The doorman, in a plain black jacket, radiated goodwill and welcomed Leah in English as he held open the heavy door.
“Beautiful day,” he beamed, ignoring her strange appearance.
“Yes, it is,” she replied, disguising her surprise that the doorman and she had exchanged greetings. In pre-war days, doormen were as silent as totem poles.
Inside, she simply stared. The red carpet of the grand lobby was stained black in places, the furniture an odd assortment of chairs and sofas Leah recognised from the more palatial suites. The walls were pockmarked with holes where ornaments and paintings had been prised off. But the most disconcerting sight were the stick-like European men and women wearing shorts and faded dresses talking very softly in groups with a few suited Chinese men and women in pretty dresses. British military personnel bustled through the crowds looking in command and on schedule. She let her eyes roam over the thin faces and nervously walked around the clusters of people. She recognised no one.
Gathering courage, she moved to the unchanged mahogany reception desk. A middle-aged Chinese man in a faded morning coat and immaculate fawn gloves presided over the guest register. Leah asked for Jonathan.
“The men were brought in a group.We’ve converted a number of rooms to dormitories to accommodate them.They aren’t registered. The Navy is handling that.” He paused, his manner concerned. “They’re on the fourth and fifth floors. Our telephones aren’t working. I can send someone up there to check for you.”
“May I go upstairs?”
“Of course. Just be a little quiet. The men like to rest during the day. The noise . . . If Mr. Hawatyne isn’t there, I can arrange a rickshaw to the Prince of Wales Hospital.”
His eyes slid off her face. He was trying so hard to be discreet. “Some require more than rest . . .”
“Yes, but I really think he is here, don’t you?”
“It was just a suggestion. In case . . .”
“It will be fine,” Leah said resolutely, struggling to remain composed, certain he was as fine as he had written in his one treasured postcard.
“If I can do anything . . .We want to help.”
Leah thanked him, then climbed the wide stairs—the lift was out. She passed by a hotel worker on his hands and knees hammering in wooden treads to keep the carpet in place. He urged her to step carefully. The carpet was loose because the brass stair treads had been stolen. Her steps slowed. She told herself she was being cautious to avoid falling. Her heart was pounding too much to race up the stairs. On the fourth floor landing, she heard men speaking in English and her heart stopped. She saw a group of skinny men smoking in the middle of the long corridor.One of them commented, “Woodbines are better than banana peel.” The others laughed.
Tony Pentley. She ran to him. He swept her into his arms, tottered, and promptly set her down. The other men moved away, further down the hall.
“How?” he demanded.
“Doesn’t matter.Where’s Jonathan?”
“He’s here.”
“But that’s wonderful.”
He didn’t meet her eyes. “He would bang on about the rules of war, the fuck—” He censored himself, “The damn Geneva Convention.” He stopped. “I mean he was an inspiration, but . . .”
“But he must be all right or he wouldn’t be here.”
“He wouldn’t go to the hospital. I mean who’d want more rules and regulations and no pretty nurses?” he joked, but his voice went down a register into worried concern. “He sleeps a lot.” He hugged her again. “It’s so wonderful you being here. Better than ten damn doctors.”
He took her hand and pulled her along. “I’ll get rid of the others so you can see him alone, lucky man.”
He peered around the door and said quietly, “Get decent. There’s a lady waiting.You lot have to leave.Let her wake him.”
From the hallway came sounds of men dressing and running tap water.There was hardly any talking. Finally, four scarecrow men good-naturedly trooped past Leah, grinning and giving the thumbs up sign. She wanted to cry.
Tony touched her shoulder saying, “Just take it slowly, love,” and kissed her lightly on the cheek, then joined the retreating men.
Even as she tiptoed into the room in her noiseless slippers, she was trembling. The blinds were down, the curtains drawn. The room was stale with the scent of men and had a naptime feel. She watched Jonathan sleeping. He was on his belly, the sheet across the small of his bare back, a spindly arm hanging off the narrow cot, his fingers grazing the floor. His blond hair was bleached from the sun—it was more white than yellow—and he was brown like tanned leather. His back was the saddest thing she had ever seen. It was a mass of raised ridges and ropey scars standing out in sharp relief. Despite the scarring and the dim light, she could count each vertebra.
