A Place Called Home (Cannibal Country Trilogy, Book 2) Page 14

  George was surprised to hear that.

  “I could put together a thousand warriors inside a week, sir. Give them rifles and you could have one hell of an infantry battalion inside your three months.”

  “And what would happen after the war, when they came back, Mr Hawkins?”

  “The same as is happening in India, from what I hear, sir. We ain’t going to be able to keep them down for too many more years as it is, sir. Where they’ve been contacted for twenty years or more they want a say in running the place already. If we don’t talk to them then we’ll have to fight ‘em. Better get ‘em on side, I reckon!”

  Australian government policy did not envisage independence ever occurring in the Territories; George had as well have walked into the Vatican bearing a marriage proposal to the Pope.

  “Half of the Highlands have not yet been contacted, Mr Hawkins! How can we envisage independence there?”

  George shrugged, it was not his problem.

  “The Tolai want councils now, so my father tells me. The Motu speakers round Moresby are talking to the people there about the same thing; I was down in Moresby only last week and was told of it. I don’t fancy fighting these blokes, there's too many of them, so we’d better talk instead. What about Police? The constables are all local men, and they carry rifles. If we can’t have them in the army then what about recruiting a Police Reserve?”

  “Herr Hitler is hardly likely to attack Lae, I believe, Mr Hawkins. Armed police will be of very little use if he stays in Europe!”

  “I was in Rabaul last month, sir, talking with the Chinese businessmen there. Have you heard of what happened at Nanking? The Japanese are building an empire and they could be looking at the South Pacific.”

  “Not to be repeated in the Club, gentlemen?”

  They nodded.

  “Plans are being laid for that eventuality. Among other things it is intended to drive all of the cattle in Northern Territory and Queensland down to New South Wales if the Japanese ever attempt invasion. The chances of such happening are slight, but the government is considering some degree of rearmament – the building of a modern air force especially. But we are sure that there could be no Japanese military action for at least another decade!”

  “For the while, sir? We should put our names down as volunteers and wait to be called?”

  “You can expect to start training well within the year, gentlemen. Have either of you any experience?”

  “Cadet force at school, sir.”

  “Then you will be earmarked for officer training, Mr Hawkins. Can you fly?”

  “Tried it, sir – no good at all!”

  “I can, sir. I’ve got my licence and run the coast and the Islands every week,” Johnny replied.

  “Then I shall, with your permission, Mr Jenkins, send your name down to the RAAF. I suspect that you will be invited to join in a very short time. We have been asked to discover bush pilots of appropriate nationality and ask them to volunteer – the word will be out within the month. Twin engine pilots will be invited into Bomber Command with an immediate commission, I am told. Fighter pilots must go through a longer training.”

  Fighter pilots were the glory boys and the Air Force was obviously short of men wanting to fly its inglorious bombers.

  A number of the fliers on the New Guinea Side were German nationals. Pilots tended to be easily mobile and a number of young men who had found no love for the new German government had drifted out to the East, often delivering Junkers cargo planes and simply never returning. George could see that this might become a problem, made a mental note to speak to his pair and encourage them either to seek citizenship, and keep their jobs, or bugger off back to Europe.

  George made his way down to the waterfront, a walk of a quarter of a mile, to the offices of ‘Masters and Hawkins, Import and Export’; the partnership formed barely a year previously with an injection of capital from Ned’s businesses.

  “It’s going to be war, Mick.”

  “Shit! Don’t need it, George. We’ll never keep the planes in our hands; the military will requisition them first thing.”

  They owned, with a lot of assistance from their bank, a second Ford Trimotor and a modern Douglas DC3 and were running them very profitably inland to the goldfields, along the coast to Madang and the Sepik and across to Rabaul on the passenger run.

