Every night at 11.30pm, the HDB block on Tiong

Bahru Road hums with the sound of fans and

distant radio static — but on the fifth floor,

the old Peranakan house stays silent. No one

dares knock after dark. The widow, Madam Lim,

keeps a brass kerosene lamp on the altar, lit

since 1947, when her father’s ship vanished off

the coast of Malaya. The lamp was taken from a

British officer’s cabin during the Occupation.

No one knows it carries the ghost of

LieutenantColonel Hargreaves — a man who ordered

the execution of three Malay fishermen for

smuggling rice to starving Chinese families. His

spirit never left. It feeds on guilt.

Lina, a Filipina FDW from Davao, works for Madam

Lim. She doesn’t believe in ghosts. But her

sevenyearold son in Manila is fading — fever

that won’t break, doctors saying it’s “spiritual

exhaustion.” A tindahan auntie whispers: “If you

want to save him, steal the lamp. The ghost only

takes what was stolen first.” The rule bites:

only someone who’s been colonised can touch it.

Only someone who knows what it means to be

erased.

On the night of the Mooncake Festival, Madam Lim

leaves for the temple. Lina climbs the attic.

The lamp is wrapped in a sarong, still warm. As

she lifts it, the air thickens. The walls bleed

black ink — not paint, but names. Hundreds. All

from 1942. The ghost doesn’t roar. It hums. A

tune. A lullaby. Her son’s lullaby.

She runs. Down the stairs. Through the void

where the old kampong used to be. Behind her,

the lamp grows heavier. Not with weight — with

memory. She feels the fisherman’s last breath.

The British officer’s boot on his chest. The

child’s cry in the rain.

At the bus stop, she smashes the lamp against

the concrete. Glass shatters. Ink soaks into the

pavement. The ghost doesn’t scream. It sighs.

And for the first time since 1947, the HDB block

sleeps quiet.

Two days later, Lina’s son wakes up. His fever

gone. In her employer’s drawer, Madam Lim finds

a single dried frangipani flower — not hers. On

the altar, the brass base remains. Cold. Empty.

The ghost is gone. Not banished. Set free.

The rule bites again: you can’t steal a ghost.

Only return what was stolen.

Lina quits. Takes her savings. Buys a ticket.

Doesn’t look back.

The lamp’s base is now in the National Museum.

Label reads: “Recovered from Tiong Bahru, 1963.

Donor anonymous. No provenance.”

No one knows the ghost was never in the lamp.

It was in the silence.

And Lina gave it back.