Flash House

by Aimee E. Liu

  “Thank you,” she said to Weller, but also, he sensed, to him. “Please. I could use a drink.”

  4

  That night Joanna sat up in bed, roused by a dream that, though instantly vanished, left her skin feeling liquid. The room was thick with heat, and the mosquito netting hung in a blur above her head. Still half asleep, she reached for Aidan. Then she placed herself, and the chill that followed made her teeth chatter.

  As her eyes adjusted to the dark, she could just make out Kamla coiled soundless on her cot. Familiar as she had become with the child’s silent sleep, Joanna could never get used to it. Simon snored and rolled and flung his arms like a cub marking its territory. By contrast, Kamla seemed intent on disappearing, claiming as small a space, as little atmosphere as humanly possible. She could sleep anywhere, any time, under any conditions.

  Not that these were hardship conditions. The silence here was opaque. No whining mosquitoes or rattling beetles. Nothing like Delhi, or even Kashgar. The nets were a fit of excess. Americans abroad. What Lillian had revealed to her when they were alone was Weller’s “keen” idea of establishing a “third force” of tribal and Turki rebels—a U.S.-and British-backed coalition that would remain in place even after Chiang’s troops fled, to “stand up against those Communists and defend the Free World.” Lillian thought Dan a hero for devising such a scheme, as it united three factions that heretofore had been ripping each other, as well as the Nationalists and Communists, to shreds. Literally, in fact, as some of the so-called freedom rebels were Kazakhs who fought on horseback with sabers as their preferred weapons—presumably before the U.S. started furnishing grenades and machine guns. “As we Americans well know,” intoned Lillian, “a house divided against itself cannot stand.”

  And in the very next breath she’d said, “You know, that girl is trouble. Like Nancy Drew wandering into the middle of a gunfight. Dan tried to talk some sense into her, and when that didn’t work he tried to tell your husband to steer clear of her…” The drift of her voice had completed the statement.

  Joanna shuddered, threw off her covers, and climbed out from under her web. She and Lawrence had hardly spoken all evening. The Wellers didn’t permit many words in edgewise, and on top of that they watched their guests so closely that it felt like surveillance. But Lawrence was the only one who could help her make sense of this.

  Was Aidan, in fact, trying to escape her? Or was this disappearing act an attempt somehow to spare her?

  She hugged herself, gripping the slate floor with her toes, her skin alive to the silk of the gown Lillian had urged on her. She traced a hand over Kamla’s profile, registering the delicate contours of her face without penetrating the net. She envied the child’s refusal to wake. Then she turned away.

  She found a knob, stepped into the unlit hallway, and felt her way along the wall. But once outside Lawrence’s room she stopped, and the chill of her waking came again. The door stood ajar. She could hear him breathing. Quiet. Alert.

  She recalled Aidan’s face smiling at her from a hundred directions. Dirty light and filtered amusement park music making the reflections vibrate. The muffled roar of the sea, and a flash, like the strobe from an unseen watchtower. Please? She’d begged, and he’d obliged her. Given her all that she’d asked.

  She felt again the heat of Lawrence’s touch in Kashgar, the power of his body surrounding her and Kamla after he’d pulled them from the rapids. She pictured his mismatched eyes in the dark, waiting for her to choose.

  She put her hand to the wall to steady herself. Then fled.

  5

  You know, sometimes in the flash house I had seen men with the look that Lawrence now carried in his eyes. Mira in particular had that effect on her babus. They would make promises. They would beseech her. They would go to her bed in anguish and leave with an air of tragedy. I thought Mira had such power! But she insisted that all power is illusion and none more illusory than this power of the flesh. Sure enough, the babus would come for weeks, sometimes months, and then we would not see them again. You see? she would say if I asked after them, and snap her fingers. Illusion. But she did not seem to mind this so much. Better them, she told me, than the ones who cannot distinguish between love and rage. She would show me the scars on her neck and wrists, the bruises on her back to illustrate. Or the ones who mistake us for banks, she would say, laughing now. You know, show me the slot. The trouble is, they never put in more than five rupees at a time! Sometimes the moon-eyed babus, they would pay one hundred.

