Abdullah bin Ahmad was concerned. He had not heard from Daing Ibrahim for weeks, and had not been paid for his last mission. He had heard of the death of Si Rahman at the hands of the Singapore expedition, but it was not his fault that his message had laid the trap––he had merely been the messenger. He waited a few more weeks, and then went to see Daing Ibrahim at Telok Blangah. When Abdullah arrived at Daing Ibrahim’s bungalow, he sent one of his servants to announce his presence. When the servant returned, he looked perplexed and afraid.
‘Please master,’ he said, ‘please do not blame me for what I have to report. I do not understand. Daing Ibrahim said that he does not know Abdullah bin Ahmad, and has no business with him. He wishes you to leave immediately.’
Abdullah struck the man a vicious blow across the face with the back of his hand. ‘You stupid, lying dog,’ he yelled at his servant. ‘There is obviously some mistake. Go back and tell him that it is Abdullah bin Ahmad that has come, Abdullah bin Ahmad who has done so much business with him in the past.’
The servant went back to report what Abdullah had said. When he returned, he was accompanied by one of Daing Ibrahim’s servants, a small man with a bald head, who addressed Abdullah in a tone that he found officious and offensive:
‘Abdullah bin Ahmad, my master has asked me to come and say to you that he does not know you and has never done business with you. You are to quit his residence, and never return, on pain of death.’
Abdullah was dumbstruck, but he understood the import of what had been said. Daing Ibrahim had sold out to the Singapore merchants, and had no further need of his services after his betrayal of Si Rahman. He knew the danger he faced if he tried to demand the compensation he was due for that action. As Abdullah turned to leave, the servant fixed him with his small beady eyes. ‘A final word of warning, Abdullah bin Ahmad. Do not speak of this to anyone, or be assured that you will regret that you ever lived, and beg God for the release of death.’
The advisor smiled at him. It was an ugly, evil, deadly smile.
* * *
Abdullah stood in front of his writing desk. He was dressed in a dark green baju shirt and kain sarong, edged with gold thread, and he wore a black velvet songkok cap upon his head. He lifted the sheathed kris from his desk, and positioned it inside his waistband. He took up the parang in his left hand, and the pistol, which he had primed and cocked, in his right. He swayed slightly on his feet, and took a deep breath to clear his head. He had not tasted food or drink for days, and he felt light headed. He turned around and looked out through the doorway of his house to the sun-washed street beyond. The world around him seemed to glow with a bright fire, and his eyes seemed to burn in his skull. He walked across the room and out the door onto the wide balcony. His servant came forward and bowed before him.
‘Master,’ he began, but did not finish, for Abdullah placed the pistol against his forehead and fired, spraying the man’s brains across the steps in front of him. Flinging the pistol aside and transferring the parang to his right hand, he stepped over the body and down onto the street. He cut down an Indian dhobi who crossed his path carrying a bundle of laundry, and drawing his kris with his left hand, stabbed the man through the heart. The cry of ‘Amok! Amok! Run Amok!’ went up from those who had seen what had passed, and alerted those who had not. An elderly Chinese hawker turned and tried to run from him, but Abdullah sliced at his leg tendons with the parang, and then cut the man down with a vicious blow to his neck. He came across two Malay children, mere toddlers, standing laughing at their reflections in a large puddle of water, and sliced off their heads. The puddle of water turned into a puddle of blood. Their grandmother, who had watched with horror from the steps of her own house, ran at Abdullah with a stick, but Abdullah stabbed her in the eye with his kris, and smashed in her face with the butt of his parang.
Now his anger and his hatred consumed him, and the world turned red before his eyes. He cut down an Arab merchant in a flowing white robe. The old man displayed no fear, but fixed him with his black eyes as Abdullah brought the blade down upon his turbaned head. Abdullah sank the blade in so deep that he could not withdraw it as the man slumped to the ground, and had to release it to defend himself against an Indian peon who came at him with a wooden baton. The peon managed to land a blow against the side of Abdullah’s head, but it hardly seemed to affect him, except for a loud echo that rang in his ears, like the roaring of the sea in a storm. It only served to stoke his fury, which now reached a crescendo in his burning brain. He stabbed the peon in the throat with his kris, and the man fell dead at his feet.
Then as Abdullah bent down to retrieve his parang, he saw her in the dim distance, hastening off to his left with her infant in her arms. It was Rashidah, and he marked her for death. When he had begun, he had not cared who he killed––he had only wanted to kill. But now he had seen her, he would take his revenge. He had earlier planned to kill her husband, Musa bin Hassan, but now he realized he could inflict greater punishment by taking the life of his wife and child. He ran after her, his songkok tumbling from his head, his now bloody sarong flapping around him. He cut down a young boy carrying a songbird in a cage, and a beggar who stood with his mouth open in wonder as Abdullah drove his kris into the back of his skull. He leapt over the beggar’s body and was gaining fast on Rashidah, when she tripped and pitched forward on the ground, landing heavily on her shoulder in an attempt to protect the infant. But to no avail. The child struck his head upon a rock, dashing his brains upon the dusty road without even a murmur.
Now Abdullah stood over her, his heart pounding in his breast and the anguished and angry cries of the crowd ringing in his ears. The world around him blazed in a fierce red light, shed by the raging fire that burned deep into his soul, and he screamed in rage at all who had beaten and betrayed him. He bent down and grabbed Rashidah by her hair, and raised his bloody kris for the killing blow. But then the blazing light before his eyes was suddenly extinguished, and his consciousness fled from his brain. The Bugis captain, who had struck him on the head with his club, pulled Abdullah from Rashidah’s body. He helped the terrified mother to her feet, and mourned with her the death of her child. Musa, who had come to investigate when he heard the commotion and cries of ‘Amok’, stood aghast for a moment when he saw his dead son, and the trail of blood and bodies that led from Abdullah’s house to where he stood. For a moment he wondered at the evil of men, and the great mystery of their existence. Then he went to comfort his wife, whom God had preserved.
