Soon after the lines securing her to the wharf were cast into the water, SS Kepong, with rumbling engines sending tremors through its hull, makes its laborious departure from the port of Kuching. As if to bid farewell to the few port workers standing along the wharf, the ship sounds its thunderous horns three times before turning its bow towards the ocean, the ocean that will take us to Singapore three days from now. Abdul Rahman and I, captivated from the start by the white waters churned by the propellers now turn our eyes to catch a final view of Kuching. Dusk was falling as the ship left the harbor and the lights now coming on in several houses on shore make the town glitter in the thickening darkness. Abdul Rahman turns to me, and smiles the first smile to appear on his face in two weeks. 'Thankd God, we made it, Dol. Safe at last from that Thing. My God! What a horrible experience! I can never stop grieving for our friends, especially Professor Morrison. he never had a chance, did he?'
That Thing, the cause of this tragedy we have just gone through, is a hand. Just a hand. But what a hand it was! Severed from the mummified corpse of a Dayak warrior , seemingly breathed with a life of its own and driven by a demoniacal thirst for revenge, it had been hunting us down for the best part of the past two weeks. It chased us through the jungles of Borneo all the way to town, sending us fleeing like mad, disoriented men, with little to eat and little to sleep. By then, it had already brought two of our colleagues to violent death, and driven another mad, to wander in the middle of the vast Bornean jungle. We are to be its final victims. 'You're right, Man,' I reply, 'we are lucky to escape. But...' I did not finish the sentence. I have been having this disturbing feeling that our troubles are not really over. Something tells me we are never going to escape that demon hand, even if we ran to the end of the world. Just last night, back in Kuching, that hand had tried to get into my hotel room while I was asleep. It even knocked gently when it could not open the door. When I awoke, I thought that it was Abdul Rahman calling on me. But halfway to the door, I noticed the knocking hand suddenly shifted to the windows. I did not open them fortunately, but I could see its index finger, which had already made it through the grille, groping for the latch. it failed again and finally went away, with fading thuds on the floor.
Now in our cabin, Abdul Rahman and I sit down to discuss what we went through. we have decided to put down in writing everything that has happened, how it all began, what brought us into the jungle, how that dead man's hand turned killer. We believe we must narrate them before either or both of us fall victim to it. Abdul Rahman now shares my suspicion that it is still around and we have not really escaped it. The only question is which one of us will be the first to go. And before that happens, the story must be told. So here it is, our story...
My name is Abdullah Abdul Karim. I was born in Singapore. My late father, a school teacher, poured everything he earned into my education, sending me first to a Malay school and then to English, through primary and high schools, till I made it to England, where two years ago I graduated with a degree in anthropology from the University of London. On my return, I found a job at the museum in Singapore as an assistant to the curator, Professor A D Morrison. It was also there that I met Abdul Rahman, who was another assistant to the Professor. Three weeks ago Professor Morrison received a letter from the museum of Borneo in Kuching, about attempts to locate a 500 year old Dayak tomb. The curator, Dr Ian Hunter, had led a party to a potential site, a cave in the middle of the Bornean jungle, and had come back quite certain he was on to something. Now he wanted the Professor to join him in exploring the site further. Three days later, Professor Morrison, Abdul Rahman and I departed for Kuching an a Malayan Airways flight. We were received by Dr. Hunter himself.
That night, at his home, Dr. Hunter gave us details of his investigations. He also told us the story behind the tomb. 'There's an old Dayak legend about the tomb of a princess located within a dark cave in the jungle. The princess was the consort of a Dayak chief who ruled some 500 years ago. The legend told how she poisoned the chief when she fell in love with the tribe's leading warrior. This was discovered, and the princess was sentenced to death. But before she was executed, she claimed the warrior had conspired with her. When the warrior denied this, she put a curse on him saying he would die with her and stand forever as guardian of her tomb. True enough, as soon the princess was executed, the warrior fell ill inexplicably and died. He was entombed with her, she in a coffin, he standing beside her. 'Based on this story and the clues I've found so far, I think there is a good chance we will find a royal Dayak tomb in that cave,' said Dr. Hunter, ending his story. 'I invited you here gentlemen because I believe it's going to be a lot of work for me, if the tomb is found, to study it on my own. I presume there'll be a lot of ancient treasures there and I think it would be to our mutual advantage to conduct a joint investigation.'
