The Long Journey Home

by Cecily Blench

  ‘Kate! It is you!’ Mi Khin hurtled forward and clutched Kate around the waist. ‘I’m happy to see you.’

  ‘You look even taller,’ said Kate, holding her out to look at her properly. Gone was the demure uniform of the children’s home. She wore a new purple longyi and a white blouse, and on her wrist were the bangles that Kate had sent months before. Her hair was done in a new, grown-up style that reminded Kate with a pang of Myia, crowned with fresh orchids.

  ‘Papa is here. Come and meet him!’

  Kate followed her into the dark teahouse, feeling unaccountably anxious. She had always hoped that this day would come, but the reality of handing over Mi Khin’s care to her surviving parent was very different to what she had imagined.

  Near the back a man in a light suit waved and stood to welcome her. ‘Miss Girton.’ He was younger than she had supposed, no more than forty, although his hair was heavily flecked with grey. There was something in his bearing that reminded her instantly of Edwin. He was more handsome but had the same shy sweetness about him. He looked almost entirely Indian, and only his deep blue eyes spoke of his English heritage.

  ‘You must be Mi Khin’s father.’ She shook his hand, reassured by his firm grip.

  ‘Joseph. I am so pleased to meet you at last, Miss Girton.’

  ‘Kate, please.’

  He pulled out two stools, knocking one of them over in the process, and at last, after some rearranging, they sat down together, all speaking nervously at once.

  Mi Khin beamed from one to the other, obviously delighted to have the two adults she knew best in the same place. Up close, she was very obviously his daughter; it was there in her nose and the dimples in her cheeks.

  A waiter appeared. ‘What would you like to eat?’ said Joseph, looking from Kate to Mi Khin.

  ‘Oh, anything,’ said Kate. ‘You order.’

  He spoke to the waiter in Burmese and she listened to the familiar words with regret. She had tried to learn a little Burmese while living in Rangoon, but the prevalence of English, not to mention the difficulty of the language and the alien script – and my laziness, she chided herself – had made the project an uphill struggle.

  ‘I’m starving,’ said Mi Khin. ‘We haven’t eaten for ages and ages.’

  ‘Since lunchtime,’ said Joseph, laughing at her.

  ‘It seems a long time ago.’

  ‘When did you arrive?’ asked Kate.

  ‘Yesterday afternoon,’ said Joseph. ‘We came down on the train from Simultala and then booked straight into a guest house.’

  ‘Papa came all the way from Bombay for me,’ said Mi Khin proudly.

  Joseph squeezed her hand. ‘I would have come from the ends of the earth.’

  ‘Your letter said you were in the army,’ said Kate.

  ‘I was in a barracks near Bombay, waiting to be discharged, when a telegram came last week to say that my daughter was still alive.’ He looked intently at her. ‘For more than three years I believed that I had lost her. I cannot express my gratitude to you for bringing her here safely.’

  Kate shook her head. ‘I did what anyone would have done. And besides, I was not alone. Mi Khin, have you told your father about our journey?’

  ‘A bit, while we were on the train,’ said Mi Khin. She fidgeted. ‘It makes me sad to talk about it.’

  Joseph stroked her hair. ‘You don’t have to talk about it yet if you don’t want to. All that matters to me is that you are here.’

  The waiter appeared again and began to set down large bowls of thick Shan noodles, and Kate breathed in deeply. The rich smell was instantly identifiable; with her eyes closed she might have been back there.

  ‘You miss Burma,’ said Joseph. ‘I understand that.’ He smiled ruefully, spooning up the broth from his bowl.

  ‘Why did you leave?’

  ‘I went to India on business in – I suppose it must have been early December 1941,’ he said. ‘I was only meant to be away for a few weeks.’

  ‘You said you wouldn’t be long,’ said Mi Khin reproachfully. ‘You said you’d be back soon.’

  ‘I tried, my darling,’ he said. ‘I really did. But the Japanese joined the war and when I went to get a flight back there were none going.’

  ‘You could have walked.’