  “They would have to pay for them, Mick. Won’t be a loss of capital, but it’ll hit our income to hell. No easy way round it, either… We’ll have to deal with it when it comes. Copra will go up in wartime because it’s a major in munitions – trade a bit more in that to keep going. I’ll be called up for service, that’s for sure. I’ve put me name in already – better to volunteer, I might be able to make a bit of a choice that way. If it’s right with you I’ll fly across to see the old man pretty soon, see what the word is over there.”

  The word in Rabaul was non-existent – if they pretended that nothing was happening then it might go away.

  “What about the Chinese, Dad?”

  “Nothing. They will not be permitted into Australia unless they have nationality, and none have.”

  “What about those born here?”

  “Good question! According to the government they don’t exist, and in any case this is their land so they can stay here.”

  “And if the Japanese invade?”

  “Officially they won’t, so there is no need to plan for something that ain’t going to ‘appen!”

  “Bastards!”

  “Politicians!”

  “What does Mr Tse say?”

  “Not a lot, that ain’t his way, but he’s worried. His girl, Mary, she’s fifteen now, got a birthday soon.”

  George had met Mary a goodly number of times now – thinking on it, he had seen her every time he had called on Mr Tse, had been pleased to, as well.

  “Sixteen?”

  “Old enough to marry. Nice little girl, too – bright, pretty enough, well brought up – she’d make any man a good wife.”

  “You reckon? I didn’t think the Chinese wanted their girls to marry up with gwailos.”

  “Depends on the gwailo.”

  “I don’t suppose I ought to say anything myself, Dad, that ain’t the way to do it. Talk to him, will you? To be honest, I’ve had a soft spot for her since ever I knew her. If she’s willing and so is he, then I could do a lot worse, and I ain’t sure I could ever do any better.”

  Mr Tse was very pleased to entertain the notion of a marriage into the Hawkins family, was a little surprised at Ned’s insistence on asking Mary’s opinion. He pointed out that she was a well-mannered, properly brought up girl and would undoubtedly do exactly as she was told, and she obviously liked George.

  “Not the way we do things, Mr Tse – and if she marries George then she will be an Australian, with all of the rights of an Australian woman, which includes divorce! Better for all of us to make sure she’s happy at the start of the marriage – what ‘appens down the road no bugger can tell!”

  It was all very strange, but Mr Tse fell in with Ned’s request and brought Mary to the office to acquaint her with the possibility of marrying George. She was slightly built but obviously grown-up, big-eyed still, very pretty and immediately excited.

  “When, sir? Now?”

  “No, you cannot until you reach legal age, sixteen.”

  “Nine weeks.”

  “Yes. Are you willing to marry him, Mary?”

  “Do what, sir?”

  Mr Tse was becoming impatient, thinking he had been clear enough.

  “You have the choice, Mary! Do you wish to marry George Hawkins?”

  “Of course I do, sir! I have wanted to since the day I met him first. I did not think it was possible, so I have never said a word, because it was just a dream, not for real… Thank you, sir! And you too, Mr Hawkins! I shall be a very good wife to George, sir!”

  “You may have to leave Rabaul, Mary.”

  “Of course, sir. I shall go where Geo
rge goes.”

  “You may have to live in Australia, down on our station near Cairns.”

  “I shall live in the place where our home is, Mr Hawkins. That is what a wife does.”

  The men shrugged – she would make a life for herself it seemed.

  “Go and tell your mother, Mary. Carefully! She may not be very happy about it.”

  Mr Tse turned to Ned, commented that his wife had made a few plans for Mary, none of which included her marrying out of the Chinese community.

  “We should discuss her dowry, Mr Hawkins.”

  “Not our way of doing things, Mr Tse!”

  “I know, but I want to put money in her hands before a war starts. It may be too late to arrange afterward. There are family holdings in Hong Kong, Singapore and Shanghai as well as smaller amounts in different banks in London and San Francisco; most of them are in my name and if the Japanese come here then they would be seen as enemy held and could be lost to us. Put into the name of Mary’s husband, he to be trustee for her and for their children, they would be safe until after the war. The family would continue.”