We left Kuching town early the next morning. Together with us were two Dayak porters, a Dayak cook, and John Smith, a Kuching Museum staff who acted as our cameraman. Five days of trekking and boating upriver later, we arrived at the mouth of a cave. It was already late afternoon then, so we decided to strike camp and spend the night resting. We went in to start work early the following morning. It was another 200 yards from the mouth of the cave to our destination and, to light our way in the darkness, we carried torches. We came to a sort of door, sealed with a large rock, behind which Dr. Hunter believed lay the princess tomb. We made a check for any kinds of device meant to open the door, and even tried shifting the rock manually, but failed. Finally, I was told to go back to base camp to get some iron bars we had brought along for just such a purpose. When I reached the campsite, I found it deserted. The three Dayaks we had taken along with us were gone though none of our property was taken. I fetched the four iron bars and returned to the cave to tell the team what had happened.
'That's no surprise. They are very frightened of this place. They say it's haunted,' said Dr. Hunter. Aided by the iron bars, the five of us heaved and pushed until, at last, the rock budged and we managed to open the gap large enough to let ourselves through. We entered a dark and stuffy chamber, and under the light of our torches, beheld its contents for the first time. It was outstanding. The chamber was filled with all kinds of strange artifacts, magnificent pieces of pottery and metal cases waiting to be discovered. Dr. Hunter was right. As we were to find out later, this was the chamber he had been looking for. We went to work right away, exploring the place, studying the artifacts one by one. All of a sudden, there was a shriek from one corner of the cave. It was Smith. Apparently, we had left him far behind us as we moved along. We rushed towards him, expecting to find him in danger. But we were stunned when we reached him. Smith had actually opened one of the metal cases, and it was filled to the brim with jewels and gold ornaments that looked simply dazzling under the light of the torches.
'Look, we're rich,' Smith shrieked again, ecstatically. His eyes shone as he stared at the treasure. 'Yes, fine, but we're not here to be rich,' Dr. Hunter replied, clearly unamused. 'We're here to look for the princess tomb. So, lets not waste anymore time.' We found what we were looking for soon enough. At another corner of the chamber was a platform and on it stood what looked like a coffin. It was made of wood, gleaming as if it had been oiled. Standing gallantly at what we assumed was the head portion, clad in loincloth, one hand holding a spear and the other a short sword, was an astonishingly lifelike statue of a man. At least, we thought it was a statue.
Professor Morrison took a closer look as he rubbed its hand. 'It must've been a master sculptor who made this. Look at the perfection. You'd be forgiven if you'd mistaken its for a human. He must have been a great warrior to have a statue made of him and entombed with the princess like this,' he remarked. 'No,' Dr. Hunter replied, 'actually that's the warrior I told you about. That's not his statue. That's him. He was entombed here with the princess when he died. They've mummified his body so well, you can't see any sign of decomposition or disintegration.' And then he exclaimed with delight. 'Don't you see? This is it! This is the tomb we've been looking for! This warrior guardian, this coffin, they are exactly as the legend said.'
It was only then that Dr. Hunter told us about the curse of the coffin. According to the legend, he said, whoever opens the coffin will suffer the wrath of the Guardian. We heard him alright. But people like us do not believe such things, do we? 'Alright, let's take a look at the other items here first. We can go back to the coffin later,' Dr. Hunter suggested afterwards. And so we spent the rest of the day scrutinizing and documenting the artifacts in the cave chamber, while Smith took photographs of them. We put aside those we could carry to be taken out when we leave. When evening came, we packed up and left for base camp. Smith remained behind, however, saying there were a few more shots he wanted to take. We agreed, thinking it would not be too long before he rejoined us. But when he still had not emerged half an hour later, we became very concerned. Dr. Hunter asked Abdul Rahman and I to go back to the cave chamber to look for him. We called out his name when we reached the entrance, but there was no reply. So we decided to go in.