  The moon had entered Lawrence’s eyes in the mountains and grown to fullness by the time we reached Tihwa. The first morning after our arrival at the American consulate I left Mem sleeping and stole downstairs to find him alone in the garden. Over the weeks we had spent together Lawrence and I often met each other sleepless and wandering in the dawn. We did not talk a great deal at these times, but he might take my hand. We would watch the sun rise. Sometimes he told me about his son’s antics or the jungles and oceans where he had traveled. We did not talk of Mem, but I could sense in him the tangle of emotions that she aroused. That morning as I came out of the house the high, pulsing wail of the muezzin’s call to prayer began, and the sound seemed to echo what I knew Lawrence was feeling within his breast.

  He stood with his hands clasped behind his wide back, facing away from the house. The great sky above him was striped with saffron clouds, the air soft and still. The garden, unlike the city we had passed through the day before, was dense with greenery and flowers that masked the smell of coal dust. I called out softly, and he started, turning with that full-moon look of hope, which changed as soon as he saw me. But I was accustomed to this shadow of disappointment, as well as the quick shift to a welcoming smile. “Couldn’t sleep, eh?”

  I shook my head. “It is different.”

  “Tihwa, you mean?”

  I nodded.

  “Could be the Americans.”

  “I do not remember them.”

  “No, that’s what I’m telling you. There were none. Americans are new in this part of the world.” We had been walking away from the house along a gravel path. Now he looked back at the consulate.

  “Will you take me to my father today?”

  Lawrence stopped. He turned to me with a kind of care that was at once alert and tender. He touched my cheek with his fingertips, and just then a commotion of dropping pots and yells broke from the servants’ quarters, but he did not remove his eyes from me. The moon was still in them, but it had retreated almost out of sight. I had driven it away.

  I do not know if that was what I intended, if this was why I had chosen this moment to ask for my father. But my words stung the soft morning air.

  “Ah, Kammy,” he said finally. “We’re going to try.”

  Then he squatted in front of me, clamping his big hands over my shoulders. “But whatever happens,” he said, “Mem and I’ll see you’re safe. Whatever happens, you hear?”

  I was not accustomed to promises, and my life had taught me not to believe those that did come my way. Yet I knew at once this promise was different. The two colors of Lawrence’s eyes seemed to lock me in an embrace, and I felt the fervor of his vow run through me like a current. Whatever happens. This was not merely an offer of protection. He was begging me to hold him to it.

  6

  May 2, 1949

  Dear Mem,

  Dr. Milne is taking good care of Ralph and me. My leg is almost all better. Dr. Akbar shows us how to do rope tricks. He let me use one of his swords to cut a paper box in half. Dr. Akbar has lots of friends. They come around and smoke from a hookah and talk all night. I’m learning a little Kashmiri. Dr. Milne says they’re all Communists but he likes them too. They bring me candy and I let Ralph have some. I teached them all to say A-OK.

  I hope you and Lawrence and Kamla are A-OK. Dr. Milne says this letter will take five weeks to reach you. He showed me on the calendar. He says it will be longer for your letters to reach me because first you have to find
a dak.

  I can pray to Allah. You go lower than in church. You put your hands and knees on the ground. Your forehead, too.

  I hope you find Daddy soon.

  Love you,

  Simon

  Joanna stood alone in the consulate sunroom with tears streaming down her cheeks. Simon’s letter had been relayed from Kashgar. It was accompanied by a note from Milne assuring her that Simon was indeed safe and well—thriving was the word he used.

  “Thriving,” she said out loud and sat down hard on an upholstered ottoman that let out a gasp in reply.

