He was thirty-five, and all he knew about the heart told him that love was more vulnerable and evanescent than dew, was killed quickly by a word, a look, a smell, or slowly by the years, dying nastily, screeching out its life, withering, blowing away, ash. The fear of that, the secret pain of it, kept pace with love; great love was twinned to great torment.
He could hardly believe that he was in love, but he saw no other explanation. For once the word did not embarrass him. He was suddenly mortal, and it was worth the anguish. Chills and fever, pangs and spasms, and yet this sense of natural discovery, of permanence, of belonging.
He spent a moment of pity for men who died without ever loving, and he touched Hao-lan’s cheek. “Shameless,” he said, to dispel the sorrow. “A wanton.”
“Oh yes,” she said. Her hands roamed his body; again she bent to kiss his manhood.
“You are merely trying to soften my heart,” he said sternly.
“Wrong on both counts,” she said, and they did not sleep that night, but made spring showers until dawn admonished them, and a fresh fall of lacy snow. They stood at the window entwined, and wished the world lost.
13
On a summer afternoon in 1943 Major Kanamori and Citizen Wang were celebrating Kanamori’s promotion with a cup of Dragon’s Well tea in Kanamori’s garden. The hum of bees was loud, bucolic, comforting. Kanamori wore thin cotton Chinese trousers and a silk shirt open at the neck. Wang was his customary dry and deferential self, though he had ventured a joke: if the war lasted long enough, Kanamori would be a general. “If the war ends unexpectedly,” Kanamori answered, “I shall be a civilian, and Chinese at that.” He was tired these days, and inordinately jumpy. His visits to Olga’s had become more frequent, his abasements deeper, his ecstasies sharper. Mornings after, he was shattered. He was ashamed now to be seen without a shirt. He understood that debauchery was taking a toll, but it was after all only a habit, like wine, that could be broken if his light anxiety turned to fear.
“Ah well, if the war ends sooner,” said Wang, and let the thought drift between them. American forces were progressing westward across the Pacific. Tokyo had actually been bombed over a year before—shocking news—and while the Japanese had continued to advance, occupying some mysterious islands in the far north near the icy wastes of a land called Alaska, the Americans had now retaken those islands, as well as some of the Solomons, and had won—if communiqués were read carefully—two or three considerable naval battles. Wang invariably asked Kanamori to locate these exotic spots; Kanamori suspected that Wang’s geography was not at all deficient, but supplied the information anyway.
Kanamori was not so fierce now, and heard himself saying, “I suppose we could lose this war.”
“The prudent man,” said Wang, “fills his pocket with coppers and lines his shoes with gold.”
“If we lose this war I will be stripped of my shoes too,” Kanamori said.
“In the jails of Chungking,” Wang mused, “cockroaches thrived. The administration set the prisoners a quota: ten roaches per day per man, or no food. The roaches disappeared. Now the quotas could not be met, and the wardens laughed as they divided the food appropriation, and the prisoners starved.”
“So?”
“So the prisoners founded cockroach farms. Assets, exchangeable. In effect they lined their shoes with gold.”
“Parables and proverbs,” Kanamori said. “You are about to sell me a cockroach farm.”
“No, no, no,” Wang said, and they went on to speak of other matters: Communists in the northwest, and the local Vermilion Society, which had proclaimed itself responsible for several assassinations and promised more. But as the sun westered and conversationn flagged, Wang said, “You know Ho Tzu-kai the master steamfitter?”
“Of course.” Ho Tzu-kai the master steamfitter had not done a day’s work in four years: he was a licenser of steamfitting projects, and was fat on bribes.
“His parents are in the unoccupied zone. They are old. He fears they will die before he and his wife and their four young ones can make proper obeisance.”
Kanamori took this news calmly, but among the lees of his samurai’s soul contempt stirred. The first rat was fleeing the ship. “Surely he can find a way across the lines.”
“Ah, but he is a man of substance.”
“And wants to carry the substance with him.”
“You understand.”
“Let him convert it to gold, and line his shoes with it.”
“Generations of household goods? Ivories? Old porcelains? Furniture? Think of the loss, should he sell at panic prices.”
“Then let him stay.” This Ho annoyed Kanamori.
