Chapter 1

 

Desierta or Hardman Island, North Pacific Ocean. The Mansion House, home of Brigadier General Horace Starr, US Army (Reserve) and Mrs Starr.

"Is my husband behind this?"

The young lieutenant had walked up from the boat landing; his shirt had damp patches under his armpits and between his shoulder blades, but he had politely declined all offers of hospitality on the grounds that his seaplane was urgently needed elsewhere and must make an immediate return. Looming over the elegantly clad woman coolly reclining on the shady veranda, he looked awkward, protectively clutching a smart brief case with a gold seal stamped into the leather.

"Certainly it was General Starr who requested we try to evacuate you and your daughter. Diverting this plane was the best we could do. There is not much room for luggage, I'm afraid." He looked at the glittering bracelet on her wrist and the diamond studs in her ears. "Just a jewel case perhaps."

"There is no such need," she said, irritably stubbing out her cigarette and waving away the Malay butler who had materialised in expectation of orders. "Why should the Japanese bother with a small undefended island? If it comes to war they will have plenty to do elsewhere."

"Well Ma'am, the Japs have their eye upon the island's peak for the site of a radio warning station." He fumbled in the case for a sheet of paper, his eyes upon the lady reclining in her long chair, her lemon yellow silk dress clinging smoothly about her hips, the neckline diving invitingly deep between her breasts. He reminded himself that this was a General's wife he was lusting after.

"This is strictly confidential, ma'am," he said hastily. "But perhaps I should tell you that the army has obtained a Japanese document which has particular reference to your situation here. I believe you had trouble with a villainous Chinese gardener?"

"He certainly stirred things up!" Her lips quirked. "My husband had him summarily dealt with, in accordance with island custom."

"Well, this concerns him. He was not Chinese but an officer in Japanese military intelligence operating under cover. Apparently during his time as your servant, he obtained important information and has been rewarded with promotion and a post as prospective military governor of this island. You see your danger now, Ma'am. If you delay you may find yourselves..." He looked embarrassed at his paper. "You should know that it is the Jap's practice to humiliate captured white Colonials before their native subjects in order to emphasise their loss of power!"

"This is not a colony!" the lady broke in sharply. "Our family company owns the entire island and all its resources. The people here are merely our employees, though I dare say some vile agitators among them wouldn't hesitate to claim squatter's rights if we abandoned the island!"

"He may have recruited collaborators..." the officer suggested.

"Let me see this document." Mrs Starr demanded sceptically.

The officer seemed to have second thoughts about the paper he had been waving in emphasis, but the General's wife imperiously reached out, taking the sheet out of his hand, but then laid it aside on the low table with ostentatious lack of urgency. "I shall make my own judgement when I have read it carefully. My husband is much too precipitate. Rather than abandon everything, I'm sure we can afford to wait. Matters may be less desperate than he thinks."

The flustered officer seemed now only anxious to make his escape. He repeated the offer of immediate passage and when it was again declined, quickly departed, assuring the lady that he would pass on her opinion of the situation to his superiors.

 

"What did he want?" a tall young woman bounced up onto the veranda, trailed by two huge wet hounds with lugubrious faces which settled obediently at the foot of the steps. "He looked very promising. Couldn't he have stayed over? Cold drink, Achmad!" She shed the loose beach coat she wore over her one piece swimsuit and threw it carelessly to the white uniformed butler who had reappeared. "This island is going to get boring!"

Her mother looked irritated. "You should have had enough excitement. It was just your father trying to frighten us into leaving. No doubt so that he can set his dirty Kanaka floozy up here in my place. She picked up the paper the young man had left. "The lieutenant had news about Lee, the gardener you had an affair with, and the General had flogged."

"That was anything but boring!" the girl acknowledged. "Father was incandescent. I've never seen him so worked up!"

The General's wife gestured irritably, gold bracelets jangling. "You are practically a princess here! Anyway, as it turns out, Lee was really a Japanese officer spying on your father."

"Good heavens! Lee! An officer and a spy!" Amy was diverted. "Well, I warned him that he was taking a risk, fooling with his employer's daughter. Especially with Father supposedly so hot against miscegenation. I wasn't going to take any blame. Besides, you said not to admit anything."

"It would have been foolish. The General being such the Southern gentleman, he expects ladies to be chaste and innocent. No need to disillusion him."

They looked at one another, Diana and Amy Starr almost identical in appearance with not twenty years between them, more like sisters than mother and daughter.

"Lee behaved quite bravely when he was flogged, didn't he?" Amy pondered.

"Your father maintains that Orientals don't feel pain the way we do. That's why they invented such long-drawn out methods of torture. Anyway, how did you know?"

"I was up in the old mill tower with the big telescope." Amy said. "It was thrilling! It gave a really close-up view. I could see the regretful look on your face when he was stripped naked to be tied up. I made the girls all watch as a punishment. They had all fancied him, especially Zaira, but I told them he was my property."

"Did you?" Mrs Starr took a reflective draw on her cigarette. "Apparently, his spying was so successful that if the Nips do invade us, he is to be made governor here. So at least we wouldn't have to deal with a stranger," she said calmly.

"Everyone else is convinced they are coming." Amy went on. "I just spoke to Zaira. She says that all the other girls' families have hired that big fishing boat that came in from Mindanao."

"I shall speak to them!" Mrs Starr sat up.

"You'll be too late. They've already sailed. They just took off with whatever they could carry. Even the delectable Jose. So much for his protestations of love!"

"There was no need to panic," Mrs Starr said angrily. "We will just have to take charge and manage without them," then "At least Zaira's father has remained loyal."

"Zaira was very cheeky. I told her we wouldn't run away. She said she was sure of that but in a sneery sort of way. Maybe she heard, somehow, about Lee being put in charge. I gave her a good hard slap." Amy looked enlivened. "And I was thinking how boring it was going to be on our own. Inventive little man." She smirked. "I suppose he might blame us for his punishment. Perhaps he will want recompense. How alarming. If we were to be in his power, we would have to do exactly as he wished."

"This paper," Mrs Starr brandished it irritably, "was supposed to contain the details of whatever our friend planned to do here, but it's all in Japanese. The fool must have given me the wrong copy. Whatever it was, it probably will never happen. We have to keep the respect of our employees. I don't suppose the Jap military are any better organised than your father; leaving military documents lying about the bedroom." She looked momentarily a little guilty, then recovered. "Really, if the worst comes to the worst, you could say the new governor will be indebted to us for his good fortune."

 

Later that day in the empty wastes of the North Pacific two Japanese Zero fighters circled over the small stain marking the last trace of the seaplane they had shot down. Amid the gas stain a leather brief case, with an eagle and shield stamped in gold, floated for a few minutes, then slowly sank and disappeared.