The Hills of Singapore (24 page)

The child in her belly moved suddenly, causing a pain to shoot round her hip. She put her hand to it and waited, head down, for the pain to pass. Her neighbour, noticing, stopped chanting and put out her hand to Noan, who gripped it. The women here were always a great comfort to her. They all understood suffering, and Noan found the greatest relief with them in prayer.

The chant slowed and then, finally, with the beating of the silvery bell, stopped. Noan rose with the other women and lit a bundle of incense sticks, waving the fragrant smoke around the goddess, thanking her. She put the sticks into the censer and bowed one last time. The other women departed, but Noan stayed. She needed to offer one more prayer. She lit some incense sticks and moved the smoke around her and before the goddess.

“
Na Mo Kuan Shi Yin Pu Sa
. Compassionate One. Bless my children, bless the one who is to be born and bless my husband's son.”

As she uttered the words she felt a presence at her side and turned. Her sister stood close by and was looking at Noan in amazement.

“Bless your husband's son? What son? What are you talking about, Noan?”

Noan recoiled, astounded to see Lilin here in the temple. “You. What are you doing here?”

Lilin looked at her sister shrewdly. She had come to the temple knowing Noan would be here. Lilin wanted to talk to her sister about this white woman. She knew Noan had been out. A servant had tattled that she had seen her arrive in Philip Street in a white woman's carriage. This was news indeed, and Lilin wanted to know more.

She had waited as the temple was filled with chanting and the striking of bells. She used to come here often, but now she almost never set foot inside a temple, except occasionally to light incense on the anniversary of her son's death. She liked the perfumes and sounds of the temple, though. It was pleasant, she found, to be there, and she had taken a place at the back of the courtyard listening to the mantra, inhaling the scent of the incense, waiting. Now she was very glad she had.

“Well, sister, I am here to help you home. You look so tired. Come take my arm.”

Noan was tired, but she could not make out what Lilin was talking about. Come here to help her? This was unbelievable. But Lilin took up her cloth bag and took her sister by the arm. They bowed to the priest in the large front courtyard and stepped up over the log, into the street.

Lilin put her oiled-paper umbrella up, over their heads, and they made their way along Telok Ayer Street to the market. At a fruit stall, Lilin stopped. There were some benches, and Noan sat, tired. Lilin paid the Malay stall keeper to prepare two coconuts, and they watched as he took out his
large parang
and, with the deftness of experience, opened the top in one slice. They both drank through the bamboo straw.

Noan smiled at Lilin. They hadn't done this for years. As children they had played here on the bayside. Their amah always had a coin to buy them each a coconut. Lilin looked up and smiled at her sister. She too remembered that time long ago. How different things had been then. They had been close, played and laughed together easily. Even after they had been secluded they had found enjoyment in each other's company.

It was Noan's marriage that had changed everything. She had gotten Zhen, and from that moment Lilin could find no contentment, no forgiveness that she, the lovely one, had not received this gift. Her reward for her beauty, her devotion to her family, her hard work at embroidery and cooking, had been nothing more than Ah Teo and a dead child. That thought surfaced now, and she finished her coconut noisily.

“Well, sister, what is all this about a son? I know you have been to see the
ang mo
woman?”

Noan too finished her drink. The stall man took the coconuts, cut them swiftly in two, tied them into a banana leaf and handed them back. At home the maids would scrape and dry the flesh or make the milk to use in cooking. The husks were used as simple bowls and ladles or fuel for the stove.

Lilin waited, sensing her sister's reluctance. “Well, you might as well tell me,” she prodded. “You have told Kuan Yin. I have heard you, and now I shall not give up until you have told me.”

Noan knew this was true, and suddenly she wanted to unburden herself. Lilin had seen this woman too, knew more than she. What difference did it make?

“I will tell you what I know, but first tell me about her, the
ang mo
.”

Lilin smiled. “I know she is a widow of a
belanda
in Jawa who has a lot of money. She is very rich and has a large house. Her brother is the chief of the police. She has two children. She's a lucky creature isn't she? Luckier than us. I should like very much to be a widow and have lots of money.”