  It was a different way of looking at things – the family as an entity separate from its members in any one generation – and caused Ned some problems, not having any kinsfolk of his own.

  “What of your sons, Mr Tse?”

  “One, the second son, is in England, Mr Hawkins, in Cambridge, at university there, Physics or some such thing. The others are in China and I know nothing of them – they are inland somewhere, separately, I hope. My eldest should be with the Kuomintang forces, he was a captain when last I heard, and the third boy was to have joined with my brother in the warehouses in Nanking; if he did, then he is dead, I expect, together with the other quarter of a million butchered by the Japanese there! The boys are provided for separately, and there are funds in England sent by my uncles. We will retain some of our wealth, Mr Hawkins, whatever happens – it is a matter of making the fraction lost as small as possible. It is also the case that I want little Mary to be happy in her life and I think your George, if he survives the war, will do his best for her – I have watched him in her company!”

  Mr Tse had only the one daughter, and was more westernised in his attitudes than he realised.

  “I’ll send instructions to the bank in Brisbane, making George co-signatory on all my accounts. If I go missing then he will be able to continue using the funds with no need to hand over; no, what is it? ‘Probate’, that’s it, to delay things. What do you say to buying into one of the air freighters here, Mr Tse?”

  Tse thought quickly, realised Ned was considering evacuation when the day came, when the invasion became a reality. They would not be able to escape before the Japanese arrived, both having responsibilities which could not simply be abandoned.

  “Good idea, if we can… Use our funds to purchase a flying boat, or two – could be useful to work between here and Kavieng and Lorengau up on Manus, and down to Milne Bay. Be able to land and pick up at any of the coastal plantations – it’s almost always calm inside the reef. What sort is that one that is based here, Mr Hawkins?”

  “American, a Grumman. Should be possible to get a couple shipped across from San Francisco. Have you any contacts here in Rabaul?”

  “Not in aviation – all gwailo.”

  “I’ll have a quiet word around the Club, then. I’ll talk to the bank as well. Maybe a word at the Administration offices – they might be in favour of having a way out themselves.”

  “I’m getting married in a couple of months, Mick.”

  “Good on you, George! Bit sudden, mate? Been doing anything you shouldn’t over in Rabaul?”

  George laughed and denied the accusation, swore that all was above board.

  “Young Chinese girl I’ve known since I walked out of Salamaua – met her talking business with her dad and seen her plenty of times since. She’s a lovely girl, Mick, you’ll like her!”

  “That’ll be a first, George!”

  “Ah, you know what I mean, cobber! Her old man wants her to be safe if the war comes to us, so I’m acceptable as a husband now instead of being a big-footed barbarian monkey!”

  “Sounds about right to me. What about Maria?”

  “She’s been a good girlfriend, mate, but she’ll be an embarrassment, that’s for sure.”

  “Burns Philp are employing stewardesses on their bigger boats now, George. I know their manager down at the wharves – I’ll have a word with him, see if I can get her aboard on the run down to Brisbane. Good enough job in itself and gives her the chance to get to know the passengers and the ship’s officers – she might get herself fixed up Down South that way.”

  “I’d be glad if you would, mate – I wouldn’t want her to come to any harm, that’s for sure. I’ll speak to her meself and drop her a thousand to be going with – I owe the girl!”

  “What about housing, George?”

  “Mary will want a place of her own, a house that’s hers. I’ll look about for somewhere.”

  Mick shook his head, said that he would do it.

  “I know people, George. Lot of friends of mine who owe me a favour or two. I’ll buy a place, well into the centre of town. Even if it gets burned down in the war the land will be worth something then.”

  “Good idea. I’ll be coming back when it’s all over – I belong up here. What about you, Mick? You won’t be joining up, being that bit older than me, so where do you go to?”

