up outside. Kretek cigarettes cloyed the air with the scent of cloves. Magnus greeted them and a senior kangani called out their names, marking them off against a list on a clipboard. It reminded me of roll-call in the camp.
Magnus consulted with the assistant manager Geoff Harper, a short, burly man in his fifties with a pair of rifles slung over his back. ‘All the workers showed up today?’ Magnus asked.
Harper nodded. ‘Rubber price was low.’
‘Let’s hope it stays that way.’
‘We had an ambush last night on the road going into Ringlet. A Chinese couple,’ Harper said. ‘The bastards – pardon me, Miss… the CTs – left their bodies hacked into bits all over the road.’
‘Anyone we know?’
‘They were visitors from Singapore. They were driving back from a wedding dinner.’
The tea-pickers marched off to the slopes. I trailed behind the workers entering the factory. ‘Grinders, rollers and roasters,’ Magnus said, pointing to the huge, silent machines lined up inside. The smell of roasting leaves dusted the air; I felt I had pried open a tea caddy.
Workers wheeled out racks of tin trays covered with withered leaves curled up like insect larvae.
The machines started up a second later, pounding the factory with their racket. Magnus beckoned me back outside.
We went onto a track between the tea bushes. The dogs trotted ahead, noses to the ground. ‘What has the price of rubber got to do with your workers?’ I asked.
‘Geoff checks it on the radio every evening. If it goes up, we know some of our workers will leave to work in the rubber plantations. Most of those who left before the Occupation have returned, but we’re always short-handed.’
‘You employed them again, after they deserted you?’
He turned to look at me, then resumed walking. ‘When the Japs came, I told my workers that they were free to leave. Their old jobs would be available to them once the war was over. I told them I’d keep my promise if I were still alive.’71
The ground steepened sharply, straining my calves. Tendrils of steam uncurled off the tops of the bushes. Glancing behind at me, Magnus shortened his stride, which only made me push myself harder to keep up. I was breathing hard when we reached the top of the rise. He stopped and pointed to the mountains.
They had broken out of the earth three hundred miles away to the north, near the border with Thailand, and they stretched all the way to Johor in the south, forming a vertebration that divided Malaya in two. In the tender light of morning, the mountains had the softness of a scene on a silk painting.
‘This always reminds me of the week I spent in China, in Fujian province,’ Magnus said.
‘I visited Mount Li Wu. There was a temple there, a thousand years old – so the monks said.
They grew their own tea, those monks. They told me that the original tea tree had been planted there by a god, can you believe it? The temple was famous for the flavour of its tea, a flavour not found anywhere else in the world.’
‘What sort of flavour?’
‘To preserve the innocence of the tea,’ he said, ‘only the monks who hadn’t reached puberty could pick the leaves. And for a month before they started picking, these boys were not allowed to eat chillies or pickled cabbage, no garlic or onions. They couldn’t touch even a drop of soy sauce otherwise their breath might have polluted the leaves. The boys picked the tea at sunrise, just about now. They wore gloves so their sweat wouldn’t taint the flavour of the tea.
Once picked and packed it was sent as tribute to the Emperor.’
‘My father thought you were mad to go into tea planting.’
‘He wasn’t the only one who thought so.’ Magnus laughed, plucking a leaf from a bush and rolling it between his fingers under his nose.
Voices and singing floated from the tea-pickers in the valley. Most of them were women, their heads shaded beneath tattered straw hats. Large wicker baskets were strapped
Magnus consulted with the assistant manager Geoff Harper, a short, burly man in his fifties with a pair of rifles slung over his back. ‘All the workers showed up today?’ Magnus asked.
Harper nodded. ‘Rubber price was low.’
‘Let’s hope it stays that way.’
‘We had an ambush last night on the road going into Ringlet. A Chinese couple,’ Harper said. ‘The bastards – pardon me, Miss… the CTs – left their bodies hacked into bits all over the road.’
‘Anyone we know?’
‘They were visitors from Singapore. They were driving back from a wedding dinner.’
The tea-pickers marched off to the slopes. I trailed behind the workers entering the factory. ‘Grinders, rollers and roasters,’ Magnus said, pointing to the huge, silent machines lined up inside. The smell of roasting leaves dusted the air; I felt I had pried open a tea caddy.
Workers wheeled out racks of tin trays covered with withered leaves curled up like insect larvae.
The machines started up a second later, pounding the factory with their racket. Magnus beckoned me back outside.
We went onto a track between the tea bushes. The dogs trotted ahead, noses to the ground. ‘What has the price of rubber got to do with your workers?’ I asked.
‘Geoff checks it on the radio every evening. If it goes up, we know some of our workers will leave to work in the rubber plantations. Most of those who left before the Occupation have returned, but we’re always short-handed.’
‘You employed them again, after they deserted you?’
He turned to look at me, then resumed walking. ‘When the Japs came, I told my workers that they were free to leave. Their old jobs would be available to them once the war was over. I told them I’d keep my promise if I were still alive.’71
The ground steepened sharply, straining my calves. Tendrils of steam uncurled off the tops of the bushes. Glancing behind at me, Magnus shortened his stride, which only made me push myself harder to keep up. I was breathing hard when we reached the top of the rise. He stopped and pointed to the mountains.
They had broken out of the earth three hundred miles away to the north, near the border with Thailand, and they stretched all the way to Johor in the south, forming a vertebration that divided Malaya in two. In the tender light of morning, the mountains had the softness of a scene on a silk painting.
‘This always reminds me of the week I spent in China, in Fujian province,’ Magnus said.
‘I visited Mount Li Wu. There was a temple there, a thousand years old – so the monks said.
They grew their own tea, those monks. They told me that the original tea tree had been planted there by a god, can you believe it? The temple was famous for the flavour of its tea, a flavour not found anywhere else in the world.’
‘What sort of flavour?’
‘To preserve the innocence of the tea,’ he said, ‘only the monks who hadn’t reached puberty could pick the leaves. And for a month before they started picking, these boys were not allowed to eat chillies or pickled cabbage, no garlic or onions. They couldn’t touch even a drop of soy sauce otherwise their breath might have polluted the leaves. The boys picked the tea at sunrise, just about now. They wore gloves so their sweat wouldn’t taint the flavour of the tea.
Once picked and packed it was sent as tribute to the Emperor.’
‘My father thought you were mad to go into tea planting.’
‘He wasn’t the only one who thought so.’ Magnus laughed, plucking a leaf from a bush and rolling it between his fingers under his nose.
Voices and singing floated from the tea-pickers in the valley. Most of them were women, their heads shaded beneath tattered straw hats. Large wicker baskets were strapped
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