The Influence
IV. Borneo Sunsets
Chapter 23
The cabin is tiny, bordering on claustrophobic. But it is immaculately kept, with a metal cabinet, a neatly made bunk and, next to it, a small table that looks like a shrine: in the centre, a framed black and white photograph of a woman and two children, all three smiling at the photographer; in front of this a stack of letters held together by a ribbon; on one side of the frame an indistinct drawing held in place by a small, leather-bound book; on the other, several candles, their fumes cloying, frame a wooden box and a dagger with a long, slightly curved blade that is lying on a white cloth.
The walls and the hull groan and creak, the floor lists slightly more with each barely perceptible thud. Water is trickling through the closed door, pooling in one corner. A man kneels on the bunk, naked but for a cloth loosely wrapped around his hips, head bowed and eyes closed, hands resting on thighs. He breaths out once, forcefully, lifts up his head, opens the eyes and, as his lips shape silent words, reaches out towards the photograph. He does not touch it but caresses the air in front of it. Then he lets out a grunt and grabs the dagger and the cloth.
The cloth is a long, narrow strip which the man fastidiously wraps around the handle and the bottom part of the blade before he grips the covered area and wraps the remains of the cloth firmly around his hand and wrist, finishing with a tight knot.
Another shudder passes through the ship, tilting it even further, and the door can now barely contain the onslaught of tonnes of oily seawater that are pushing at it, intent of getting through and taking possession of the last remaining air space.
Focusing on his hand wrapped up with the dagger, he places the tip on his lower left abdomen, the blade in a horizontal position, then raises his head staring at the empty wall ahead – as if looking for guidance – and pushes the dagger into the stomach, simultaneously releasing the air from his lungs. The pain must be unbearable, as the man sways and hyperventilates.
Yet he manages to pull the dagger to the right, cutting across the abdomen, slicing through the skin and muscle, leaving a gaping wound through which blood pours liberally and, as the gap widens, his intestines start spilling out. Ending the cut above his right thigh, the man pauses, barely conscious by now. Fighting the reflexes which want to shut his whole body down, he pulls out the dagger and slowly unwraps the cloth from his hand and wrist, lets the dagger drop to the floor, reaches for the box as he gasps for air. He opens it, plucks out a yellow, shining, round object (Did it just give off a brief flash, as if unhappy with being disturbed?) and, muttering incomprehensibly, pushes it deep into his stomach cavity before he curls up on the bunk just as a foetus inside the protection of a womb would do.
And as he closes his eyes, in excruciating pain yet at peace, welcoming death and accepting it as the ultimate saviour, the cabin door is prised open by the pressure of water, filling the tiny space in an instant and creating an unyielding vortex.
The dagger, trailing the stained cloth as an unholy banner; the photograph in its frame; the bundle of letters; the book and the drawing, the candles; the blood and guts seeping from the dying man’s abdomen and tinting the water, all are caught up in this very private and secret maelstrom which whips them up and makes them spin around the cabin in a grotesque dance while the sheer pressure of the unrelenting sea squeezes the air into fist-sized pockets which chase each other pointlessly across the ceiling.
For a moment there is dead calm before an ear-shattering explosion tears open the hull, inviting the rest of the sea to inspect and take possession of the submerged cabin. The last few miniscule air bubbles shrink to nothingness as the ship continues to sink towards the muddy bottom when the man lying on the bunk – still alive, if barely – opens his eyes one last time and smiles. The ship groans as it is torn apart, the water pressure continues to increase until it becomes unbearably painful and–
The walls and the hull groan and creak, the floor lists slightly more with each barely perceptible thud. Water is trickling through the closed door, pooling in one corner. A man kneels on the bunk, naked but for a cloth loosely wrapped around his hips, head bowed and eyes closed, hands resting on thighs. He breaths out once, forcefully, lifts up his head, opens the eyes and, as his lips shape silent words, reaches out towards the photograph. He does not touch it but caresses the air in front of it. Then he lets out a grunt and grabs the dagger and the cloth.
The cloth is a long, narrow strip which the man fastidiously wraps around the handle and the bottom part of the blade before he grips the covered area and wraps the remains of the cloth firmly around his hand and wrist, finishing with a tight knot.
Another shudder passes through the ship, tilting it even further, and the door can now barely contain the onslaught of tonnes of oily seawater that are pushing at it, intent of getting through and taking possession of the last remaining air space.
Focusing on his hand wrapped up with the dagger, he places the tip on his lower left abdomen, the blade in a horizontal position, then raises his head staring at the empty wall ahead – as if looking for guidance – and pushes the dagger into the stomach, simultaneously releasing the air from his lungs. The pain must be unbearable, as the man sways and hyperventilates.
Yet he manages to pull the dagger to the right, cutting across the abdomen, slicing through the skin and muscle, leaving a gaping wound through which blood pours liberally and, as the gap widens, his intestines start spilling out. Ending the cut above his right thigh, the man pauses, barely conscious by now. Fighting the reflexes which want to shut his whole body down, he pulls out the dagger and slowly unwraps the cloth from his hand and wrist, lets the dagger drop to the floor, reaches for the box as he gasps for air. He opens it, plucks out a yellow, shining, round object (Did it just give off a brief flash, as if unhappy with being disturbed?) and, muttering incomprehensibly, pushes it deep into his stomach cavity before he curls up on the bunk just as a foetus inside the protection of a womb would do.
And as he closes his eyes, in excruciating pain yet at peace, welcoming death and accepting it as the ultimate saviour, the cabin door is prised open by the pressure of water, filling the tiny space in an instant and creating an unyielding vortex.
The dagger, trailing the stained cloth as an unholy banner; the photograph in its frame; the bundle of letters; the book and the drawing, the candles; the blood and guts seeping from the dying man’s abdomen and tinting the water, all are caught up in this very private and secret maelstrom which whips them up and makes them spin around the cabin in a grotesque dance while the sheer pressure of the unrelenting sea squeezes the air into fist-sized pockets which chase each other pointlessly across the ceiling.
For a moment there is dead calm before an ear-shattering explosion tears open the hull, inviting the rest of the sea to inspect and take possession of the submerged cabin. The last few miniscule air bubbles shrink to nothingness as the ship continues to sink towards the muddy bottom when the man lying on the bunk – still alive, if barely – opens his eyes one last time and smiles. The ship groans as it is torn apart, the water pressure continues to increase until it becomes unbearably painful and–
‘Whoa, that hurts!’ I exclaimed as I woke up and looked at Kris next to me. ‘Are we landing? My ears are killing me!’
‘Yes we are, darling. I was about to nudge you awake when we started descending, but you looked so peaceful, like a baby.’ Kris smiled at me angelically and looked her most innocuous. ‘I let you sleep as you seemed to have a nice dream, at least to begin with, after which it stopped being nice, didn’t it? I wouldn’t interrupt one of your dreams, now would I, as it could be of interest to us if it was one of your special ones. Anything new that I should know about and be prepared for?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ I was still reeling from the dream, not to mention the brutal decrease in altitude and accompanying ear pain, ‘how about a Japanese guy slicing open his belly while his ship is going down?’
‘Too generic. Any distinguishing details?’ Kris asked eagerly.
I told Kris the whole story, or rather the whole dream as I had perceived it, while the plane taxied to the gate. BB, sitting behind us and leaning forward, his massive hands on our headrests, nodded sagely throughout my narrative.
‘That settles it,’ Kris exclaimed as I finished, ‘It must’ve been the Kokusei Maru. The crack in the hull that you described, I’ve seen it. It’s the only one of the three ships that nearly broke in half as it sank. And we’ll check it out today.’
‘Today? But it’s already after twelve.’ I was incredulous. ‘By the time we check in at the hotel and get to the dive site it’ll be dark. And you said we’d do leisure dives! I’m not keen on visiting a wreck at night.’
‘Of course you’re not, darling, and we’ll have all day tomorrow for the fun dives. That’s why I propose we check out the wreck today and have it over with, then enjoy ourselves tomorrow. And I promise that we’ll be out of the water by six,’ Kris sounded very reasonable. Trustworthy and believable.
I’ve had nightmares about that dive ever since, and to this day I regret agreeing to her optimistic – no, let’s call it by its true name – insane plan.
‘Yes we are, darling. I was about to nudge you awake when we started descending, but you looked so peaceful, like a baby.’ Kris smiled at me angelically and looked her most innocuous. ‘I let you sleep as you seemed to have a nice dream, at least to begin with, after which it stopped being nice, didn’t it? I wouldn’t interrupt one of your dreams, now would I, as it could be of interest to us if it was one of your special ones. Anything new that I should know about and be prepared for?’ she asked.
‘Yes,’ I was still reeling from the dream, not to mention the brutal decrease in altitude and accompanying ear pain, ‘how about a Japanese guy slicing open his belly while his ship is going down?’
‘Too generic. Any distinguishing details?’ Kris asked eagerly.
I told Kris the whole story, or rather the whole dream as I had perceived it, while the plane taxied to the gate. BB, sitting behind us and leaning forward, his massive hands on our headrests, nodded sagely throughout my narrative.
‘That settles it,’ Kris exclaimed as I finished, ‘It must’ve been the Kokusei Maru. The crack in the hull that you described, I’ve seen it. It’s the only one of the three ships that nearly broke in half as it sank. And we’ll check it out today.’
‘Today? But it’s already after twelve.’ I was incredulous. ‘By the time we check in at the hotel and get to the dive site it’ll be dark. And you said we’d do leisure dives! I’m not keen on visiting a wreck at night.’
‘Of course you’re not, darling, and we’ll have all day tomorrow for the fun dives. That’s why I propose we check out the wreck today and have it over with, then enjoy ourselves tomorrow. And I promise that we’ll be out of the water by six,’ Kris sounded very reasonable. Trustworthy and believable.
I’ve had nightmares about that dive ever since, and to this day I regret agreeing to her optimistic – no, let’s call it by its true name – insane plan.
●
It started innocuously enough, Kris popping by the house a week earlier to celebrate.
‘Darling, I managed to sort it out!’
‘Sort what out?’
‘The takeover, of course! About now,’ looking at her watch, ‘the current directors of one of the major corporations listed on the KL exchange are being shown their resignation letters, all duly signed and witnessed ages ago, and dated yesterday. And politely asked to vacate the premises. Ha, I bet you the suckers don’t even remember it, nor had a clue what it was they were signing at the time.’
‘So you’re happy, I take it? Having made a killing once again,’ and I couldn’t help prodding her, just a bit, ‘to the detriment, I’m sure, of the poor and uneducated masses.’
‘Oh stop pretending, you bourgeois closet socialist. Consider your life for a moment. You live in the most prestigious part of the city, in a mansion–’
‘A ruin, currently hardly fit for human habitation–’ ‘Fuck that. Your ruin, with all the land, is worth more than five good-sized family homes anywhere in KL. Except Bukit Tunku. And you know it.’
‘I’m not a socialist and I resent being labelled one,’ I replied, skilfully changing the subject. ‘If anything, I see myself as a communist with capitalist inclinations. The best of both worlds.’
‘Whatever, darling, let’s not argue about trifling matters. Just open that bottle of bubbly I’ve brought, will you,’ Kris said, refusing to take the bait.
As I busied myself sourcing two glasses that would approximate champagne flutes, and opening the bottle – Kris expressly forbidding me to sabre it – I was treated to a condensed insight into unfriendly company takeovers and how easy they can be accomplished. If you’re Kris, that is.
‘I take it,’ I said, tasting the champagne, slightly too dry and oily for my taste but I refrained from mentioning it, ‘your people are happy, their people are not?’
‘Never mind them, darling,’ Kris was beaming, ‘I’ve just had close to eight million deposited in one of my accounts.’
‘Ringgit?’
‘No, silly. Dollars.’
