The sound of John Sturgess’s voice as she approached the back door infuriated her and banished immediately any tears. How dare he still be here if he’d sent Alan away? She was about to burst into the kitchen and confront this Jekyll-and-Hyde character when she heard her mother’s raised voice.

‘Rape! For God’s sake!’

Liz stood transfixed, hand raised in the act of opening the door. Inside, her mother had also paused as if to try to understand what she herself had exclaimed, then repeated with terrifying anger, ‘Rape!’

Liz stepped away from the door. Is this what they believed? Was Alan in prison? Had he been arrested? Was that where he had gone? ‘No!’ she exclaimed and went quickly in, ready to defend and absolve her lover.

Her mother and John Sturgess both turned to look at her, but their eyes had that look of being focused elsewhere. She felt she just caught Alan’s defence in her teeth, as she realised there was no accusation for him, or for her. This was some quite other problem.

As if to reinforce her impression Blanche turned sharply away, walked across to the sink and threw the glass she held with some force into the washing-up bowl. Liz heard it crack. John Sturgess winced and held his teeth askew, obviously not quite sure what to say next for the best.

‘Rape? Did I hear the word?’ Liz asked.

‘Yes.’ Sturgess frowned and looked at his feet. ‘I’m sorry about that — ’

‘George Harfield has been arrested in Ipoh for rape!’ Blanche burst out. ‘Did you ever hear anything so bloody senseless in all your life?’

Chapter Thirteen

The extraordinary news so overwhelmed them all that Liz knew her own misunderstanding had passed unnoticed. She took hold of a chairback to steady herself as John Sturgess revealed the reason for his swift reappearance in full jungle-green kit and laced jungle boots.

‘The trouble is time. I have to make a quick visit to my headquarters, then we need a final briefing before our next operation, which must begin promptly or we’ll lose all the advantages of the raid on your amah’s village. We have more information than we dared hope for. I just cannot take time to go and see George, but neither can I just leave things — we go back too far together.’

‘How can we help?’ Blanche asked.

‘All I know is the charge and that he was taken to Ipoh police station. I … ’

In the pause Liz thought he looked like a man doing his duty against the odds. An honourable pose? She wondered.

‘I know it’s an awful presumption, particularly at this moment,’ he went on, ‘definitely not a good time.’

‘Shouldn’t think there’s ever a good time to be charged with rape,’ Blanche retorted; then, looking at Liz, she nodded and confirmed, ‘Don’t worry, we’ll go. We’ll sort it out!’

‘Find out all you can. I didn’t know who else I could ask … ’

‘We’ll be glad to do something for George,’ Liz replied. With unplanned swiftness and dishonesty she added, ‘Could you do something for me in return? I have a book belonging to the guardsman who was here. Could I ask you to return it for me?’

‘Cresswell!’ There was something between censure and surprise in the exclamation. ‘I do have to leave straight away.’

She nearly commented that he often seemed to have to rush off — when duty called — and take his men whether they were willing or not. ‘I’ll fetch it from my room at once,’ she said, turning away so he should not see her satisfaction. At least she had extracted the tacit information that the major was going to be seeing Alan again, so presumably they were going on the same operation.

Liz went to her room, her mind racing over what she could send to him and what it might mean if she did. Picking up a slim book titled New Zealand Poets, she found a clean flyleaf and swiftly in bold outlines she sketched the figure of an anonymous guardsman in jungle gear with rifle, standing in a far from anonymous empty room. As an afterthought she added, ‘Waiting to hear’ as a kind of caption. She dared do no more and take no more time. She slipped the book into an envelope and took it back to the kitchen where the major was preparing to leave.

She held it out. ‘Of course, if Mr Cresswell was coming back here, I need not trouble you?’

He reached for the book. ‘There will be no call for any of my men to be at Rinsey now you have your own guards organised.’

‘Thanks to George,’ Blanche said.

‘But I shall come again as soon as I’m able,’ he added.

Liz returned his coldly questioning stare without, she hoped, giving away her true feelings, but something flickered in his eyes like a camera lens as if he had registered an impression for future use.

He left as Anna came into the kitchen.

‘I do washing now, mem,’ she said. When Blanche protested, she said, ‘No, I want to, be busy, please, mem. You fetch towels and you,’ she said to Liz, ‘your dirties, please.’

‘I’m going to telephone for a car to take us to Ipoh first,’ Blanche said.

Anna watched Blanche go, then beckoned Liz back, whispering, ‘Your young man, he touch pocket with your photo in and nod to me to tell you what happened.’ She paused to throw up her hands like a magician producing a rabbit. ‘He had no time to do anything. That major come and — ’ she paused to stand with her hands on her hips and, curving down her lip, went on in tones of extreme bossiness, ‘said pack now, would answer no questions and did not leave for one second. All pack and gone in ten minutes. I think that major — ’ she made a significant downward thrust of her thumb — ‘but I think young man you give your photo to ... ’ She gave thumbs up and nodded sagely.

Liz embraced Anna. ‘Did he say anything at all?’

‘No time. Major no answer questions, no speak, only orders: Do this! Do that! Now!’

‘Thanks, Anna.’ In the background she could hear her mother negotiating very loudly for a car. ‘You won’t tell … ’

Anna shook her head. They had shared too many secrets for there to be any need to spell out what should not be told to whom.

‘What we’re getting, basically, is a taxi,’ Blanche said, coming back, ‘as far as Ipoh, anyway, then we can talk to the man at the garage ourselves and buy something.’

Liz nodded and the two exchanged looks which acknowledged the fact that they really had no man to advise them now.

‘Anna.’ Her mother’s tone softened. ‘Will you be all right on your own here?’

Anna gave a rough, short laugh. ‘Mem, I’m safer here than I’ve been since the end of the war, with that Josef coming and going to see them communists — using my house! I’m glad it burned down!’

‘Oh, Anna!’ Liz was quietly appalled that anyone should be driven to wish their home destroyed. ‘But your home is here now, isn’t it, Mother?’

‘We will always see you’re provided for,’ Blanche agreed, then asked, ‘Would you tell us more about all those years while we wait for this car?’

‘That boy Josef was always greedy for more and more,’ Anna began as they sat at the table. ‘The Guisans move here when you all left.’

‘Into the bungalow?’ Blanche demanded, and Anna nodded confirmation.

‘Not the Japanese?’

‘Them too, later.’ Anna went on, ‘I went home to my village. Then there was much killing by the Japanese — my family, Mr Guisan ... Long time, years, before I see Josef again. Mrs Guisan and Lee came once to see me after her husband shot slashing trees so Japanese cannot have rubber. I have never seen since.’ The old lady paused and the incomprehension on her face was echoed in both her listeners’ minds.

‘Josef said his mother was a traitor in the war — ’

‘Josef traitor now,’ Anna commented matter-of-factly before going on with her story. ‘At first it was all buddies using my home to leave messages for Chinese fighting in the jungle against the Japanese. Then I thought we were all helping Mr Hammond win the war.’ She paused to sip the sweet lemon tea Liz had made for her. ‘But I knew he really wicked when Mr Hammond come back. Josef he so, so angry.’ She shook her fists in the air to emphasise the point.