BREAKFAST WITH AN ORANG UTAN - Part Six
"To know you are among people whom you love, and who love you - that has made all the successes wonderful, much more wonderful than they'd have been anyway." - Noel Coward.
Phillipa must have known something. She wanted to be cremated in Singapore and her ashes to be scattered over the Malacca Straits. She had arranged everything, done all the paperwork and got all the necessary permissions before leaving London. They were all in a neat folder she had entrusted to Audrey.
"I'm sorry" said Greg as he rescheduled his arrangements to remain for the funeral. "I don't understand this it's as though I've known Phillipa all my life."
"I wish I could stay too." We made love all the afternoon as though we wanted to remind ourselves that we were alive. I had just packed a enough for a few days in London and all my clothes from Singapore with the exception of the black evening dress which I was taking with me would be shipped direct to Princeton. We didn't want to seperate and in the end the shower was rushed and less than thorough.
Audrey said goodbye to me in the foyer of Raffles and handed me an envelope which I stuffed into my purse and instantly forgot.
We didn't even notice the car was going down the same streets we had gone down when we went to Changi Beach because we couldn't take our hands off each other or think of anyone else. We didn't care how many people saw us kissing passionately outside the departure lounge as the last boarding call for the Qantas flight to London sounded. I knew as I walked down the aisle to business class that I was still smelling of sex and of Greg and it didn't worry me one bit.
It seemed no sooner had the undercarriage been retracted that I looked up to see one of the pilots standing in the aisle beside me. Oh God I thought someone must have complained. But he was there to let me know I had been upgraded to first class. I asked him if it had been organised by Dr. House but apparently Greg had nothing to do with it. Suddenly I thought of Phillipa and then I remembered the envelope that Audrey had handed to me as I left Raffles.
I had seen Phillipa's distinctive handwriting once before when she replied to Greg's note about the trip to Changi. There was just my name on the envelope nothing as melodramatic as "...in the event of my death" but that is what it was all the same.
As I read the first few words I could almost hear her beautiful voice and smiled at the memory. But before I reached the end of the first paragraph I gasped in shock.
My dear Stacy,
Thank you for the kindness and generosity you have shown me in allowing my intrusion on your time with Gregory House. I can remember what it was like to be in love the way you are now and I am not sure I would have been as sanguine or welcoming to an ancient stranger. What you did not know and I was not sure of, until Audrey told me what you had said in the car at Changi Beach about Greg's previous visit, was that I had met him before.
Indeed, I knew him in 1966 when he was a child. It was the first time I had been back since the war had ended. Greg was staying in Singapore with my friends Commander John Monteath and his wife Diana, a navy couple stationed at HMS Terror the Royal Navy Shore Establishment. Greg's mother, a delightful woman, was in hospital her shoulder had been badly injured in a fall. His father was on R&R leave from Vietnam. Maybe it was the effect of the war over there but we all throught he treated his son very shabbily.
His father didn't even attend the party Diana arranged for Greg's seventh birthday at the Officers' Club. Greg did his best to hide how terribly hurt he was. He told Diana he still wanted to do the party piece they had rehearsed for his father to hear. That poor little boy sang "Mad Dogs and Englishmen" with tears running down his cheeks.
John Monteath was a clearance diver and a specialist in underwater mine demolition. He had met Greg's father when he gave a series of instructional lectures to the US Marine Corps and he was furious with the man after seeing the way he treated his son. John asked me if I could stay with them and back up Diana in looking after Greg as he was going to sea the following day and would be away for the next two months. I was more than happy to oblige because even at seven Greg was a bright and entertaining companion.
You are probably wondering why he did not recognise my name. Well that is because no one called me Phillipa then. I was either addressed as "Pip", "Mrs Fox-Robinson" or "Mem-sahib" the Raj was still alive even though it was on it's last legs. Greg called me "Foxy" because he thought it was funny and I loved it. I loved him too. I had a son who died when he was still a baby. Being around Greg helped me to recover in part from my own grief. If my son was alive today he would be 63. Had he lived, had he been anything like Gregory House, I would have been so proud.