  She wiped her eyes with the back of her wrist and licked the tears from the corners of her mouth. Outside the window Lawrence and Kamla were walking hand in hand, their faces obscured by the salmon-gold brilliance of sky behind them. They couldn’t see her seated here below eye level, and this fact intensified the effect, not of spying exactly, but of observing with heightened appreciation and a kind of full attention possible only when undetected. Lawrence leaned toward Kamla as he walked so that their arms both swung at full extension, without him pulling her up. Joanna wondered if she did the same when she swung arms with Simon. She thought so. She knew Aidan didn’t. She had a clear picture of Aidan sauntering down the road with Simon’s hand yanked up past his ear. It used to touch her to watch her dashing, worldly husband making time for their young son. She’d never considered the way they walked. Whether Lawrence was conscious of his solicitousness or not, his whole body reflected the attention and concern he was directing toward Kamla.

  Simon was thriving, she told herself again. It seemed nothing short of a miracle.

  She breathed in softly and drew her gaze down Kamla’s silhouette. The top of the girl’s head came nearly to Lawrence’s shoulder. She was taller than Joanna had realized. Was it possible she had grown just in the time they’d been together? She computed the weeks. Two months at ten, eleven years of age. Yes, more than possible. And then another thought seized her. Last night after supper Mr. Weller had promised to review what files he had, see if anyone answering the description of Kamla’s father was listed. He promised to check with the British consul as well. He’d warned them not to get their hopes up, but Joanna saw now that hope was exactly what they had to keep up—no matter what the cost.

  She rose and pushed open the French doors to the terrace just as the two reached the house. She smiled.

  “Hullo!” Lawrence’s eyes took her in. “What do you have there?”

  “It’s from Simon.” She showed him the letter. “He sounds fine. Though by the time we get back, Akbar may have turned him into a Communist, a brigand, and a Mohammedan.”

  “Please?” Kamla took the page from Lawrence and studied it intently. She had a natural aptitude for reading, seemingly memorizing each new word as it was pointed out to her, but she had not yet mastered writing, and Simon’s ability impressed her no end. She grinned when she came to her name, but the smile faltered as she reached the end. I hope you find Daddy soon.

  “Come,” Joanna said abruptly. “Let’s see about getting some breakfast, shall we?”

  As they emerged from the sunroom, Mrs. Weller appeared down the hall, smoothing the collar of her polka dot dress and setting her scarlet lipstick with rabbity pinches of her mouth. “There you are!” She beckoned them forward. “You’re all so quiet and sneaky, I thought you’d stolen away in the night.”

  A stricken look crossed her face as she must have realized Joanna was mentally completing her comment, “just like that woman and your husband.”

  “Not at all,” Lawrence jumped in. “We woke early and didn’t want to disturb anyone.”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake. What could you possibly disturb! Dan was up at the crack of dawn. He went over to the British consulate on that matter he promised you.” Lillian threw a meaningful glance toward Kamla, who hung back in the sunroom doorway.

  “And?” Joanna asked.

  “He’s still there.” The consul’s wife slid her tongue along her front teeth, checking for lipstick smears. “By the time we finish breakfast he should be back.”

  As they proceeded to the breakfast room she rattled on about the capital’s sights—temples, mosques, bazaars, camels, modern shops. Having flown into Tihwa from central China, Mrs. Weller apparently had no conception of the miles they had covered or the conditions under which they had traveled. She seemed equally casual about the political landscape, Tihwa’s reputation for danger and intrigue, the pending evacuation, and the two errands that had brought her guests, though when her husband strode in some minutes later, she did turn to him expectantly. “Learn something, dear?”

  Weller ignored her, addressing Lawrence alone. “Could I have a word with you?”

  Joanna opened her mouth to protest, but Lawrence beat her to it. “If there’s news, it’s more Jo’s business than mine.”

  The consul’s woolly eyebrows shot up. He was probably handsome in his youth, Joanna thought. A quarterback or class president. The thought prompted a twinge of hostility, and she realized simultaneously that she didn’t trust this man and that she identified him with the same forces in Washington that, in Lawrence’s words, had pegged Aidan for the Red Menace. “There’s news, and there’s news,” he said. “Suit yourselves.”

  Joanna felt Kamla’s stillness beside her. This business, in point of fact, was the child’s if it was anyone’s, yet Weller’s gruffness was not a good omen, and he was hardly one to cushion the blow. “It won’t be long,” she promised Kamla.