She knelt on the floor by his head, listening to his even breathing, and matched him breath for breath. She held his out stretched hand and rubbed it along the side of her face. He stirred and murmured, but didn’t open his eyes.
“Darling, I’m here.”
He opened his eyes and stared, grumbling, “Christ, now I’m hallucinating,” and sat up. “Am I dead?” He looked wide-eyed around the room trying to fathom why heaven had become this five-bedded room in the Peninsula containing a woman who looked like Leah, but was wearing filthy Chinese clothes and sobbing until her nose ran as she clutched his hand with an iron grip.
Leah’s sobs subsided in Jonathan’s arms. Minutes passed as they clung together. She pulled away to declare, “I’m home” and began to cry again. They kissed urgently and hungrily, tasting each other’s tears. Leah was acutely aware of Jonathan’s bones and his rapidly beating heart.
He cradled her awkwardly on the narrow cot and buried his head in the softness of her body. “It’s wonderful,” he said, his hands working over her clothed body as if she were a living sculpture, to prove that she existed, murmuring her name like a chant. She felt her heart melting into such happiness that she flushed red with pleasure and couldn’t talk. They lay together on the cramped cot, their arms entwined, until finally Leah suggested they should eat.
Jonathan leaned on Leah’s arm, her other arm around his waist, and watched where he placed his feet on the stairs. The touch and feel of him made her reckless and she kissed him on the first floor landing in full view of the teeming lobby.
He was a little shaken. “It’s just not quite real yet,” he said.
The trip down the Peninsula’s staircase winded him.
They wanted to sit quietly, away from the crowds in the lobby, and wallow in their happiness. Leah spoke to the concierge and asked if they could eat in the closed verandah restaurant. Delight filled the concierge’s face and he agreed, saying he’d send a waiter and they could order food, not much, there wasn’t much. Leah didn’t care.They held hands, each reluctant to stop touching while sweet Jonathan watched her as if it hurt to keep his eyes trained on her for too long, like gazing at the sun.Finally, he looked away and focused on the people moving about in the lobby.
“Later, I’ll get us a room,” she declared.
“It’s crammed to the gills. They can’t make exceptions.”
“Nonsense, everyone wants to help. There aren’t those kind of rules anymore.”
They ate omelettes and bread made with rice flour. The rice bread came with a curl of butter. “Butter,” he said with satisfaction. He cut the bread into four neat squares and chewed each square thoroughly. “Maybe I’ll save the next slice for later. Mustn’t overdo it.”
“Is that what the doctor said, darling?”
“It’s best. Otherwise, I get bloated and can’t eat. Nuisance, really.”
She didn’t probe any more, could tell he wasn’t ready yet to tell her much. Instead, she told him about Macau, an expurgated version in which she emphasised her luck at finding a job and a flat. All the exiles had rallied around trying to do their best, she said.
He asked very few questions about how she got to Hong
Kong so quickly. He seemed to assume that the ferries between Hong Kong and Macau were still running and that somehow she had wangled a ticket and ended up here to be with him. Anyway, his curiosity for now was blunted. He closed his eyes and she realised she was tiring him with her made-up tales.
“I am going to get us that room, now. You need rest.”
“Huang fu said your house has been used by the Japs. It’s probably disgusting.”
“Yes,” she said, determined to keep her tone light. “It probably is. The concierge is very helpful.”
He stared out at the crowd in the lobby. “I don’t think there are any rooms vacant.”
“Anything can be arranged,” she said, happy and confident. Then she stopped, noticing how silent and still he had become. “I don’t want to rush anything . . .We both need time and quiet in a room of our own. I’m happy just to be near you,” she said, capturing his roughened brown hands in hers. “We’ve both waited so long . . .”
Jonathan remained uneasy and uncertain, not like Jonathan at all.
