“I was in Semenyih,” said Nam Teck quietly. “But it’s all right.” It wasn’t really, not yet, but he was desperate not to cause offence.

“Well, we were just doing our job. It was mainly for your protection, you know—you were probably too young to realise.” He was right, Nam Teck had hardly met any of the Ma Gong growing up, although on his few excursions outside he remembered thin, sunburnt men who ruffled his hair, Auntie Poh’s face tight with polite fear as they told him to be good and study hard, then disappeared again into the surrounding trees.

“One day,” continued the man, “I was driving along, near the jungle, when I got a flat. I had no idea how to change it—I’m just a civil servant, my job was to measure the perimeter and order the wire, we didn’t have to work with our hands. I was so scared of the bandits—sorry, the Communists.”

That correction, Nam Teck realised, was in case he knew someone in the jungle—an older brother, a cousin. Plenty of people in the village had family inside, which is why they had to be searched going out—what number of laws, however strict, could stop a mother bringing food out for her son? But Nam Teck knew no one, so could just smile and shrug.

“Well then. Those men with guns, they’d come out and kill you, just for doing your job. We were warned to be careful, but of course the British wouldn’t let us carry arms, only the white men, as if we couldn’t be trusted. They thought any Chinese was capable of turning. It’s ridiculous, I speak good English, but they thought we were all the same.

“I couldn’t have walked into town, it was miles, and I didn’t want to go back through the jungle. Just as I was about to give up hope, two men in a jeep came along, planters—a Frenchman and a Dutch, very friendly. They helped me to fix the tire with a rubber patch—these planters always have a piece of rubber about their person. We had a good laugh, and I was on my way before sunset. A month later, I read in the paper that both of them had been killed. Shot in their sleep, even before the sun came up.” The man sighed, absorbed in his small piece of the tragedy. “Terrible times. They pay the servants to stay away that morning. They kill the dogs, and then they come for you.”

Nam Teck nodded, and made a sympathetic noise. He was becoming aware of battle lines, fainter now the war had ended but still present. As yet, there was no need for him to choose a side.

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