  “Come, dear,” Lillian Weller barreled through. “Do you know how to play gin rummy?”

  7

  As they entered the office, Lawrence looked past Weller to a sallow man of indeterminate age seated in front of the consul’s black lacquer desk. He had floppy brown hair, large, red-veined ears, and wore his tailored tan linen suit as if it rubbed him the wrong way. From the single recessed window behind the desk, a diagonal strip of sunlit dust motes split the high-ceilinged room in half. The man squinted over it through wire-rimmed glasses, rising as the three of them approached.

  “John Henderson,” Weller introduced him. “My counterpart over at the British consulate.” He shut the door behind them, and Henderson shook hands first with Joanna, then Lawrence. His handshake was dry and tepid, noncommittal rather than weak. The arrogance of this withholding irked Lawrence enough that he returned it with a bone-crushing squeeze. Henderson’s thin lips tightened, and he retrieved his hand.

  Joanna and Lawrence seated themselves in two oval chairs on one side of the sunbeam, Henderson on the other. As in the rest of the house, most of the furnishings were distinctly Chinese rather than Sinkiangese, and of suspiciously high quality.

  Weller took his place behind the desk with the window at his back. “John’s come up with a name that matches.” He slid across his desk a plain sheet of notepaper on which was scrawled “Patu Chand. Former lieutenant, Jat Regiment, H.M. Indian Army.”

  Joanna turned the sheet over, but there was no other information. Lawrence looked at Henderson. “From Kashmir?”

  The British consul nodded. “Sikh, married to a Tungan woman.”

  “And he was arrested five years ago?” Joanna leaned forward, sounding breathless.

  “I can’t tell you exactly—I only arrived here last year and the records are spotty, but thereabouts, yes. Accused of being a reactionary.”

  Weller set his elbows on his desk and kneaded his hands together. “That much the kid had right. But she was wrong on one major detail.”

  Henderson said, “Chand never deserted.”

  “I knew it,” Lawrence thought out loud. Then he read Joanna’s confusion. “Kamla’s father was a British agent.” And to Henderson, “A news writer. Am I right?”

  “The early 1940s were a horror here,” Henderson continued as if Lawrence hadn’t spoken. “Of course, most of the English had left by then, but there were still quite a few British Indian traders, and they bore the brunt of it. Chand was a good soldier.”
>
  “What happened to him?” Lawrence asked.

  The British consul nibbled his upper lip. “I’m afraid he’s dead.”

  “You know this for a fact?”

  “Yes.” But his tone was evasive.

  “How do you know?” Joanna demanded.

  “Honey—” Weller began, but at this Joanna shot him a look of admirable venom, and he retrained his statement. “Mrs. Shaw, the war may be over in other parts of the world, but here in Sinkiang”—he pronounced it Sink-yang—“it’s at full tilt. You’ve got your Turkestan rebels up in the hills with Joe Stalin’s guns and advisors. You’ve got your Chinese Reds padding around the underground right here in the capital. You’ve got Chiang’s boys looking to fly the coop, and a bunch of native tribesmen with more brawn than brains, but at least the natives are a tough lot and terrific guerrilla fighters—” He had evidently forgotten the question and was rehearsing his position statement.

  “Mr. Weller,” Joanna broke in. “I appreciate the politics, but my concern right now is this child, who according to you is an orphan. If I’m going to tell her that her father is dead, I want to be damn sure it’s true. If there’s proof, I want to see it.”

  A series of horizontal lines appeared in Weller’s forehead. He seemed on the verge of laughing. “I like a woman who cusses,” he said to Henderson, who frowned distractedly and checked his watch.

  “That’s just it,” Henderson answered Joanna. “Proof. We have no record that Chand had a daughter.”

  She stared at him.

  Lawrence said, “You mean there was no birth certificate.”

  “No document of any kind.”

  “But surely that’s not unusual here—especially for a girl child.”

  “No, it’s not. Nevertheless—”

  “When you hear how he died you may decide she’s better off not knowing,” Weller interrupted.

  No one spoke.