I am not surprised he grew up to be a doctor or the specialty he chose. I used to take Greg to the hospital each day to visit his mother. He was interested in everything, the equipment what illnesses people had and displayed an almost goulish fascination with surgery. One day I left him with his mother as I went to get her a magazine. When I came back she was asleep and he was gone. He had told the nurse where he was and I found him speaking to a young man who was in severe pain. I asked if Greg was annoying him and he answered that the boy was taking his mind off things.
On the way back to HMS Terror he told me about the patient who was scheduled for surgery the next morning. His leg was to be amputated because gangrene had set in following a poorly treated jungle ulcer. I felt as though my heart would break and I went to lie down. Greg spent that afternoon looking up things in the Encyclopaedia Brittanica at dinner he announced to Diana and myself that he was going to be a doctor when he grew up. We both thought he would want to be a surgeon but he surprised us saying that he wanted to be a diagnostician. After he'd gone to bed Diana and I looked up the word "diagnostician" in the encyclopaedia.
Stacy, I wanted you to know Greg as I remembered him all those years ago. He was a wonderful child and I feel privileged that I was able to see what a fine man he has become. Thank you again for so generously sharing Greg with this ancient stranger. He loves you so very much and I believe he has made the right choice in asking you to be his bride. Look after him, he is such a remarkable and talented man.
Noel Coward said, "We have no reliable guarantee that the afterlife will be any less exasperating than this one, have we?" and I know that Greg believes that white lights and visions are just symptomatic of the brain shutting down. However, I am hopeful that there is an afterlife because at last I feel ready to live again. If there is an afterlife I will send you back to Greg if you turn up first. and if Greg turns up before you I promise that if I am able I will turn him around and send him back to you.
Bless you both.
Sincerely,
Phillipa.
A steward came up to me and asked me if I was alright. My hands were shaking and I couldn't seem to get the letter back into the envelope.
"You're looking pale" He said but did not suggest it was like I'd seen a ghost. I felt like that though.
"Can I help you with that?" I handed him the folded letter and the envelope. I liked flying with Qantas not just for the safety record but also for the casual warmth and efficiency of the Australian cabin crew
"A very dear friend of ours died"
"I'm sorry." he found out the reason the letter would go back. "There are photographs in here. Did you know?
"No." I said he handed me three photographs. The first was of Andrew and Phillipa dancing the bridal waltz. The second was Phillipa and the Orang Utan and the third was the honeymooners at the foot of the Changi Tree.
I realised the Steward had gasped.
"This was our friend, Phillipa" I said showing him the photograph with Ah Meng and the baby Orang.
"Forgive me" he said "I couldn't help but notice. There was a photograph of a tree."
"The Changi Tree" I said.
"Do you have any idea how rare that photograph is?"
"Is it?"
"You need to keep it very safe. I have only ever heard descriptions of it. Never seen a photograph. I got the impression none were left after the fall of Singapore"
"Phillipa was a prisoner of war."
"When did she die?"
"Yesterday"
"She must have been an incredible woman."
"She was."
"I had an uncle who died in Changi. There were a lot of Australians there."
"Phillipa was born in Malaysia, well she called it Malaya, she was the daughter of a planter. Her husband and her baby were both killed."
"Would you like a brandy?" he asked
"Yes please"
"Let's hope she is with her husband and baby now." he said.
"Oh God I hope so." I said
Again the letter would not go into the envelope. There was another photograph it was a picture of Greg and Phillipa he had taken it by holding the camera at arms length as they both looked into the lens. They had only met moments before but looked as though they had always known each other.
"Is that your husband with her?"
"Yes." I said smiling. It did not feel as though I was telling a lie. It was what happened later that made a liar of me.
Greg never came to London the next time I saw him was when I flew back home early to find him facing the possibility of amputation. It was not the time to show him the letter from the woman he had called "Foxy" when he was a child.
But as each hour passed and the pain grew worse I clung to the joke she had used to lighten the end of the letter. "... if Greg turns up before you I promise that if I am able I will turn him around and send him back to you."
Greg was technically dead for over a minute and again I wondered if maybe Phillipa had known something. He saw something but not what he told the students in the lecture hall that he had seen. He did not treat either of those patients until nearly three years after the infarction. Yes, House lied.
I wondered if he had seen Phillipa and if she had turned him around as she had promised.