We had hardly stepped inside when Abdul Rahman, who was ahead of me, suddenly froze in his tracks and screamed. We found Smith on the floor. in his right hand was his camera, apparently broken. In his left, a handkerchief. It had a tear, and out of the breach had split some jewels, obviously taken from the case we found today. But what horrified us most was the spear that was stuck in his chest, the very spear that has been in the hand of the warrior standing guard at the head of the princess coffin. Smith was dead and the blood from his chest was already soaking the shirt he wore. Thinking the spear must have accidentally slipped off the statue's hand and stabbed him, I tried to draw it out of Smith's chest. But I could not. It had gone right through his body and lodged its point in the cave's rock floor. Only with our full combined strength did we manage to pull it out. That was how Smith met his death. We buried his body just outside the cave....
Last night I could not continue writing our story, because that Thing had killed Abdul Rahman. I am all alone now. God, what shall I do? It would be fruitless to seek help because everyone would say I am mad. Poor Abdul Rahman. Never knew he would be the first to go. But Abdul Rahman would not listen to me. I had warned him not to take strolls on the deck at night. a member of the crew was with him when it happened, and saw it all. He said Abdul Rahman started screaming all of a sudden. His hands were on his throat, and his eyes seemed like they were going to pop out. Then he fell overboard, just like that. The ship stopped to allow a search to be made, but he was not to be found... Before continuing with my story tonight, I have locked the cabin door and windows from the inside to make sure that Thing would not be able to come in. I know I do not have long to live. I know I am racing against time to finish this story. Even now I can hear it coming. The knob is turning now. It must be trying yo open the door. Come on, you demon, come on in if you can. I've locked the door from inside. I see, you're trying the windows now, huh? To hell with you! I'm not as stupid as Rahman. I've locked them too...
The next morning, Professor Morrison, Dr. Hunter, Abdul Rahman and I went back into the chamber of the princess tomb. We worked till noon, and then decided to go back to camp for lunch. We were out of the cave and half way to camp when we realized Dr. Hunter was no longer with us. Before we could call out his name, however, we heard loud laughter like someone gone mad. It came from the direction of the cave. Soon Dr. Hunter appeared, laughing and stumbling away like a lunatic. When he saw the three of us, he paused and pointing his finger repeatedly at us, shouted, 'You're going to die, all of you. He's going to get you... Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha!... You can go and get yourself killed, I'm not going to let that happen to me.' The hair on the back of my neck stood on end as I stared, stunned, at him. Before we could say or do anything, the doctor was gone. He simply ran away, blindly, laughing like a lunatic, and disappeared in the thickness of the jungle. I am not sure why, but the next thing I knew, Professor Morrison was rushing back into the cave, his torchlight swinging about as he went in. Abdul Rahman and I ran after him, but before we could catch up, we heard him screaming from within the chamber. We dashed inside just in time to see the Professor gasping his last breath. The tomb guardian, earlier stiff as a statue, was alive and his hand were on the Professor's throat. We also noticed that the lid of the coffin had been lifted, presumably by Dr. Hunter, who was the last to leave the place. That must have brought the warrior back from the dead. But we had no time to speculate what might have happened because the guardian was now lifting the Professor's body and throwing him at us. And then he came charging!
'Run, Dol, run!' shouted Abdul Rahman. 'He's coming after us.' we ran as fast as we could out of the cave with the guardian hot on our heels. At the cave mouth, Adbul Rahman and I picked some large stones and threw them at him, but he kept coming. Desperate, I picked our kerosene stove and hurled it at him. It struck him and he fell. I quickly grabbed one of the steel bars we had used to open the chamber door and swung it at him with all my strength. The first blow landed on his right wrist and severed the hand. The second smashed his head. He moved no more. The severed hand, however, seemed to have a life of its own. It came speeding on its fingers, just like an insect, to grab my feet. I kicked it as hard as I could, sending it flying some distance away. But it soon came back.
