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     A bit after midnight on a clear, cool moonlit night in December of 1939, my father pulled his 1923 Buick “Touring Car“ up to the front gate of the bungalow that the Burmah Oil Company had provided for him.  It was a spacious, comfortable two bedroom, two bath, structure resting well off the ground on teak pilings - possessing a twelve-foot hedge surrounding its grounds for privacy - with a kitchen and servant’s quarters in a separate building at the rear.

     Dad had recently purchased the Moby Dick-sized white Buick from another oilman returning to England.  It sported a tan canvas top - without any side windows – having only rolled up, clear plastic drapes that could be lowered in the event of rain. 

     Although this vehicle was nearly 16 years old, dear reader, remember that it was built long before the major car manufacturers had invented “planned obsolescence.”  These pre-war babies were built to last forever, and were far superior to the crap being produced by American auto manufacturers today.

     The passenger door on the huge Buick opened, and my mother slipped out wearing a powder-blue, strapless chiffon formal gown.  She closed the car’s door, and my dad drove the car round the side of the hedge to park in the garage.

     Mom opened the gate and stepped onto the white gravel path, that wound across the front lawn, as she hummed “Over the Rainbow” from The Wizard of Oz.  Then shut the gate and did a pirouette in the moonlight, the gossamer chiffon flaring out about her trim body.  She stood five-foot-four, had blue-green eyes, shoulder length blonde hair, delicate features and, in a word, was glamorous; she easily passed for actress Carole Lombard’s double. 

      Carole Lombard

     Being an accomplished musician and singer, she had worked the supper club and radio circuits in Hollywood for several years before meeting my pop.  Though Mom had only been in country a few weeks, she had become very popular by singing and playing piano at The British Club.

     You see, dear reader, the British maintained a tradition when tucked away in isolated jungles and deserts far from civilization: Once a week one was required to dress in tuxedo or ball gown and attend a formal function at “The Club.”  It kept one from “going native,” don’t-cha know. 

     The stuffy British Club. 

     So far it had been a special night: Mom as usual being the center of attention - performing before an extremely appreciative audience – and then dancing the night away with my old man to phonograph music in a formal setting.  Having previously read everything that Pearl S. Buck had written on the Far East, it happily hit Mom - as she twirled down the path - that she was actually living her girlhood dreams in exotic India with servants no less.  And to top it all off, Mother was living this romantic adventure with the man she loved.  What could possibly spoil such a perfect night?

     That’s right, dear reader.  Stick around.

     Mom gracefully floated down the garden path in the moonlight – just like Dorothy on the yellow brick road in The Wizard of Oz - towards the shadow of an immense jacaranda tree growing in the middle of her front yard.  “Toughie” - a stray mongrel Pop had adopted – woke up on the bungalow’s veranda.  Wagging his tail, Toughie ran down the front steps and towards my mother. 

     “Toughie,” the Indian stray.

     However, prior to reaching the tree’s shadow on the white, moonlit gravel path, he slammed on the brakes, stiffened, then bristled and began growling at Mom! 

     Immediately she froze on the path.

     At length, Toughie barked loudly and snarled as he angrily shook his head from side to side.

     Mom told me her first thought was that Toughie had gone rabid, which apparently was a common malady dog owners had to face out there in the tropics.  Remember, dear reader, this was raw, 1930's India with neither animal control nor friendly family vets with shots.

     Dad suddenly appeared at my mother’s side in his tuxedo, and asked, “What’s wrong, Vivienne?”

     “It’s Toughie, Mike...something’s wrong with Toughie,” Mom replied.

     Pop was carrying a flashlight that he had used to put the Buick away.  Clicking it on, he whipped its beam of light onto Toughie.  But as the beam cut through the tree’s shadow spilling across the path, it reflected a brief, glossy flash.

     Father backed the beam up and, much to his horror, discovered a king cobra standing roughly four feet above the ground - with its hood flared out - facing Toughie.

     Let’s share a “Jeff Corwin” moment, dear reader. This specific king cobra measured out to 16 feet in length and, depending on its venom’s reservoir and potency, probably issued a volume of venom that would kill an adult in minutes – reputedly five times faster than a black mamba.