“What is it?”
He tightened his hold on her hands and said in a shame whisper, “I don’t think I can sleep in a bed yet.Would you mind if I asked them to move the cot in? I need . . .” He dropped her hands and took a long swallow of water.
“I’ll go now,” she said, and left him alone at the table as he meticulously cut another slice of bread into quarters.
They were lucky.There was an empty single room.A British officer was leaving for China to negotiate with officials there for rice. He would be gone for weeks. The concierge said it was his pleasure to lend it to Leah. He remained expressionless when she asked that Jonathan’s cot be moved and agreed, saying, “Things will get better,” and they both knew he wasn’t talking about the shabbiness of the hotel. She thanked him profusely.
The cot gave the room a military air. There was only six inches between the bed and the cot, which was piled high with sheets, pillows and blankets. Already, it was an obstacle to manoeuvre around.
“Do you mind?” he asked. “It’s only for sleeping,” and he caught her up and held her tight, then fumbled with the clasps of her tunic. “It smells of the sea.”
“It was a rough passage. Let me,” she said and pulled the blouse over her head and stepped out of her trousers. Together they fell onto the bed. She burrowed in beside him, searching for the silky man inside the battered and bruised prisoner of war.
“I’m a wreck.”
“No. You’re the man I love.”
He half pulled her on top of him, his cock stiffening.
“I’m not hurting you?” she asked.
“No,” he said coldly.
“Don’t,” she said and put her fingers against his mouth.
He nibbled at them and began to explore her body with his hands. “What’s this?” he asked as his fingers touched her gunshot scar.
She told him without emotion about how the Japanese hated the British consul and tried to assassinate him. “I got in the way. It looks worse than it is. It’s all healed now. There’s just the scar.” She showered him with kisses. “Not like your back. How?”
He closed his eyes. “I’m more tired than I thought.” He slipped naked out of bed and began to make up the cot, falling asleep almost immediately.
She lay on the bed staring at the ceiling for a long time then she reached over and held his hand, seeking solace in the feel of his skin.
23
JONATHAN WAS PUTTING on weight steadily and regaining his health, but their lives together lacked a rhythm. It wasn’t that they were awkward with one another; rather, Leah thought, they were too kind to each other, too polite. So much between them went unsaid. Often the sweetness of their lovemaking lacked passion or, perhaps, she was too sensitive to how his fingers always found her scar. Three weeks later, she still woke to find Jonathan asleep in the cot.
Huang fu appeared one bright morning and then visited them regularly. Leah liked having him around. He was their mediator and go between. He brought little delicacies from the black market and Chinese cures from the herbalist to restore Jonathan to health. He understood what Jonathan had been through and papered over their silences with his energy and good humour. Sometimes, she felt like an intruder, a visitor who returns from overseas and stares in disbelief that things have changed so much.
Today, the three of them sat in the hotel room having breakfast and finalising plans to see the Peak house. The Peak tram was working again. Jonathan looked at Leah and said, “You two go. I’ll go another day.”
“It doesn’t have to be today. Tomorrow or the next day will do.”
“No, really the walk up the hill, the people . . . I’m feeling a bit tired.”
“Shall I send for the doctor?”Leah asked, searching his face for signs of illness.
“I insist. You two have been planning this for days.”
She didn’t want to argue in front of Huang fu. Jonathan had been consulted about the need to assess the house and make a claim for damages. He had reminisced about his first trip to her house and how An-li distrusted his motives, certain he was going to steal it out from under Leah. But now that she thought about it, he hadn’t said that much as she and Huang fu made lists of tasks like check the roof, test the wiring, inventory the remaining treasures.
She couldn’t claim for damages for her best pieces that she’d shipped to the Freer. No one knew what happened to them. She had spent hours telegraphing the States and making enquiries of the director. The ship had last been sighted off the coast of Japan. It hadn’t been sunk. It could have been pirates. Japanese planes might have used it for target practice. No one knew. The shipping line had its offices in Singapore. There weren’t any records left. It was all gone. Distraught, Leah had sought comfort in Jonathan’s arms. He murmured blandishments and was pricked with real sorrow for her, but she could see he had forgotten what Theo’s treasures had meant to her. It made her despair. Now, she said: “You’re right. You shouldn’t push yourself, Jonathan.Why look at ruins.”