Abdul Rahman grabbed my arm and told me we had to flee. We ran and kept on running through the jungle for the next five days and five nights, hardly pausing for food or drink. When we finally reached a Dayak village at a river mouth, we were completely sapped. It was with the help of the Dayaks, who ferried us downriver on their boats, that we finally made it to Kuching. We checked into a hotel in town, confident that the demoniacal hand would not be able to track us that far. But it came knocking at my door that very night. The next day, we took the first chance we had to buy tickets for our passage back to Singapore on the SS Kepong, sailing the same evening. Abdul Rahman is now dead, dispatched by that hand. My God! It must have followed us right up to our ship. It is now my turn to meet death. I know it must be tonight. I know this is going to be my final night alive. Farewell!
At the Singapore harbor when SS Kepong berthed, a team of policemen led by a European officer went on board to meet the master. Abdullah's body was later taken down to a waiting police van to be sent to the morgue. The captain recorded the incident in his log as follows: 'The door and windows to Abdullah's cabin had been secured from the inside. I had to break in with the help of some of the crew. We found Abdullah sprawled on the floor, his mouth distorted and eyes wide in apparent horror. His neck was bruised and had what appeared to be strangulation marks. We found no other evidence in the cabin, though we noticed the ventilation hole was open and there was a terrible stench from inside, something like the smell of a decomposed corpse.'
That night, at his home, Dr. Hunter gave us details of his investigations. He also told us the story behind the tomb. 'There's an old Dayak legend about the tomb of a princess located within a dark cave in the jungle. The princess was the consort of a Dayak chief who ruled some 500 years ago. The legend told how she poisoned the chief when she fell in love with the tribe's leading warrior. This was discovered, and the princess was sentenced to death. But before she was executed, she claimed the warrior had conspired with her. When the warrior denied this, she put a curse on him saying he would die with her and stand forever as guardian of her tomb. True enough, as soon the princess was executed, the warrior fell ill inexplicably and died. He was entombed with her, she in a coffin, he standing beside her. 'Based on this story and the clues I've found so far, I think there is a good chance we will find a royal Dayak tomb in that cave,' said Dr. Hunter, ending his story. 'I invited you here gentlemen because I believe it's going to be a lot of work for me, if the tomb is found, to study it on my own. I presume there'll be a lot of ancient treasures there and I think it would be to our mutual advantage to conduct a joint investigation.'
We left Kuching town early the next morning. Together with us were two Dayak porters, a Dayak cook, and John Smith, a Kuching Museum staff who acted as our cameraman. Five days of trekking and boating upriver later, we arrived at the mouth of a cave. It was already late afternoon then, so we decided to strike camp and spend the night resting. We went in to start work early the following morning. It was another 200 yards from the mouth of the cave to our destination and, to light our way in the darkness, we carried torches. We came to a sort of door, sealed with a large rock, behind which Dr. Hunter believed lay the princess tomb. We made a check for any kinds of device meant to open the door, and even tried shifting the rock manually, but failed. Finally, I was told to go back to base camp to get some iron bars we had brought along for just such a purpose. When I reached the campsite, I found it deserted. The three Dayaks we had taken along with us were gone though none of our property was taken. I fetched the four iron bars and returned to the cave to tell the team what had happened.