I know what you’re thinking, and I wholly agree with you. Me, having made that kind of money, I’d just retire with immediate effect and live off it for the rest of my life. Not Kris, though. She thrives on making these killer deals, they are her raison d’être. It’s all about the adrenaline kick and getting the upper hand in a business deal. And, to give Kris her due, most of the money she makes goes into a number of nature preservation projects, both land and sea. Only the odd million from each of her deals is retained to keep her lifestyle.
‘Anyway, darling, I’ve booked us on a flight to KK next weekend. Together with BB, just in case. We’ll check out the wrecks and see what the nearby Bajau communities remember about when the boats were sunk and if they’ve any stories about it. These people are amazing, you know, they may be illiterate but they hang on to their history by telling and retelling their children every single event that has ever happened to the family. Who then pass it on to their offspring. Just don’t forget to bring your dive gear, I’ll show you a couple of fantastic spots on the wreck hulls, with a bunch of rare cowries that I’m sure no one has discovered yet.’
‘Seriously? Just pleasure diving with you? No goons trying to kill us? No entering the wrecks? You know I hate enclosed spaces, even more so if they’re underwater.’
‘Darling, the dives are just for me to reminisce and for you to see rare shells. Anyway, this may be our last chance to see the site untouched. I’ve heard rumours about the government in Sabah giving a licence to a Chinese outfit to salvage the wrecks.’
‘Surely there can’t be anything much left to salvage after so many years. And why now?’
‘Greed. As always in this part of the world. This time masked as a concern for the environment. Supposedly toxic materials leaking from the wrecks. In reality, a Sabahan government bureaucrat gets a fat bribe to allow some uncivilised Chinese to butcher the wrecks for valuable metals, like the bronze propellers. While screwing up the marine eco system that has been thriving there for well over half a century and taking away the main food source from the villages along the coast. No one cares about the sanctity of the wrecks either, with most of crew having gone down with the ships.’
‘But the ships are Japanese, aren’t they? Surely the international maritime law is applicable even in Malaysia – an identified shipwreck being the absolute property of its country of origin? Particularly if there was anyone onboard the ship when it went down? It kind of makes it sacred and untouchable, doesn’t it?’
‘This is Southeast Asia, darling, not Europe. Nothing is sacred or untouchable here if it feeds someone’s avarice. Never, ever forget that.’
‘Darling, I managed to sort it out!’
‘Sort what out?’
‘The takeover, of course! About now,’ looking at her watch, ‘the current directors of one of the major corporations listed on the KL exchange are being shown their resignation letters, all duly signed and witnessed ages ago, and dated yesterday. And politely asked to vacate the premises. Ha, I bet you the suckers don’t even remember it, nor had a clue what it was they were signing at the time.’
‘So you’re happy, I take it? Having made a killing once again,’ and I couldn’t help prodding her, just a bit, ‘to the detriment, I’m sure, of the poor and uneducated masses.’
‘Oh stop pretending, you bourgeois closet socialist. Consider your life for a moment. You live in the most prestigious part of the city, in a mansion–’
‘A ruin, currently hardly fit for human habitation–’ ‘Fuck that. Your ruin, with all the land, is worth more than five good-sized family homes anywhere in KL. Except Bukit Tunku. And you know it.’
‘I’m not a socialist and I resent being labelled one,’ I replied, skilfully changing the subject. ‘If anything, I see myself as a communist with capitalist inclinations. The best of both worlds.’
‘Whatever, darling, let’s not argue about trifling matters. Just open that bottle of bubbly I’ve brought, will you,’ Kris said, refusing to take the bait.
As I busied myself sourcing two glasses that would approximate champagne flutes, and opening the bottle – Kris expressly forbidding me to sabre it – I was treated to a condensed insight into unfriendly company takeovers and how easy they can be accomplished. If you’re Kris, that is.
‘I take it,’ I said, tasting the champagne, slightly too dry and oily for my taste but I refrained from mentioning it, ‘your people are happy, their people are not?’
‘Never mind them, darling,’ Kris was beaming, ‘I’ve just had close to eight million deposited in one of my accounts.’
‘Ringgit?’
‘No, silly. Dollars.’
I know what you’re thinking, and I wholly agree with you. Me, having made that kind of money, I’d just retire with immediate effect and live off it for the rest of my life. Not Kris, though. She thrives on making these killer deals, they are her raison d’être. It’s all about the adrenaline kick and getting the upper hand in a business deal. And, to give Kris her due, most of the money she makes goes into a number of nature preservation projects, both land and sea. Only the odd million from each of her deals is retained to keep her lifestyle.
‘Anyway, darling, I’ve booked us on a flight to KK next weekend. Together with BB, just in case. We’ll check out the wrecks and see what the nearby Bajau communities remember about when the boats were sunk and if they’ve any stories about it. These people are amazing, you know, they may be illiterate but they hang on to their history by telling and retelling their children every single event that has ever happened to the family. Who then pass it on to their offspring. Just don’t forget to bring your dive gear, I’ll show you a couple of fantastic spots on the wreck hulls, with a bunch of rare cowries that I’m sure no one has discovered yet.’
‘Seriously? Just pleasure diving with you? No goons trying to kill us? No entering the wrecks? You know I hate enclosed spaces, even more so if they’re underwater.’
‘Darling, the dives are just for me to reminisce and for you to see rare shells. Anyway, this may be our last chance to see the site untouched. I’ve heard rumours about the government in Sabah giving a licence to a Chinese outfit to salvage the wrecks.’
‘Surely there can’t be anything much left to salvage after so many years. And why now?’
‘Greed. As always in this part of the world. This time masked as a concern for the environment. Supposedly toxic materials leaking from the wrecks. In reality, a Sabahan government bureaucrat gets a fat bribe to allow some uncivilised Chinese to butcher the wrecks for valuable metals, like the bronze propellers. While screwing up the marine eco system that has been thriving there for well over half a century and taking away the main food source from the villages along the coast. No one cares about the sanctity of the wrecks either, with most of crew having gone down with the ships.’
‘But the ships are Japanese, aren’t they? Surely the international maritime law is applicable even in Malaysia – an identified shipwreck being the absolute property of its country of origin? Particularly if there was anyone onboard the ship when it went down? It kind of makes it sacred and untouchable, doesn’t it?’
‘This is Southeast Asia, darling, not Europe. Nothing is sacred or untouchable here if it feeds someone’s avarice. Never, ever forget that.’
Chapter 24
The main roads in Sabah are quite good, which was a surprise to me.
Kris had, as expected, everything organised from the moment we stepped out of the airport. A Toyota Hilux was waiting at the exit, the driver grinning at us and deferring to Kris as if she was Malay royalty. After a brief stop at the hotel to drop off our overnight bags, with Kris informing the fawning staff that we would check in later, we continued on the A3 going north from KK towards Kota Belud. There, a boat was waiting to take us out to the wrecks. A Bajau skipper and his single crew member, a kid who looked twelve.
BB was not at all happy to leave dry land.
‘Mankind has spent millions of years getting rid of fins and gills. Why would anyone want to get back to water?’ And he positively started sulking when he saw the boat, a typical Bajau construction: narrow, with outriggers and an old car engine in a crude wooden frame, trailing a couple of metres of rusty pipe ending with a tiny, dented propeller. ‘I cannot do this, ma’am, this is a danger to all of us.’
‘Stop fretting, BB,’ Kris was firm, ‘you’re not going diving with us, you’ll stay onboard and drink all this lovely, ice cold beer,’ holding up two six-packs of Tiger.
Half an hour later, with the land barely visible, I got up from the makeshift and painfully hard wooden bench and made my way to the prow where Kris was soaking up the afternoon sun.
‘Shouldn’t we be getting the dive gear ready soon?’
‘Not yet, we’ve got another forty minutes or so to go. Come and lie down next to me. Enjoy the solitude at sea.’ Kris patted the planks next to her, eyes closed to the sun, her face an expression of bliss.
‘Solitude? Forty minutes more? That would make it more than,’ I did a quick calculation in my head based on our estimated speed, ‘fifteen kilometres from land. You didn’t tell me that this was going to be an open water dive!’
‘Actually, from where we started, it’s more like twenty-plus. Say twenty-five? But it doesn’t matter, does it? The skipper knows exactly where it is, and even if he didn’t I’m sure that I would be able to find the spot.’
‘Never mind about finding the spot, I’m more concerned with diving in the middle of the sea. In late afternoon. And why do we have four tanks with us, if we’re doing just one dive?’
‘Ah,’ Kris waved her hand dismissively, eyes still closed, ‘it’s always good to have spare air. And as I’ve promised you that we’ll be back on the boat by six, so we shall.’
May I tell you what I see as the biggest problem with us males? It’s simply being male and therefore always having this urge to confirm our manliness. Particularly when we perceive a challenge from the opposite gender. Thus, instead of applying logic and telling Kris that we should turn back now and return tomorrow morning, I retreated to the uncomfortable plank and sat down next to BB.
‘Eether tae this genl’man,’ BB was musing, ‘Or tae ‘er death. You cannae win a joust wi’ a lass, mate.’
This was news to me, BB doing a solid Scottish accent while misquoting the bard. I had to reciprocate.
‘Shut yer gob, ye sad bugger, and pass me a can. Please.’
For the next hour (yes, Kris’ ability, as with any woman that I’ve ever known, to accurately estimate time is nonexistent), BB and I sat quietly next to each other, going through the cans and being miserable for different reasons.
Kris had, as expected, everything organised from the moment we stepped out of the airport. A Toyota Hilux was waiting at the exit, the driver grinning at us and deferring to Kris as if she was Malay royalty. After a brief stop at the hotel to drop off our overnight bags, with Kris informing the fawning staff that we would check in later, we continued on the A3 going north from KK towards Kota Belud. There, a boat was waiting to take us out to the wrecks. A Bajau skipper and his single crew member, a kid who looked twelve.
BB was not at all happy to leave dry land.
‘Mankind has spent millions of years getting rid of fins and gills. Why would anyone want to get back to water?’ And he positively started sulking when he saw the boat, a typical Bajau construction: narrow, with outriggers and an old car engine in a crude wooden frame, trailing a couple of metres of rusty pipe ending with a tiny, dented propeller. ‘I cannot do this, ma’am, this is a danger to all of us.’
‘Stop fretting, BB,’ Kris was firm, ‘you’re not going diving with us, you’ll stay onboard and drink all this lovely, ice cold beer,’ holding up two six-packs of Tiger.
Half an hour later, with the land barely visible, I got up from the makeshift and painfully hard wooden bench and made my way to the prow where Kris was soaking up the afternoon sun.
‘Shouldn’t we be getting the dive gear ready soon?’
‘Not yet, we’ve got another forty minutes or so to go. Come and lie down next to me. Enjoy the solitude at sea.’ Kris patted the planks next to her, eyes closed to the sun, her face an expression of bliss.
‘Solitude? Forty minutes more? That would make it more than,’ I did a quick calculation in my head based on our estimated speed, ‘fifteen kilometres from land. You didn’t tell me that this was going to be an open water dive!’
‘Actually, from where we started, it’s more like twenty-plus. Say twenty-five? But it doesn’t matter, does it? The skipper knows exactly where it is, and even if he didn’t I’m sure that I would be able to find the spot.’
‘Never mind about finding the spot, I’m more concerned with diving in the middle of the sea. In late afternoon. And why do we have four tanks with us, if we’re doing just one dive?’
‘Ah,’ Kris waved her hand dismissively, eyes still closed, ‘it’s always good to have spare air. And as I’ve promised you that we’ll be back on the boat by six, so we shall.’
May I tell you what I see as the biggest problem with us males? It’s simply being male and therefore always having this urge to confirm our manliness. Particularly when we perceive a challenge from the opposite gender. Thus, instead of applying logic and telling Kris that we should turn back now and return tomorrow morning, I retreated to the uncomfortable plank and sat down next to BB.
‘Eether tae this genl’man,’ BB was musing, ‘Or tae ‘er death. You cannae win a joust wi’ a lass, mate.’
This was news to me, BB doing a solid Scottish accent while misquoting the bard. I had to reciprocate.
