The Language of Solitude

by Jan-Philipp Sendker

  “Where is the letter for me?” she asked almost sullenly. “Where is the letter for my mother?”

  Yin-Yin put the envelope away. “There’s . . . He . . . Don’t forget what circumstances he wrote this under—”

  Christine interrupted her. “You don’t need to defend your father. He had many years to write us a letter.” She did not want to argue, and she could feel that every further word said would only make her more furious. Instead, she was overcome by a deep sadness.

  After a long pause, Christine asked, “Does Paul know about it?”

  “Yes. Xiao Hu told him about it in Shanghai.”

  They got off the train at Central and walked silently to the ferry terminal. She did not want to explain herself. Why hadn’t Paul told her anything? She presumed he had wanted to protect her.

  They said good-bye at the pier with a quick hug. Christine watched her niece walk up the swaying gangway, headphones in her ears. How she had changed in the weeks since they had first met. China years, she thought. Now she too had lived through China years. She waved briefly and watched the ferry until it was gone from view beyond the pier.

  She hated saying good-bye to people, whether at the ferry terminal, the train station, or the airport. The loneliness of being left behind, the emptiness and the sudden silence that enveloped her, was so difficult to break out of. Christine sat down on the steps leading to the pier and took out her cell phone. She had to hear Paul’s voice. A few words would be enough.

  “Talk to me,” she said.

  “What’s happened?” he asked, worried.

  “Nothing.” She swallowed her tears. It was not the right moment.

  “You don’t sound well.”

  “Just talk to me about something,” she repeated in a tired voice. “I need to hear your voice.”

  “I love you.”

  “More.”

  “You are the heart of my happiness. You are my rose, my love. You are everything I have. More?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re hungry for love.”

  Christine could see his smile. “Aren’t we all?”

  “Some more than others.”

  She could have ended the call there. She didn’t need more than that. “Paul, I love you. More than anything. Don’t ever leave me.”

  “Never. You sound so sad.”

  “I am.”

  “Why?”

  “The dinner.”

  “Didn’t it go well?”

  “No. It was very difficult.”

  “Why?”

  Christine hesitated. She didn’t want to talk about her brother’s betrayal now, or about why Paul had not told her about it. “You know what my mother is like. She can be very difficult. I didn’t get the feeling that she was especially interested in her granddaughter.”

  “And what about Yin-Yin?”

  “She tried her best.”

  “I’m sorry. I know how important it was to you.”

  “It’s my family,” she said, hoping he would understand what she meant.

  “I know. But it’s growing, and the new members will be more talkative, I promise.”

  “I sense that,” she said, wishing she could take the next ferry to Lamma.

  XXIV

  * * *

  He had just switched off the light when his cell phone rang. CHRISTINE was displayed on the tiny screen. They had talked earlier that evening. Christine had wanted to lie down because she was feeling nauseated and her limbs were aching; she had promised to call again tomorrow. She had turned down his offer to come to her apartment. It wasn’t that bad.

  A stranger’s voice on the phone. Paul knew immediately that something was wrong. Tita Ness. Sorry, who? It took him a few seconds to realize who it was. The Filipina maid. She was very agitated, and he had trouble understanding her. Mrs. Wu. Not good. On the way to hospital. Bleeding. Very sudden. Kwun Tong Hospital. Paul looked at his watch: 11:17 p.m.

  The last ferry from Yung Shue Wan to Central was leaving in thirteen minutes. Almost no chance, he thought immediately, then he started moving without thinking. Slipped on his underwear, grabbed a shirt and pants from his closet, dressed, and ran out of the house. It had been raining. The tiles on the terrace were wet. He slipped and fell, got up, and kept running. He took the shortcut down the steps, bounding down them four or five at a time. He lost his balance at a landing and crashed backward into a trash can, which fell over with a loud clang. He hurried on down to the village, where he heard the bell signaling the closing of the gates to the ferry. He ran past Green Cottage like a man possessed, and past the Island Bar, shouting for them to wait for him. Wait! Wait! When he got to the post office he heard the low rumble of a ship’s motor in reverse gear. When he came to a stop on the pier, the ferry had turned around and was on the way to Hong Kong.

