Chapter 29

We moved out the following day carrying the bare minimum. The boat we were on would restock our personal supplies when we left with it, we were told. Wilf knew where we were headed but I had no idea. It was often like that. You did as you were told and you hoped it all worked out. There was little choice. One bit of news we heard when we were on the boat was that a massive invasion of Allied troops had begun in France, although that didn’t mean all that much to us as that was half a world away. It did lift our spirits a bit. We got little other news and we had no map in our heads to figure it all out anyway. Before the war I knew where Australia was and a little bit about Europe. As for anything in Asia, most of us had no clue. Since the war began, I’d been to Europe and back and in New Guinea. One day I hoped to go to Japan just to see where these crazy people we were fighting actually lived. To do that we would have to win the war and I had no idea whether we were winning or losing.

The boat we were on took us back towards Darwin, but surprisingly we were transhipped onto a small Javanese fishing vessel before arriving. I looked questioningly at Wilf as the Dutch East Indies was occupied by Japan, and the Javanese captain may well have had links to them. Wilf however explained that the man was just one of a number of Javanese who were pleased to see the end of the Dutch rule, however were even more disappointed that the Japanese who had “freed” them were even worse. Once we were on the boat and uncomfortably settled in the small confines, Wilf called us all on to the afterdeck.

“Raharjo is going to take us along the southern coast of Java and Sumatra to a small island where we will train for a mission that I will tell you about when you need to know. The island brings us closer to our target and has similar features as where we are ultimately heading. The island, from what I have been told, is uninhabited by Japanese although they do patrol in the area. Our biggest issue that we will have is being pulled up by a Japanese boat or spotted by an aeroplane on the way to this island. So, we will pretend to be Javanese fishermen for the next few weeks as it is a bloody long way. You will find clothes down below that will be much different to what you wear normally. You will also find some dye for your exposed skin. It will fade and need to be reapplied. Those of you with light hair and you of course, Bluey McDonald, will either have to shave it off or wear a head scarf similar to Raharjo’s. We won’t fool anyone who sees us up close and personal, but we will deal with that if it comes,” Wilf explained.

Bluey, with his reddish orange hair, seemed a bit affronted by this, but made a sensible statement, “If we are captured not in our uniforms, we can be shot as spies.”

“My experience with the Japanese is, that if you are captured, you are likely to be tortured and killed or just killed, whether you are wearing a uniform or not. For the next six months we won’t be wearing uniforms because that will make us an easy target. When you have changed, drop your uniform over the side. In six months’ time, if we make it back, I’m sure the army will give us a lovely Christmas present of a brand-new uniform,” Wilf said.

I sent the men down below four at a time to change. Once they came up, and the poking of fun was had, four more went below. Wilf and Raharjo had by then opened a five gallon can of dye and had paint brushes at the ready. Those now dressed in “skirts” and shirts began carefully to apply the henna after they had thrown their uniforms over the side. There was not one query about the mission, what training was involved, the dangers they might face from any of them. It wasn’t just blind acceptance. The unit had changed. I didn’t know whether that was Jackson being booted out, or whether it was we were actually probably going to do something at last, or whether it was Wilf. I didn’t ask, I merely thought it was not just strange, but a quick turnaround and something that I never thought would happen.

Most of us had sun bronzed skin so the mix that I was told was henna was able to be thinned down before we painted it on. Poor Bluey, who burned rather than tanned, needed full strength. Even then it gave him a blotched appearance. He was a damned good radio operator, but his attempts at camouflage were at the other end of the scale.

With so many of us on board we could have quite easily filled the boat in the first week. However, that would have looked strange to any passing plane or ship as we would be wallowing in the water with a full catch and still not heading into port, so Raharjo taught us how to cast the nets, haul them in and release the catch before it was brought on board. We kept enough to feed ourselves. In his limited English he explained about the types of fish that were around and what ones were dangerous. Many were and had sharp poisonous spines that were even more dangerous than the ones with sharp teeth.