'That's no surprise. They are very frightened of this place. They say it's haunted,' said Dr. Hunter. Aided by the iron bars, the five of us heaved and pushed until, at last, the rock budged and we managed to open the gap large enough to let ourselves through. We entered a dark and stuffy chamber, and under the light of our torches, beheld its contents for the first time. It was outstanding. The chamber was filled with all kinds of strange artifacts, magnificent pieces of pottery and metal cases waiting to be discovered. Dr. Hunter was right. As we were to find out later, this was the chamber he had been looking for. We went to work right away, exploring the place, studying the artifacts one by one. All of a sudden, there was a shriek from one corner of the cave. It was Smith. Apparently, we had left him far behind us as we moved along. We rushed towards him, expecting to find him in danger. But we were stunned when we reached him. Smith had actually opened one of the metal cases, and it was filled to the brim with jewels and gold ornaments that looked simply dazzling under the light of the torches.
'Look, we're rich,' Smith shrieked again, ecstatically. His eyes shone as he stared at the treasure. 'Yes, fine, but we're not here to be rich,' Dr. Hunter replied, clearly unamused. 'We're here to look for the princess tomb. So, lets not waste anymore time.' We found what we were looking for soon enough. At another corner of the chamber was a platform and on it stood what looked like a coffin. It was made of wood, gleaming as if it had been oiled. Standing gallantly at what we assumed was the head portion, clad in loincloth, one hand holding a spear and the other a short sword, was an astonishingly lifelike statue of a man. At least, we thought it was a statue.
Professor Morrison took a closer look as he rubbed its hand. 'It must've been a master sculptor who made this. Look at the perfection. You'd be forgiven if you'd mistaken its for a human. He must have been a great warrior to have a statue made of him and entombed with the princess like this,' he remarked. 'No,' Dr. Hunter replied, 'actually that's the warrior I told you about. That's not his statue. That's him. He was entombed here with the princess when he died. They've mummified his body so well, you can't see any sign of decomposition or disintegration.' And then he exclaimed with delight. 'Don't you see? This is it! This is the tomb we've been looking for! This warrior guardian, this coffin, they are exactly as the legend said.'
It was only then that Dr. Hunter told us about the curse of the coffin. According to the legend, he said, whoever opens the coffin will suffer the wrath of the Guardian. We heard him alright. But people like us do not believe such things, do we? 'Alright, let's take a look at the other items here first. We can go back to the coffin later,' Dr. Hunter suggested afterwards. And so we spent the rest of the day scrutinizing and documenting the artifacts in the cave chamber, while Smith took photographs of them. We put aside those we could carry to be taken out when we leave. When evening came, we packed up and left for base camp. Smith remained behind, however, saying there were a few more shots he wanted to take. We agreed, thinking it would not be too long before he rejoined us. But when he still had not emerged half an hour later, we became very concerned. Dr. Hunter asked Abdul Rahman and I to go back to the cave chamber to look for him. We called out his name when we reached the entrance, but there was no reply. So we decided to go in.
We had hardly stepped inside when Abdul Rahman, who was ahead of me, suddenly froze in his tracks and screamed. We found Smith on the floor. in his right hand was his camera, apparently broken. In his left, a handkerchief. It had a tear, and out of the breach had split some jewels, obviously taken from the case we found today. But what horrified us most was the spear that was stuck in his chest, the very spear that has been in the hand of the warrior standing guard at the head of the princess coffin. Smith was dead and the blood from his chest was already soaking the shirt he wore. Thinking the spear must have accidentally slipped off the statue's hand and stabbed him, I tried to draw it out of Smith's chest. But I could not. It had gone right through his body and lodged its point in the cave's rock floor. Only with our full combined strength did we manage to pull it out. That was how Smith met his death. We buried his body just outside the cave....
Last night I could not continue writing our story, because that Thing had killed Abdul Rahman. I am all alone now. God, what shall I do? It would be fruitless to seek help because everyone would say I am mad. Poor Abdul Rahman. Never knew he would be the first to go. But Abdul Rahman would not listen to me. I had warned him not to take strolls on the deck at night. a member of the crew was with him when it happened, and saw it all. He said Abdul Rahman started screaming all of a sudden. His hands were on his throat, and his eyes seemed like they were going to pop out. Then he fell overboard, just like that. The ship stopped to allow a search to be made, but he was not to be found... Before continuing with my story tonight, I have locked the cabin door and windows from the inside to make sure that Thing would not be able to come in. I know I do not have long to live. I know I am racing against time to finish this story. Even now I can hear it coming. The knob is turning now. It must be trying yo open the door. Come on, you demon, come on in if you can. I've locked the door from inside. I see, you're trying the windows now, huh? To hell with you! I'm not as stupid as Rahman. I've locked them too...
