not tricks to lure him out of the Inner Zone so that the garrison could be chopped to pieces by the main body of the insurgents. He also knew that, however much he might want to discard Major Gani, the time had not yet come when he could safely do so. Without Gani, the arming of the militia could not be completed, and he, the Military Governor, would be left again to plead im-potently for reinforcements which would never arrive. He knew, too, that he could never justify, even to himself, the proposition that the life of one Indonesian officer was worth sacrificing for the pleasure of punishing three whites.

He heard himself saying: "Very well. I understand. But what guarantees do we have that they will keep the agreement?"

"One moment, sir."

"I had better speak to Oda myself."

"One moment, please, sir."

There was a pause and silence. Gani had had the impertinence to put his hand over the microphone. Then another detested voice addressed him.

"Governor, this is Ross Hallett. I am at the jail in order to protect the lives of two American citizens. Colonel Oda, who commands the troops now in control of the jail compound, has requested my assistance and that of the British
Vice-Consul
in the matter of this proposed exchange of prisoners."

"What kind of assistance?"