Deep Night

by Caroline Petit

  “I may be dying,” he said.

  “Finish the story.”

  “Heartless bitch,” replied Vasiliev, moaning. “I can’t go on.” His head sank onto his knees.

  “Don’t look at the waves. It will be worse. Look at me. If you talk, you’ll forget about feeling sick.”

  He shook his head, but began to speak. “I don’t know how Everston and Chang got together. But they did. I think each decided Theo wasn’t to be trusted. Or maybe Chang had something on Everston. Everston had a succession of young Chinese mistresses. Chang is very good at blackmail,” he said. Leah didn’t want to probe and discover what sordid, repulsive incident Chang had used against Everston. Anyway, he’d only lie.

  “You know the reason none of these Chinamen are seasick, Chinese medicine. But do they share, no.Or maybe it’s not good for Europeans. Their drugs can kill us Europeans.” He struggled to wink. He whispered, “Ma huang, it’s a favourite of Chang’s. It cures hay fever, asthma, the common cold. Its biological name is ephedra.

  “How do you know this?”

  “I know a lot about drugs,” he admitted.

  At first she thought he was confessing in his own devious way to supplying Vestna with opium. But, she realised, he was telling her something else too.

  “You can make tea from ma huang,” he volunteered.

  A memory stirred in Leah. Sometimes she accompanied Theo to Everston’s office. He was a great tea connoisseur, priding himself on his tea collection, brewing them up in wonderful teapots Theo had searched out specially for him. She could picture the Yixing clay teapot in Everston’s hand as each man lifted his porcelain teacup companionably, sniffing the bouquet, consulting each other about the colour. Sometimes, three or four teas were brewed, each in its own pot.

  “Ma huang is known to bring on tremors, perspiration. After taking it, people have died of heart attacks, especially if they go out in the heat of Hong Kong and are fat, unused to physical exercise. A man like Theo, with his business partner, who might be a solicitor, meets his partner’s friend, a Mr. Chang.They have a tasting of teas. Despite the heat, they go on a vigorous walk away from prying ears or eyes to discuss their plans for Manchukuo and leave a poor perspiring Theo, dripping sweat, to recover on a park bench. It could have happened like that.” He eyed her. “Later, this man Chang goes to Theo’s daughter and persuades this now penniless girl to go to Manchukuo. Meanwhile, Everston continues to delight in his new tea. How soon after Theo died, did Everston take sick?”

  “A few weeks,” she said, recalling the absolute fury she had felt when she discovered Everston’s perfidy and how pleased she had been to hear he was dying.

  “Chang doesn’t like loose ends.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  He thought about it. “You know you look so much like your mother. Fairer, but still when I see you . . .Maybe I have a debt to Vestna’s daughter. I have feelings too.”

  She was about to protest.

  “I see in your eyes what you think of me. Doesn’t matter. If I survive this storm, I’m Mr. Harris now, with an excellent passport. There will be so many refugees returning to Britain, I won’t be noticed. The aftermath of war is always confusing. I will do well in England.” He lowered his voice. “There will be no Chang there.”

  Together, they lifted the flap to gaze at Chang and Lee’s C245 sons working the rudder, their faces straining to keep the junk on course, their hair plastered down and the rain falling off them in waterfalls while the wind whipped by them.

  “Will it get worse?” Leah yelled to the captain.

  The captain raised his head to look at the black sky. “Strong boat,” he said in Cantonese and returned his attention to the waves.

  “Have to lie down,” said Vasiliev. “I can’t feel any worse.”

  He crept out on his hands and knees and continued at a snail’s pace over the slippery deck to the ladder. She saw the top of his white haired-head disappear below. His loud moans mixed with the storm and her revengeful thoughts.

  When Chang stuck his head under her tarpaulin tent, she jumped.

  “You can come out now,” he said, “it’s veering off.”

  She stared. He was soaked, from his soft cloth slippers to his hair, his suit clinging to him like tissue paper.He must have abandoned his raincoat during his fight with the rudder. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the bare feet and wet trouser legs of one of Lee’s sons. Then Chang collapsed backward with a thud. She fought her way out of the tarpaulin to see Chang with a rope around his neck. The oldest son pulled it tighter and flashed her an angry warning as he pushed Chang into a sitting position.The younger son squashed a rag into Chang’s mouth and tied Chang’s arms together.With a finger to his lips, the younger son stepped cautiously over the slick deck and descended into the cabin. She heard muffled cries and thumps. The older son went to help his brother, leaving Chang tied up, his back to her.