     Had it not been for Toughie, Mother might’ve danced right into that big sucker, and I wouldn’t have been born.  We’re not in Kansas anymore Dorothy.

     Cautiously, Pop started backing Mom and himself away, towards the front gate, while keeping the flashlight’s beam on the monster cobra.

     At that point, stepping out from the shadows alongside the bungalow, Tulah-Rhum materialized carrying a branch he had previously cut from one of the mango trees in the garden.

     Let’s hit “pause” for an interval, dear reader, and discuss Tulah-Rhum: 

     He was unusually tall for a Gurkha from Nepal - standing slightly under six feet - with a thin wiry-frame and dark skin from working in the garden.  Usually he wore a black Nepalese-topee, resembling a US Army garrison cap, with an open black vest over a long-sleeved white shirt and longyi, or sometimes white pantaloons.  His leathery feet were shod in buffalo hide sandals, and from a belt at his waist, of the same material, there hung a most unusual weapon: A Gurkha Kukri. This was an 18-inch, two-pound knife forged by his father from the steel leaf spring of a British lorry.  It was curved much like a boomerang, with the cutting edge on the inside of the curve, while the outside of the curve formed the blade’s quarter-inch thick spine.  The blade was also flared towards its tip and was designed for slashing; not stabbing.  In the hands of an expert it could easily disembowel or decapitate an enemy.  At 43, Tulah-Rhum was such an expert.

     The knife’s blade was incased in a wooden scabbard covered by black buffalo hide, with its pointed tip capped in silver from pounded–out rupee coins.  Two smaller, leather scabbards were also attached that held the Karda – a small knife for skinning – and the Chakmak – a blunt knife for sharpening the kukri and striking flint.  An additional compact leather purse was attached on top of these smaller blades’ scabbards, for carrying flint to start fires.

     Tulah-Rhum’s Kukri; after being cleaned and renovated with a new grip.

     As a teenager growing up in my father’s house, I’d occasionally take this Gurkha Kukri down and draw its blade.  The Kaudi usually caught my attention at once: Which was a gunsight-shaped notch cut into the edge of the blade, near the hilt, designed to prevent blood from flowing onto the teak grip.  I’d generally touch it first...then carefully run my finger down the blade’s cutting edge.  Despite not ever being sharpened by any of us, throughout the years it always held its razor-like edge; whenever I touched it though, an unreasonable fear often took hold of me.

     In his late teens Tulah-Rhum had enlisted in the 8^th Gurkha Rifles – 2^nd Battalion.  That’s when his father had forged this exceptional kukri for him.  By his early twenties he was shipped off to France and fought in The Great War. 

      Tulah-Rhum at France in 1915.

           Gurkhas carried their Kukris into battle.

       As if the Germans didn’t have enough problems.

     At the Battle of Loos, 25th September 1915, the brutal trench warfare nearly wiped out Tulah-Rhum’s entire regiment and, though seriously wounded, he became one of the few survivors.  In the words of the Indian Corps Commander, “Loos was where the 8^th Gurkha Rifles found their Valhalla.”  Out of 800 men only fifty survived.

      Additionally, in the vicious hand-to-hand combat of that battle, Tulah-Rhum had killed six German soldiers with his kukri.

     Perhaps, dear reader, that was the source of my unreasonable fear each time I had touched Tulah-Rhum’s hefty knife.  This blade had taken human lives.

     Tulah-Rhum now advanced on the king cobra.  My parents ceased their retreat as Dad kept the cobra illuminated with his flashlight.  Ignoring barking Toughie, the cobra turned to face Tulah-Rhum and hissed loudly at the arrival of this new threat.  Boldly getting down to business, Tulah-Rhum prodded the cobra with his freshly-cut branch, prompting the mammoth snake to strike.  Finally it did just that, but Tulah-Rhum dodged the cobra’s biting end, and clamped its head firmly onto the gravel path with his forked mango branch.

     Without any hesitation, in one fluid motion, Tulah-Rhum drew and slashed with his kukri, severing the cobra’s head in a silvery flash; then skewered the head on the tip of his oversized knife.  Tossing the branch aside, Tulah-Rhum seized the cobra’s massive, writhing, headless body, stood up and, not uttering a single word, ultimately vanished in the same shadows of the bungalow from whence he came.

