The Silk Merchant’s Daughter

by Dinah Jefferies

  ‘It must mean a lot to you.’

  ‘It means everything.’

  ‘I didn’t expect you to take it so seriously.’

  They went on to talk about the family’s main department store on Rue Paul Bert and how the profits were dwindling. Sylvie had plans, she said, big plans for when the present trouble was over. She seemed so certain it would be over.

  ‘Look, I wish we could start again,’ Sylvie said.

  ‘From when?’

  ‘Way back … when we were children, I suppose.’

  Nicole sighed. If only it were that easy. ‘Do you remember when you told everyone I was adopted?’

  ‘Oh dear, I was awful, wasn’t I?’

  Nicole grinned. ‘Only sometimes.’

  ‘It wasn’t all me. You left a dead mouse in my bed.’

  ‘You and your friends excluded me.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’ Sylvie paused. ‘Can’t we try a little harder?’

  ‘To do what?’

  ‘To like each other …’

  There was a brief silence while Nicole thought about it. The truth was that when they were children there had been times when Sylvie had stuck up for her. She’d helped with maths homework too, and had been kind when Nicole woke trembling from the nightmare of drowning in the Perfume River. A sister relationship was complicated, and so heavily rooted in half-remembered childhood events.

  ‘Tell you what, I’m going to the lantern village tomorrow,’ Sylvie said. ‘There’s a festival. Would you like to come too?’

  Nicole didn’t answer but bent down behind the counter. She came up with a string-tied white paper parcel. ‘Here are your eight metres. It’s lovely, this cream. The best silk we have. What do you want it for?’

  ‘Just my bottom drawer.’

  Nicole didn’t raise her eyes. What was really going on? Could her sister be hoping that Mark would propose?

  She felt a burst of anger, her heart banging against her ribs, and she only looked up when she was confident that her distress didn’t show. But still it felt like a punch to the stomach and she was sick with jealousy. If he and her sister were as close as Sylvie was implying then it really was all over for her.

  ‘So how is Mark?’ Nicole said, aiming for nonchalance, but desperate to find out more.

  Sylvie tapped her watch repeatedly. ‘Oh, busy, you know. Like me. In fact, he’s away in Saigon most of the time. So do you want to come to the festival? We could meet at Hoàn Kiếm Lake at four?’

  The festival of lanterns was an evening affair, but Sylvie had suggested arriving early so they could watch some of the lanterns being made. Nicole had only agreed to go in order to quiz her sister about Mark, and had decided to invite O-Lan to come along for moral support.

  ‘The lantern makers here came from Hoi An originally,’ O-Lan was saying as they left the car and walked into the heart of the village, where lanterns were hanging in readiness for the evening. While some were in the shape of dragons’ heads, others resembled fish and a few were simple boxes decorated with streamers. ‘The frames are made of aged bamboo,’ O-Lan said. ‘They soak it in salt water for several days.’

  ‘Why?’ Sylvie asked, seeming like her usual calm self again.

  ‘It protects them from worms and moths.’

  ‘The silk is beautiful,’ Nicole said, fingering a red lantern recently displayed. In the shape of a mythical beast, the colours looked as if they were on fire.

  ‘All the silk comes from my family’s village,’ O-Lan said.

  Nicole nodded. ‘Let’s buy one, Sylvie, for the garden at home. We could have a full-moon party.’

  ‘I’m not sure Papa would agree to that, but it would look lovely. These are much bigger than the paper lanterns we have at home.’ Sylvie grinned. ‘In fact, I think we should buy several. And you could hang one in the shop.’

  They went into a shop to watch the owner making one. A strong smell of incense rose from a coil in the corner and Sylvie began to cough. They went back outside, where the scent still lingered but was less overpowering.

  ‘Heavens,’ she said, ‘how many different herbs were in that?’

  ‘As many as fifteen,’ O-Lan said.

  ‘Too many for me. By the way, how’s your mother, O-Lan? I heard she was ill.’

  Nicole was surprised at this. She couldn’t remember telling Sylvie.

  ‘A bit better, thank you.’