“Well, it is not merely the going,” Wang said. “And it is not merely the salvaging of his possessions. For that alone he has a porcelain chicken.”
Kanamori laughed. The laugh subsided, but a residual giggle bubbled to the surface.
“This porcelain chicken is painted green and yellow.”
Kanamori waited.
“It is perhaps a thousand years old.”
Kanamori said slowly, “A T’ang porcelain.”
“He also owns a porcelain peasant woman, hauling water by means of a yoke.” Wang was almost jolly now. “So great is Ho’s filial piety that he will give a chicken to cross the lines, but he will give a peasant woman for a warrant.”
Wang was too clever. Irritating. “What is this warrant?”
“A warrant for his arrest,” Wang said, “denouncing him as a Chinese patriot and hero of the resistance. Perhaps even posters in the public square.”
Kanamori grinned like a thief. “Why not kill him and take his baubles?”
“Because,” Wang said patiently, “there are others. Would you destroy the cockroach farm?”
Kanamori’s collection grew. So, he assumed, did Wang’s. Yu Tsung-huang the cement king was denounced for communication with Chiang Kai-shek’s armies. He disappeared; his poster graced the Central Post Office in Nanking, and Kanamori was the richer by a winged pedestal cup, of wood, lacquered, possibly an imitation, but priceless if real. Jung Meng-yu the coalyard king remained in Nanking, but his wife, a former opera singer, was denounced; shortly she was said to be in Chungking starring in patriotic dramas. Kanamori was fond of the gilt bronze bodhisattva that sat like an icon smiling at him; it was only four hundred years old but rare enough, after all. Chou Chun-yi the chemical king (sulfuric acid, nitric acid, hydrochloric acid, caustic soda, soda ash, sodium sulfide) remained in place, but a false dossier was prepared with care and filed away; should the Chinese actually win this war he would be found to have “sheltered criminal elements,” “maintained criminal contact with the Chinese government,” and “transmitted information of a confidential military nature.” Kanamori received a bronze oil lamp in the shape of a ram. His favorite piece proved to be erotic and Japanese: a top-knotted samurai grimacing in glee as he plunged into an acquiescent maiden from behind, horse upon horse, the figures were of painted hardwood, and the woman, her head upflung, seemed to be screaming in joy. After some days he noticed that her hands were not flat, but clawed the earth, that the cords of her neck strained, and that her scream might not be joyful. He was momentarily depressed, even sullen, but the features, limbs and joints were so delicately carved, the figures in such flowing balance, that his annoyance ebbed. Even when this piece invaded his dreams he cherished it. More, he became superstitiously attached to it, and stared at it for long minutes, as if in penance.
Kanamori had no notion what he would do with these treasures; Wang presented him with another every month, and dimly Kanamori realized that they were not easily negotiable. But by now he was in the grip of a curious fatalism, as if suspended: he had his house, his servants, his work (which all but accomplished itself), his amplifying obsessions at the whorehouse. Day followed day, none much different, and what was to become of him seemed unimportant. Now and then he wondered if he was falling into madness. He was courteous always to the Ch
inese. He was incapable of sex save with whores and when beaten. In 1944 he concocted excuses and declined home leave. The Americans swept westward across the Pacific: Tarawa in the Gilberts, Saipan in the Marianas, Hollandia in Dutch New Guinea, Peleliu in the Palaus. In Burma the Allies took Myitkyina. The bombing of the Japanese homeland became commonplace. Toward the end of the year, American forces invaded the Philippines.
“There is someone I want arrested,” Wang said testily. Today he was more nervous than Kanamori.
“My pleasure. Who is it?”
“A man called Sung Yun.” Wang wrote the characters on a scratch pad.
“And what shall we arrest him for?”
“He agitates among the Chinese, urging sabotage and general resistance. He slanders men like me, who keep the peace and maintain order. He seems to have singled me out, and I do not like it.”
Kanamori was indifferent to this: “Write up a description, and you shall have your warrant.”
“Thank you. He may be hard to find. I hope you will set spies and informers at his heels.”
“Whatever you say.”
“A troublemaker,” Wang muttered.
“A Communist?”
