22

Luke’s snores came loud and regular from his side of the bed. Laura crept about, so as not to waken him. The first rays of the morning sun were beginning to penetrate the gaps in the wickerwork roof. She glanced at her watch, aware that she needed to move quickly. She folded her few clothes and slipped them into the backpack, along with her flip-flops and wash bag and the guide books she had previously unpacked.

She pulled a notebook from her rucksack and scribbled a few lines:

‘Dear Luke, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking over the past few days and I’ve decided to go straight on to Penang alone instead of coming to Phuket. You’ll have a far better time without me. I’m sure Jed and Dale will be great travelling companions. I’m sorry things haven’t worked out between us. I’m sorry, too, that I dragged you here on a quest after my father’s past. I know it’s been very dull for you, but it was something I needed to do. I’m going to get the early train back to Bangkok and then a night train down to Malaysia. You look as though you need some sleep, so I’m not going to wake you.’

She wrote ‘Love Laura’ at the end, but then hesitated, and scribbled it out quickly. She had loved him, but she couldn’t feel any trace of it now. She propped the note against his water bottle and crept towards the door. She paused as she opened the door and the sunlight flooded into the room, afraid that it would wake him, but glancing back, she saw that he slumbered on. She stared at his sleeping form, the half open mouth, the mass of dark hair spread out on the pillow. He was still beautiful, she observed, even if all her desire for him had vanished. So this was it. There was no going back now. If she left, it would be the end. She felt an odd thrill of excitement at what she was about to do. With one last look, she hoisted her rucksack onto her shoulder and walked away.

The owner of the guesthouse was already up and bright-eyed, frying rice for breakfast in the outdoor kitchen behind her own hut, the toddlers playing around her on the floor. She looked at Laura with frank curiosity when she said that she was checking out but that her friend was staying on. She smiled, put her hands together in the traditional Thai greeting of ‘Wai’, wished her well as she paid the bill, then walked out onto the dusty road.

When she arrived at the station, breathless and sweaty from the walk, she was told that the Bangkok train was not due for another hour. She bought a ticket, deposited her rucksack at the left-luggage counter and set off for the museum again.

It was just opening. The monk on the door, setting out his tickets and money tray for the day, greeted her with a smile and a deep bow: ‘Welcome back. You are my first customer today, madam.’

This time she didn’t pause to look at the exhibits. Instead, she walked quickly through the museum area and made straight for the shop that was set up in the last of the bamboo huts.

She looked around at the disappointing display. There were a few cheap trinkets on show, similar to the ones sold on the stalls beside the bridge - little metal models of the bridge, key-rings, pencils. There were a few postcards showing the bridge, the railway and various scenes from the surrounding countryside, and one or two books wrapped in yellowing cellophane. She picked them up and examined them. One was about the filming of The Bridge on the River Kwai, and the other was written in Thai script. The only thing that looked worth buying was an illustrated pamphlet written by the Buddhist monk who had founded the museum. Laura flicked through it. It summarised the history of the railway in simple terms. She bought it and a couple of postcards to send to Ken and Marge.

Smiling her thanks to the monk, she wandered out onto the road, feeling deflated, and started to head back towards the station. She walked past a row of stalls set up at the side of the road, mostly selling local produce. The stallholders shouted out greetings and waved to her as she passed. Tucked amongst the food vendors, a little way along the line, she was surprised to find a tiny stall selling a few dusty second-hand books.

She paused and looked at the books with idle curiosity. There were a lot of dated, heavily-thumbed paperback thrillers and Mills & Boon romances. An old man who had been gossiping with the stallholder next door ambled over and smiled at her.

‘Good morning, madam. Can I help you?’

‘I’m not sure. I’m looking for a book about the building of the railway.’

‘Oh, I only have one or two here. I don’t often get them. They are very difficult to find. Very rare.’

His head disappeared behind the stall. Laura could hear him rummaging under the table. He re-emerged a few minutes later with a wooden crate. He carried it round to the front of the stall and heaved it onto the table in front of Laura.

She peered inside. There were one or two old histories by military historians, titles that she remembered noticing on the shelves at Imperial War Museum. She sorted through them and took out a couple that she thought might be worth buying. She knew that she would have to bargain hard with the old man; his protestations about the books’ rarity were obviously his opening gambit. She was beginning to learn that this was the way things were done here. She thanked the old man and set off again.

Along the road to the station there were two or three other second-hand stalls that had a few old books amongst the bric-a-brac. She flicked through them, but most were old novels discarded by people passing through. At the last stall though, Laura noticed a thin volume tucked inside another book. It was covered in brown paper, like a school exercise book. She pulled it out, curious. There was no title on the front cover, so she opened it up and looked at the front page: ‘A Short History of the Thai-Burma Railway.’

‘How much is this?’ she asked the stallholder, who eyed her shrewdly, clearly assessing how much she might be persuaded to pay. Once again, she paid well over the odds for the pamphlet.

