Looking for Mrs. Peel 7: Life’s Work

Changi autograph book.

Scene Twenty-Three: Batu Caves Estate near KL

SOUND: crowd sounds

Dorothy: Last train? Military orders?Women and Children? So soon? I can’t. I can’t leave now. The bungalow is filled with evacuees and I promised Marion that I’d see his family safe..

Phone: Blah blah

Dorothy: What kind of an example are we British setting for the Asiatics if we leave at the first sign of trouble?

phone: grumble

Dorothy: Kuala Selangor landings? On what? Bicycles? Tanks in the rubber Plantations? Where’s all this airpower that’s supposed to back up the sea power in support of the land power?

Phone: blah blah

dorothy: The navy blames the army, the army blames the air force. The British blame the Americans. The Civilians blame the Military. Whatever happened to cooperation? I refuse to evacuate. I’ll stay back and defend our estate with the men.

Scene Twenty-Four: Train Kuala Lumpur to Singapore

SOUND: women children talking wailing, screech of iron on iron

Woman 1: Why are they stopped?

Woman 2: It’s a relief not to hear that infernal screeching. Have they been riding the brakes the whole time?

Dorothy: The train is being driven by survivors of the Prince of Wales and Repulse.

Woman 2: Ah, sailors, not engineers. Help me will you get my bag from the overhead. It’s so dark.

Dorothy: What’s that sound?

Woman 1: Bottles clinking, I suspect

Woman 2: Absolutely right

Dorothy: You’ve filled your suitcase with booze! Good Show! But the irective was to pour the stuff out, to keep it from the looters. Not bring the bottles with us.

Woman 2: No one can accuse me of deserting my friends. Dorothy, meet
Johnny Walker, Captain Morgan. Meet Dorothy.

Dorothy: You are a bloody genius

Woman 1: Let’s have a drink ladies. It will probably be our last.

Dorothy: To Singapore and safety.

Scene Twenty-Five: Westminster Office

SOUND: door slamming, man huffing and puffing

Clerk: Ah, Mr. Cramden. This is Mrs. Dorothy Nixon, our witness for the prosecution at the Double Tenth War Crimes Trial.

Mr. Cramden: Croak

Dorothy: Good afternoon.

Cramden: Croak

Dorothy: Can I finally start?

Clerk: Yes (sx begins to type as Dorothy speaks)

Dorothy: I, Dorothy Nixon, wife of Robert Nixon, Manager of Batu Caves Estate with permanent home address at Seafield House, Crosby,near Maryport, Cumberland, make an oath and say as follows: I was in Singapore the time of capitulation of the British forces to the Japanese, February 1942. I had arrived on the island, the impenetrable Fortress, as we saw it,in mid-January, a few days before the Japanese invaded. I ran into a roommate, a friend from Kuala Lumpur, Margaret Robinson,who was working at the Malayan Broadcasting Corporation.. She had a flat in the Cathay Building, the tallest building in Singapore and the European nerve centre, although owned by a Chinese millionaire. She told me they needed help at the MBC radio station, on the 5th floor, as that organization had just been setting up when Malaya was overrun. I was glad to have something useful to do. My job was to time records in the studio but on February 8, many staff members decided it was time to get the hell out so I was called upon to do more

Scene Twenty-Six: Malayan Broadcasting Corporation Offices

SOUND: Busy radio office sounds

Woman: Dorothy, the staff is stretched to the limit, it seems. Can you fill in.

Dorothy: And do what?

Woman:: Announcing. You have a lovely voice.

Dorothy: I am an amateur.

Woman: Well, you will fit right in, then. I should show you this letter in the Straits Times. A listener, just a few months ago, called us, quote, very likely the worst radio station in the world. But, now, it is our time shine, to be the Daventry of the East in earnest.

Dorothy: What do I say?

Woman: Say anything. Be inspirational.(sx door slamming)

dorothy: This is Dorothy Nixon, librarian at the Kuala Lumpur Book Club. You may know the book club, as it is an institution in these parts. Although if you are not a member of the expat community you may not, for the library counts mostly Europeans among its members. I am planning to change that and bring in members from all KL communities, the Chinese Indian and Malay. I know the book club has a bit of a reputation for supplying low brow literature to thrill starved planter’s families,a kind of opiate of the literate, but I assure you many of our clients have excellent taste in books. Books are wonderful things, a person’s most precious possessions. A good place to look for inspiration in a time of difficulty. Courage, for instance. There are many books about courage…A finer example of courage you won’t find anywhere, is Marion, our Indian ARP officer at the Book Club. When the bombs first fell he went about his
business in an efficient and quiet manner, although clearly green with fear. I hope his family is listening. They would have been very proud to see him. (Sx record being put on)

Woman: Sorry, Dorothy. We have to interrupt. We’ve just received word from the Singapore authorities that bomb shelters are to be built – for the Asiatics.