  “Port Moresby, unless we get thrown out of there as well. I reckon the Navy ought to be able to hold the Papuan Gulf even if it can’t do any good over on the New Guinea Side. I’ve got nothing down in Australia – except a couple of warrants out against me in New South Wales for indecency! If it works for you, George, I reckon to buy a warehouse down in Moresby and start a branch there over the next year or two.”

  “It’ll do me, mate.”

  “I’ve had a word in one or two ears as well, George, and there should be a commission as a Reserve Police Inspector available for me. If nothing else it gives me a gun if everything goes haywire. Your Territorials will start up within the month, by the way. Keep a sharp eye out for them trying to attach you to a battalion being sent to England or Egypt when the war starts!”

  “Why would they do that?”

  “Because they’re the bloody army and if they can get anything arse-about-face, they will!”

  “Yeah… you might be right, I’ve heard the Old Man talking about the way they cocked-up the invasion in the last war. You know they sent a dozen steamers up to Moresby but forgot to supply any coal?”

  “That sounds about right, mate – not in the least surprising!”

  George was enrolled as a sergeant in the Territorials, on the grounds that he knew the basics of the drill-book. It amused him for a couple of weeks, but as soon as his men knew how to button their uniforms correctly he started to badger his lieutenant to spend more time at the range, less on the square.

  “Most of these men have never used a rifle, sir. None have even seen a machine-gun. If we get involved in any fighting up here it will be in the bush – platoons working independently. They’ll have no need even to hold together as a company, sir. Good practice with their rifles will keep them alive, sir, and do the enemy some harm.”

  The lieutenant was a regular, sent up to train the locals, and with very little expectation that they would be called upon to fight up in the Islands.

  “We have been told to expect to accompany you to Europe, Sergeant Hawkins.”

  “Word I’ve got, sir, is that the Japs are likely to stir up trouble through the whole of the Pacific. We’ve been told that they want land for cattle ranching, being as they’re short of meat at home.”

  “But the only cattle land in the Pacific is in Australia, Sergeant Hawkins! You surely cannot think…”

  “There’s no big country between us and them, sir. What’s to stop them?”

  The lieutenant had been warned that his Territorials would inclu
de many of the best educated of the local men, and the sons of almost all of the highest-placed officials and businessmen. To discover that his sergeant claimed inside knowledge was not surprising. Add to that, he had been to the right sort of school and would certainly be commissioned at an early date, could well outstrip him with wartime promotions.

  “We have a Vickers gun, Sergeant Hawkins, and the captain talked of the chance of having some Thompson guns sent up here, as well as a Bren or two. I think I might be able to persuade him of the need for bush training. For the while, I suppose it can do no harm to get on the range.”

  “Very good, sir. Tomorrow evening, sir, I’ll put into field-stripping the Lee-Enfields and teaching them to speed load. Three or four sessions and then we can start into actual firing, sir.”

  A month and most of the men could loose off ten rounds rapid fire with moderate accuracy, the Lee-Enfield being a forgiving, workmanlike rifle. Some showed evidence that they would progress towards marksman in a short time.

  There were exceptions; a few men could not hit the proverbial barn door and seemed unlikely ever to improve. Blue Piggott was one of those who could not put his ten rounds into the barn wall even; a huge man standing six foot four and twenty stone, little of it fat, his thatch of flaming red hair – hence his nickname – making him even more visible, he was acutely conscious of his inability and announced his intention of pulling out of the Territorials. He said he was a liability, useless to them.

  “I would not wish him to go, sir,” George said to Lieutenant Carter. “He’s a clever man and well-liked and could make a good officer. The blokes all listen to him, always have done, it seems. He can drive a big truck, I know, so could we use him with our transport?”

  “We haven’t got any, Sergeant Hawkins! What we have got – just come up from Brisbane – is this monstrosity. Look at it!”

  A rifle, mounted on a bipod, longer by almost a foot than a Lee-Enfield and of much greater bore.