‘Shut yer gob, ye sad bugger, and pass me a can. Please.’
For the next hour (yes, Kris’ ability, as with any woman that I’ve ever known, to accurately estimate time is nonexistent), BB and I sat quietly next to each other, going through the cans and being miserable for different reasons.
●
Kris was sitting on the gunwale, regulator in hand and ready to roll over. ‘Come on, lover, let’s get going.’
It’s always like this when we go diving. By the time I’ve put on the wetsuit, Kris is all kitted up and ready to go.
‘I’m very, very concerned that it’s half past four already and we’ve barely an hour of sunlight left,’ I replied, adjusting the BCD straps, ‘Not to mention that we’re going to dive in open seas, in a current. And that you’ve not been honest with me about the depth. My air won’t last more than twenty minutes down there, at most. Can we please reconsider this?’
‘Would you leave your woman on her own, unprotected in this wild sea, prey to all manner of beasts?’
I could see Kris actually fluttering her eyelashes inside the mask as she said this.
‘Of course I wouldn’t, I’d see it as my responsibility to dissuade you from–’
‘Love you too, see you down there.’ With a wicked grin, Kris put the regulator in her mouth and rolled over the edge. No coming up to the surface to signal that she was okay, not even waiting for me, the bloody woman just went down.
‘Hurry boss, or you not fain’ her in current,’ the skipper said as he tried to manoeuvre the boat back to the spot where Kris had gone in.
Fucking hell. This is not how I like my dives. I pulled on the mask, no time to clean it, and rolled over. The last thing I saw before the roll was BB giving me a half-hearted thumbs-up; then I was under water, being spun around by the savage surface current, desperately bleeding the BCD of any remaining air, finning furiously to get down below the current while trying to breathe calmly. The dive computer – bloody instrument, too precise for my liking – showed me that I’d already wasted close to a third of my air. And looking down didn’t help.
A blue-grey mass of water, the visibility appallingly bad. I recalled Kris saying that the bottom was fine sand and mud, and it looked like a good deal of it was suspended in the water around me. Once below seven metres I could feel the current decreasing, so I stopped kicking and let myself sink slowly. I started looking for Kris while I kept an eye on the depth reading. She’d said that the upper part of the ship was at thirty metres, so I had at least another twenty to go. If, that is, we were above the ship, which I wasn’t sure about despite both Kris and the skipper insisting that this was the right location.
There she was. I could see a vague shape below and in front of me, moving slowly back and forth, probably also looking for the ship. Then the shape flicked its tail and disappeared down. Not Kris, then, just a grey shark. At least I was telling myself that it must’ve been a grey, no point in contemplating the possibility of it being one of its less friendly cousins.
Again I had to force myself to relax and slow down my breathing, with barely half of the air left now, continuing to sink. After what seemed like forever, a dark mass was coming up to meet me, so huge I could barely see its indistinct edges. Goddammit, they were right, Kris and the skipper, and we were spot-on. This calmed me somewhat and I made for the railing, covered in multicoloured soft coral swaying gently back and forth. Maybe this would be a good dive, after all, I thought. Now just to find Kris. She’d given me a handful of recognisable markers on the wreck and all I had to do was follow these towards the spot she wanted us to check out.
A few more minutes before I saw Kris, sitting calmly on the deck, between two large gorgonians, and clapping slowly in my direction. Cheeky woman. I finned over to her and could see how excited she was, taking out the regulator and blowing me a kiss. Signalling that I follow her, she went over the edge and disappeared in the murk below, following the crack that was apparent even up here, snaking its way across part of the deck.
I mentioned earlier, didn’t I, that I hadn’t had time to clean my mask before going in? It was all fogged up and I was constantly having to let water in to clear the lenses. I hate diving without thorough preparation – where’s the pleasure in a dive if you barely see anything?
I finned down, dropping to nearly forty metres before I reached Kris. She pointed at the crack that was wider here, then pulled out her torch and shone the light inside. Floating just above her, I used my torch as well to light up the interior. What must have been a cabin once now looked like a tiny underwater cave, heavily encrusted in marine growth. Kris turned around to face me and indicated that she was going in, then got stuck almost immediately as she tried to swim through the narrow opening.
Going from incredulity at what Kris was trying to do, to near panic imagining her cutting the regulator hose on a sharp edge, to relief as she wriggled out, I signalled to her that we should go up, now, showing her I only had seventy bars left. All I got back was an okay and another big smile, regulator out of her mouth again. Then the silly woman undid the BCD straps and, before I realised what she intended to do, pushed the BCD with the attached tank and regulator through the crack, then followed it. Once inside, she calmly pulled on the BCD, secured all the straps and only then retrieved the regulator, giving me another okay sign followed by both hands forming a heart, and then showing five. Five minutes?! I gesticulated wildly that she come out immediately, all standard diver signs forgotten by now, but Kris ignored it and, turning her back on me, proceeded to methodically search the cabin, picking up everything that seemed loose, or semi-loose, and shoving her hand in every crevice, oblivious to any potential risks in doing that. The silt that had collected inside over the years and was now swirling around didn’t help. I could barely see her rummaging around.
My mask was getting worse, and letting water in to clear the glass only worked for moments. So when Kris pulled out something long and narrow from one of the cavities I couldn’t make out what it was even though, eyes lit up triumphantly, she held it up for me to see. In exasperation, I pulled off the mask and started rubbing the glass with my fingers to remove the moisture film.
The last thing I expected was to be hit from behind. The force slammed me into the crack, nearly made me drop the mask, and I inhaled seawater through my nose. As I fumbled to put the mask back on, retching, I was hit again, and shaken violently this time. Mask back on and only partially drained, I could just about see Kris staring at something behind me.
I turned around to see a grey shark barely an arm’s length away, fins down and back arched, flicking the tail in jerky motions. Behind it, another grey was swimming back and forth, also highly agitated. As I instinctively pulled back towards the crack I felt Kris coming out, then she was next to me, pulling on the BCD, regulator in her mouth by now, and stuffing whatever it was that she had found inside the straps, all with a minimum of movement. We looked at each other briefly, not wanting to let the sharks out of our sight, and signalled “up”. By now I had a measly twenty bars left, not even enough for a straight ascent, let alone adequate for a decompression stop.
We had barely gone up a metre when the shark further away went rigid, then charged us. I’ve no idea how I managed to push Kris away from me while tilting my body to the left, but I had time to see the jaws open and the eyelids close before the grey hit my right shoulder, shook it savagely, then promptly swam away. I didn’t need to look, I could hear the escaping air screaming from the ripped BCD and the remains of the regulator hose, and tasted seawater in my mouth. Even if we could fend off further attacks, I would still have to make my way up to the surface without air.
I did the only thing I could think of. I spat out the regulator, unsnapped the BCD and shrugged it off, letting it sink still trailing bubbles. Instinctively, both sharks dived sharply towards the escaping air, giving me enough time to look at Kris, check out her remaining air – still over ninety bars left, good girl – grab her octopus and, holding tightly on to her BCD, start finning hard upwards. The remaining air in my tank would only last a handful of seconds and I urgently wanted us away from this spot. Then Kris did the one thing all beginner divers are warned against. She fully inflated her BCD. At first slowly, then gaining momentum, we began ascending at a pace guaranteed to rupture our lungs or at best give us the bends. But this was our only option now and all we could do to minimise the risks was to breathe sparingly and, heads tilted up, open up as straight a passage as possible from the lungs to the mouth to exhale fully. Meanwhile, I was desperately scanning the water above us, looking for any signs of the surface. If anything, the water was getting darker and I thought that if we somehow survive this, I would never, ever get into water again with Kris, not even in a jacuzzi.
Kris was continuously monitoring our depth as we zoomed up. At one point she dumped most of the air in her BCD which slowed our ascent considerably, and signalled that we were at ten, then nine, then eight metres – still ascending too fast, but manageable. As she let out the remaining air we focused on exhaling, aware that the last few meters are the most dangerous in fast ascents. At last we broke the surface, greedily sucking in fresh air, and were met by a heavy, cold rain whipping up the water. When we had gone in, the sky had been clear and, other than the current, the sea calm. Now, it was a leaden grey everywhere I looked, the sun invisible and the surface of the sea a rolling mass of frothing waves. And no boat to be seen. Kris was prepared, though. She pulled out and unrolled her safety sausage and proceeded to fill it with air from her regulator, while I frantically scanned the sea below us, expecting the sharks to come up and finish what they had started.
A two metre high orange beacon, pointing at the sky like an oversized erect penis, is normally sufficient to get the attention of any dive boat skipper. But in these circumstances, with the rain having reduced the visibility badly and the towering waves, I was not sure it would be of much help, if any. No one would be able see the sausage unless actively looking for it, within no more than maybe ten metres from us. I was so happy to be wrong, and to this day I’m convinced that we owe our lives to the Bajau skipper and his uncanny ability to locate us. A few minutes after Kris had inflated the sausage, there was a flash in the sky, not too far from us.
‘They’ve seen us,’ Kris said calmly, ‘We should be up and dry soon.’
She was right. The boat appeared, chugging through the waves, and I’ve never welcomed BB’s ugly visage more than on this occasion, seeing his concerned look, hanging halfway over the railing, scanning the sea while holding a ladder in place for us to get onboard. Next to him, and nervous, was the boy, eyes going in all directions.
‘Get your gear off and I’ll help you up,’ I said between mouthfuls of seawater, doing my best to repress a vision of open shark jaws rushing up towards us and ignore the throbbing pain in my shoulder.
‘Will do, darling, as soon as I secure this,’ Kris responded, unbuckled the BCD and carefully removed the object she had found and shown me earlier, then passed it to the boy who looked both awed and scared, followed by her fins. BB had managed to grab her BCD and tank.
Trying to remain cool, at least outwardly, I rolled my eyes, ‘Do whatever you feel compelled to do, just let’s get out of the water. Now, if possible.’
At that moment, there was no place in the world where I would’ve wanted to be more than on that crappy boat, out of the water and away from the sharks, under the tarpaulin and drying out with a cold beer. Thankful for still being alive. Somehow I managed to control my base impulses and assisted Kris with climbing up on the boat, pushing hard on her lovely bum until she was safe.
I was acutely aware of being alone in the water now, all the time checking below me, pulling off the fins and passing them on to BB. Or the boy, I didn’t look up, too concerned with what was underneath. And there they were, the fucking sharks, three of them now, rushing up towards me.
‘Get me up now!’ I bellowed, stretching up my arms above me. ‘Shar–’
I could feel strong hands clamping my wrists, then I was pulled up, painfully scraping my shoulder and back against the hull, and deposited in a disgustingly smelly slush of old seawater seasoned with diesel, fish guts and fuck knows what else. And I was in serious pain.
‘Fuck you, BB! You’ve broken my shoulder, you dickhead,’ I wailed.
‘No, man,’ he looked at me intently, ‘your shoulder not broken. Just eaten. Ha!’
I turned my head to the right – bloody painful, it was, and my first thought was that I’d got a serious case of the bends. Then I saw my right shoulder and wondered briefly why anyone would pour a ton of ketchup on a perfectly good midin salad (for the unenlightened, it’s made from a very tasty fern growing in Sarawak).
The rest of that day is mostly a disconnected blur, likely because BB was playing the nurse, liberally plying me with the local alcohol of choice, tuak – fermented and distilled palm sap, it sounds exotic but tastes like liquid shit – from the skipper’s private reserve on the boat. I have vague memories of being carried from the boat to a shack, then having more tuak poured over my shoulder. Not a friendly way of greeting a stranger into your household, I felt, but was unable to protest after a greasy cloth was shoved into my mouth. Then I promptly fainted as someone proceeded to dismantle my shoulder. Next thing I remember is being pulled out of a car, not too gently, carried to a very comfy bed, with several voices crying ‘dokter, dokter’ just before I happily embraced Morpheus.
It’s always like this when we go diving. By the time I’ve put on the wetsuit, Kris is all kitted up and ready to go.