  The next ship left at 6:20 a.m. Apart from medical emergencies, when acutely ill or injured persons had to be evacuated from the island by helicopter, it was the only way to leave the island. He was trapped. Paul wondered if it was possible to swim to Hong Kong. The East Lamma Channel at Pak Kok was a little more than a mile wide, but the current was strong, there was a lot of shipping traffic at night, and the weather was poor. There had been a strong wind blowing all day, and it had gained in strength that evening. He looked at the water and saw white crests on the waves in the light cast from the pier. He couldn’t swim in that. His only chance was to find a private boat that would take him over.

  Paul tried to reach Christine on the phone, but neither she nor Tita Ness answered. He ran to the Island Bar, where there were still a few people, British and Australians who had lived on the island for a long time and knew him by sight. When Paul explained why he needed to get to Hong Kong as quickly as possible, silence fell in the bar. No, none of them had a boat. But the bartender knew a fisherman who had a small motorboat that was moored in the harbor. He lived around the corner, just up the steps, in the upper part of the village.

  The fisherman had already gone to bed. He opened the door grumpily. He was a head shorter and few years older than Paul. He looked suspiciously at the barefoot stranger who was drenched in sweat and whose gray hair was sticking to his face. At this hour? He shook his head.

  Paul offered him a thousand Hong Kong dollars.

  No.

  Two thousand.

  The old fisherman sized him up more thoroughly but shook his head again.

  Three thousand.

  At least he was awake now. He stepped out of the door, looked at the dark sky, the palm leaves swaying in the wind, and the churning sea. In this weather? No.

  Five thousand.

  No.

  Ten.

  Can you swim?

  Paul nodded.

  Did he have the money with him?

  Paul said no. Explained, appealed, showed his Hong Kong ID card. Promised. Ten thousand. In cash. Tomorrow evening, latest.

  The man gave a long sigh. Okay. Ten minutes, at the pier.

  Paul ran back, only now noticing how cool it was. His bare feet were cold; he could hardly feel them. In the bar, someone asked him if they could lend him more clothing; he got a windbreaker and some shoes that pinched his toes.

  The fisherman brought a faded yellow life vest with him and tossed it to Paul. Then he climbed onto a tiny square raft and paddled out to his boat, which was fastened to a buoy sixty-five feet offshore. He untied the rope, fiddled with the motor, pulled a strap a few times until the motor sprang to life with an unsteady rattle, and picked Paul up from the breakwater.

  It was an old wooden boat, barely fifteen feet long, and wide enough for only one person. In it were two oars for an emergency, a fish trap, a net, bamboo poles, Styrofoam markers, and a plastic pail.

  To balance the weight better, Paul sat at the bow. The fisherman passed him a powerful flashlight to search the black waters for big pieces of driftwood. They ducked as they passed underneath the pier and kept as close to the shore as possible. Despite that, the boat began to b
ob up and down. Paul knew that this was only the beginning; it would get worse when they rounded the tip of the island at Shek Ko Tsui and crossed open water in the channel between Lamma and Hong Kong.

  He thought about Christine, and tried to calm down. What might have happened? There were only two weeks left to the due date, so this was not a matter of a preterm delivery with all the complications and risks that implied. The pregnancy had progressed with no particular problems until now, apart from frequent morning sickness and water collecting in Christine’s arms and legs. She had been able to carry on working until yesterday, and had spent the summer and the fall preparing for her new life. She had rearranged Paul’s house, given notice on his future mother-in-law’s small apartment in Hang Hau, and found her a new one in Yung Shue Wan. As soon as Christine had found a tenant for her apartment, she, Josh, her mother, and the baby would move to Lamma.

  The regular prenatal appointments had not given any cause for concern. According to the results of the early diagnostic tests, the baby was healthy. Nevertheless, the astrologer’s words still haunted him.

