On the morning of the inquiry, he entered the august chambers of City Hall and took his place next to Boon Leong. His brother’s face held an expression of studied objectivity as he riffled through the sheaf of papers on the table in front of him. In the row of seats behind them were members of the White Crane who had been accused together with him of starting the riot. He looked around the chamber and saw Kok Seng in the public gallery, but the rest of his family was nowhere in sight. His stomach muscles tightened. He’d expected them to be out in full force. Had they begun to distance themselves already? He felt his son’s eyes on him and the young man’s words, we don’t want to live in China, almost rattled his resolve.
The governor and the six officials of the Commission of Inquiry came in and took their places at the table facing the public gallery. He was dismayed. They were all Englishmen, including the secretary for Chinese Affairs and the head of the Chinese Protectorate. He’d never faced so many foreign devils before. Stern inscrutable faces. Cold grey eyes. Red beards. Brown moustache. Sharp noses. Barbarian, barbarian, barbarian, he repeated the word inside his head like a secret mantra as he was conducted to a seat set aside for those to be interrogated by the commission.
“Your name,” the Chinese interpreter asked in a loud officious voice.
“Wong Tuck Heng.”
“Raise your right hand and repeat after me. I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God.”
“I swear by my ancestors that I will tell the truth and not betray my brothers,” he said in Cantonese. Cheers and applause from the gallery.
“Do you want me to repeat the oath?” the flustered interpreter asked.
“No need. Tell the foreign gentlemen that since I don’t believe in their god, I shall take the oath by my gods.”
“Anything the matter?” one of the Englishmen asked.
“No, no, sir. Everything’s fine.”
He saw the man in charge of Chinese Affairs whisper something in the governor’s ear and the governor nodded.
“Tell His Excellency and the commission about the riots,” the interpreter told him.
“I, Wong Tuck Heng, greet Your Excellency, the Great Prince who rules the Straits Settlements and the Malay States. I greet too your honourable officials who help Your Excellency to govern the country,” he began in his best formal Cantonese.
“I’m emboldened by Your Excellency’s patience and willingness to listen to so many people during the past several days. Therefore I shall speak frankly and without fear, for you are respected by all Chinese as a just and fair-minded man.”
He saw the flicker of a smile from the head of the Chinese Protectorate.
“His Excellency says to go on,” the interpreter whispered.
“Your Excellency, the riots during Lunar New Year are not anti-British. The coolies were celebrating the new year and the liberation of China from Manchu rule. For after three hundred years of foreign domination, China is free.”
He stopped, watching their faces as the interpreter translated. He could feel Boon Leong’s eyes burning through him, but he refused to look at his brother.
“I beg Your Excellency to hear me out. The China I came from, the China ruled by the Manchu dogs, has suffered a great deal. Wars, plagues, starvation and corruption! Every coolie has a sad tale to tell about official corruption in the old China. So Your Excellency can understand why we support the new Republic of China. We Chinese hope that the new China will be free of official corruption like the Straits Settlements under your enlightened rule.”
“Hear, hear!” The foreign devils clapped. He turned and looked in Boon Leong’s direction. His brother smiled for the first time.
“It is my firm belief that Your Excellency’s a just ruler. You will not deport someone because of his patriotic feelings for his homeland. If so, Englishmen must be deported from this colony too. Because on Empire Day, they show their love for their country and they get drunk! The coolies have been unruly. True! They have fought and they’ve cut off the queues of others. But must they face the terrible fate of deportation for the excessive expression of patriotic feelings? What will happen to them if they return to China?”
He paused and looked at his brother. But Boon Leong was examining his papers again.
The interpreter finished translating and hissed, “Go on.”
“Let me tell Your Excellency. If they return to China, they will face wars and starvation. Poverty, hunger and shame. All their hopes and dreams for a better life will die on the ship back to China. Starved of hope. Robbed of dreams. And faced with the prospect of unemployment and certain hunger. You are sending them back to a withering death. I beg Your Excellency, can they not be punished in some other ways? Lock them up in your jails. Send them to hard labour in your mines. But don’t send them back to China.”
Shouts of “Right! Right!” came from the crowd in the public gallery. Boon Leong looked alarmed. His fists were clenched till his knuckles turned pale. Kok Seng’s expression was one of bewilderment. This wasn’t what Uncle Boon Leong had rehearsed with his father.
“Among the people here today whose fate depends on your justice are Chinese who’ve resided here for years. They’re respectable persons in the community. They have a business or several businesses. They may be married and settled here and they regard this colony as their adopted country. To deport such traders, towkays and merchants will raise many fears and questions about the justice and fairness upheld by so many learned gentlemen in Your Excellency’s government. Therefore I urge Your Excellency and Your Excellency’s officials to ponder this very carefully. Thousands of lives depend upon your justice and compassion.”
The governor and the members of the commission sat stiffly in their seats. Their faces were inscrutable as the speech was being translated for them. Never in the history of the colony had a Chinese made such a speech in their presence. This was unthinkable audacity! The highly sensitive issue of the governor’s immense power to deport anyone without trial was being brought out into the open by a Chinaman! Englishmen in the colony were just as unhappy as the Chinese with the deportation law. It gave the governor too much power and it violated the Englishman’s sense of justice and fair play. But it had never occurred to the English that a Chinese was capable of questioning that very law.
“Your Excellency, in the mines, the plantations and the towns, life would be impossible without Chinese coolie labour. Do you need to dig a drain or a cesspool? Chinese coolies will dig it for you. Do you need to dig tunnels for waterworks or collect nightsoil in the towns? Chinese coolies will do it. They will do anything to earn a living. All the things which other people don’t want to do, they’ll do. It’s true, we’ve among us many troublemakers and gangsters too. But let me assure Your Excellency that although we Chinese are some fingers long, some fingers short, on the whole we’re law-abiding and very grateful for the opportunities we’ve found in this country of our adoption.”
Cheers erupted from the public gallery. There was a loud crash. It seemed to have come from outside the chamber. Shouts of “Mrs Wong is here! Mrs Wong is here!” rang in the corridors leading to the chamber.