  A few minutes later, Vasiliev’s head popped up through the cabin opening and he flopped onto the deck, pushed from behind. The sons pulled him down next to Chang and bound him too.

  Then, the older son relieved his father at the wheel. Mr. Lee rushed toward Chang and barked. “Traitor!” He aimed a deadly kick at Chang’s ribs. Chang toppled sideways. Blood reddened the gag.

  “He’s choking,” said Leah and pulled the rag out.

  The captain raised his hand as if to slap her, then cursed her.

  Vasiliev pleaded for his life. He had done nothing wrong, he wailed. He was a Chinese patriot. He had helped in the underground. All three Lees ignored him. “Do something,” he begged Leah.

  Helpless, Leah stood by the stacks of rice: wet, bewildered and afraid for herself. The wind gusted, the boat went into a heavy roll.

  Lee’s voice became triumphant. “We Communists will win in the end. Enough talk. How can you expect to find ivory in a dog’s mouth? It has been decided.”

  Lee bent and grappled with the pistol buckled to his leg. It looked very ugly in his hard gnarled hands. The tips of his fingers were raw. “You should not look,” he said to Leah. “This is nothing to do with you.”

  Her vengeful thoughts raced as she studied Chang,now pulled into a standing position, his dark eyes unfathomable, his face a mask. If she asked, would they hand her the gun and let her pull the trigger? She put out her hand as if to intercede and it grazed Chang’s chest. His skin was warm. She pulled her hand away as if stung.Who knew how many deaths he had been responsible for? She remained silent as Lee and his younger son hauled Chang unto the gunwale. The son held Chang by his knees.

  Vasiliev babbled incoherent phrases in Russian, whether cursing or pleading for Chang, Leah couldn’t make out.

  Chang stood and looked into the cold brown sea. Lee C247 pointed his gun at the back of Chang’s head, Chinese executioner style, and fired. There was a loud splash, followed by a sickening thud as Chang’s body crashed against the hull.

  Leah’s knees buckled. She landed hard on the deck, biting her knuckles to keep from screaming. Blood oozed up.

  Father and son groaned under Vasiliev’s weight as they hauled him up like a sack of rice. Vasiliev screamed his innocence in every language he could muster. The men held Vasiliev suspended above the deck and let go.Even after he hit the water, his piteous shouts could be heard for several long minutes.Leah covered her ears, rocking in fear.

  Mr. Lee stood over her, strapping his gun back to his shin. “We need you to get the rice through customs.No one else but you came on this boat.You saw nothing.You will get your cut.” He waited.

  She nodded.

  Lee ordered his sons to throw dozens of rice sacks overboard. “We must float over mines. People’s stomach shrink when they starve. There will still be enough.”

  She made her shaky way down the ladder. In the tiny cabin, she couldn’t stop trembling. She stripped off her sodden clothes and, naked, wrapped herself in a dry blanket to lie on the hard plank bed. Exhausted, she closed her eyes and
blacked out to the sound of heavy rice sacks hitting the water. She didn’t dream.

  22

  THE UNION JACK waving from a flagpole caught at Leah’s heart,moving her to tears as the junk entered Hong Kong harbour in full morning sun. A group of sailors on board a destroyer waved merrily as they came within hailing range. Leah laughed and waved back; the men whistled and hooted.

  It was the harbour she remembered, the same buildings, the same high mountains rising behind it, but it was eerily quiet, like a ghost town, without the boisterous hawkers crowding the docks, holding up tatty souvenirs and fresh fish and yards of silk and funny straw hats. The youngest Lee jumped nimbly onto the wharf and began securing the ropes. A stick-thin old Englishman in worn khaki shorts, tanned like a prune, made his slow way towards them. He stared at the sacks of rice. “You’ve brought rice,” he said.

