" The ringer looked at the girl’s bleeding face and at her bleeding feet. ‘Leave her alone, you bloody mucking bastards,’ he said angrily in his slow Queensland drawl. ‘I stole those mucking chickens, and I gave them to her. So what?’ Darkness was closing down in my London sitting-room, the early darkness of a stormy afternoon. The rain still beat upon the window. The girl sat staring into the fire, immersed in her sad memories. ‘They crucified him,’ she said quietly. ‘They took us all down to Kuantan, and they nailed his hands to a tree, and beat him to death. They kept us there, and made us look on while they did it.’ 4 ‘My dear,’ I said. "