  As the daylight faded and the November air cooled, the lanterns were lit and, once the night had properly settled, dozens of them punctuated the darkness, making the sky seem even blacker in contrast. The main road was only a dirt track but it was well trodden and not muddy.

  The girls walked on and, reaching a crossroads, came to a simple stage, surrounded by smaller lanterns suspended from ropes between the trees. Excited children were running round the stage, calling to each other and dodging the adults busily trying to collar them. Half a dozen dogs joined in too and the atmosphere was buzzing.

  As several musicians took to the stage and the sound of drums took over, Nicole swayed to the music; inside, though, she was so full of anxiety she was surprised it didn’t show. Three men came on to dance with a huge red and gold silk dragon. The men held it high above them, each one carrying two long sticks which they used to articulate the creature; its monstrous head, bulging eyes and the paper flames pouring from its flaring nostrils were mesmerizing.

  The older Vietnamese still believed everything contained a spirit, including lakes, rivers and trees. The festival was a ritual to honour the spirits of light and it was critical that every year they make it as beautiful as possible to ensure the continuing of the sunlight. The belief was, if mankind did the right thing, they could influence the spirits to look on them with benevolence.

  Nicole could see the way the dragon symbolized power and prosperity, and turned round to speak to Sylvie, but her sister wasn’t there. O-Lan, caught up in the show, carried on watching as Nicole fought her way through to the back of the crowd.

  ‘There you are,’ she said when she spotted Sylvie.

  ‘I’ve bought two dragon heads. Look!’ Sylvie held them up. ‘Of course, they’ll look better with light inside, but aren’t they beautiful? And I knocked the man down on the price.’

  Nicole ran her fingers over the silk. ‘They are exquisite,’ she said.

  ‘Here, you carry one.’ Sylvie passed a lantern to Nicole and then linked arms with her. ‘It’s so nice to spend time together, isn’t it? We don’t do it enough. Shall we find something to eat now?’

  ‘We need to wait for O-Lan.’

  ‘Oh yes, of course, I didn’t mean we should go without her.’

  ‘Actually, why don’t you wait for O-Lan and I’ll run back to the car with the lanterns? If we try to eat while carrying them, they’ll only be ruined.’

  Before passing her the other lantern Sylvie touched Nicole’s arm. ‘I know I should have said so before but I am sorry about what happened at the ball.’

  ‘Mark?’

  ‘I meant the dress.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘But Mark too. I didn’t realize you thought there was anything more than friendship between you.’

  Nicole shook her head. ‘There wasn’t anything more than friendship. Not really.’ It wasn’t true but she didn’t want to give Sylvie the satisfaction of knowing how devastated she really felt.

  ‘Well, I realize now you hoped there might have been. I wish there was something I could say to make it all right.’

  Nicole looked into her sister’s eyes. Lit by a lantern hanging from a branch just above her head, Sylvie’s eyes looked moist and sincere. Instead of asking questions, Nicole felt more confused and worse than ever.

  17

  Soon after the night of the festival a sparkling day lifted Nicole’s spirits, with the heat tempered by a silvery breeze and a comfortable humidity. Like many Hanoians, she loved September. The cool dry weather was still bright and along the streets the trees flaunted their re
d and yellow leaves. The sky was a more intense blue, and the lakes glittered, greener than in the rainy weather. Large white daisies and yellow sunflowers grew on every scrap of land, but she especially loved the fragrance of milk flowers in the cool of the evening. The tiny white flowers on the tree in their garden also bloomed on a few trees lining the city streets, and there was talk of planting many more when the war with the Vietminh was won. Their blossom infused the air with a bitter-sweet fragrance and, as the wind blew, Nicole thought the fluttering white flowers looked like falling snow.

  It made her feel happy and as she walked to the shop she thought of their life in Huế, recalling a day when her father had taken her beyond the usual Huế villages to a distant hamlet of bronze casters. He’d been looking for a birthday present for Sylvie. Nicole racked her brain trying to remember what he’d bought. The next day he’d taken Nicole to a silk village to show her how silk was made.