Raharjo was an interesting character. Just over five feet tall, he was all skin and bones it seemed, but attached to these were wiry muscle and sinew. He explained that he was the son of a mixed marriage. His father was a Javanese fisherman and his mother was from Burma. As such he left us for dead in terms of languages. Some of us had trouble speaking plain English whereas Raharjo spoke fluent Javanese and Burmese. It was the latter that gave me a clue as to where we were headed because Wilf got him to teach us some Burmese and in return, we taught him all the slang and swear words we knew. He was able to mimic our voices so readily and it seemed strange to hear this short dark-haired man utter a perfectly coined phrase with an Australian accent. He could even do a version of Bluey’s Scottish brogue that passed muster. However, Bluey’s Scottish Australian Burmese was so distorted that we had no idea what he was saying.

All this time Wilf kept a distance between himself and the rest of us. I got the feeling that he was observing us and watching the interplay between people. He was good at asking questions and the men responded very amicably about their past life and their war experiences. When he was asked, he discreetly changed the subject in such a way that nobody noticed I think except for me.

Our only sighting of Japanese was a double winged seaplane that had a huge pontoon down the middle and two smaller outrigger ones attached to the lower wings. It flew in low but we kept our heads down and, as we practised for such an event, we cast the nets out as it went past on its first fly over. On its return Raharjo came out of the wheelhouse and waved in a friendly manner to the pilot. We braced ourselves for the next hour in case a group of attack aircraft had been called up. You could feel the tension in the air because we certainly couldn’t fight any off. Our ruse just had to work and luckily it did. No-one felt hungry that night. The acid build-up in my stomach was probably the same in everyone’s.

It all seemed pretty passé to Wilf who nonchalantly went about his business. There was radio silence and not much for anyone to do. Five days in and the Javanese skirts weren’t even commented upon. The sun beat down mercilessly between heavy rain showers. There was an ongoing swell that was picking up and Raharjo made us keep a large amount of our catch to try to get the boat to sit more evenly in the water, but soon the sea calmed down and we had the horrible job of emptying out by hand the fish from the hold so that we could make better speed. It was a good idea that the Javanese clothes were light as that made them easier to wash but afterwards, they still smelt like fish. Wilf said that we needed to get used to it because there was no point in using soap because we would have to shift fish again. No wonder fishermen dreamed of mermaids. Although none of the men on the boat had the right shape.

None of us were so ill that we couldn’t function, although many of us had a silent heave over the side when one particularly heavy storm drove in at a ninety-degree direction to the swell. Raharjo was brilliant as a helmsman. He swung the boat into the waves and seemed to be able to read them so well that only one occasion did I have any fear of us capsizing. As the storm reached its height so the waves reached their peak. Raharjo must have been seeing something in the gloom ahead as he was watching the waves. Suddenly he swung the wheel to port in between waves when we were down in a trough. I felt certain that we would roll over, but a rogue wave from what had been our port side but now was front on, lifted us up high as another wave from the starboard hit where we once had been. His grin was wide but the seriousness in his eyes was evident. I didn’t care what his religion was, I was happy to thank each and everyone of his gods for having him as our captain.

There were no signs of any charts in the wheelhouse, just an old-fashioned compass. It was like Raharjo knew this vast area as well as I knew my own neighbourhood in Wellington. With another of his trademark grins in the early afternoon one day, he pointed ahead and we saw flocks of gulls diving down into the water. We hadn’t seen them for a long while and then it dawned on me that these were land based birds. Soon we could see in the haze to the north-west a low cloud and beneath that the closer we got we observed the outline of an island. Wilf gathered us together and said that the island had no jetty or safe harbour. We would have to lower the small lifeboat and there would need to be a number of trips made. He explained that there was immense danger of being spotted while we were stationary and that the transfer to shore needed to done both speedily and safely. There was no time for errors and the rocky outcrops indicated there was no room for them either. The other immediate problem was that the sun was setting and that meant the last couple of trips needed to be done in the dark.

It was a hard slog. We took no supplies on the first trip as Wilf wanted to secure the beach first. I was left on board to oversee the movement and Wilf was to establish a base on the island. The supplies came on the next two trips and finally I was the last aboard the lifeboat. I had no real words to express to Raharjo my thanks. He not only had to make his way back to Java on his own, but also now had no lifeboat should he run into difficulties. He was a gutsy bloke and showed no signs of fear. He merely said that if it was Allah’s will he would make it safely back. I had no idea who this Allah, was but I thought that he should look kindly on this brave young man. I remember waving to Raharjo and seeing the flash of teeth in reply in the dim twilight.