Noan looked at Lilin sharply, but Lilin merely shrugged. “No use pretending. I am, in any case, to all intents and purposes a widow. Ah Teo has his new wife and a child on the way. Not that I care.”

Noan rose. She wanted to go home, to lie down. Her legs felt heavy, and her headache had started again. Lilin rose too, seeing her sister's distress. She was slightly alarmed. Noan had not been well with this pregnancy, and despite everything she held against her sister, Lilin had, by moments, felt sorry for her.

“Come. Hold my arm. Let's go home,” she offered.

Noan took Lilin's arm, glad of the support and glad of the umbrella.

“The boy, the boy with the white woman, he is my husband's son,” she said, her voice low and tired.

Lilin gripped her sister's arm. “Can you be sure?”

“Yes, if you saw him you would know. He is like Zhen and has something of Lian's eyes, too.”

As they turned into Market Street, Noan stumbled slightly and Lilin held her. She could hear Noan's breath, which had become a wheeze. “We are almost home. Look, a few more steps,” Lilin urged.

Lilin was relieved to arrive home. As they crossed the threshold she called for servants, and they helped Noan upstairs to the bedroom. “Thank you, younger sister,” Noan called as she left.

Lilin looked at her sister departing. What on earth did Noan feel about the secret she had just revealed? It was difficult to tell. Perhaps they would talk about it later, when Noan felt better. But more importantly, Lilin thought, what do I think about this?

Zhen had a son. Lilin settled her umbrella into a porcelain stand and began slowly to climb the stairs. Zhen had a son. She arrived at the landing and started to walk towards her room. Suddenly she heard a laugh. It was Lian, she knew immediately, for she was close to this child. She went to the nursery and saw the children playing. Lian was six years old. Lilin contemplated this child. Zhen's child. Zhen's child and half-sister of his son by the white woman.

Lilin turned from the door. They were brother and sister, of course they were. Did Zhen know? She was not sure, but something told her that he did not. Brother and sister. Well, if they were to come together, what would their offspring be? The idea appeared fully grown inside her head. Here was a way to destroy both Zhen and his white whore.

Lilin put her hand to her mouth. Incest. Her heart had started beating hard. Here was the way to ruin them, destroy their love for each other.

She smiled. At last, a reason to be living. She had only to plan and wait.

27

Captain Elliott had made the
Queen
ready and stood awaiting her instructions. They had been commended to join the Honourable Company's war steamer
Auckland
in convoy with Sir James's new gunboat
Rajah
, launched at Singapore only a few days ago and now made ready for Sarawak. Her sleek swiftness and her long brass guns were destined for active service in the suppression of piracy in the seas of Borneo and Sulu, but Captain Elliott was of the opinion that her four horsepower engine was insufficient for the intended purpose.

Nonetheless they were joined in convoy and set out together along the Straits of Singapore heading due east to Borneo. The
Queen
soon outstripped her companions, for the wind was high and the sails carried her far ahead. The going was thick and rough with driving rain, and the voyage uncomfortable. For three days there was no relief until, when the wind died down, they finally came in sight of land. The call went up, and Charlotte came on deck with Isabel.

Isabel had never before in her life left Singapore, never set foot aboard a seagoing vessel. Her excitement and girlish boisterousness at the departure had quickly evaporated, and she had spent the entire voyage extremely seasick and confined to her cabin. She looked pale and wan and, through lack of appetite, had lost a good deal of weight. Charlotte had given her crystallised ginger to nibble, and the cook supplied hot ginger drinks. Ginger had long been known as a restorative for seasickness, and she had relied on her own supply during her voyage from England. It had proven efficacious for Isabel in stopping the nausea, but her appetite had yet to return.

Captain Elliott had slowed their rate to allow the other ships to catch them and now ordered sail lowered in order for the
Auckland
and the
Rajah
to come ahead. In the waters which ran about the coastal inlets and numerous rivers of this island, piracy and danger abounded. In convoy then, they began their approach along the northern coast of Borneo. Thunder and lightning, rain and a heaving swell made the voyage disagreeable until the distinctive peak of Mount Santubong signalled the twin entrances to the Sarawak River.