“No, no,” Wang said quickly, and paused, frowning. “No, I do not believe that. Though … no.”
“Write him up, write him up,” Kanamori said. “I shall have a fat price put on his head.”
Olga dressed his wounds herself, with buttery ungents compounded by old-fashioned pharmacists. Kanamori was thoroughly at home now with this henna-haired, sharp-beaked ex-countess. He had met few White Russians who were not ex-counts or countesses, or dukes or princes, but was happy to give Olga the benefit of his ample doubt. “Ya, ya, ya,” she murmured. “You heal quickly, but in time this will be scar.”
“I am less than human,” Kanamori said sadly.
“The Orient,” Olga said. “Dans l’Orient désert quel devint mon ennui!”
Kanamori understood no French and so was even more fascinated by this harpy. She was little more than fifty, but the veins in her nose were disintegrating beneath the rice powder, and no makeup could clear her bloodshot eyes. He was also fascinated by her wrinkled neck and parchment chest, and the crab-apple breasts beneath the watered silk of her Western evening gown; always she wore a long dress, like a diplomat’s wife at a prestigious function. Kanamori did not desire her. He was aware of her body as an alien and faintly disagreeable presence: how dismaying, almost sickening, to realize that this sharp-nosed, scrawny snob grew hair between her legs, presumably made the beast with two backs, had in her time moaned and shrieked and whimpered! These days he was most often repelled by the human body, at best intrigued when it was exotic like this one. He had seen so many bodies used and thrown away. Yet he was sensitive to fluctuations in his own pulse: a bellyache frightened him; the recurrent failure of his manhood depressed him; he did not smoke because the swelling of his nasal membranes and the consequent snuffling, hawking and spitting alarmed him as portents of malfunction and dissolution.
With Olga he drank vodka and felt international. “My father,” he said, “fought Russians.”
“Fate moves in circles. The stars rule all.” Olga’s Chinese was fluent but her accent deformed. “And now we are friends. Even intimate friends.”
“That is true. No woman knows me as you do.”
Olga waved off the gratitude.
“Nevertheless,” Kanamori persisted, “I am grateful. You will one day allow me to be of service.”
“Absolutely,” Olga said, surprising him. “Today. I want to leave here soon.”
“Ah.” Kanamori’s heart ached, as if a young love had spoken of some other man. Nanking without the Snow Goose Pavilion? Where would he find ease? A young woman could perhaps be trained, but would she understand? Or would contempt show behind the eyes?
“Let us say the war ends,” Olga grumbled. “Let us even say it ends badly. In Nanking I am Madam Olga, friend to the Japanese. In Peking—for example—I could be Madam Olga who quarreled with the monkeys, Madam Olga much persecuted. You forgive my frankness.”
“Of course. Between you and me … but I can promise nothing. I must think.”
“Think all you like,” she said, “but one promise you must make me: if you are called back to the home islands for defense, you will arrange my … well, my own transfer, before you leave.”
“That I promise,” Kanamori said, and brightened. “Such a recall might be the making of me. Now I am only an edgy bureaucrat suffering nightmares.”
“It might indeed be the making of you. I cannot say what would be best for you. Your soul does not exist. I have seen men in all conditions and states of lust and madness—fetishists, syphilitics, even Americans. But there is something especially empty about you.”
“Madness,” Kanamori repeated peacefully. “Yes, I think I am mad.”
Wang said, “If the worst happens, we must not be taken in this city. We must be anonymous. You could pass for Chinese.”
“I too have thought so. I know where I want to go.”
Wang cocked his head.
“To Peking.”
“Ah. The mother of cities.”
“Madam Olga also wishes to see Peking.”
Wang grimaced elaborately. “The foreign bustard.”
“My friend.”
“And I honor her for it,” Wang said quickly.
So raddled red-haired Olga, waving a long Russian cigarette (luxuries ignored parties, armies, boundaries), left Nanking by train, taking with her an old servant and four lovely, accomplished whores. The platform was thick with officers, many of whom had brought flowers, some real and some of paper. Olga smiled a wooden smile and blew regal kisses. Kanamori was there, strutting like the rest and making a soldier’s jokes, but nervous within, abruptly homeless. The Americans were fighting in Manila, Tokyo had been devastated by B–29s, and here was Kanamori with his filing cabinets and objets d’art and no one to whip him.