Jonathan’s face filled with relief.
Guiltily, Leah kissed his cheek. It was petty to take her unhappiness out on him.
He squeezed her hand. “I’ll visit later,” he reassured her.
On the walk up the hill, Leah was grateful for Huang fu’s company as her home came into view. The house had been blinded: its windows contained no glass and the frames were broken off or hacked at. The gravel driveway was barely visible beneath a thick carpet of weeds. Inside, the smell was revolting: urine, animal droppings—rats maybe—overlain with the heavy stink of gasoline. Several gutted engines rested against the mouldy living room walls. All the fittings had been stolen, from the chandelier to the copper pipes and the bathroom sink. There was, of course, no furniture and nothing of her collection. Upstairs, the plaster walls were sprayed with urine. She was loath to touch anything. Huang fu stopped making his damage report. The house was beyond repair.
They stood in the abandoned garden with the dead peonies, staring at the blackened circles on the lawn where trash or maybe Japanese military papers had been burnt. Her beautiful garden was a rubbish tip. She dusted off the patio bricks and sat down with her head in her hands. “It’s unliveable. It’s not even fit to camp in. Especially, not for Jonathan. I’m glad he isn’t here.”
“The banks will reopen soon,” said Huang fu.
“I haven’t got any money.No one will lend me money. Reparations are not going to pay to rebuild this. I’ll be lucky to get enough to build a bungalow. I could always sell the land. It will break Jonathan’s heart.”
“Japanese occupation terrible,” said Huang fu. “Impossible to make a living when those bandits stole whatever they wanted.”
Leah hung her head. She hadn’t been able to protect anyone or anything. She felt so guilty. Most of those who had been at Stanley saw themselves as martyrs and used it, even her old friend Delia. They implied Leah had let the side down by not remaining in Hong Kong to
be interned. Delia, so changed, had lost her pre-war charm. She was hard and dictatorial. Or, perhaps, she was simply envious that Leah had not suffered deprivation, had emerged intact, still looking young and beautiful. She knew she was being unfair. She hadn’t suffered. She had no idea what she would be like after years of internment and how she would view people who had escaped. Probably, she’d hate them.
Delia made it clear that Leah had been demoted from friend to acquaintance.Not that it mattered; everyone she had known was leaving.Delia and Carrington were to be on the first civilian boat to England. All the internees and most of the POWs were being processed and arrangements being made for their passage home, including the leaders of the old colonial regime. After the trauma of imprisonment and near starvation, they were unable to slip back into a work-a-day world. Leah felt sorry for all of them, Delia included. Hell, she felt sorry for herself in this burned out paradise, looking at the tatters of her life. She hardly bothered to listen to Huang fu.
“For years I care for your house, oversee your curios.Your curios are very old and beautiful.Then those damn Japs come.” His voice shook and she saw the hurt in his face as he poked a stick into the blackened garden bed. “Terrible the things they did.When I visited Mr. Hawatyne in camp, some of the other soldiers pledged me money to buy food, medicine, other things for them.”
It dawned on Leah that Huang fu had been a black mar-keteer. She gave him a penetrating look. He was better dressed than she remembered. Beneath his linen jacket, he wore a fine cotton open-collar shirt, his trousers were good and on his feet were real leather shoes. She ought to condemn him for profiting from war, but he had helped many people. Rules, she had learned, didn’t apply during war. “It was war.”
“No,” Huang fu retorted, incensed. “Not black marketeer. I didn’t make huge profits like those scum who preyed on those in Stanley. They added 200 per cent to their goods and had prisoners write IOUs.”
In Huang fu’s mouth IOU came out in one long diphthong. Leah puzzled over what he meant and what he was getting at.
Deep Night Page 23