‘I’m very, very concerned that it’s half past four already and we’ve barely an hour of sunlight left,’ I replied, adjusting the BCD straps, ‘Not to mention that we’re going to dive in open seas, in a current. And that you’ve not been honest with me about the depth. My air won’t last more than twenty minutes down there, at most. Can we please reconsider this?’
‘Would you leave your woman on her own, unprotected in this wild sea, prey to all manner of beasts?’
I could see Kris actually fluttering her eyelashes inside the mask as she said this.
‘Of course I wouldn’t, I’d see it as my responsibility to dissuade you from–’
‘Love you too, see you down there.’ With a wicked grin, Kris put the regulator in her mouth and rolled over the edge. No coming up to the surface to signal that she was okay, not even waiting for me, the bloody woman just went down.
‘Hurry boss, or you not fain’ her in current,’ the skipper said as he tried to manoeuvre the boat back to the spot where Kris had gone in.
Fucking hell. This is not how I like my dives. I pulled on the mask, no time to clean it, and rolled over. The last thing I saw before the roll was BB giving me a half-hearted thumbs-up; then I was under water, being spun around by the savage surface current, desperately bleeding the BCD of any remaining air, finning furiously to get down below the current while trying to breathe calmly. The dive computer – bloody instrument, too precise for my liking – showed me that I’d already wasted close to a third of my air. And looking down didn’t help.
A blue-grey mass of water, the visibility appallingly bad. I recalled Kris saying that the bottom was fine sand and mud, and it looked like a good deal of it was suspended in the water around me. Once below seven metres I could feel the current decreasing, so I stopped kicking and let myself sink slowly. I started looking for Kris while I kept an eye on the depth reading. She’d said that the upper part of the ship was at thirty metres, so I had at least another twenty to go. If, that is, we were above the ship, which I wasn’t sure about despite both Kris and the skipper insisting that this was the right location.
There she was. I could see a vague shape below and in front of me, moving slowly back and forth, probably also looking for the ship. Then the shape flicked its tail and disappeared down. Not Kris, then, just a grey shark. At least I was telling myself that it must’ve been a grey, no point in contemplating the possibility of it being one of its less friendly cousins.
Again I had to force myself to relax and slow down my breathing, with barely half of the air left now, continuing to sink. After what seemed like forever, a dark mass was coming up to meet me, so huge I could barely see its indistinct edges. Goddammit, they were right, Kris and the skipper, and we were spot-on. This calmed me somewhat and I made for the railing, covered in multicoloured soft coral swaying gently back and forth. Maybe this would be a good dive, after all, I thought. Now just to find Kris. She’d given me a handful of recognisable markers on the wreck and all I had to do was follow these towards the spot she wanted us to check out.
A few more minutes before I saw Kris, sitting calmly on the deck, between two large gorgonians, and clapping slowly in my direction. Cheeky woman. I finned over to her and could see how excited she was, taking out the regulator and blowing me a kiss. Signalling that I follow her, she went over the edge and disappeared in the murk below, following the crack that was apparent even up here, snaking its way across part of the deck.
I mentioned earlier, didn’t I, that I hadn’t had time to clean my mask before going in? It was all fogged up and I was constantly having to let water in to clear the lenses. I hate diving without thorough preparation – where’s the pleasure in a dive if you barely see anything?
I finned down, dropping to nearly forty metres before I reached Kris. She pointed at the crack that was wider here, then pulled out her torch and shone the light inside. Floating just above her, I used my torch as well to light up the interior. What must have been a cabin once now looked like a tiny underwater cave, heavily encrusted in marine growth. Kris turned around to face me and indicated that she was going in, then got stuck almost immediately as she tried to swim through the narrow opening.
Going from incredulity at what Kris was trying to do, to near panic imagining her cutting the regulator hose on a sharp edge, to relief as she wriggled out, I signalled to her that we should go up, now, showing her I only had seventy bars left. All I got back was an okay and another big smile, regulator out of her mouth again. Then the silly woman undid the BCD straps and, before I realised what she intended to do, pushed the BCD with the attached tank and regulator through the crack, then followed it. Once inside, she calmly pulled on the BCD, secured all the straps and only then retrieved the regulator, giving me another okay sign followed by both hands forming a heart, and then showing five. Five minutes?! I gesticulated wildly that she come out immediately, all standard diver signs forgotten by now, but Kris ignored it and, turning her back on me, proceeded to methodically search the cabin, picking up everything that seemed loose, or semi-loose, and shoving her hand in every crevice, oblivious to any potential risks in doing that. The silt that had collected inside over the years and was now swirling around didn’t help. I could barely see her rummaging around.
My mask was getting worse, and letting water in to clear the glass only worked for moments. So when Kris pulled out something long and narrow from one of the cavities I couldn’t make out what it was even though, eyes lit up triumphantly, she held it up for me to see. In exasperation, I pulled off the mask and started rubbing the glass with my fingers to remove the moisture film.
The last thing I expected was to be hit from behind. The force slammed me into the crack, nearly made me drop the mask, and I inhaled seawater through my nose. As I fumbled to put the mask back on, retching, I was hit again, and shaken violently this time. Mask back on and only partially drained, I could just about see Kris staring at something behind me.
I turned around to see a grey shark barely an arm’s length away, fins down and back arched, flicking the tail in jerky motions. Behind it, another grey was swimming back and forth, also highly agitated. As I instinctively pulled back towards the crack I felt Kris coming out, then she was next to me, pulling on the BCD, regulator in her mouth by now, and stuffing whatever it was that she had found inside the straps, all with a minimum of movement. We looked at each other briefly, not wanting to let the sharks out of our sight, and signalled “up”. By now I had a measly twenty bars left, not even enough for a straight ascent, let alone adequate for a decompression stop.
We had barely gone up a metre when the shark further away went rigid, then charged us. I’ve no idea how I managed to push Kris away from me while tilting my body to the left, but I had time to see the jaws open and the eyelids close before the grey hit my right shoulder, shook it savagely, then promptly swam away. I didn’t need to look, I could hear the escaping air screaming from the ripped BCD and the remains of the regulator hose, and tasted seawater in my mouth. Even if we could fend off further attacks, I would still have to make my way up to the surface without air.
I did the only thing I could think of. I spat out the regulator, unsnapped the BCD and shrugged it off, letting it sink still trailing bubbles. Instinctively, both sharks dived sharply towards the escaping air, giving me enough time to look at Kris, check out her remaining air – still over ninety bars left, good girl – grab her octopus and, holding tightly on to her BCD, start finning hard upwards. The remaining air in my tank would only last a handful of seconds and I urgently wanted us away from this spot. Then Kris did the one thing all beginner divers are warned against. She fully inflated her BCD. At first slowly, then gaining momentum, we began ascending at a pace guaranteed to rupture our lungs or at best give us the bends. But this was our only option now and all we could do to minimise the risks was to breathe sparingly and, heads tilted up, open up as straight a passage as possible from the lungs to the mouth to exhale fully. Meanwhile, I was desperately scanning the water above us, looking for any signs of the surface. If anything, the water was getting darker and I thought that if we somehow survive this, I would never, ever get into water again with Kris, not even in a jacuzzi.
Kris was continuously monitoring our depth as we zoomed up. At one point she dumped most of the air in her BCD which slowed our ascent considerably, and signalled that we were at ten, then nine, then eight metres – still ascending too fast, but manageable. As she let out the remaining air we focused on exhaling, aware that the last few meters are the most dangerous in fast ascents. At last we broke the surface, greedily sucking in fresh air, and were met by a heavy, cold rain whipping up the water. When we had gone in, the sky had been clear and, other than the current, the sea calm. Now, it was a leaden grey everywhere I looked, the sun invisible and the surface of the sea a rolling mass of frothing waves. And no boat to be seen. Kris was prepared, though. She pulled out and unrolled her safety sausage and proceeded to fill it with air from her regulator, while I frantically scanned the sea below us, expecting the sharks to come up and finish what they had started.
A two metre high orange beacon, pointing at the sky like an oversized erect penis, is normally sufficient to get the attention of any dive boat skipper. But in these circumstances, with the rain having reduced the visibility badly and the towering waves, I was not sure it would be of much help, if any. No one would be able see the sausage unless actively looking for it, within no more than maybe ten metres from us. I was so happy to be wrong, and to this day I’m convinced that we owe our lives to the Bajau skipper and his uncanny ability to locate us. A few minutes after Kris had inflated the sausage, there was a flash in the sky, not too far from us.
‘They’ve seen us,’ Kris said calmly, ‘We should be up and dry soon.’
She was right. The boat appeared, chugging through the waves, and I’ve never welcomed BB’s ugly visage more than on this occasion, seeing his concerned look, hanging halfway over the railing, scanning the sea while holding a ladder in place for us to get onboard. Next to him, and nervous, was the boy, eyes going in all directions.
‘Get your gear off and I’ll help you up,’ I said between mouthfuls of seawater, doing my best to repress a vision of open shark jaws rushing up towards us and ignore the throbbing pain in my shoulder.
‘Will do, darling, as soon as I secure this,’ Kris responded, unbuckled the BCD and carefully removed the object she had found and shown me earlier, then passed it to the boy who looked both awed and scared, followed by her fins. BB had managed to grab her BCD and tank.
Trying to remain cool, at least outwardly, I rolled my eyes, ‘Do whatever you feel compelled to do, just let’s get out of the water. Now, if possible.’
At that moment, there was no place in the world where I would’ve wanted to be more than on that crappy boat, out of the water and away from the sharks, under the tarpaulin and drying out with a cold beer. Thankful for still being alive. Somehow I managed to control my base impulses and assisted Kris with climbing up on the boat, pushing hard on her lovely bum until she was safe.
I was acutely aware of being alone in the water now, all the time checking below me, pulling off the fins and passing them on to BB. Or the boy, I didn’t look up, too concerned with what was underneath. And there they were, the fucking sharks, three of them now, rushing up towards me.
‘Get me up now!’ I bellowed, stretching up my arms above me. ‘Shar–’
I could feel strong hands clamping my wrists, then I was pulled up, painfully scraping my shoulder and back against the hull, and deposited in a disgustingly smelly slush of old seawater seasoned with diesel, fish guts and fuck knows what else. And I was in serious pain.
‘Fuck you, BB! You’ve broken my shoulder, you dickhead,’ I wailed.
‘No, man,’ he looked at me intently, ‘your shoulder not broken. Just eaten. Ha!’
I turned my head to the right – bloody painful, it was, and my first thought was that I’d got a serious case of the bends. Then I saw my right shoulder and wondered briefly why anyone would pour a ton of ketchup on a perfectly good midin salad (for the unenlightened, it’s made from a very tasty fern growing in Sarawak).
The rest of that day is mostly a disconnected blur, likely because BB was playing the nurse, liberally plying me with the local alcohol of choice, tuak – fermented and distilled palm sap, it sounds exotic but tastes like liquid shit – from the skipper’s private reserve on the boat. I have vague memories of being carried from the boat to a shack, then having more tuak poured over my shoulder. Not a friendly way of greeting a stranger into your household, I felt, but was unable to protest after a greasy cloth was shoved into my mouth. Then I promptly fainted as someone proceeded to dismantle my shoulder. Next thing I remember is being pulled out of a car, not too gently, carried to a very comfy bed, with several voices crying ‘dokter, dokter’ just before I happily embraced Morpheus.
Chapter 25
‘Darling, how are you feeling?’
As I surfaced from the goo of oblivion, this sounded vaguely familiar but not in any way reassuring.
‘Fuck you,’ I mumbled.
‘Oh darling, it was just a scratch, more or less. And these two… er… teeth that I removed from your shoulder,’ Kris held up something blurry in front of my face, ‘I’ll have them set in gold for us to wear. And for me to remember when you saved my life.’
Clawing up my way to full consciousness now, and remembering the dive in every unpleasant detail, I was less than gracious.
