The collapse of the British colonial regime in Malaya changes the fate of four white men who are unable to change the inexorable course of events. A major official, Tolbot, consoles himself with his immoderate passion for food. Victor Krabbe is consumed by guilt over his dead first wife and does not notice how he is losing his second. Lawyer Hardman is forced to convert to Islam and marry a wealthy Malay widow. And priest Laforgue dreams of converting the Chinese to the Catholic faith. The prehistory of the destinies of the Englishmen Victor and Fenella Crabbe is told in the novel “The Time of the Tiger.”