“Perhaps,” Wang ventured diffidently, “we should all prepare a move to Peking.”
“But you are rid of that bustard,” Kanamori said lightly. “Can you be in such a hurry to rejoin her?”
“I have given this some thought. A businesswoman in Peking, with a house of her own … In the north, foreigners sprinkle themselves more evenly among the populace, and are less noticeable.” Wang smiled, cheerful and guileful. “A place to go! What man does not need a place to go? With a bit of space in the basement to store the household gods—”
“Those priceless household gods,” Kanamori murmured.
“And a room in the attic,” Wang continued, “where a man may live quietly for a time while life’s storms subside.”
“Peking!” Kanamori mused. “Perhaps I shall be a mandarin after all.”
The Imperial High Command played the card for them: after a few judicious hints, Kanamori was seconded to Peking. Much of the Peking garrison was posted back to the home islands for defense; in a steady drift northward, or toward Shanghai, Japanese officers and men responded to forces dimly perceived and not truly comprehended. Kanamori was ordered to destroy all his records. The work took a whole day; the bonfire blazed high. “All those years of life and labor,” Wang grieved. “Up in smoke.”
Kanamori admired the man’s sense of humor. “I can make copies of your own records, if you wish, to reminisce over in your old age.”
“No, no,” Wang protested; both men laughed. “Will your baggage be limited?”
“Personal belongings, but most officers have accumulated souvenirs.”
“Souvenirs indeed. As I am a Chinese civilian, my own baggage would be subject to examination and even pilferage.”
“We shall consolidate your things with mine,” Kanamori said.
“I hoped you would say that.”
“But we have been partners for six years. Think of it!”
“I think of it often,” Wang said, “and always with gratitude.”
Such a conni
ver! But Kanamori was more amused than wary.
I have killed and raped and plundered, Kanamori thought, and now I must crown my work by betraying my own country. And yet, which country? I have conquered the one and now I shall cheat the other. There seemed to be two Kanamoris these days—one half-witted, doing as instructed by Wang; the other shrewd, detached, observing and understanding Wang’s every gesture and intent. Also the dreams were more frequent and more horrific, as though the imminent end of the war was also to be a reckoning, a climax: now the nervous breakdown, now the impotence, now a gibbering Kanamori locked away by righteous, vengeful victors. Yet what remained of his mind worked like a fine watch.
With his goods and Wang’s crated together, a narrow heart was advisable. Wang’s pieces, he noticed, were less valuable than his own, more humble, deferent, ordinary. They were predominantly bronze and porcelain lions, with also a lacquered Ming box, much Ch’ing porcelain and several scrolls and paintings beyond Kanamori’s ken. Wrapped and buried in straw, the entire collection occupied four large crates. Kanamori was impressed by the probable value of all this; yet part of him shrugged. He could not know that his bronze oil lamp in the shape of a ram was not a gift from Chou Chun-yi the chemical king but was the last of a series of extortions and trades—trading up, indeed!—effected by Wang and was virtually priceless, surely beyond the means of all but a handful of collectors; he could not know that the collection as a whole would never be negotiable except to governments and museums; but he did know that Wang coveted the entire lot. He warned himself to be cautious. Wang smelled of greed as other men smelled of sweat.
At the station Wang sat in his well-sprung, brass-mounted ricksha like a lanky prince; when he required forward motion he touched the ricksha man with a foot. In all these years Kanamori had never noticed who, or how many in succession, pulled the ricksha. Nobody ever sees the ricksha man. It was a true ricksha, beautifully balanced, not a pedicab.
The crates were duly sealed, placed in Kanamori’s compartment and guarded by two Japanese infantrymen personally known to him. (Not Tateno or Kyose; those days were gone.) Wang expressed satisfaction, even affection. They would meet again in a better place: to wit, Peking. Kanamori admired the man’s audacity: staking his all—and a large all it was—on one grand throw. Nevertheless, Kanamori’s final farewell was to a captain of military police, whom he instructed to follow Wang, arrest him and see that he died quickly and in silence.
The Last Mandarin Page 12