‘Fuck you and all your future generations. When I’m ready to die I will do so in a controlled environment. As far away as I can get from any water. Preferably in the Gobi desert.’
‘Darling, I understand that you’re emotional, but–’
‘Emotional?’ I was getting seriously emotional by now, despite my best efforts to stay calm. ‘Is that how you’d describe me? Fucking emotional? You have me going down in the middle of the sea just to prove a point. Well here I am, having survived a nightmare dive, with bloody sharks trying to eat me, and me getting you back on the boat without even a scratch. Is that emotional enough for you?’
‘Oh my darling, I’ll never forgive myself, as long as I live, for endangering your life yesterday. It’s totally my fault, assuming to understand the weather patterns off Sabah and relying on locals. And I’ve never seen grey sharks behave like that. But we came through in the end, didn’t we?’
‘We fucking survived, if that’s what you mean.’
‘Oh, lover, we did much more than that. We’ve found something priceless.’
‘Really?’ I hoped I’d said it dripping with sarcasm.
‘Really, darling. But let’s talk about that later. Now, it you’re up for it, the doctor suggested that it’s best for you to have a good breakfast. You’ve… ah… lost some blood… and need to recover. And the hotel has extended the breakfast time, just for you.’
‘How gracious of them. I am so thankful. Can they get me a shark steak, preferably rare? Or why not shark balls sashimi? Yeah, I’d like that. I’d even appreciate shark fin soup now, I may get addicted to it.’
As I surfaced from the goo of oblivion, this sounded vaguely familiar but not in any way reassuring.
‘Fuck you,’ I mumbled.
‘Oh darling, it was just a scratch, more or less. And these two… er… teeth that I removed from your shoulder,’ Kris held up something blurry in front of my face, ‘I’ll have them set in gold for us to wear. And for me to remember when you saved my life.’
Clawing up my way to full consciousness now, and remembering the dive in every unpleasant detail, I was less than gracious.
‘Fuck you and all your future generations. When I’m ready to die I will do so in a controlled environment. As far away as I can get from any water. Preferably in the Gobi desert.’
‘Darling, I understand that you’re emotional, but–’
‘Emotional?’ I was getting seriously emotional by now, despite my best efforts to stay calm. ‘Is that how you’d describe me? Fucking emotional? You have me going down in the middle of the sea just to prove a point. Well here I am, having survived a nightmare dive, with bloody sharks trying to eat me, and me getting you back on the boat without even a scratch. Is that emotional enough for you?’
‘Oh my darling, I’ll never forgive myself, as long as I live, for endangering your life yesterday. It’s totally my fault, assuming to understand the weather patterns off Sabah and relying on locals. And I’ve never seen grey sharks behave like that. But we came through in the end, didn’t we?’
‘We fucking survived, if that’s what you mean.’
‘Oh, lover, we did much more than that. We’ve found something priceless.’
‘Really?’ I hoped I’d said it dripping with sarcasm.
‘Really, darling. But let’s talk about that later. Now, it you’re up for it, the doctor suggested that it’s best for you to have a good breakfast. You’ve… ah… lost some blood… and need to recover. And the hotel has extended the breakfast time, just for you.’
‘How gracious of them. I am so thankful. Can they get me a shark steak, preferably rare? Or why not shark balls sashimi? Yeah, I’d like that. I’d even appreciate shark fin soup now, I may get addicted to it.’
●
‘I hope I won’t get arrested for eating with my left hand, seeing as how my right arm is currently somewhat incapacitated.’
‘Don’t be silly, darling. No one here in Sabah cares how you eat. Anyway, I was assured by the doctor that there’s no major damage and that you’ll regain full use of your shoulder, eventually. Maybe not for bench press, but you know I like your body as it is, too much muscle is ugly.’
Sitting at the table with Kris and me, BB nodded at me while he stuffed his mouth with fried eggs and beef bacon. Staying quiet for once, recognising that I was not in the best of moods.
I ignored Kris’ jibe about my gym workouts, ‘Ah, yes, speaking of the damage, how come my shoulder feels like it has been through a shredder? Yet I’ve not felt a single stitch under the tape?’
‘The ingenuity of the locals, darling. Don’t you just love them?’ Kris beamed. ‘Superglue. You wouldn’t stop bleeding and, without a proper doctor in the village, they’ve learned how to cope with minor skin cuts.’
‘Minor?’
‘Okay, slightly more than minor,’ she sighed. ‘So, we closed your wounds – yes, I was there to assist – with superglue. And it works!’
‘Oh, fantastic,’ I responded less than enthusiastically. ‘So now that that’s been taken care of, all I need to do is apply automotive body filler to my ripped shoulder then sand it down to make it smooth and ready for a coat of primer, followed by a top coat of skin-tinted paint. Which will make me look as good as fucking new, won’t it? And in the meantime, I’ll just continue with the painkillers, washing them down with this Finlandia.’
To prove the point, I swallowed two of the pills that Kris had given me and had a good swig of vodka that I’d insisted on having at the table when we got to the breakfast room, the staff rolling their eyes at drunken Europeans but still humouring me.
‘You’re upset, I get it, and I do understand you.’
‘Upset? It wouldn’t even begin to describe my state of mind. Let me tell you a story,’ I held up my hand as Kris was about to interrupt me. ‘Once upon a time an easygoing bloke, having lived more or less happily for decades and having made good money from providing strategy advice to companies all over the world, and being no more adventurous than getting into the odd heated argument with a bank’s board of directors, or occasionally having sex without a condom, this bloke decides to settle down and live the rest of his life in peace and harmony. Which he then proceeds to do in a faraway and exotic, yet civilised country, expecting a zen-like existence. You’re with me so far?’
BB had stopped eating and Kris was itching to say something, so I felt compelled to shush her, once again holding up my hand.
‘Then this bloke meets what he believes is the woman of his dreams,’ I ignored Kris’ aw-you’re-so-sweet expression, ‘and he is certain that he has hit the jackpot. Surely this is the pinnacle of my life, he thinks, and expects to live happily ever after with the aforementioned woman, doing what happy, carefree people usually do. You know, potter around the garden, dabble in home improvement, peaceful activities like that. But not very long after he meets this woman, he happens to have a few dreams which he shares with her. Which then unexpectedly result in him, amongst other incidents, ending up with a permanent mohawk and having his shoulder rearranged by a fish. A fucking fish, mind you, even if somewhat oversized and on testosterone. Not, I repeat not, what this bloke was after when he moved to his expected paradise. And never mind the stupendously stupid and disturbingly deranged people that think he can lead them to a fucking treasure, shooting at him and generally pissing him off.’ Kris reached out across the table without saying anything. I accepted her hand, however without squeezing it lovingly as I’d normally do. ‘And you’re telling me that I’m upset?’
She looked away, pained, and I was suddenly overcome with remorse for blaming her for everything that had happened to us. After all, it was a result of my ridiculous dreams, not hers, and I’d realised from the day I met Kris that she’s a born adventurer, shrewd but reckless, and always an optimist. But of course, I couldn’t just admit it and let her get away with it. So I changed the subject.
‘What’s this thing you found in the cabin, then? Something valuable? But it’s too short to be the staff that Moses used when he–’
‘I knew you’d be interested and intrigued,’ Kris gave me one of her beautiful and disarming smiles. ‘I found it inside the wardrobe, buried in silt, and even a Bajau wouldn’t have had sufficient air in his lungs to stay down long enough to go through that. I’m almost certain it’s a sword. An heirloom, mainly ceremonial, but in times of war carried by the head of the family, to bring honour to the ancestors when required. The man that you saw in the cabin must’ve been a high ranking officer, the lower classes were not allowed to have swords. The tanto, the dagger that he used on himself would’ve been the sword’s companion.’
‘That’s it? An old Japanese sword? If it’s old enough I can see it having a certain collector value, but being priceless?’
‘Priceless for us, darling. Each one of these swords is unique, bearing the family crest. Which means we can identify its owner and find out who he was. And how he is linked to your dreams.’
‘Sure, say it really is a sword, as you think. Unique and theoretically usable to identify the suicidal maniac on that ship. But now that it’s out of the water, it’s probably already started disintegrating into a pile of wet muck.’
‘Not if it’s kept wet. I had it wrapped in wet rags before we returned to KK, and nursed it almost as much as you, my poor hurt baby. And BB was very helpful yesterday, finding a big enough container and a bottle of drain cleaner at short notice.’
‘Drain cleaner?’
‘Yes, sodium hydroxide mixed with tap water raises the pH to a level where corrosion stops. And allows us to examine the sword, look for any identifying features.’
‘So why are we sitting here and wasting time? BB, take that bottle of vodka with you, there’s a good chap.’
‘Don’t be silly, darling. No one here in Sabah cares how you eat. Anyway, I was assured by the doctor that there’s no major damage and that you’ll regain full use of your shoulder, eventually. Maybe not for bench press, but you know I like your body as it is, too much muscle is ugly.’
Sitting at the table with Kris and me, BB nodded at me while he stuffed his mouth with fried eggs and beef bacon. Staying quiet for once, recognising that I was not in the best of moods.
I ignored Kris’ jibe about my gym workouts, ‘Ah, yes, speaking of the damage, how come my shoulder feels like it has been through a shredder? Yet I’ve not felt a single stitch under the tape?’
‘The ingenuity of the locals, darling. Don’t you just love them?’ Kris beamed. ‘Superglue. You wouldn’t stop bleeding and, without a proper doctor in the village, they’ve learned how to cope with minor skin cuts.’
‘Minor?’
‘Okay, slightly more than minor,’ she sighed. ‘So, we closed your wounds – yes, I was there to assist – with superglue. And it works!’
‘Oh, fantastic,’ I responded less than enthusiastically. ‘So now that that’s been taken care of, all I need to do is apply automotive body filler to my ripped shoulder then sand it down to make it smooth and ready for a coat of primer, followed by a top coat of skin-tinted paint. Which will make me look as good as fucking new, won’t it? And in the meantime, I’ll just continue with the painkillers, washing them down with this Finlandia.’
To prove the point, I swallowed two of the pills that Kris had given me and had a good swig of vodka that I’d insisted on having at the table when we got to the breakfast room, the staff rolling their eyes at drunken Europeans but still humouring me.
‘You’re upset, I get it, and I do understand you.’
‘Upset? It wouldn’t even begin to describe my state of mind. Let me tell you a story,’ I held up my hand as Kris was about to interrupt me. ‘Once upon a time an easygoing bloke, having lived more or less happily for decades and having made good money from providing strategy advice to companies all over the world, and being no more adventurous than getting into the odd heated argument with a bank’s board of directors, or occasionally having sex without a condom, this bloke decides to settle down and live the rest of his life in peace and harmony. Which he then proceeds to do in a faraway and exotic, yet civilised country, expecting a zen-like existence. You’re with me so far?’
BB had stopped eating and Kris was itching to say something, so I felt compelled to shush her, once again holding up my hand.
‘Then this bloke meets what he believes is the woman of his dreams,’ I ignored Kris’ aw-you’re-so-sweet expression, ‘and he is certain that he has hit the jackpot. Surely this is the pinnacle of my life, he thinks, and expects to live happily ever after with the aforementioned woman, doing what happy, carefree people usually do. You know, potter around the garden, dabble in home improvement, peaceful activities like that. But not very long after he meets this woman, he happens to have a few dreams which he shares with her. Which then unexpectedly result in him, amongst other incidents, ending up with a permanent mohawk and having his shoulder rearranged by a fish. A fucking fish, mind you, even if somewhat oversized and on testosterone. Not, I repeat not, what this bloke was after when he moved to his expected paradise. And never mind the stupendously stupid and disturbingly deranged people that think he can lead them to a fucking treasure, shooting at him and generally pissing him off.’ Kris reached out across the table without saying anything. I accepted her hand, however without squeezing it lovingly as I’d normally do. ‘And you’re telling me that I’m upset?’