  You will give life. You will take life. These first two predictions had come true. Not a day passed in which he did not think of the third prediction, even though he had grown calmer in recent weeks, when the doctors had reassured him that the baby was now able to survive a preterm birth.

  You will lose life.

  Paul saw the blinking of the beacon marking the tip of the island. They would be traveling alongside land for about a hundred yards more. Now fifty, thirty . . . Paul turned and tried to look the fisherman in the eye. He was standing upright at the stern, with his legs spread wide, one hand on the motor and the other holding a cigarette that had gone out. Ten more . . . five more . . .

  The first broadside crashed into them with full force, making the whole boat shake. The water pounded the side of the boat relentlessly in dull thuds. Paul put the flashlight away and clutched the sides of the boat with both hands in order not to be pitched overboard. The fisherman too was now sitting down, and holding on to the stern of the boat. The spray had completely drenched both men in seconds. Fat, salty drops of water ran down their faces. The wind was coming from the northwest, chasing dark clouds over the night sky illuminated by the city. Paul, who had always thought himself seaworthy, felt as sick as a dog. Waves crashed into the boat over and over again, and it slowly began to fill with water. The fisherman shouted something at him, but was drowned out by the noise. He spat out a few curses in Cantonese and pointed at the pail. Paul tried to hold on to the boat with one hand and use the other to bail water out of the boat. Suddenly the boat pitched upward so steeply that he fell backward and his back crashed into the side of the boat. Their boat was at a dangerous angle. Paul crawled back to the bow on all fours. The fisherman was shouting something again, but it was carried away in another direction by the wind.

  From one second to another, the storm abated, and the sea grew a little calmer. They had made it into the shadow of a container ship that was moored offshore by Lamma. Their boat was heading straight for the black side of the ship, which rose in front of them like a sea monster that seemed never-ending. Paul shuddered as he saw how small they were compared with the freighter. They traveled through calmer waters for a few minutes. Paul bailed water out of the boat with both hands, as quickly as he could. The fisherman slowed the boat down a little, as though he wanted to draw breath before making the great leap across the East Lamma Channel. They had barely passed the container ship when they took a sharp dip. The wind was now blowing at them straight on, just like the swell, which was much greater than it had seemed from land. Paul looked at the lights of Hong Kong in front of them. The high-rise buildings appeared so near, and yet impossibly distant at the same time. If they capsized, they would not be able to swim the distance in this storm, neither to Hong Kong nor back to Lamma. Their only hope would be to be seen by a ship and be rescued.

  Two large ships were approaching from port and starboard; they would have to cross their paths. For a moment, Paul wondered if they could do it, or if they should turn back instead. Once more, he tried to catch the fisherman’s eye, but the man ignored him. He had eyes only for the two freighters, and he seemed to be calculating a route that would bring them through the two vessels. They headed toward the ship approaching from port side. Paul couldn’t see a gap, only walls of steel towering over them. The captain must have thought they were blind or crazy; he had sounded his horn three times, sending it echoing in the night. Soon they were so near that Paul could even see small patches of rust on the side of the vessel. They reached the eddy around the stern, turned ninety degrees, and with another daring turn, the fisherman had them on course again. The second freighter appeared directly in front of them, and the swell around its bow hit the side of their boat at an angle. Paul fell forward onto his stomach and felt a sharp pain in his head.

  He stayed facedown, and heard the fisherman shout, but did not move. The boat was beginning to fill with water frighteningly fast again, so Paul began to bail water again from a prone position. Faster, he heard the old man scream, faster, faster! After a few minutes, the waves grew less powerful. Paul lifted his head and saw Green Island at what he estimated to be six hundred feet distance. They had reached the wind shelter of the island.

  The fisherman set Paul down at a small jetty by Kennedy Town; he would spend the rest of the night in the harbor. As arranged, Paul gave him his ID card for security, thanked him, and ran to the road. There must be a taxi, even at this hour. His shoes were tight and soaked with water; he pulled them off and ran on barefoot.