Later, as she sat on a wooden seat in the cramped third class carriage she opened the little book. Curious about what might be on the cover, she ripped off the brown paper. There was a crude photograph of the bridge, the title in capitals and underneath that the author’s name: Dr. Arthur Stone.

Her heart stood still. Arthur Stone. She couldn’t believe her luck. It was really no more than a pamphlet, printed in courier script like a draft manuscript. Holding her breath, she turned to the back cover: ‘Arthur Stone read Military History at Oxford University and has researched and charted the history of many conflicts. He is currently curator of records at Imperial War Museum, London.’

She flipped back to look at the date. 1965. That was a long time ago. She wondered if he was still alive.

She flicked through the pages and read the preface written by the author:

‘This work is the culmination of several years of study of the conditions endured by Allied prisoners-of-war in the Far East at the hands of the Japanese. I spent a long time interviewing surviving prisoners-of-war in the late 1940s and early 1950s. All had been profoundly affected by their experiences. Many felt shame that they had survived when their comrades did not. Many had been discouraged from speaking about it. Most did not want their identities revealed, which is why these accounts are unattributed.’

She read on. By the time the train started to rattle through the outskirts of Bangkok, she had finished. She slipped it back into her backpack, disappointed. It was no more than a summary of interviews given by several prisoners: details of conditions in the camps, the lack of medical supplies, the harsh treatment by the Japanese and Korean guards, the malnutrition and disease, the camaraderie between the men that got them through their ordeal. It told her nothing new, and certainly no more than the diaries she had read in the museums and the few books she had been able to find on the subject.

She stared out the window at the suburbs of Bangkok. Sprawling and ramshackle, built along canals and dirt tracks, wooden stilted houses set amongst lush vegetation and the occasional shining modern block flashed past her. Her thoughts returned to Luke. She imagined him waking up, bleary-eyed and hung-over, and discovering her note. What had he felt when he read it? Would he try to follow her? She doubted it. He would take up with those two Australians and find a suitable beach bar to hang out at until his funds ran dry. It occurred to her suddenly that they had return tickets booked for the same flight in a fortnight’s time. She resolved to go to the airline office in Bangkok and try to change hers. Even if she had to pay a fee, that was preferable to the pain and embarrassment of spending twelve hours in a cramped airline seat next to him.

When the train arrived at Thonburi Station in Bangkok, she took a taxi to Kao San Road, where she and Luke had stayed the first night they had arrived from London. She avoided the guesthouse, where the friendly Chinese owner was bound to ask awkward questions, and found a quieter place at the other end of the road, where she rented a single room for one night.

She ate her evening meal at a food-stall, sitting at a plastic table in the steamy street, watching the owner rustle up delicious concoctions in a fast-moving wok over a gas flame. She sipped a bottle of Singha Beer and enjoyed the feeling of being alone in a busy place, free to do what she wanted and go where she wanted without having to negotiate, persuade or compromise. She wondered why she had ever agreed to Luke coming along in the first place. It felt so right to be alone here.

The next day she got up early and went out onto the street while the saffron clad monks were making their daily procession for alms before morning prayer. She took a tuk-tuk to the airline office located in a modern shopping centre and changed her ticket for a day in the week after Luke’s flight. Later she went to Hualamphong, the main train station, and booked a sleeper train to Butterworth in Malaysia, which would leave that evening.

Before she left the guesthouse, she went to the lobby and dialled the number of the house in Highbury New Park from the phone behind the reception counter. She wanted to tell somebody that she was setting off to another country. The faint distant tone rang for a long time.

Ken’s voice was obscured by buzzing and crackling. It sounded thousands of miles away.

‘I thought I’d just let you know, there’s been a change of plan,’ she had to shout. ‘I’m going to Malaysia early.’

There was a long delay before he said.

‘Where’s laughing boy?’

‘It’s finished, Ken.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that.’ There was a pause. She wasn’t expecting words of comfort. He was obviously struggling to find the right words. Finally he said, ‘Have you had any luck with your search?’

‘Not much. I’m hoping for more luck in Penang.’

‘Oh, by the way, someone’s been trying to get in touch with you. He’s called a couple of times. A boy called Rory.’

‘That’s strange. He’s a friend of Luke’s.’

‘He seemed a bit agitated.’

‘He’s a bit odd. Tell him I’ll call when I get back if he phones again. I’ll let you know when I get to Penang.’

‘Good luck, lassie.’

The night train to Butterworth raced across the flat rice fields of the Central Plain of Thailand as the huge red sun dipped beneath the western horizon. Laura sat at her table in the first class compartment and was served supper by a smiling waiter. She stared out at the tropical landscape, the sun streaking the paddies red. For the first time since she had left home, she felt content.

She thought about Dad and his words to her about Luke: ‘If he makes you happy, that’s all that matters.’ What an idiot she’d been. She knew now why those words had troubled her so. Dad had known that Luke could never make her happy. But it had taken this trip for her to work that out for herself.