  ‘I tried,’ said Joseph, running a hand through his hair. ‘I got as far as the border. But the army stopped me and forbade me from going any further. The Japanese were everywhere by that point.’ He sighed. ‘Anyway, I went back to Calcutta and went every day to the refugee office. I telephoned friends in Burma – most of them were already gone. I sent letters, telegrams, but no news came. Finally, someone said that they had seen my family leave our town in a truck, but they never arrived in Calcutta. The more time that passed, the more sure I was that my wife and daughter must be dead.’

  He rubbed his face, looking weary. ‘So I signed up. I had hoped to be sent into Burma but the army were retreating and so I ended up going to North Africa and then Italy and Greece.’

  ‘You were in Europe?’ said Mi Khin, eyes wide.

  ‘Yes, for a long time. We only came back a few weeks ago.’

  ‘What was it like?’

  Joseph looked thoughtful. ‘Cold,’ he said at last.

  It was strange to discover that while Kate had been in Burma and India, taking care of Mi Khin as best she could, the child’s father had been halfway across the world, closer to Kate’s home in England than she had been for a long time. What had those years been like for him? Fighting for a country that was not his own, on an unfamiliar and hostile continent, supposing his family lost.

  When Mi Khin disappeared to look for the WC, Kate put down her spoon abruptly.

  ‘Mr Smith—’

  ‘Joseph.’

  ‘How much do you know?’

  ‘About your journey? Very little.’ He sipped slowly at the soup in his bowl, looking at her closely, and then put his spoon down.

  ‘I was with your wife when she died.’

  He nodded, frowning slightly. ‘I did not know that. They told me that you found Mi Khin and that her mother was dead but I’ve hardly heard anything else, you know.’

  ‘That’s what I imagined.’ Kate shifted in her seat, feeling overheated and anxious. ‘I thought you ought to know.’ She watched him chewing his lip. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘You have nothing to be sorry for.’ He glanced around the teahouse. ‘This is not a conversation for now, I think.’

  ‘No. But – well – I’ll tell you anything you want to know.’

  ‘I’m grateful to you. Another time.’ He looked up, smiling bleakly, and she remembered Edwin talking about the night his wife had been killed.

  ‘How long will you be in Calcutta?’

  ‘A few days,’ he said, looking up as Mi Khin returned. ‘We’re going to do some sightseeing, aren’t we?’

  ‘And shopping!’

  ‘More shopping? What else do you want?’

  ‘Clothes. Sweets. Some paints.’

  ‘Are you an artist, now?’ said Kate. ‘What kind of paintings do you do?’

  ‘All kinds,’ said Mi Khin, picking at the noodles in her bowl. ‘The art mistress was cross at me and said I wasn’t to paint any more.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘She didn’t like my pictures. She said they were too scary and that I ought to paint nice things.’

  ‘We’ll get you some paints,’ said Joseph, his arm around her shoulders. ‘And you can paint whatever you like.’

  ‘I’m sorry the teachers did that, Mi Khin. They shouldn’t have stopped you,’ said Kate.

  ‘It’s all right. In the end Mrs Princeton said I was allowed to paint again.’

  ‘Did she?’ said Kate, smiling. ‘Perhaps she’s not so bad.’

  ‘Ah, yes, the formidable Mrs Princeton,’ said Joseph ruminatively. ‘Quite a character, I thought.’

  ‘She cried a bit when I left,’ said Mi Khin.

  ‘She’s fond of you,�
�� said Kate. ‘It must be hard to say goodbye to the girls who come through her care.’

  Mi Khin nodded. ‘I’m glad to be with Papa, now, though.’ She smiled up at him.

  ‘You too, my darling.’ He hugged her, and over Mi Khin’s head Kate saw his tired, worried face. She felt apprehensive on his behalf about the great task that awaited him. He would have to get to know his daughter again after four years apart; pick up the pieces of an old life and remake it.

  ‘Are you planning to stay in India?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Joseph, looking down at his daughter. ‘We both thought – a fresh start – it would be very hard to go back to Burma now. My mother lives near Madras, so we’ll go there soon.’

  ‘What about the seaside?’ said Mi Khin.

  He laughed. ‘Perhaps, little one. There will be plenty of time for going to the seaside. Don’t you want to see your grandmother?’