At dusk they rounded the Santubong peninsula and moved into the sheltered waters of the bay before the Morotabas entry to the river. For the first time the ship glided smoothly, and Isabel let out a cry of relief as tears sprang to her eyes. Charlotte put her arms about her friend's shoulders, and Isabel was finally able to give a small smile.

“From here, surely our journey will be filled with sights we have never seen before,” Charlotte said, hoping to reassure the poor girl.

The
Auckland
dropped anchor near the
Queen
. For the journey upriver they would all board the
Rajah
under the guidance of Mr Richards, the pilot. When the
Queen's
cargo had been ferried upriver, she would load with antimony, the chief mineral of Sarawak and for which, Charlotte had learned, the country was in fact named. The Rajah paid for his cargoes in kind, and antimony was his main source of income.

The
Queen
would return to Singapore with this cargo and spend several weeks in dock for repairs and cleaning. After two years, every ship in the tropics, no matter how well cared for, became infested with rats and cockroaches and needed to be thoroughly smoked with pitch, sulphur or mercury and cleansed of these vermin. The hull needed careening too, to clean it of barnacles and weeds and repair the wood which was under constant attack by shipworms that ate it to pieces. Following this, she would take a sea run carrying iron goods, cloth and opium to Benjamarsin for diamonds and gold, make a stop in Batavia to pick up a cargo of tea, coffee, sago and teak wood for Singapore. In Singapore she would load with guns and ammunition, cloth and other stores for the Rajah on the run back to Sarawak to pick up her owner.

The night in the sheltered bay proved thankfully uneventful, and with the dawn came a return to fine weather. The early morning mist clung to the trees and mountains, sweeping and swirling along the river carrying an indefinable scent, half sweet, half fetid. Charlotte shivered. The air was cold, everything covered in a sheen of dew. The mountain of Santubong rose, green and luxuriantly wooded, to a great height, dwarfing them. At its foot lay a vast expanse of fine sand strewn randomly with enormous brown boulders, as if giants had suddenly been disturbed at a game of bowls.

The shore was lined with groves of
rhu
, the casuarina trees which, Charlotte knew, the natives called “talking trees” for the sound of the breeze rustling through their lacy branches and feathery leaves. They looked so delicate it seemed a wind could blow them away in a puff of green smoke. In the distance a village lay, Lilliputian brown huts dotting the beach, canoes tethered to the shore, the women and children barely discernible from this distance, the mist swirling like a diaphanous silken ribbon around the green cliffs and crevasses of the mountain and drifting in silence around the trees and along the water like a vaporous breath.

It was very different to Singapore and Java. The jungles and rolling hills of Singapore, the great mountains and plains of Java were touchable, approachable, arable, but here, Charlotte recognised, was true wilderness. Impenetrable, but for the river banks and coastal villages. Impenetrable and merciless to man. Only animals and insects could reign over this wild land of Borneo. She felt a quickening of her pulse, a true excitement at this newness, at the potential for danger.

As the
Rajah
entered the wide mouth of the river, the turquoise blue of the sea changed gradually to a swirl of greens and browns, the one running through the other as if coloured dyestuffs had been poured about them. They sailed on these marbled waters until they left the coast behind and the jungle walls enveloped them. Now the river was completely brown, dark and smooth and slow, lined with low mangroves, plumed
nipa
and leafy
nibong
palms flying into the sky.

It was long and sinuous, the Sarawak River, Captain Elliot had told them, twenty-four miles from the mouth to Kuching, At each bend of the river the little black faces of monkeys greeted them, hanging from branches, chattering and flying from branch to branch, as if angry at this intrusion into their domain. Villages of palm-leaf houses hugged each wide reach, and women and naked children came to the steps to stare at the ship. Fishermen stopped casting their nets and waved and called. Logs of wood suddenly became crocodiles that flopped into the water or eyed them from the muddy banks. Chinamen in small, swift, narrow canoes loaded with fish guided their boats like Venetian gondoliers along the dark waters, making for the market at Kuching.