  There she had seen the three stages of silk production for the first time and had fallen in love. The first stage was the cultivation of the mulberry trees. Next came the breeding of the silkworms and the extraction of the thread from the cocoons. The silkworms ate the mulberry leaves and after they had transformed into pupae they were killed by dipping them in boiling water before the adult moths emerged. She’d felt rather sorry for the poor little pupae, bred only to produce a silk that, once the whole cocoon unravelled in the spinning, would come out as one continuous thread. After that they were cooked and eaten. The third stage, and the most exciting, was weaving the threads into cloth.

  Nicole glanced at the street stalls she passed. It was market day, and everyone was milling about, picking up produce or gossiping on the corners. Feeling buoyant, she swung her arms as she walked. Everyone loved to haggle and she listened to the laughter and the sound of voices raised in friendly argument. As the day grew hotter she paused to buy a strong tea from the boy with the little teacups hanging from a bamboo pole, thinking about what she would be doing that day. She glanced up and spotted Yvette standing between two parked cars. Perhaps she’d invite the child to spend some time in the silk shop again. Yvette waved and Nicole lifted her hand to wave back.

  Without warning, a deafening blast hurled debris twenty metres up in the air, before showering the street as it fell. Instead of waving at Yvette, Nicole’s hands flew to cover her ears and she was thrown back into an alleyway. Fear swept through the street: children crying and running for their mothers; people screaming and shouting; men calling out and women standing rooted to the spot in disbelief. Nicole half saw it all happen, half heard it, but as smoke thickened the air, it nevertheless became clear that two cars were still on fire. Her body felt strangely heavy as she stepped out from the alley. Another explosion rocked the street. A ferocious ball of fire erupted, followed by a rumbling, roaring sound. In a state of terror, Nicole closed her eyes against the blinding white light of the after-image.

  She began to choke on the ash, but remembering Yvette, opened her stinging eyes and stared at the burning cars – the exact place where she’d seen the child. In desperation to reach Yvette, she ran over the shards of broken glass and jagged edges of torn metal. Dogs began howling and in the noise and general panic she barely noticed a man lying on the ground, reaching out his arms to plead for help. As she passed more of the injured, Nicole hesitated, but then she saw the little girl. For a moment Nicole could not move. The smoke had cleared just enough to see, but the air around her was stifling and unbearably hot. As the horror hit her in the pit of her stomach she made a strangled sound. Please not Yvette. Not a child who had never harmed anyone.

  Water began spreading across the street, and collecting in a pool where the road dipped. The little girl lay beside the water with her left leg crushed beneath bricks and mortar, the little puppy, Trophy, whimpering at her side. Nicole glanced around for help. Wild with fear, she began pulling at the rubble covering Yvette’s leg, breaking her nails and scratching her arms. As she released the little girl’s leg, the blood spread out on top of the pool of water, shining mirror-like.

  Though the street was far from silent, the sound of French music playing on a radio could be heard drifting out from inside the bakery. Nicole fell to her knees and lifted the little girl’s head to her lap, hardly able to look at her dark eyes, but stroking her face and murmuring her name. With tears refusing to fall, Nicole rocked Yvette, wiping the child’s warm blood and the dirt from her cheeks, and attempting to sing her favourite song, the song they had always sung together on a Saturday morning in their kitchen. The blast must have killed her instantly. As Nicole’s throat became too choked to continue, she looked up and saw Yves coming towards her, the bones in his face standing out, the flesh drawn so tight he barely looked alive himself.

  She glanced down at her dress where it had soaked up blood and noticed a shard of glass embedded in her hand. Now her own blood was trickling between her fingers. Yves came over and lifted Yvette. Everything went silent. He did not speak and neither did Nicole. She gulped, gritted her teeth, pulled out the glass, ripped a piece of her skirt to wrap round her hand, then picked up the puppy and stumbled after Yves into the bakery.

  Yves sat down at a table with his daughter in his arms and wept.

  Nicole sat opposite in a state of silent shock.