  Mr. Lee dropped a plank over the side to serve as a gangway and urged Leah to show the old man her papers. On the wharf, Leah couldn’t keep her eyes off the Englishman’s doorknob knees. She thought she was inured to the ravages of starvation after the hunger of Macau, but she had never seen anyone alive so thin. How could the man stay upright? He had a clipboard and an official-looking pad. Immediately, she launched into her story about how the rice originated from Indo China and was a gift from the people of Macau as a gesture of goodwill to help the people of Hong Kong in their hour of need. She handed the old man her forms. He tucked them into his pad and wrote furiously, turning page over page in rapid succession. She rattled on to hide her surreptitious glances at the man’s legs and at what he was writing so intently. He didn’t look up once. She was completely unnerved when he ripped off the pages and gave them to her.

  “It’s a chit,” he said in a quavering voice full of uncertainty.

  She studied the forms. A series of large loopy circles filled each page. “Is this it?” she asked.

  The old man nodded. “Rice is good. I hate rice.” His eyes filled with tears, spilling down his concave cheeks. He wiped at them with the back of his hand. “I’m not myself,” he apologised. “Stanley . . .” He turned towards the harbour to watch the wheeling gulls and the sun on the water.

  Leah waited. There was something familiar about this wraith of a man, holding himself upright on his puny legs, his hands clasping her papers behind his back, a muddled dignity in his loss of control. She knew him. It was Hope Cuthbert’s father.When last she’d seen him, his belly hung over his belt and he had a thick head of grey hair. The hair and the belly were gone. He looked like a chicken carcass boiled down to the bone. She laid a hand on his back and said softly, “It’s me,Mr. Cuthbert. Leah Kolbe. Hope’s friend.”

  The old man’s sparse eyebrows came together in concentration, more tears clouded his eyes. He clasped her hands. “Yes, yes,” he said. “Wonderful. You must come and visit us.” He paused. “Mrs. Cuthbert died. Hope isn’t here.” He thought a minute, then said, “Yes, that’s right. Hope is recovering in hospital. Her Charles—” and lost his train of thought as he searched Leah’s face as if she could supply the missing information. He daubed at his teary eyes, then let his bony callused hands hang by his side, waiting for someone to tell him what to do next.

  A young naval lieutenant in a bright white uniform came down the wharf at a half-run. He waved at Mr. Cuthbert as he drew nearer and saluted smartly. “Mr. Cuthbert, sir, I’ll handle this shipment. You’re wanted in the Customs Office.”

  Distressed, Mr. Cuthbert looked at the documents in his hand and threw them into the water.

  “Hey,” cried Leah, watching her papers floating away.

  Lee hooked them with a grappling iron.

  “That’s my authorisation,” she wailed to the embarrassed lieutenant as water dripped off the flimsy documents, now a soggy mass of runny ink.

  Mr. Cuthbert waited to be hit, squatting on the dock with his hands over his head.

  “It’s not important,” the lieutenant reassured Mr. Cuthbert. “We’ll accept the shipment.”

  Frightened by Lee and his sons who swore at the stupid old white man in Cantonese,Mr. Cuthbert remained in a squat.

  The lieutenant scowled at the Lees. “Can’t you tell those fellows to be quiet?”

  Bowing and apologising,Mr. Cuthbert slunk away.

  Uncomfortable, the lieutenant and Leah watched the old man shuffle off. “Mr. Cuthbert gets muddled.Our orders were to give them jobs . . . It’s too much for them. I’m sorry about your papers.”

  “It’s all right. Mr. Lee,” said Leah in English, “the officer is going to help us.” She gave the lieutenant a brilliant smile. “We’ve had a terrible trip.We came through the typhoon.The men want to see their families and we are worried about the condition of the rice. The sooner it is in cooking pots, the better.”

  He stared in disbelief.

  “We did really.We didn’t get the full brunt of the storm. It veered off and well . . . here we are. The rice, I mean.”

  She saw the lieutenant trying to take it all in. He could still commandeer the rice and demand that she verify her story and then . . . And then, she was not at all sure what the murderous Lees would do. They would blame her and take their revenge. She blustered, “The papers are all in order. The consul,Mr. Albe-marle, will verify this if you want to telegraph him.”