  The first taxi driver stopped, saw what state his prospective passenger was in, and drove on. The second did the same. The third wanted to know if Paul had come from a shipwreck. Something like that, he said, and asked the driver to take him to the hospital in Kwun Tong by the quickest route possible.

  Paul curled up in the backseat, shivering all over. The trembling did not get any better, even when the heating in the car was turned up so high that the driver started sweating and rolled down a window. Paul was trembling not just from the cold. The fear was worse. Nothing must happen to Christine. She was everything that he had left. He wanted to tell the doctors that if they had to decide between saving the life of the mother or the child, they should save Christine.

  The clock showed that it was just past two in the morning when they reached the hospital. The trauma and emergency unit knew who he was talking about immediately. The pregnant woman with the bleeding, whose waters had broken. She was on the maternity ward, third floor. Before they could say anything else, Paul had disappeared up the stairs.

  The labor ward was busy even at this late hour. Women and men in green and white uniforms hurried down the corridors, and no one took any notice of Paul’s strange appearance: a tall Westerner, breathless, in a white shirt and white pants, so wet that his clothing clung to him, barefoot, holding a pair of shoes dripping water. He heard loud groaning coming from a room, and the soothing voice of a nurse; from another room came the piteous screams of a newborn.

  He found Christine in the next room. She was lying in bed dressed only in a white nightgown, with no cover, with a drip by her side. She was hooked up to a cardiogram that was monitoring the baby’s heartbeat and her contractions. Her smile when she saw him. She was pale and sweating. Her lips were cracked. What was wrong with her eyes? Either they had given her medication, or the exhaustion had drawn a veil over her gaze. He took her hand and kissed her on her forehead, her eyes, her mouth. My darling. My little one. Are you all right? Is everything okay?

  A nurse came in, looked at him in surprise, and wanted to know who he was.

  The father, Paul said. The young woman gave Christine a questioning look and she nodded in confirmation.

  Your wife is doing well, the midwife said. The baby’s heartbeat was normal and the contractions were still weak. The waters had broken, but there was no cause for concern. The doctor would carry out a caesare
an section soon. He was just busy with another birth at the moment.

  No cause for concern. The wrong words.

  Christine realized that. She pressed his hands. Paul pulled a chair up to the bed and sat down. He wanted to be strong for her, but he felt only how weak he was. After Justin’s death, he had really thought that there would never be anything else that he need be afraid of. Now he was learning otherwise.

  “Rest,” he said, in a low voice.

  “Why are you so wet?”

  “I’ve been swimming.”

  She laughed and closed her eyes. Suddenly she clutched his hand and bit her lips, raised herself, groaned, and sank back onto the pillow.

  “Can I do anything for you?” he asked with concern. He could not remember any of the many breathing techniques that they had learned in the prenatal classes.

  “Stay by my side, that’s enough,” she said. “You mustn’t be worried.”

  “I’ve been trying to convince myself of that during the pregnancy. It’s not that simple.”

  “Trust in Master Wong.”

  “Why him especially?” Paul had tried to sound casual, but Christine lifted her head, amazed at the fear in his voice.

  “Because all his predictions come true.”

  “Please, please no.”

  “Why not? He prophesied that you would give life.”

  “Yes. And?”

  “In a few minutes it will happen. What could go wrong? Apart from that, he would have said.”

  “What?”

  “If something were to happen to me or the baby.”

  “Don’t say that,” Paul said.

  “Do you still not trust in the stars?” she asked. “People need something that they can believe in, don’t they?”

  “I— I don’t know,” he said. “I can’t say that I believe in them. But I can’t say that I don’t believe in them either.”

  She smiled again. “You’re much more Chinese than I thought.”

  He saw the next contraction coming in her face. Only now did he become aware of the strange noise that filled the whole room. How could he not have heard it before? A mysterious pounding. A completely unique sound, one that reminded him of a horse galloping. Fast and relentless. For a long moment, he did not know what it was. It was his baby’s heartbeat. He could hear the heart of his unborn son.