Dorothy: A little late, with the Japanese overrunning the island and after many days of wholesale bombardment of their neighbourhoods..

Woman: Well, I phoned the authorities to ask if we could blow up the Mount Pleasant transmitter before shutting down our operation in Singapore and the Governor ’s people assured me that, despite appearances, all is far from lost.

Dorothy: Maybe I believed that two weeks ago, last week, even yesterday, But not today. Look around. Singapore is in flames.

Scene Twenty-Seven: Westminster Office

SOUND: (sx typing) Westminister Office.

Dorothy: The next day all staff, European and Asian, were given their last paycheques.I refused to evacuate despite the pleas of my my friends.

Woman: You must come with us. They’ve commandeered 3 sampans to
Batavia for the remainder of the MBC staff. We have a good chance of
making it.

Dorothy: No. I cannot. My husband, Nicky, is in the LDC and cannot leave, so I will not either. He’s lost his entire life’s work.

Woman: Many of us are leaving our husbands behind, Dorothy. Think of your sons, Peter and Michael in England. Denise too.

Dorothy: They would want me to stay, I know it.

Looking for Mrs. Peel 9: Something the cat dragged in

Dorothy in her cell: “Heaven by comparison”

Scene Thirty-Seven: Westminster Office

SOUND: Typing

Dorothy: On the tenth day of October, 1943, there was a peculiar atmosphere in the Nipponese Office. They took the roll call list from me but did not go through it. I was then told to go back and wait in the Rose Garden with the other women. We all stood a long time in the sun. Two women fainted from the heat. Then I heard the sound of marching feet in the Girdle walk Soldiers rushed in and surrounded us. Two familiar looking Nipponese Officers arrived with 3 I had never seen before. Obviously Kempetai. A Japanese woman interpreter accompanied them. They asked me all manner of ridiculous questions.

Scene Thirty-Eight: Rose Garden

SOUND: Silence

Man: Hiss

Interpretor: Mrs. Nixon. Are there any radio in the women’s camp?

Dorothy: Of course not. They are strictly forbidden.

Man: Hiss

Interpretor: Have you heard of any in the men’s camp?

Dorothy: No. How could I have?

Man: Hiss

Interpretor: What do you know about Japanese tankers being sabotaged
in Singapore Harbour.

Dorothy: Nothing.

man: Long Hiss

Interpreter: You are to instruct the women to return to their cell block and wait outside in an orderly line as we search each cell.

dorothy: Fine. But as Women’s Representative, I insist on being present at these searches.

Woman: Mrs. Nixon. I must speak to you.

Dorothy: yes

Woman: (whispering) I must get back to my cell before it is searched.

Dorothy: Why?

Woman: My diary. I left it out in the open.

Dorothy: Diaries. What is it with you women and your diaries? Do you realize how many hours I have spent in the Nipponese office defending the contents of various diaries? Maybe you should be made to suffer for your sloppiness.

Woman: Please Mrs Nixon. More people than me will be harmed if the Japanese read my diary.

Dorothy: What guilty secrets are you hiding? I’m to accompany the Kempetai on the search. I’ll see what I can do.

Scene Thirty-Nine: Inside Empty Changi

SOUND: belongings being thrashed about man: Yelling

dorothy: It’s a stethoscope. What can you possibly find suspicious about a thing like that. The person in this cell is a doctor. Doctors use stethoscopes to hear into people’s chest.

man: yelling

DOROTHY: You don’t understand a word of what I am saying. Do you?
Well, interpret this. See me jump up and down. See me point to my privates. Please. I need to go to the loo.

Man: Harrumph

Dorothy: Where’s her cell? There’s the diary.Right out in the open.
(sx pages turning) My God. Names. Places. Secret communications in the camp. What fools some females be! Ah. (reciting) I am certain it is Mrs. Nixon who is bringing the News into the camp. She could have me killed! (sx ripping of paper) Where’s the dustbin?