  The lieutenant held the dripping useless papers at arms length. What did it matter? Hong Kong was in chaos: people tripping over one another to restore order and the poor displaced Colonialists exhausted from starvation and ill treatment. He wasn’t going to refuse food. It was his fault for letting poor old Cuthbert out of his sight. He was supposed to assist him in every transaction. If this got out, they’d throw the book at him.

  Wreathed in smiles, Mr. Lee strode down the plank and talked rapidly in Cantonese to Leah who translated, “He has to see his agent about the unloading.”

  “Yes, fine. Do what is required.There is almost no food here. There could be food riots.” He paused, embarrassed. “I know it’s legal,” he said, shaking the wet documents, “but do you trust these men?” He looked at Mr. Lee. “They won’t price gouge? The black market . . .”

  “The black market,” huffed Leah. “I’m with the Red Cross. It’s all in those papers.”

  The lieutenant reddened. “I wasn’t implying anything.Tell him to get his agents.”

  Leah spoke rapidly and Lee nodded, showing how diligently he was following her orders. He saluted the lieutenant and bustled down the dock. His act didn’t convince Leah, but the lieutenant seemed appeased.

  “It’s a blessing in disguise. I hate paperwork.” The lieutenant grinned.

  Leah gushed her thanks and flirted with him a little in the warm sun. The lieutenant suggested a drink later. Leah looked away and said in a halting voice. “I’m just so happy to be back in Hong Kong. I escaped before the civilian roundup.”

  “That was a piece of luck.”

  “My fiancé wasn’t so lucky.” She saw the light go out of the lieutenant’s face as he turned somber and spoke more gently.

  “I see,” he said.

  “He was with the Volunteer Brigade. Are they all right?”

  “Some are; some aren’t,” he replied. He looked so young, vulnerable. He didn’t want to expose his own feelings about the prisoners, too upsetting. She felt years older than him despite his war experience.

  “Oh,” she said, a catch in her throat, trying not to think in which category Jonathan would be.

  “Are you all right, Miss?” asked the lieutenant, touching her lightly on the shoulder. “You look so pale.”

  “His name is Jonathan Hawatyne. Do you know him?”

  He shook his head. “The word is once they get proper food and rest, especially the young ones, they’ll be back to normal.”

  He was being kind.

  “Seeing you, Miss, would perk any man up.Don’t you worry about this.” He pointed to the junk. “There won’t be any questions asked.”

  “Do you know where they p
ut the—” She tried to say prisoners of war, but couldn’t get her tongue around the words.

  “They’ve put the officers up at the Peninsula Hotel. Try there. If I can do anything . . .” He let his words hang as Leah spoke rapidly in Cantonese to Lee’s sons and told them where she was going.

  “Don’t expect to get what you agreed, we aren’t capitalist gougers,” said the older son, handing down her rucksack.

  Startled, she nodded, unable to think about money or its terrible cost.

  She kissed the dark-haired boyish lieutenant on the cheek. “Thank you, it’s so good to be home.”

  He pulled himself to his full height and grinned, “It’s been a pleasure, Miss.” Even as he uttered the words, he was overwhelmed by a rush of homesickness and cursed the war, the Japanese and everyone else he had learned to hate.

  On Nathan Street,Leah debated changing into a day dress, but she didn’t want to meet Jonathan clean and washed. Neither of them were those two shiny people who had decided to marry on the eve of war. Hoisting her rucksack onto her back, she walked the familiar streets and saw the wounds the Japanese had inflicted on the Colony. A shop was gutted on Austin Road. Many houses had been stripped of their wrought iron, whole balconies torn away. Queen Victoria’s imperious statue had been replaced with a monstrous Japanese memorial to its war dead.

  It was a long walk. After so much time at sea, her legs were rubbery. Her emotions surged like waves: cresting with hope, followed by a trough of despair. He might be . . . No. He wasn’t dead. She must not be shocked at his appearance. Inwardly, she rehearsed saying hello, looking only at his eyes and falling into his arms. There would be tears, but they would be happy tears.

  The Peninsula Hotel came into view. A yard-high hand-painted sign in English read PENINSULA HOTEL followed by an exclamation point. It hung over Japanese characters on a brass plate. In places, the white stucco had worn away and the striped awnings were tattered. The windows were dirty and missing drapes. It was like visiting an old friend recovering from a terrible bout of illness who, while still pale and frail, was on the mend.