The next morning, Professor Morrison, Dr. Hunter, Abdul Rahman and I went back into the chamber of the princess tomb. We worked till noon, and then decided to go back to camp for lunch. We were out of the cave and half way to camp when we realized Dr. Hunter was no longer with us. Before we could call out his name, however, we heard loud laughter like someone gone mad. It came from the direction of the cave. Soon Dr. Hunter appeared, laughing and stumbling away like a lunatic. When he saw the three of us, he paused and pointing his finger repeatedly at us, shouted, 'You're going to die, all of you. He's going to get you... Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha!... You can go and get yourself killed, I'm not going to let that happen to me.' The hair on the back of my neck stood on end as I stared, stunned, at him. Before we could say or do anything, the doctor was gone. He simply ran away, blindly, laughing like a lunatic, and disappeared in the thickness of the jungle. I am not sure why, but the next thing I knew, Professor Morrison was rushing back into the cave, his torchlight swinging about as he went in. Abdul Rahman and I ran after him, but before we could catch up, we heard him screaming from within the chamber. We dashed inside just in time to see the Professor gasping his last breath. The tomb guardian, earlier stiff as a statue, was alive and his hand were on the Professor's throat. We also noticed that the lid of the coffin had been lifted, presumably by Dr. Hunter, who was the last to leave the place. That must have brought the warrior back from the dead. But we had no time to speculate what might have happened because the guardian was now lifting the Professor's body and throwing him at us. And then he came charging!
'Run, Dol, run!' shouted Abdul Rahman. 'He's coming after us.' we ran as fast as we could out of the cave with the guardian hot on our heels. At the cave mouth, Adbul Rahman and I picked some large stones and threw them at him, but he kept coming. Desperate, I picked our kerosene stove and hurled it at him. It struck him and he fell. I quickly grabbed one of the steel bars we had used to open the chamber door and swung it at him with all my strength. The first blow landed on his right wrist and severed the hand. The second smashed his head. He moved no more. The severed hand, however, seemed to have a life of its own. It came speeding on its fingers, just like an insect, to grab my feet. I kicked it as hard as I could, sending it flying some distance away. But it soon came back.
Abdul Rahman grabbed my arm and told me we had to flee. We ran and kept on running through the jungle for the next five days and five nights, hardly pausing for food or drink. When we finally reached a Dayak village at a river mouth, we were completely sapped. It was with the help of the Dayaks, who ferried us downriver on their boats, that we finally made it to Kuching. We checked into a hotel in town, confident that the demoniacal hand would not be able to track us that far. But it came knocking at my door that very night. The next day, we took the first chance we had to buy tickets for our passage back to Singapore on the SS Kepong, sailing the same evening. Abdul Rahman is now dead, dispatched by that hand. My God! It must have followed us right up to our ship. It is now my turn to meet death. I know it must be tonight. I know this is going to be my final night alive. Farewell!
At the Singapore harbor when SS Kepong berthed, a team of policemen led by a European officer went on board to meet the master. Abdullah's body was later taken down to a waiting police van to be sent to the morgue. The captain recorded the incident in his log as follows: 'The door and windows to Abdullah's cabin had been secured from the inside. I had to break in with the help of some of the crew. We found Abdullah sprawled on the floor, his mouth distorted and eyes wide in apparent horror. His neck was bruised and had what appeared to be strangulation marks. We found no other evidence in the cabin, though we noticed the ventilation hole was open and there was a terrible stench from inside, something like the smell of a decomposed corpse.'
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