  This was nothing like the black-and-white pictures in the newspapers, mainly of French victories in the remote hills and valleys of the north. This blood was red, redder than she could have imagined, and there was so much of it, the flesh torn and battered, the death real. Far too real. Time seemed to have halted, trapping Nicole in a world where a child’s life could be taken in a matter of seconds. She felt colder inside than ever before. Gradually, as the sounds of the street filtered through again, she heard voices raised in anger and became aware that something inside her had changed. The police finally arrived and the sound of their sirens rang out. That was what she would remember: a blur of sirens, people sobbing and the sickly smell of blood and burnt sugar in the street.

  The police questioned her at the scene, a few simple questions. What had she witnessed? Was there any warning? That sort of thing. So she was surprised when her father summoned her into his office early the next morning, saying that the police wished to speak to her again. She trailed behind him, feeling raw and wearing only her silk dressing gown. She had wept for Yvette throughout the night and Lisa had held her close. But Nicole’s sorrow ran deep. She had loved Yvette like a sister.

  As her father closed the door she tried to wipe the images from her mind, but all she could think was that nothing could justify the killing of children. Then she saw who was waiting in the smoky office: Inspector Paul Giraud took up too much space in the room as he stood with his back to the wall, legs apart, and with his arms folded in front of him. Nicole felt a knot twist in her stomach as they came face to face. He focused his watery eyes on her. She glanced at her father with raised brows.

  ‘Monsieur Giraud has a few questions he’d like you to answer, Nicole. That’s all.’ He had spoken kindly and with warmth in his voice.

  The combination of grief and exhaustion had left her vulnerable. She took a step forward and gripped the back of an upright chair. ‘Papa, I haven’t slept at all. Can’t it wait?’ Her voice shook.

  Her father looked at the floor as Giraud came to stand beside her. He smoothed down his hair, so close she felt as if he was about to pounce. She could identify every black nostril hair and smell the tobacco on his breath. Remembering what she’d seen him do, she shuddered.

  ‘If I can have a minute,’ Giraud said and carried on smoothing his hair. ‘An amicable chat. It has been noticed you have been spending time with a young Vietnamese man.’

  His voice was low, not much louder than a murmur. She hated that. It meant she had to strain to hear and that gave him power over her. She gazed at him before replying and something in his eyes told her he had caught sight of her watching him at the brothel. The knot in her stomach grew tighter.
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  ‘It’s not against the law, is it?’

  Her father interrupted with a warning note. ‘Nicole.’

  ‘You know you can put your faith in me,’ Giraud said, holding out a hand. ‘You trust me and I’ll trust you, if you get my meaning.’

  Nicole shook her head. ‘I haven’t been spending time as you put it.’

  With an exaggeratedly patient sigh he continued. ‘You were seen eating ice cream with him while sitting on the front step at your shop.’

  ‘Is that a crime?’

  ‘I didn’t bring you up to behave like a common native,’ her father said, but he hadn’t spoken angrily.

  ‘He’s a student. I hardly know him,’ Nicole said.

  ‘What is his name? Or rather, what is the name he has given you?’ Giraud asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Come on, Nicole,’ her father said. ‘We are trying to find the killers of Yvette. I know you care.’

  ‘Of course I care.’ She clenched her jaw so tight it hurt but really she wanted to sit down and howl. She closed her eyes. If she could just make Giraud disappear and the questions stop …

  ‘Well. Does he have a name?’

  She hesitated. But, knowing she had no choice, opened her eyes. ‘I only know he’s called Trần.’

  ‘They are all called Trần or Nguyễn. Is that all you know? Think, Nicole, anything you can give us might be the clue we need. Anything at all.’

  There was a pause as her father smiled at her. ‘Monsieur Giraud is not blaming you, Nicole. We know it was nothing to do with you.’

  Nicole could no longer hold on to her tears and as they began to drip down her cheeks she brushed them away, furious with herself for crying in front of the odious man.

  He pulled a chair out for her and smiled. ‘Why not sit, my dear? You’ll feel better.’

  She did not want to sit but did as she was told, then watched as he turned to her father. ‘Édouard, could you arrange for a glass of water, please, or maybe a lemonade.’

  He could have rung the bell to request the drink, but her father left the room. As soon as he had gone Giraud’s smile faded and he wiped a hand across his brow. Now he raised his voice. ‘We have been watching young Trần.’