  ‘Of course,’ said Mi Khin indignantly. She turned to Kate. ‘My grandfather was a real Englishman, you know. Just like Fred.’

  ‘She’ll be so happy to see you,’ said Kate, thinking of her own mother.

  ‘I was three when I last saw her,’ said Mi Khin. She looked up at her father. ‘Do you think she’s forgotten me?’

  ‘No one could forget you.’

  59

  Calcutta, December 1945

  Whenever she could find the time that week, Kate spent it with Mi Khin and Joseph, joining them as they explored the city. She did not want to intrude on their reunion, but they begged her to come with them and it was hard to resist. These extra days were precious and she wanted to make the most of each one before they left for good.

  It felt like an atonement of sorts for the years that she had not been there for Mi Khin when she most needed her, although she could not undo what had been done.

  Joseph was attentive and they talked more openly than she could remember doing with anyone for a long time. She felt relaxed enough in his company to tell him about things she had tried for three years to forget. She told him about his wife Hla Pemala’s death at Shinbwiyang and how Fred was the one who had rescued Mi Khin. She told him about her father and how hard it was to go home. She told him about Edwin, her dearest friend. She even told him how she had killed a man.

  ‘But I never see his face in my nightmares. Isn’t that strange? I see all the others, but never him.’

  They were watching Mi Khin playing with other children in the street during the Kali Puja festival, as elaborate statues were carried past on palanquins. Nearby, someone set off a firecracker, and people laughed as they drew patterns on the pavement in coloured chalk.

  Joseph turned to her. ‘You know, deep down, that you did the right thing. That’s why. You saved my daughter’s life. If you carry any guilt, please forget it now.’

  ‘Can it be that easy?’

  ‘None of this is easy.’

  He, in turn, told her of the war, and how, in the battlefields of Europe, watching friends falling all around him and feeling utterly alone, he had often longed for death.

  ‘I do not know how I survived,’ he said.

  ‘You survived for her,’ said Kate, nodding towards Mi Khin. ‘Perhaps you knew deep down that she was alive and needed you.’ She saw his face soften as he looked at his daughter.

  They walked home from the festival, Mi Khin holding hands with them both, her sleepy feet stumbling occasionally. Joseph was quiet and Kate felt a pang to think that he and Mi Khin would be gone tomorrow. The houses that they passed were lit with dozens of candles and sparklers twinkled in the distance.

  They reached the guest house, where Joseph had rented a bungalow, and Kate looked at Mi Khin with a sigh. ‘Well – this is it, little one. I must go. I’ll get a rickshaw, I think.’

  ‘And I think it’s your bedtime, Mi Khin,’ said Joseph.

  ‘Won’t you come in and tuck me in?’ Mi Khin asked Kate plaintively. ‘Like you used to? Just this once?’

  ‘I’m sure your father wants to do that.’

  ‘We can both do it. That is, if you don’t mind. She’s so thrilled to see you again.’

  In Mi Khin’s room, Kate pulled back the mosquito net and helped her into bed, laughing at the old-fashioned English nightgown that had been a parting gift from the school.

  ‘Mrs Princeton says I’m too old for bedtime stories,’ said Mi Khin, lying back. ‘I suppose she’s right.’

  ‘Nonsense! Would you like a story?’

  ‘Perhaps just one.’ Mi Khin frowned and then sighed. ‘I won’t see you again after today, will I?’

  ‘Not for a long time, I’m afraid. But you’re going to have a wonderful time with your father, Mi Khin. You can’t stay in Calcutta forever.’

  ‘But you’ll stay in touch?’

  ‘Of course.’ She kissed Mi Khin’s forehead. ‘What story would you like?’

  ‘You choose.’

  Kate dredged up a fairy tale from her memory and, as usual, it bore little resemblance to the version she had been told as a child – was it a magical hat or a shoe? – but Mi Khin didn’t seem to mind, and she listened drowsily. Kate thought of the stories she had told each night in circumstances much less comfortable than these, shivering on a darkened hillside and listening to the rain falling all around. Three years and a lifetime ago.

  Joseph watched from the doorway for some time and Kate was aware of his gaze. At one point she glanced at him and he looked away but kept listening.

