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Contents (54)
  1. The Hour Before Dawn
  2. Table of Contents
  3. PROLOGUE
  4. ONE
  5. TWO
  6. THREE
  7. FOUR
  8. FIVE
  9. SIX
  10. SEVEN
  11. EIGHT
  12. NINE
  13. TEN
  14. ELEVEN
  15. TWELVE
  16. THIRTEEN
  17. FOURTEEN
  18. FIFTEEN
  19. SIXTEEN
  20. SEVENTEEN
  21. EIGHTEEN
  22. NINETEEN
  23. TWENTY
  24. TWENTY-ONE
  25. TWENTY-TWO
  26. TWENTY-THREE
  27. TWENTY-FOUR
  28. TWENTY-FIVE
  29. TWENTY-SIX
  30. TWENTY-SEVEN
  31. TWENTY-EIGHT
  32. TWENTY-NINE
  33. THIRTY
  34. THIRTY-ONE
  35. THIRTY-TWO
  36. THIRTY-THREE
  37. THIRTY-FOUR
  38. THIRTY-FIVE
  39. THIRTY-SIX
  40. THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. THIRTY-EIGHT
  42. THIRTY-NINE
  43. FORTY
  44. FORTY-ONE
  45. FORTY-TWO
  46. FORTY-THREE
  47. FORTY-FOUR
  48. EPILOGUE
  49. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  50. About the Author
  51. THE HOUR BEFORE DAWN
  52. By the same author
  53. Copyright
  54. About the Publisher

He leans against a tree to steady himself. Raises his hand. Opens his mouth. The shot rings out and lifts the crows from the treetops. The dogs race back from the shadows to the body lying in the bracken and stay with him all night until Beattie comes looking for him.

A story started long ago, finally ends. At the other side of the world, in a garden with no straight lines or angles, just the wild curves of land and blue sea and sky, a child is being laid to rest and another life is just beginning.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am indebted to Taschen GmbH Publishers for allowing me to quote from Harry Rand’s book Hundertwasser.

I had not heard of Hundertwasser, architect and painter, before a visit to New Zealand in 2003. I became fascinated by his unusual buildings and ecological paintings. One painting, The Garden of the Happy Dead caught my imagination and so my book was born. A note on this painting is at the back of the book.

The New Zealand garden at the end of the book was inspired by the remote and beautiful garden belonging to (my son) James and his wife Susannah, an amazingly creative and resourceful horticulturist who, in true pioneer fashion are hacking and taming wilderness into a place of spectacular beauty.

I am very grateful to my two taxi drivers, Sebastian, (Christian) and Anwall (Muslim) in Port Dickson. They entered enthusiastically into my search for a past I would never have found on my own, for it hardly exists anymore, unless you look hard.

For purposes of this novel I have taken a few small geographical liberties with Port Dickson. The old rest houses, as they were, are gone and in their place stand modern red tiled, pagoda roofed houses. The lonely atmospheric road to Tanjung Tuan Lighthouse is now surfaced, but still lies through the jungle full of monkeys and strange birds and still brought me out in goose bumps. The steps from the beach have disappeared or perhaps they only existed in memory. The half moon curve of beach with spider crabs remains, but the sea is not as blue as I remember.

Despite seeing the west coast of Malaysia as it is now, in 2005, it remains the same as ever it was behind my eyelids. That place, that time.

About the Author

THE HOUR BEFORE DAWN

Sara MacDonald was born in Yorkshire and travelled extensively as a forces child. She attended drama school in London and worked in television and theatre before she married, living abroad for many years before moving to Cornwall with her two sons.

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By the same author

Sea Music

Another Life

Copyright

HarperCollinsPublishers
77-85 Fulham Palace Road,
Hammersmith, London W6 8JB

www.harpercollins.co.uk

A paperback original

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2005
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Copyright © Sara MacDonald 2005

Sara MacDonald asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work