A constable and three peons arrived on the scene, and carried the unconscious Abdullah away in a bullock cart they commandeered for the purpose. They had to fight off the relatives of the victims and the crowd that had gathered around them, who wished to render immediate justice with their own krisses on the body of Abdullah bin Ahmad. They would very likely have done so if police reinforcements had not arrived soon afterwards, and taken him away to the safety of the jail, where armed guards were placed outside his cell.
Abdullah was tried a week later, but the outcome was a foregone conclusion. After the witnesses were brought forth, and the case heard, the judge delivered a lecture to the packed courthouse on the subject of the murderous practice of running amok, which he attributed to forms of pride, rage and fanaticism unique to Mohammedans, though he reminded the court that they were no worse than men of any other religion who committed crimes against innocent women and children. Then he passed sentence upon Abdullah.
The sentence of this court is that you, Abdullah bin Ahmad, be remanded to the place from thence you came, and that in the morning of Wednesday next you be drawn from thence on a hurdle to the place of execution, and there hanged by the neck until you are dead. Your body will then be handed to the surgeon for dissection, and your mangled limbs, instead of being restored to your family and friends for decent internment, will be cast into the sea, thrown into a ditch, or scattered on the earth at the discretion of the Magistrate. And may God Almighty have mercy on your miserable soul.
Abdullah said nothing. He thought nothing and felt nothing. He was already dead to the world when was hung the following Wednesday from Presentment Bridge. His remains were given to a relative of the Chinese hawker who had been Abdullah’s third victim, who fed them to his pigs.
Captain Scott went to visit Musa bin Hassan to offer his condolences to him and his wife. He knew Musa well, having purchased two skiffs from his father’s yard for his use as harbour master, and had been greatly impressed by the young man’s workmanship. But he was shocked to find that Musa and his wife did not seem to be badly affected by their loss, but went about their business as if nothing untoward had happened to them. Captain Scott told Musa that he must be a very strong-hearted man to cope as well as he did in the face of such a tragic loss. Musa looked at him in surprise, and then explained to Captain Scott that in their eyes there had been no tragedy, for he and his wife knew that God welcomed young children into Heaven. God had ordained when their son would die, as he would ordain whether or not they were blessed with another child. And blessed they were, for the following year Rashidah was delivered of twin boys.
* * *
Tan Hong Chuan had worked his way up from a humble hawker to a prosperous businessman, and had nearly lost it all again. But he had been determined to make his way back up the ladder, and with the help of his friends and his now first wife Siti, he was well on his way to doing so.
He had let his manager go and now ran the chandlery business himself, taking full advantage of the improvement in trade. Siti managed his pineapple plantation, and doubled its profits in the first year. In the early days she had helped to sell the produce, arriving in town at six in the morning bearing the freshly cut pineapples on baskets suspended from a shoulder pole. What sort of wife was she, he thought too himself? He wished he had given her control of his business earlier on––they would have been millionaires by now! But Hong Chuan was a man to learn from his mistakes, so when his business began to prosper again and he had paid off all his loans, he put Siti in charge of the development of all his fruit plantations.
She made him a rich man again on her own behalf. Then, as if to quell those gossipy Nonya women who complained that her first duty to her husband was to produce a son, Siti promptly produced a healthy boy who yelped his way into the world on the first day of the Chinese New Year of the Dog.
* * *
Arjun Nath made an offering to the goddess Sri Mariamman, and thanked her for her blessings. His wife had borne him a son, his cattle herd was thriving, and he was doing good business with European merchants and Indian lightermen. He was grateful for his good fortune, but he had heard the reports about the tigers, and hoped that he would never again in his life have to face one.
Lee Yip Lee had risen in the ranks of the Ghee Hin and become a tiger general. Now he was in a position to order his tiger soldiers to do his killing for him, but most of the time he did not. He still drew his strength from draining the life from an enemy.
Ibrahim bin Aman had been promoted to the rank of captain, and was proud of his contribution to the peace of the settlement. He wished that his father were still alive so that he could share in his pride, but Ibrahim vowed that he would honour his memory by bringing justice to those who robbed and murdered, including the cruel servants of the Ghee Hin.
* * *
Ronnie stood talking to Alexander Johnston in front of his godown at the mouth of the river. They had just come from a meeting at which the European merchants had dispatched a letter to the governor protesting levy charges contemplated by the Indian Government.
‘I’m confident they’ll back down on this again,’ said Johnston. ‘Our present prosperity depends on our continuing status as a free port.’
‘I hope you’re right about that, Alex,’ Ronnie replied, ’but I dinna trust those politicals to do anything right.’
‘Still, you have to admit,’ he continued after a pause, ‘we’re nae doing so bad at the moment.’
‘I can’t argue with that, Ronnie, not at all bad at the moment,’ Johnston replied, as their eyes wandered down the length of the river and out to sea.
All was bustle and clamour the length and breadth of Boat Quay, as lighters and sampans unloaded their cargoes at the merchant godowns, and took on new cargoes that they carried out to the forest of shipping in the Singapore roads––European and American square-riggers, Chinese Junks, Malay and Bugis prahus, and Cochin-China Topes. The British Flag flew high above on Government Hill, but many of the Malays avowed they could still hear the ghosts of the past whispering on the monsoon winds as they wound around Forbidden Hill.