  At last, when Mi Khin was asleep, Kate stood and tiptoed from the room. Joseph smiled as she closed the door.

  ‘Drink?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you.’

  He made her a gin and tonic, apologising for the lack of ice, and they stood by the window, looking out at the night.

  ‘I’ve been drinking too much,’ he said, swirling his glass in his hand. ‘All of this . . .’

  ‘How does it feel? Getting her back?’

  ‘Bittersweet. I thought I’d lost everything.’ He took a gulp.

  ‘Not quite everything.’

  ‘No.’ He looked at her. ‘And what about you?’

  ‘What about me?’

  ‘You’ve lost a lot, too. What does the rest of your life look like?’

  ‘I can hardly remember what normal life is like,’ she said quietly. ‘I feel frozen. I worry sometimes that I’ll never . . .’ She felt tears starting and wiped them away.

  He took the glass from her hand and set it down with his own on the table, and suddenly he was folding her in his arms, stroking her back, kissing her hair. She looked up and he kissed her, pulling her tighter to him.

  Suddenly he stopped and pulled away. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, running a hand roughly through his black hair, looking anxious and embarrassed.

  ‘It’s all right,’ she murmured, and pulled him back towards her, feeling desire surging as she pressed against him. ‘It’s all right.’ She could not remember the last time she had been held this way, feeling him cradle the back of her head, his lips warm on hers.

  He pulled her into his room and closed the door. Silently, quickly, they undressed, hands fumbling. He looked at her intently for a moment, taking in every detail, and for once she didn’t care about the scars and the stretch marks. After a moment he knelt down before her as she leaned back against the door and felt his breath on her thighs. Her fists clenched and unclenched and she could hear the blood roaring in her ears, filling the quiet room with noise.

  At last she pulled him up and kissed him before pushing him onto the edge of the bed, lowering herself onto him. The frame creaked, making them both giggle. Joseph put a finger to his lips and looked towards the door, moving his hands to her hips, his breath quickening. He was flushed and looked wonderingly at her as she moved against him, bracing herself against the bed, his fingers tight on her skin. The world contracted.

  At last she leaned against him and her breath became ragged, then suddenly she was holding him tight and kissing his face, his ear, the side of his
neck, feeling her head and her heart pounding.

  60

  Calcutta, December 1945

  Lying under a tree, Kate drifted. She could hear traffic in the distance and the shouts of people in the street, but it all seemed a long way away. She had been here for most of the morning, since waking early, and the shade was starting to move away from her. She could feel her feet and her face burning. A book lay beside her head, unheeded.

  Suddenly the heat on her toes was gone and she realised that someone was standing nearby, their shadow falling across her feet. No one except her ever came to this quiet corner of the cemetery. She squinted, dazzled by the sky.

  ‘They said I’d find you here,’ said Joseph, moving so that his shadow covered her face. He sat down nearby, making sure to shade her face still, and watched her.

  Kate closed her eyes. ‘Where’s Mi Khin?’

  ‘Helping the landlady to paint a mural back at the guest house.’

  ‘She’ll like that.’

  ‘Yes. Someone mentioned mango ices.’

  Kate sighed and sat up, brushing the dry grass off her dress. She frowned and studied his expression. ‘What are you doing here, Joseph?’

  ‘I wanted to talk to you. Before we leave.’

  ‘All right.’ She folded her arms, feeling warm sweat in the crooks of her elbows.

  ‘Don’t do this, Kate.’

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Close yourself off. I can see you doing it. Hardening your heart against me – and Mi Khin.’

  ‘I’m very fond of you both,’ said Kate stiffly.

  Joseph shook his head, looking frustrated, and was silent. He pulled at the grass between his feet, and she saw again the callouses and burns on his hands.

  ‘This is how I survive,’ she said, although she no longer believed the words as she said them.

  ‘By not trusting anyone?’

  ‘I trusted Edwin,’ said Kate. ‘My best friend. On the way out of Burma there were others that I trusted – even loved. And they’re all gone.’ She shook her head, remembering Fred’s stolid calm. ‘I can’t do it again. I can’t.’