Li gazed at the poker in fascinated horror and his throatwent dry. He moistened his lips and croaked: “You wouldn’t dare. The marks would be on my body for all to see. Mrs. Hume would be a witness to all that had taken place.”
“They told me to clean out Perak, Mallory said, “and I’ve only got till Friday morning to do it. That means cutting a few corners. You understand, I’m sure.”
He took the poker from the fire. It was white hot and he turned and said gently, “Tell me where your men are, that’s all I want to know.”
“You’re wasting your time,” Li said. “You might as well shoot me and get it over with.”
“I don’t think so.” Mallory considered him carefully and shook his head. “I’d say you might last two hours, but I doubt it.”
It was perhaps three hours later when Li regained con-sciousness on his bed in the cool darkness of his room. His hands had been roughly bandaged and pain coursed through his entire body, sending his senses reeling.
And he had talked. That was the shameful thing. He had poured out everything to the terrible Englishman with the white face and the dark eyes that pierced straight through to the soul.
He pushed himself upright and slowly hobbled across the floor, grinding his teeth together to keep from crying out. He paused at the window and peered outside. The verandah was deserted. There was no one in sight. He pushed the window open and crossed to the steps. He stood there for a moment, inhaling the freshness of the rain, a faint excitement stirring inside him, driving the pain from his mind. He would win. He would beat Mallory in the end and that was the import-ant thing.
He stumbled down the steps and started across the lawn. He was perhaps half-way across when he heard the click of a bolt as a weapon was cocked. He turned, mouth opening to cry out, conscious that even now Mallory had won.
The line of fire erupting from the bushes spun him around twice and drove him down against the earth. For a moment only there was the scent of wet grass in his nostrils, then nothing.
In his office at the command post Mallory heard the rattle of the sub-machine-gun clearly. He paused for a moment, head raised, then returned to the map in front of him. A few minutes later the door opened and Tewak entered, shaking rain from his groundsheet.
Mallory sat back. What happened?”
“The sentry got him as he was crossing the garden. Mrs. Hume’s outside. Apparently she ran out of the house when she heard the shooting. She saw his condition.”
“Bring her in,” Mallory said.
She was wearing an old Burberry that was far too big for her, the shoulders soaked by the rain. Tewak led her forward and she slumped into a chair and sat looking at Mallory, her face old and careworn.
“I saw Mr. Li,” she said dully. “I saw what you’d done to him.”
“Mr. Li was directly responsible for the murder by torture of Lieutenant Gregson and his men,” Mallory said. “He was responsible for the deaths of thirteen schoolgirls two weeks ago and very many more innocent people during the past two years.”
You tortured him,” she said. “”Tortured him in cold blood, then shot him down.”
“If he’d gone to Singapore he’d have been tried and very probably sentenced to ten years at the most as a political offender,” Mallory said. “His friends would have got him out before then, believe me.”
“You fool,” she whispered. “You’ve lost everything. Every-thing. Don’t you see that?”
Mallory leaned forward. “There are sixty-three Commu-nist guerrillas in Perak, Mrs. Hume. That’s something I got out of Li. About thirty of them are camped at this moment on an abandoned rubber estate near Trebu. I’ve got a large patrol in that area now. They’ll be in position to attack at 2 a.m. The rest are going to pass downriver hidden in two fishing boats within the next hour. Apparently, they’d in-tended to destroy the railway bridge at Peg at dawn. I’m afraid they’ll be disappointed.”