She looked away, pained, and I was suddenly overcome with remorse for blaming her for everything that had happened to us. After all, it was a result of my ridiculous dreams, not hers, and I’d realised from the day I met Kris that she’s a born adventurer, shrewd but reckless, and always an optimist. But of course, I couldn’t just admit it and let her get away with it. So I changed the subject.
‘What’s this thing you found in the cabin, then? Something valuable? But it’s too short to be the staff that Moses used when he–’
‘I knew you’d be interested and intrigued,’ Kris gave me one of her beautiful and disarming smiles. ‘I found it inside the wardrobe, buried in silt, and even a Bajau wouldn’t have had sufficient air in his lungs to stay down long enough to go through that. I’m almost certain it’s a sword. An heirloom, mainly ceremonial, but in times of war carried by the head of the family, to bring honour to the ancestors when required. The man that you saw in the cabin must’ve been a high ranking officer, the lower classes were not allowed to have swords. The tanto, the dagger that he used on himself would’ve been the sword’s companion.’
‘That’s it? An old Japanese sword? If it’s old enough I can see it having a certain collector value, but being priceless?’
‘Priceless for us, darling. Each one of these swords is unique, bearing the family crest. Which means we can identify its owner and find out who he was. And how he is linked to your dreams.’
‘Sure, say it really is a sword, as you think. Unique and theoretically usable to identify the suicidal maniac on that ship. But now that it’s out of the water, it’s probably already started disintegrating into a pile of wet muck.’
‘Not if it’s kept wet. I had it wrapped in wet rags before we returned to KK, and nursed it almost as much as you, my poor hurt baby. And BB was very helpful yesterday, finding a big enough container and a bottle of drain cleaner at short notice.’
‘Drain cleaner?’
‘Yes, sodium hydroxide mixed with tap water raises the pH to a level where corrosion stops. And allows us to examine the sword, look for any identifying features.’
‘So why are we sitting here and wasting time? BB, take that bottle of vodka with you, there’s a good chap.’
●
‘I’ve no idea why you’re convinced that this is a sword,’ I said doubtfully as I poked at the submerged thing, nearly a metre long, slightly curved, with a thick crust of coral and slippery patches of algae. ‘It could be anything, an old piece of pipe or part of the wardrobe where you found it.’
‘I may be wrong, but I don’t think I am. Let’s find out.’
Kris lifted it up and carried it out to the spacious balcony, placed it on the stone floor. Then she went back in to the room and came out with a diver’s multi-tool with the flat screwdriver bit unfolded, a fruit knife (a fruit knife, seriously?) and a heavy, ornate metal ashtray on an even heavier stand.
‘I assume that, it being a cherished object, the owner had it tightly wrapped in oilcloth to prevent exposure to sea air. So if we’re lucky, once we crack the coral growth it should come off fairly easily, with most of the coral attached to the cloth, not the sword. BB, would you do the honours, please,’ Kris asked and indicated the ashtray. ‘About here, I think, with the edge of the stand,’ pointing to a spot near one of the ends.
BB obliged and brought down the ashtray with a dull thud.
‘Again, please, but with more force.’
Another thud, followed by a cracking sound and a ‘Yes!’ from Kris. A large piece of the crust had come off, still connected to the rest at one corner.
Kris bent down to look at it closely.
‘I was right! This is a sword and there’s oilcloth underneath, and there’s no coral growing on the sword. See the remains of the twine he used to keep the cloth in place?’ she pointed out triumphantly. ‘But this is the saya, the scabbard side. Let’s work our way up. BB, do proceed, but carefully. We don’t want to damage anything if we can avoid it.’
BB continued his hammering, improving his accuracy with each blow. Chunks were coming off, revealing nearly black wood underneath, wood that was remarkably well preserved.
‘Careful now, we should be close to the tsuba. That’s the hand guard, and our best bet to identify the family.’
Under Kris’ guidance, BB kept on striking the coral, but now used the ashtray to hammer on the screwdriver for precision, each blow closer to the guard. With the last big chunk coming off, the sword looked in much better condition than I had expected it to be. I picked it up gingerly and examined the guard.
‘Seems uniformly black to me. And quite thick. But no visible markings.’
‘Let me see,’ Kris took the sword and peered at the guard. ‘Tsubas were sometimes made out of shakudō, a copper and gold alloy. Usually quite low in gold but, if we’re lucky, enough gold to have preserved any surface details. BB, would you please go down to the restaurant and ask for a couple of lemons.’
I didn’t bother to ask what the lemons were for. Kris obviously knew what she was doing, and with my shoulder starting to throb, I sat down on one of the loungers, poured myself another full glass of vodka and lit a cigarette, enjoying the midday sun as much as I could.
‘I may be wrong, but I don’t think I am. Let’s find out.’
Kris lifted it up and carried it out to the spacious balcony, placed it on the stone floor. Then she went back in to the room and came out with a diver’s multi-tool with the flat screwdriver bit unfolded, a fruit knife (a fruit knife, seriously?) and a heavy, ornate metal ashtray on an even heavier stand.
‘I assume that, it being a cherished object, the owner had it tightly wrapped in oilcloth to prevent exposure to sea air. So if we’re lucky, once we crack the coral growth it should come off fairly easily, with most of the coral attached to the cloth, not the sword. BB, would you do the honours, please,’ Kris asked and indicated the ashtray. ‘About here, I think, with the edge of the stand,’ pointing to a spot near one of the ends.
BB obliged and brought down the ashtray with a dull thud.
‘Again, please, but with more force.’
Another thud, followed by a cracking sound and a ‘Yes!’ from Kris. A large piece of the crust had come off, still connected to the rest at one corner.
Kris bent down to look at it closely.
‘I was right! This is a sword and there’s oilcloth underneath, and there’s no coral growing on the sword. See the remains of the twine he used to keep the cloth in place?’ she pointed out triumphantly. ‘But this is the saya, the scabbard side. Let’s work our way up. BB, do proceed, but carefully. We don’t want to damage anything if we can avoid it.’
BB continued his hammering, improving his accuracy with each blow. Chunks were coming off, revealing nearly black wood underneath, wood that was remarkably well preserved.
‘Careful now, we should be close to the tsuba. That’s the hand guard, and our best bet to identify the family.’
Under Kris’ guidance, BB kept on striking the coral, but now used the ashtray to hammer on the screwdriver for precision, each blow closer to the guard. With the last big chunk coming off, the sword looked in much better condition than I had expected it to be. I picked it up gingerly and examined the guard.
‘Seems uniformly black to me. And quite thick. But no visible markings.’
‘Let me see,’ Kris took the sword and peered at the guard. ‘Tsubas were sometimes made out of shakudō, a copper and gold alloy. Usually quite low in gold but, if we’re lucky, enough gold to have preserved any surface details. BB, would you please go down to the restaurant and ask for a couple of lemons.’
I didn’t bother to ask what the lemons were for. Kris obviously knew what she was doing, and with my shoulder starting to throb, I sat down on one of the loungers, poured myself another full glass of vodka and lit a cigarette, enjoying the midday sun as much as I could.
●
‘Darling, look at this!’ Kris was exuberant, shaking me gently. ‘We have what we need, it’s detailed enough. Oh come on, wake up.’
‘I wasn’t sleeping, just resting my eyes,’ I replied automatically. ‘So what do we have? Ah, how did you do that?’
The guard was now a rich, dark copper colour. And what had initially looked like a plain, thick oval covered in soot was now a beautifully crafted piece, with delicate markings and inlays.
‘Citric acid from the lemons and the hotel toothbrush, aided by the fruit knife. And a more than usual proportion of gold was definitely helpful.’
‘I’m amazed. Is there anything you don’t know about?’
‘Just basic chemistry. And diving with my father during one summer, off Crete. He likes to keep the odd memento from his dives.’
‘You were plundering a wreck?’
‘Not at all,’ Kris was indignant, ‘we discovered the remains of a ship purely by chance and of course informed the authorities about it as soon as we got back to Iraklion three days later. And we only salvaged a few pieces, like that small bronze goddess I keep on my bedside table.’
‘That’s an original Greek statuette?’
‘Minoan, actually,’ Kris corrected me. ‘My father had it dated to the late period. Beautiful piece, isn’t it?’
Gorgeous women pirates, how can you resist them?
‘I wasn’t sleeping, just resting my eyes,’ I replied automatically. ‘So what do we have? Ah, how did you do that?’
The guard was now a rich, dark copper colour. And what had initially looked like a plain, thick oval covered in soot was now a beautifully crafted piece, with delicate markings and inlays.
‘Citric acid from the lemons and the hotel toothbrush, aided by the fruit knife. And a more than usual proportion of gold was definitely helpful.’
‘I’m amazed. Is there anything you don’t know about?’
‘Just basic chemistry. And diving with my father during one summer, off Crete. He likes to keep the odd memento from his dives.’
‘You were plundering a wreck?’
‘Not at all,’ Kris was indignant, ‘we discovered the remains of a ship purely by chance and of course informed the authorities about it as soon as we got back to Iraklion three days later. And we only salvaged a few pieces, like that small bronze goddess I keep on my bedside table.’
‘That’s an original Greek statuette?’
‘Minoan, actually,’ Kris corrected me. ‘My father had it dated to the late period. Beautiful piece, isn’t it?’
Gorgeous women pirates, how can you resist them?
Chapter 26
‘What now?’ I asked Kris. ‘If we hand over the sword over to the local authorities it will just disappear. Better give it to the Japanese embassy in KL and ask them to trace the family.’
We were sitting on the terrace of one of KK’s several waterfront seafood restaurants, this one on the south edge of town. The grilled lobster was succulent and buttery, a superb Pinot Grigio complemented the dish, and the sunset was stunning, just as Kris had promised. Oranges, deep reds, purples, and the occasional rare greens were flashing across the sky, reflected in the absolute stillness and serenity of the South China Sea. Today is when we should have gone diving, not yesterday, I thought, but without any anxiety residue. Sometimes shit happens and there’s nothing you can do about it. The shoulder pain was reasonably bearable now, courtesy of my continued self-medication with vodka, and I was feeling mellow and grand.
‘I’m not handing over that sword to anyone but the family to which it rightfully belongs, once I’ve found them. And identified the man from your dream.’
‘I see,’ I’d expected that answer. ‘So we’re going to Japan, then?’
‘I’m sorry but you can’t come on this trip, darling.’
Precisely what I wanted to hear, but I still had to pretend, didn’t I? ‘Why not? I’d love for you to show me the real Japan,’ I said, acting disappointed.
‘Because you need to recover and get back the strength in your shoulder. I shall sleuth on my own for now. Also, in the places I’ll be asking questions the people are still wary of foreigners. This is about the war, still a very touchy subject in Japan. If talked about at all, it’s only possible in the right context, and only if you’re Japanese.’
‘Even if it’s just on your mother’s side?’
‘Who will know?’
We finished the dinner talking about other things, silently agreeing to drop all mention of my dreams. For once we behaved like normal folks, not worrying about thugs being after us or me having silly prophetic dreams. A very pleasant change, I can assure you.
With tolerable humidity, we decided to walk back to the hotel. BB saw us from across the street, where he’d been waiting for us in a local eatery, and lumbered over.
‘BB, ’tis a beautiful evening and we will take pleasure in a slow promenade back to our humble lodgings, if sire would care to join us,’ I said, expecting him to respond in style.
‘Okay man, if miss Kristina think is safe. But is dark here.’
‘Yes I do, BB. I think we’ll be fine,’ Kris replied. ‘Thank you for your concern.’
We walked on the right side of the road to see and stay clear of the oncoming, if sparse, traffic, with no pavement, just a strip of grass and no street lights. It did cross my mind that this would be a perfect spot for a hit-and-run. BB must have had similar thoughts, as he turned around every time a car approached us from behind, to make sure it stayed in the left lane. Meanwhile I was surreptitiously scanning the oncoming traffic.
‘We’ll have to get up early tomorrow,’ she said, ‘to have enough time for Kota Belud before we fly back to KL.’
‘Going diving again, are we?’ I asked jokingly. ‘To check out the other wrecks?’
