Dead in the Dog

Martin rose to his feet. He was a big man with a bright pink complexion and a fair bushy moustache. Tom assumed he was the senior physician, the medical equivalent of surgeon Peter Bright. As he had never appeared in the Mess, he presumably lived in the Married Quarters in the Garrison compound. He explained in a deep voice how the malaria victim was from 22 SAS in Sungei Siput and the leptospirosis or Weil’s disease sufferer was from a jungle patrol of the West Berkshires who had had to sleep in rat-infested swamp water.

‘Both are improving, they should pull through well enough,’ he ended.

This is how the meeting went for the next fifteen minutes, with the gimlet eyes of the colonel transfixing each officer in turn, demanding to know what he had been up to during the last day. He left the pathologist until last.

‘Well, Howden, any problems in the laboratory?’

‘Nossir, just settling in,’ answered Tom cautiously, as in fact he had yet to set foot in the place.

‘Better be up to speed by tomorrow, you’ve had almost a day here already!’

He stood up suddenly, the signal for everyone to lumber to their feet, put on their caps and salute, before filing out in silence.

As the door closed behind them, Tom heard Major Martin comment to Peter Bright. ‘The old man was very benign this morning, his few days’ leave must have mellowed him.’

Bloody hell, thought the new boy, what’s he like when he’s in a bad mood?

It was past noon before the news first reached the Officers’ Mess. Most of the residents had drifted back there for their pre-lunch drink and even some of the married officers had forsaken their domestic gin and tonics for a gossip with their colleagues. The table just inside the open doors of the anteroom was scattered with caps and webbing belts, as mess rules demanded that they were not worn inside. Most of the chairs were occupied and Number One was padding about with beers and fresh lime drinks, the drinking of hard liquor being frowned upon in the middle of the day. A couple of doctors were hidden behind newspapers or magazines, but most were lying back, letting the ceiling fans blow some of the sweat off them.

‘The damned Engineers in Garrison have installed air conditioning in their mess,’ complained Eddie Rosen, another Short-Service captain who worked in the surgical wards under Peter Bright. A small Jewish doctor from London, he had done a year’s ‘midder and gynae’, so was the nearest they had to a woman’s specialist, though a senior gynaecologist could be flown in at short notice from BMH Kinrara, near Kuala Lumpur.

‘Well they would, wouldn’t they,’ drawled Clarence Bottomley, a National Service lieutenant, known to all as ‘Montmorency’ for some obscure reason. He was a rather posh young man who, when in civvies, always wore a Marlborough tie and let everyone know that he was a Cambridge graduate. Though he seemed an amiable enough chap, Tom classed him amongst the ‘chinless wonders’ and the garrulous Percy had already reported that Montmorency was only marking time in BMH, until he was posted out to one of the more elite Guards’ battalions as a Regimental Medical Officer. He said they always wanted doctors who knew which fish knives to use at Mess Dinners and the correct direction in which to pass the port.

Before the ventilation iniquities of the Garrison Mess could be debated further, there was an interruption from near the door. Alfred Morris had arrived and after dropping his cap on to the table, rapped on it with his short swagger stick.

‘Chaps, listen a moment, please!’

The blunt authority of his voice was a reminder that he had once been a Regimental Sergeant Major. ‘The Commanding Officer wants me to tell you that more vigilance is required regarding security, especially outside the camp.’

There was a silence, as this was a new one, even given the eccentricities of their colonel.

‘What’s all this about, Alf?’ demanded the physician, John Martin.

‘Looks as if the lull in CT activity around these parts may be over,’ replied Morris. ‘There was an attack on one of the estates last night, only a few miles from here.’

A buzz of interest and concern went around the anteroom. If the area was returned to being a Black Area, it would interfere with their travelling, which meant problems with golf and weekend trips, to say nothing of the possibility of being shot. There was a clamour for more details as the members got up and advanced on the Admin Officer, who held up his hands for some quiet.

‘It seems that in the early hours of this morning, shots were fired at both bungalows and the workers’ lines at Gunong Besar. No one was hurt, but they drilled a few holes in the walls again, smashed the windscreen of Diane Robertson’s car and scared the shit out of some of the Indian labourers.’

Alf forgot his own swear-box penalty in the babble that followed his announcement.

‘Is that all that happened?’ demanded Percy Loosemore, who had been in TT the longest and remembered the previous more serious terrorist attacks.