Every morning before six, Tan Beng Hock sweeps
the verandah of the old Chinese temple off
Kallang Road, lights three sticks of sandalwood,
and leaves two steamed buns for the hungry dead.
He doesn’t pray. He just shows up. The temple’s
owner, Madam Lim, pays him in rice and silence —
better than the factory shifts that broke his
father’s lungs.
When the British colonial office shuts down its
old Registry Wing at Fort Canning, they need
someone to stay overnight. No one wants it. Too
many stories: the clerk who vanished midaudit,
the inkwell that bled black for three days, the
sound of a typewriter clicking when no one was
there. The District Officer, a man who never
looked up from his pipe, assigns Beng Hock.
“You’re reliable,” he says. “And you don’t ask
why.” Beng Hock doesn’t get promoted. He gets
stuck with the job. That’s how it works.
The first night, the lights flicker. The filing
cabinet in Room 3B opens by itself. Inside: a
stack of documents stamped “APPROVED — TAN BENG
HOCK — PROMOTION TO CLERK GRADE 3.” He doesn’t
sign them. He leaves them. The next morning, his
name is on the payroll ledger. No interview. No
form. No stamp from the Registrar. Just his name,
typed neat, in the middle of a list of Europeans.
The rules are simple: stay till dawn. Don’t
touch the ink. Don’t answer the phone if it
rings after midnight. Don’t let the ghost know
you see her.
She comes every night at 1:17 a.m. — a woman in
a faded sari, her hair pinned with a broken comb,
her fingers hovering over the typewriter keys.
She types the same sentence over and over: “The
British don’t forget. The Chinese don’t forgive.
” Beng Hock learns her rhythm. He learns she
only types when someone tries to erase her name
from the records. Her last entry? “Lim Eng Siew —
Dismissed 1942.” A MalayChinese clerk who
vanished during the Occupation. No funeral. No
grave. Just a file marked “REMOVED.”
He starts leaving her tea. A cup. Always jasmine.
Always two sugars. He doesn’t speak. She doesn’t
stop typing.
On the seventh night, a white officer arrives to
audit the files. He throws Beng Hock’s promotion
papers on the floor. “You’re not qualified,” he
says. “Your mother was a fishmonger. Your father
was a coolie. You’re lucky to be sweeping
temples.” Beng Hock says nothing. He picks up
the papers. He places them back on the desk. He
waits.
At 1:17, the ghost types one final line: “TAN
BENG HOCK — PROMOTED 1957.” The typewriter jams.
Ink explodes across the page. The officer
screams when he sees it — the ink is still wet.
The stamp on the form glows faintly, red as a
temple lantern.
The next morning, Beng Hock walks into the new
office on High Street. His nameplate is fixed to
the door. His chair has a dent from where the
ghost sat. The other clerks don’t look at him.
They don’t ask how he got there. They just hand
him the next file.
He doesn’t smile. He doesn’t cry. He pours tea
into a chipped cup and leaves it on the corner
of his desk.
The building still smells of joss paper. But now,
it smells like salary.