     Early the next morning with the help of Kah-Mint - my mother’s Burmese houseboy - Tulah-Rhum skinned the cobra and stretched and salted its hide with care for proper curing and drying.  The cobra’s meat he gave to Tony - my mother’s Chinese-Malay cook - who used it in a curry that night.  Mom was told it was chicken curry.  As for the cobra’s blood, internal organs, bones and head, Tulah-Rhum sold these items to the Chinese apothecary at the local bazaar, where the hide would also eventually be peddled.  Not one part of this magnificent king cobra was wasted.

     When Tulah-Rhum attached himself to Dad, in the jungle, he was in fairly bad shape.

      Like Toughie, Pop brought him home and Mom squared him away with new clothes.

     Tulah-Rhum had been the latest addition to my mother’s household staff, and she had been unsuccessfully trying to mold him into a house servant; only she found him to be, “Just a rough ex-soldier.”  So she relegated him to caring for the bungalow’s garden instead, which contained a vegetable, herb and pineapple patch, plus mango, papaya, coconut and banana trees - surrounded by a lawn that always wanted to go wild.

     After tonight’s performance with the king cobra though, it struck Mom that she was totally wasting Tulah-Rhum’s talents.  From that night forward Tulah-Rhum was elevated to my mother’s personal bodyguard.  Wherever she went, Tulah-Rhum walked ten paces behind her, shadowing and watching over her for threats to her person, while resting a hand on his kukri’s hilt.

     And you know what, boys and girls?  In all those years that Mom explored India, Nepal, Tibet, China and Burma with Tulah-Rhum...nobody ever messed with my striking, fair-haired mother.

     Years later, after returning to the States, occasionally Mother was required to traverse a dark street, alley or parking structure all alone.  Intermittently she’d glance over her shoulder and wished-to-hell she saw Tulah-Rhum back there...shadowing her once again.

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     When Mom joined my dad at Digboi, India, in late 1939, she brought with her a nine-year-old daughter from a failed first marriage. Her christened name was Loa Ruth.  However, upon visiting the Huntington Library in San Marino, California, when Loa Ruth was five, Mom was struck at how closely her daughter resembled the young girl in the famous Gainsborough painting entitled: Pinkie. 

     Ergo Loa Ruth was nicknamed “Pinkie,” and it stuck throughout her life.  She had a sweet disposition as a kid, and grew up to be a fine woman, who in turn raised two outstanding sons.

     My mother installed Pinkie in a boarding school, run by missionaries, at a hill station directly north of the Darjeeling tea plantations.

     The missionary boarding school.

    

      Darjeeling tea plantations.

     Without any warning or preparation, Pinkie found herself plunked down in the middle of a school largely filled with the sons and daughters of rajas.  In fact, Pinkie shared a room with a Shan princess, possessing magnificently expressive dark eyes.  Talk about culture shock.  But Pinkie was flexible and soon fit right in.  Unable to pronounce her roommate’s name, Pinkie nicknamed the princess “Luise,” after her favorite film star: Luise Rainer.  According to Pinkie, Ms. Rainer and the princess shared similar exotic eyes.  The princess was highly amused and loved her new American nickname.

     Luise Rainer; 1937 from the film The Good Earth.

     Mom and Dad visited Pinky every third weekend and, because the school sat at the edge of a dense jungle, my mother was horrified to learn of a little game the kids played among themselves.  It was in regards to the screens covering the bedroom windows: Whichever pair of kids had their screens replaced the most number of times in a month...won the contest. 

     And what was damaging these screens?  You may well ask, dear reader.

     Each dorm room had twin single beds, closets, a screened transom over the door and one large window, with iron bars on the outside, and a screen on the inside; the transom and window providing ventilation and cooling.  Nonetheless, sometimes at night mountain leopards came out of the jungle, reached in through the bars and scratched at the screens.

     When Mother detected this bit of intelligence the screens, in the room of Luise and Pinkie, had been replaced on three occasions that month.  They had won the contest and were ever so proud. 

     Mom had an ulcer.

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