‘No silly, we’re not. Only I am,’ Kris said, then seeing my shocked expression started laughing. ‘Oh boy, you should see your face right now. Of course we’re not diving tomorrow. Have you forgotten? We’re just going there to talk to the locals, find out if anyone remembers anything.’
‘Ah, of course. That I can do, but no going out in a boat. Promise?’
‘Cross my heart, darling.’
We were nearing the boundaries of the town proper, with pavements now flanking the road on both sides and even street lights, surprisingly enough most of them working. As the traffic increased I continued checking out the cars coming towards us. The majority were rusty pickups or Protons masquerading as taxis, except for one dark grey Mercedes with a not too discrete sign on the roof, proclaiming it to be the executive limo for the brash, vulgar and overpriced Tanjung Aru Shangri-La resort located just south of the restaurant that we’d visited. The interior light was on, and seeing the passengers for a brief moment as the car passed us I could’ve sworn that I recognised them, yet I refused to trust my eyes.
‘That car that just passed us, did you see it? And the people inside?’
‘Which car, darling?’
‘The Shangri-La Merc, of course,’ I got agitated, my paranoia soaring to peaks I wasn’t even aware of having. ‘With the fat Chinese bastard in it. Having a cosy chat with Candace.’
‘Candace? Are you sure? And fat Chinese bastard, who’s that?’
‘The bugger that was at Ho’s party, Cecil something. He knew about my dream, he was pushing me about it. A treasure, he said, and wasn’t very subtle about it.’
‘Oh Alex, Cecil is totally harmless and hardly likely to take any lasting interest in you. He’s small fry, running a few seedy clubs in KL, his only vice a predilection for ladyboys despite having a sweet wife. He probably overheard uncle Ho saying something, that’s all. And I just can’t see him and Candace having anything in common,’ Kris said as she turned towards me. ‘I think your poor brain is overloaded with bad experiences,’ she cupped my face lovingly in her hands, ‘for which I take the blame. And you need a long rest, without any excitement.’
The way she put it, it sounded quite reasonable. No one had known about this trip, not even Ho, so there was no way we could’ve been followed here. Kris was right, I couldn’t see any possible link between an American tourist and a repulsive club owner who preferred his totty served with penis on the side. Maybe I was becoming a drama queen, a quality I can’t stand in others and even more despicable if I was guilty of it. I just needed to stop my brain from working overtime.
‘Yes, you’re right, I’m being paranoid,’ I replied and kissed Kris, ‘a few weeks engaging in non-life threatening activities would be nice. And have Minnie return, I’ve missed her.’
‘You’re weird, darling, has anyone told you that? And yet I love you.’
We were sitting on the terrace of one of KK’s several waterfront seafood restaurants, this one on the south edge of town. The grilled lobster was succulent and buttery, a superb Pinot Grigio complemented the dish, and the sunset was stunning, just as Kris had promised. Oranges, deep reds, purples, and the occasional rare greens were flashing across the sky, reflected in the absolute stillness and serenity of the South China Sea. Today is when we should have gone diving, not yesterday, I thought, but without any anxiety residue. Sometimes shit happens and there’s nothing you can do about it. The shoulder pain was reasonably bearable now, courtesy of my continued self-medication with vodka, and I was feeling mellow and grand.
‘I’m not handing over that sword to anyone but the family to which it rightfully belongs, once I’ve found them. And identified the man from your dream.’
‘I see,’ I’d expected that answer. ‘So we’re going to Japan, then?’
‘I’m sorry but you can’t come on this trip, darling.’
Precisely what I wanted to hear, but I still had to pretend, didn’t I? ‘Why not? I’d love for you to show me the real Japan,’ I said, acting disappointed.
‘Because you need to recover and get back the strength in your shoulder. I shall sleuth on my own for now. Also, in the places I’ll be asking questions the people are still wary of foreigners. This is about the war, still a very touchy subject in Japan. If talked about at all, it’s only possible in the right context, and only if you’re Japanese.’
‘Even if it’s just on your mother’s side?’
‘Who will know?’
We finished the dinner talking about other things, silently agreeing to drop all mention of my dreams. For once we behaved like normal folks, not worrying about thugs being after us or me having silly prophetic dreams. A very pleasant change, I can assure you.
With tolerable humidity, we decided to walk back to the hotel. BB saw us from across the street, where he’d been waiting for us in a local eatery, and lumbered over.
‘BB, ’tis a beautiful evening and we will take pleasure in a slow promenade back to our humble lodgings, if sire would care to join us,’ I said, expecting him to respond in style.
‘Okay man, if miss Kristina think is safe. But is dark here.’
‘Yes I do, BB. I think we’ll be fine,’ Kris replied. ‘Thank you for your concern.’
We walked on the right side of the road to see and stay clear of the oncoming, if sparse, traffic, with no pavement, just a strip of grass and no street lights. It did cross my mind that this would be a perfect spot for a hit-and-run. BB must have had similar thoughts, as he turned around every time a car approached us from behind, to make sure it stayed in the left lane. Meanwhile I was surreptitiously scanning the oncoming traffic.
‘We’ll have to get up early tomorrow,’ she said, ‘to have enough time for Kota Belud before we fly back to KL.’
‘Going diving again, are we?’ I asked jokingly. ‘To check out the other wrecks?’
‘No silly, we’re not. Only I am,’ Kris said, then seeing my shocked expression started laughing. ‘Oh boy, you should see your face right now. Of course we’re not diving tomorrow. Have you forgotten? We’re just going there to talk to the locals, find out if anyone remembers anything.’
‘Ah, of course. That I can do, but no going out in a boat. Promise?’
‘Cross my heart, darling.’
We were nearing the boundaries of the town proper, with pavements now flanking the road on both sides and even street lights, surprisingly enough most of them working. As the traffic increased I continued checking out the cars coming towards us. The majority were rusty pickups or Protons masquerading as taxis, except for one dark grey Mercedes with a not too discrete sign on the roof, proclaiming it to be the executive limo for the brash, vulgar and overpriced Tanjung Aru Shangri-La resort located just south of the restaurant that we’d visited. The interior light was on, and seeing the passengers for a brief moment as the car passed us I could’ve sworn that I recognised them, yet I refused to trust my eyes.
‘That car that just passed us, did you see it? And the people inside?’
‘Which car, darling?’
‘The Shangri-La Merc, of course,’ I got agitated, my paranoia soaring to peaks I wasn’t even aware of having. ‘With the fat Chinese bastard in it. Having a cosy chat with Candace.’
‘Candace? Are you sure? And fat Chinese bastard, who’s that?’
‘The bugger that was at Ho’s party, Cecil something. He knew about my dream, he was pushing me about it. A treasure, he said, and wasn’t very subtle about it.’
‘Oh Alex, Cecil is totally harmless and hardly likely to take any lasting interest in you. He’s small fry, running a few seedy clubs in KL, his only vice a predilection for ladyboys despite having a sweet wife. He probably overheard uncle Ho saying something, that’s all. And I just can’t see him and Candace having anything in common,’ Kris said as she turned towards me. ‘I think your poor brain is overloaded with bad experiences,’ she cupped my face lovingly in her hands, ‘for which I take the blame. And you need a long rest, without any excitement.’
The way she put it, it sounded quite reasonable. No one had known about this trip, not even Ho, so there was no way we could’ve been followed here. Kris was right, I couldn’t see any possible link between an American tourist and a repulsive club owner who preferred his totty served with penis on the side. Maybe I was becoming a drama queen, a quality I can’t stand in others and even more despicable if I was guilty of it. I just needed to stop my brain from working overtime.
‘Yes, you’re right, I’m being paranoid,’ I replied and kissed Kris, ‘a few weeks engaging in non-life threatening activities would be nice. And have Minnie return, I’ve missed her.’
‘You’re weird, darling, has anyone told you that? And yet I love you.’
Chapter 27
I felt thoroughly pampered as Kris was arranging cushions around me, making sure that I was comfortable enough for the trip from Kota Belud to the airport. And having been primed with enough tuak to knock out a water buffalo I was pleasantly relaxed and enjoyed the said pampering.
‘Judging from you very satisfied expression I assume that you’ve gotten some useful information from the Bajaus.’
‘More than I expected. For starters, they prefer to be called Sama Dilaut and view the term Bajau as derogatory. And we’ve found out who the Sama Dilaut boatman in your dream was. At least as much as the villagers knew and told us. But let’s get going and I’ll tell you everything on the way.’
‘Ya, man,’ BB offered from the front seat, ‘that one was odd. Ver’ mysterious person.’
‘Judging from you very satisfied expression I assume that you’ve gotten some useful information from the Bajaus.’
‘More than I expected. For starters, they prefer to be called Sama Dilaut and view the term Bajau as derogatory. And we’ve found out who the Sama Dilaut boatman in your dream was. At least as much as the villagers knew and told us. But let’s get going and I’ll tell you everything on the way.’
‘Ya, man,’ BB offered from the front seat, ‘that one was odd. Ver’ mysterious person.’
●
After the initial greetings and Kris having distributed gifts to the villagers that surrounded us as soon as we’d stepped out of the Toyota – kitchen utensils for the women, sweets for the kids and several snorkelling kits for the men – we were led to the house of the village chieftain, an old man with bulging, constantly running eyes and skin so wrinkled he looked like a walking ad for a Shar Pei kennel.
We were ushered into a small, bare room without any furniture other than a colourful mat on the floor and a low stool for me, together with an oversized cushion that I was given to place between my shoulder and the wall I was leaning against. I would’ve preferred the room, and ideally the whole house, to be on land but at least it was built over the shallows, with the gaps between the floor planks reassuringly narrow and the stilts sturdy enough. And as long as I avoided looking at the wall on my right, with a door sized opening towards the unbroken vista of the same bloody sea that we barely survived two days ago, I was fine.
Kris and BB were sitting cross legged on the mat, facing the boat skipper and the chieftain. Next to Kris was a boy brought in to translate, if necessary, between Bahasa and whichever language the Bajau, sorry Sama Dilaut, were comfortable with. We were treated to a never ending supply of tuak, which was horrible enough, and the local equivalent of bar nuts – semi dried, rotting pieces of unidentified sea creatures – which were absolutely repulsive. Everyone was shouting at the Shar Pei guy, as he was nearly deaf from a lifetime of freediving to depths where he had no business to be, breaking every safety rule known to divers everywhere. Everywhere, that is, but here in Southeast Asia, where even now people jump overboard holding a big rock, descending in a few seconds to depths that the average scuba diver would find detrimental to health, just to collect the odd rare shell or grab a sea snake or two. Deaf? Of course they are. And prematurely aged. I suspected that the old man was barely in his forties even though he looked twice that.
Kris was right, these people remember everything that is important to them and were retelling it as if it had happened to them personally, not to their parents or grandparents or even earlier ancestors. Because of this, Kris had to check and recheck some dates, or rather years, but otherwise the story was straightforward and intriguing.
Some two years after the Japanese ships were sunk (the villagers did remember a night with thunder and the horizon lit up by fires), a small boat had sailed into their bay, with only one man in it. Looking like them, only with darker skin and speaking a language they had never heard but still similar enough to their own, he asked the chieftain for permission to stay with the village for a few moons.
He told them his name was Jun (highly suspicious, I thought, but Kris said it was possible considering where he said he’d come from) and that he had sailed for many days from a place northeast of the village. From his description of the voyage, he had followed the Sabah coast in a more or less westerly direction until arriving in the village, and before that had sailed west from a small island, one of many. This was backed by the description of his boat and particularly the sail – square and very colourful, with rectangles and triangles in different shades of yellow, red and purple, which to both Kris and me sounded like a vinta, a typical Sulu boat.
This placed his origin fairly certainly somewhere in the south Sulu archipelago, under American rule until the Japanese invasion in 1942, which is why Kris was sure that Jun, or John as she called him, was telling the truth: ‘The Americans were trying to pacify the Muslim insurgents, giving them farming and fishing equipment, but also introduced schools where English and Christianity was taught, and gave the children English names. It didn’t work then and still doesn’t work.’