Scene Forty: Westminster Office

SOUND: typing

dorothy: The Kempetai then conducted a cell by cell search. After it was over, I arranged for a late supper for the women. I stayed in the office, pretending to type whenever a guard passed. After that I turned off the light and hid and waited my chance to sneak over to the Men’s Camp. Timothy Morgan was still trying to figure out who’d been taken by the Kempetai. Gradually, it became clear it was the men from the Radio Racket….ah, might I take that last sentence back…Thank you… A few days later more men were taken, Timothy included ,as well as two from the omen’s Camp, Mrs. Rose, Camp poetess, and Dr. Mary Jones

Scene Forty-One: Changi Camp

SOUND: (birds chirping)

Mrs. Crawford: Mrs. Nixon! I’ve heard they are searching Dr. Jones’ belongings. First Mrs. Rose than Dr. Jones. That means they will come for us too!

Dorothy: Calm down, Mrs. Crawford. Remember, I am the only one who knows you were one of my distributors. And I promise you,no,I make an oath, that no matter what happens, if the Kempetai do come for me,too, I will never ever give you away.

Scene Forty-Two: Westminster Office

SOUND: typing

Dorothy: Almost six months passed. Then Dr. Jones and Christine Rose were returned to the camp. A few days later, on April 2nd I was called to the Nipponese Office. As I was no longer Women’s Representative I was relaxed about it, I assumed I was to get a wireless message. Instead I was arrested by the Kempetai and taken to the YMCA in a car with McGowan and Peters from the Men’s Camp. I waved to Nicky, my husband, as I got into the car, and tried to smile, as if everything were fine, but I knew I was in for it.I had heard rumours of the YMCA. Beastly rumours. All three of us were escorted to a basement room and told to sit at small school desks
and then we were interrogated.

Scene Forty-Three: YMCA Basement

SOUND: Yelling

Dorothy: I told you. NO ONE gave me any news. There was no NEWS

Man: Yelling

Dorothy: Sometimes I collect rumours floating around and write them down and distribute them, to make the women feel that they aren’t
totally cut off from the world. That’s all.

Man: Yelling

Dorothy: I’ve never heard anything about Japanese boats being blown up in the harbor. I’ve never seen any radio receivers or transmitters in the camp. I am not engaged in espionage and I know no one who is. Sx SLAP.

Man: Yelling.

Dorothy: I don’t care who gave me away. People will admit to anything under extreme conditions.

Scene Forty-Four: Westminster Office

SOUND: typing

Dorothy : I was not hurt during this episode. I was screamed at, cajoled, bribed with food,even threatened with beheading but not physically harmed. After many exhausting hours of interrogation I was taken with McGowan and Peters to a Cage in the basement and put in with 20 others, all sitting cross-legged and looking like something the cat dragged in. Five British men, the others were Malays, Chinese Eurasians and 2 Japanese. Another woman was there, someone I knew: Li Chan.She and her husband had a store and often ran supplies into the camp. I squeezed in behind her.

Scene Forty-Five: The Cage at YMCA

SOUND: groaning of men

Mrs. Chan: (whisper) Believe it or not, this is one of the bigger cages, can’t be more than 20 by 12.

Dorothy: (sx teeth chattering) You seem surprised?

Chan: Yes, you are the first European woman I have seen here. I saw one other Chinese woman. And I heard rumours of a Portugese woman jailed as well.

Dorothy: Dr. Jones and Mrs. Rose were here at the YMCA for only a day and then kept at Smith Road. They are back at Changi now. In rough shape but alive

Chan: I heard rumours that Timothy Morgan is dead

Dorothy: Yes, I did too. Why are you here?

Chan: My husband and I are accused of smuggling radio parts in to the Men’s Camp. We didn’t of course.

Dorothy: Of course.

Chan: And you?

Dorothy: I don’t know why I am here.

Chan: You seem to know that man over there. The thin one with the abscesses on his arms. Norris? You two made eye contact as you entered.

Dorothy: We did?

Chan: He’s been here a while. He’s starving to death. He will beg you for your ration of rice.

Dorothy: Oh

Chan: Some bloat up like balloonfish, some sink back into their eye sockets. I never thought human skin could turn so many colours: black, blue, white, yellow, red, purple, brown, green

Dorothy: Did they torture you too?

Chan: I got the electric shock but not for many months now.

Scene Forty-Six: Westminster Office

SOUND: typing

Dorothy: I heard tales of torture and death in that place, enough horror stories to fill many books. But I never saw any Europeans actually being tortured. The Kempetai took their victims out of the cell starting at ten pm. I could hear screams of agony all night long. It made my skin crawl. Also, a bright light shone in my face so I couldn’t sleep. I was not tortured, although a guard liked to kick me every time he passed. I kept my composure, to set an example for the Asiatics in the cell. If I go to Hell, and it is likely, I won’t be caught by surprise.

Looking For Mrs. Peel Complete play pdf