Instead of moving on, John remained in the village and was accepted by the community, yet he never truly became one of them. He did not build a house, instead he continued living on his boat at the edge of the bay. But he was an accomplished fisherman and would go out daily with the others to the wrecks which had by now become rich fishing grounds. And each day he would share his substantial catch with the households that were less lucky.
John was also an accomplished diver, teaching the youngsters how to make goggles out of bottle ends, tree sap and pieces of rubber, and showing them how to descend to the bottom quickly by holding on to a heavy stone. Soon most of the fishermen were following his cue, spearing fish and coming up with shells large enough to feed a whole family or two.
‘And now we know why the giant clams are so uncommon in this area,’ Kris exclaimed sadly. ‘All thanks to this John.’
But John didn’t just dive for food. After he saw one of the wrecks from the surface, on an exceptionally good day without currents and the sun for once not hiding behind clouds, he became a man with a mission. He’d still go out with the other fishermen, but instead of returning with them he’d stay at the site and dive repeatedly, methodically checking out each of the wrecks, only returning to the village when the sun was going down. Most of what he brought up he shared with the village. Initially it was guns – we were proudly shown several functioning Japanese made Nambu and Hamada pistols, as well as a couple of rifles that Kris initially identified as ‘old Mausers, Gewehr 98 model’ before examining them closely and proclaiming that they were instead ‘Czech manufactured vz 24, more reliable than the Mausers.’
Yes, before you start querying me, Kris’ father also collects weapons. And yes, firearms are just as illegal in Sabah as they are in Peninsular Malaysia.
John also found other useful things such as tools and crockery, and even bottles of sake. Some items, though, he kept for himself. All he would say was that someone will pay good money for them someday. However, after one of his dives, John stayed on the boat, the lamp he had remaining lit for most of that night. Following that day he did not allow anyone to come onboard. Whatever it was that he’d found, he kept it in a net hanging off the side of the boat, refusing to talk about it other than saying ‘good thing and bad thing.’ And the reef sharks that had been regular visitors to the bay, coming to feed on the fish remains and other food scraps thrown into the water from the houses, started hanging around John’s boat instead, ignoring the tasty fish guts.
When talking to the villagers, which was becoming increasingly rare, John had seemed obsessed with finding a buyer for whatever it was that he had found. He would disappear for weeks at the time with his boat then come back and, if in a good mood, tell the villagers stories about big city life in Jesselton, as Kota Kinabalu was known then, and Sandakan, the financial capital in those days. Occasionally he would make a profit from selling one of his other finds, returning with the boat riding low in the water, laden with sacks of rice and all kinds of machinery, giving most of it to the village. He still went out with the fishermen and continued diving on the wrecks, but by now his salvage efforts didn’t yield much. After all, he had been at it for nearly two decades.
In the early 60s, John returned from one of his forays in a different boat, without a sail but with an engine instead, mounted above the stern and trailing a long axle and propeller, a row of jerrycans visible on the deck. This was another first for the village, a motorised boat, and soon everyone was busy plundering the sundry vehicles left by the Japanese and American armies to rot in the jungles of Sabah. According to local lore, there’s a large fishing boat still in service somewhere along the coast, using an enormous V12 Mitsubishi tank engine, but personally I think that’s an urban myth – or would that rather be a village myth? Never mind that the weight of the engine alone would sink the average fishing vessel, and even assuming you could still source spare parts for the engine over half a century later, it would be a diesel-guzzler of epic proportions. But I’m getting carried away, I realise.
Back to the story, then: The new boat still trailed the submerged net with John’s prized and secret find, for which he had not yet found a buyer. Possibly because no one would offer enough money, or was not a worthy recipient, the villagers were not sure which, listening to his drunk rantings about greedy people only being trouble. His trips were getting more frequent until the day he pulled up the anchor in the early morning hours and left the cove, never to return.
We were ushered into a small, bare room without any furniture other than a colourful mat on the floor and a low stool for me, together with an oversized cushion that I was given to place between my shoulder and the wall I was leaning against. I would’ve preferred the room, and ideally the whole house, to be on land but at least it was built over the shallows, with the gaps between the floor planks reassuringly narrow and the stilts sturdy enough. And as long as I avoided looking at the wall on my right, with a door sized opening towards the unbroken vista of the same bloody sea that we barely survived two days ago, I was fine.
Kris and BB were sitting cross legged on the mat, facing the boat skipper and the chieftain. Next to Kris was a boy brought in to translate, if necessary, between Bahasa and whichever language the Bajau, sorry Sama Dilaut, were comfortable with. We were treated to a never ending supply of tuak, which was horrible enough, and the local equivalent of bar nuts – semi dried, rotting pieces of unidentified sea creatures – which were absolutely repulsive. Everyone was shouting at the Shar Pei guy, as he was nearly deaf from a lifetime of freediving to depths where he had no business to be, breaking every safety rule known to divers everywhere. Everywhere, that is, but here in Southeast Asia, where even now people jump overboard holding a big rock, descending in a few seconds to depths that the average scuba diver would find detrimental to health, just to collect the odd rare shell or grab a sea snake or two. Deaf? Of course they are. And prematurely aged. I suspected that the old man was barely in his forties even though he looked twice that.
Kris was right, these people remember everything that is important to them and were retelling it as if it had happened to them personally, not to their parents or grandparents or even earlier ancestors. Because of this, Kris had to check and recheck some dates, or rather years, but otherwise the story was straightforward and intriguing.
Some two years after the Japanese ships were sunk (the villagers did remember a night with thunder and the horizon lit up by fires), a small boat had sailed into their bay, with only one man in it. Looking like them, only with darker skin and speaking a language they had never heard but still similar enough to their own, he asked the chieftain for permission to stay with the village for a few moons.
He told them his name was Jun (highly suspicious, I thought, but Kris said it was possible considering where he said he’d come from) and that he had sailed for many days from a place northeast of the village. From his description of the voyage, he had followed the Sabah coast in a more or less westerly direction until arriving in the village, and before that had sailed west from a small island, one of many. This was backed by the description of his boat and particularly the sail – square and very colourful, with rectangles and triangles in different shades of yellow, red and purple, which to both Kris and me sounded like a vinta, a typical Sulu boat.
This placed his origin fairly certainly somewhere in the south Sulu archipelago, under American rule until the Japanese invasion in 1942, which is why Kris was sure that Jun, or John as she called him, was telling the truth: ‘The Americans were trying to pacify the Muslim insurgents, giving them farming and fishing equipment, but also introduced schools where English and Christianity was taught, and gave the children English names. It didn’t work then and still doesn’t work.’
Instead of moving on, John remained in the village and was accepted by the community, yet he never truly became one of them. He did not build a house, instead he continued living on his boat at the edge of the bay. But he was an accomplished fisherman and would go out daily with the others to the wrecks which had by now become rich fishing grounds. And each day he would share his substantial catch with the households that were less lucky.
John was also an accomplished diver, teaching the youngsters how to make goggles out of bottle ends, tree sap and pieces of rubber, and showing them how to descend to the bottom quickly by holding on to a heavy stone. Soon most of the fishermen were following his cue, spearing fish and coming up with shells large enough to feed a whole family or two.
‘And now we know why the giant clams are so uncommon in this area,’ Kris exclaimed sadly. ‘All thanks to this John.’
But John didn’t just dive for food. After he saw one of the wrecks from the surface, on an exceptionally good day without currents and the sun for once not hiding behind clouds, he became a man with a mission. He’d still go out with the other fishermen, but instead of returning with them he’d stay at the site and dive repeatedly, methodically checking out each of the wrecks, only returning to the village when the sun was going down. Most of what he brought up he shared with the village. Initially it was guns – we were proudly shown several functioning Japanese made Nambu and Hamada pistols, as well as a couple of rifles that Kris initially identified as ‘old Mausers, Gewehr 98 model’ before examining them closely and proclaiming that they were instead ‘Czech manufactured vz 24, more reliable than the Mausers.’
Yes, before you start querying me, Kris’ father also collects weapons. And yes, firearms are just as illegal in Sabah as they are in Peninsular Malaysia.
John also found other useful things such as tools and crockery, and even bottles of sake. Some items, though, he kept for himself. All he would say was that someone will pay good money for them someday. However, after one of his dives, John stayed on the boat, the lamp he had remaining lit for most of that night. Following that day he did not allow anyone to come onboard. Whatever it was that he’d found, he kept it in a net hanging off the side of the boat, refusing to talk about it other than saying ‘good thing and bad thing.’ And the reef sharks that had been regular visitors to the bay, coming to feed on the fish remains and other food scraps thrown into the water from the houses, started hanging around John’s boat instead, ignoring the tasty fish guts.
When talking to the villagers, which was becoming increasingly rare, John had seemed obsessed with finding a buyer for whatever it was that he had found. He would disappear for weeks at the time with his boat then come back and, if in a good mood, tell the villagers stories about big city life in Jesselton, as Kota Kinabalu was known then, and Sandakan, the financial capital in those days. Occasionally he would make a profit from selling one of his other finds, returning with the boat riding low in the water, laden with sacks of rice and all kinds of machinery, giving most of it to the village. He still went out with the fishermen and continued diving on the wrecks, but by now his salvage efforts didn’t yield much. After all, he had been at it for nearly two decades.
In the early 60s, John returned from one of his forays in a different boat, without a sail but with an engine instead, mounted above the stern and trailing a long axle and propeller, a row of jerrycans visible on the deck. This was another first for the village, a motorised boat, and soon everyone was busy plundering the sundry vehicles left by the Japanese and American armies to rot in the jungles of Sabah. According to local lore, there’s a large fishing boat still in service somewhere along the coast, using an enormous V12 Mitsubishi tank engine, but personally I think that’s an urban myth – or would that rather be a village myth? Never mind that the weight of the engine alone would sink the average fishing vessel, and even assuming you could still source spare parts for the engine over half a century later, it would be a diesel-guzzler of epic proportions. But I’m getting carried away, I realise.
Back to the story, then: The new boat still trailed the submerged net with John’s prized and secret find, for which he had not yet found a buyer. Possibly because no one would offer enough money, or was not a worthy recipient, the villagers were not sure which, listening to his drunk rantings about greedy people only being trouble. His trips were getting more frequent until the day he pulled up the anchor in the early morning hours and left the cove, never to return.
●
‘That settles it, doesn’t it?’ I commented once Kris had finished retelling the story. ‘He must be that boat guy in my dream. We still don’t know how he got in touch with the bloke in Singapore, but at least we know that it happened.’
‘Yes, we now know that a Sulu islander calling himself John had found an object in the wreck and later tried selling it to Tobyn-Ffolkes. We don’t know who introduced them to each other but that’s really irrelevant. What is relevant, however, is that this definitely confirms your dream about the transaction gone wrong, and I’d therefore be inclined to think that all of your dreams are based on real events. We don’t know how or why, but whether you like it or not, you’re a true psychic.’
‘As long as I don’t end up a psychotic,’ I replied glumly.
‘I’m sure you won’t, you’re a big boy,’ Kris reassured me. ‘But now we need to find out how a Japanese naval officer came to be in possession of this object. And why on earth he shoved it inside his stomach.’
‘Yes, we now know that a Sulu islander calling himself John had found an object in the wreck and later tried selling it to Tobyn-Ffolkes. We don’t know who introduced them to each other but that’s really irrelevant. What is relevant, however, is that this definitely confirms your dream about the transaction gone wrong, and I’d therefore be inclined to think that all of your dreams are based on real events. We don’t know how or why, but whether you like it or not, you’re a true psychic.’
‘As long as I don’t end up a psychotic,’ I replied glumly.
‘I’m sure you won’t, you’re a big boy,’ Kris reassured me. ‘But now we need to find out how a Japanese naval officer came to be in possession of this object. And why on earth he shoved it inside his stomach.’