The Red Thread

by Dawn Farnham

  Zhen could see the distress on her face, her eyes open wide in shock. A ripple of pain rose in his chest. He had hurt her. Putting out a finger, he turned her face to his.

  Charlotte pulled her head back and looked at him accusingly. ‘Why, why tell me this? Why?’

  Qian could not think straight. A phrase recently learned from Matteo popped into his head. ‘Honesty is best policy.’

  Charlotte gave a small, slightly hysterical laugh. The ludicrous incongruity of this homily at this moment brought her to her senses. What was she doing with these crazy men in this place?

  She stood up to leave. Zhen was alarmed. She could not go, not like this. Not angry, not hating him. In Chinese he could have wooed her, giving this love, this passion for her, poetry and depth. In her language they could not find the words to say this right. It was all coming out tawdry and foolish. The time for words was over.

  Zhen took her arm and turned her to face him. ‘Not love marry woman. Love Xia Lou. Love you.’

  He bent and moved his face closer to hers. ‘Love you,’ he said fiercely, taking her waist in his hand and pulling her gently against him. She felt his other hand move to her back, his fingers in her hair, on her neck and then her face was against his and he was kissing her. A kiss so deep and soft that, despite everything, she felt herself respond to the touch of his lips on hers, the contours of his body. He held her as if she were made of the most delicate porcelain that he was afraid to drop or crush, strength and softness in one embrace. Her arms went round his neck as if drawn by some invisible chain, and she felt the corded thickness of his queue where it lay upon his neck. A wave of desire swept through her body. Her arms responded, entwining his neck and head, deepening the kiss. Zhen felt her emotion, felt his own, lifted her from the ground and pulled her closer into him. Floating, she felt liquefied, as if he, like some ancient alchemist, had blended their two base souls into molten gold.

  ‘O Love, O fire! Once he drew

  With one long kiss my whole soul thro’

  My lips,

  As sunlight drinketh dew’

  When he finally released her—took his lips from hers with slow reluctance and made them clay again—she drooped weakly onto the stone bench. Zhen fell to his knees in front of her. Bringing his crossed arms to his forehead he gently put his face into her lap in a gesture of submission so completely unexpected it moved her to the core.

  Qian, embarrassed and a little jealous, had retreated to the other side of the tree. He had never seen a man kiss a woman like that, and he would have liked to feel Zhen’s hard arms around him.

  Without thinking, Charlotte put her hands on his head and dropped her face to kiss the place where his queue began, laying her cheek against his naked skin and entwining her fingers in the red-threaded, plaited silkiness of his hair. And so they stayed quietly. A little breeze rustled the leaves of the tree above, which fell in a golden shower over them.

  Qian peeped round the tree. It was like an antique painting. To see them sitting so touched his heart, but he did not know where all this would end. He moved through the dried leaves, and Zhen and Charlotte stirred.

  ‘What do you want?’ she asked through Qian, her eyes on Zhen.

  ‘To see you, meet you, speak with you,’ he said. Qian translated. ‘I’ll never touch you again if you don’t want it. This marriage is nothing. Economic necessity. You must not have pain because of it. All my heart belongs to you.’

  All this was difficult for Qian to find the words to explain. She put her hand on Qian’s arm, reassuring him. She understood. It was all right. Zhen wanted them to be lovers, one way or another. Marriage with her, impossible. Marriage to the other woman because he was poor. She needed to think about this very carefully, not surrender to the emotions which were swirling around in her.

  ‘Yes, see, speak,’ she said quietly. These words he understood. It was enough. He lowered his head in relief.

  They parted without another word, and Qian walked back to the chapel with Charlotte. He liked this woman very much, for he felt her heart was pure. He was worried that she would be consumed and destroyed by this passion and love of Zhen’s for her. He knew the force of Zhen’s character. He was as adept at the wu wei, the soft letting-be nature of the Tao, as with its disciplines. If he felt this Xia Lou was his by natural right he would be as the river, pulling her into the flow as effortlessly but relentlessly as a flower petal is carried on the current of a stream.

  As he left her at the gate he said, ‘Miss Xia Lou, please careful. I your friend. Zhen is dragon, yang, but can be yin, you understand.’

  Charlotte looked at Qian. ‘Yang? Yin?’

  ‘Yes. Chinese people think, all things two but make one. One yin, one yang.’ He clasped his fingers together to show her the unity of these two concepts, for he did not know the words.

  Taking a twig he drew the tai chi on the ground. She recognised it from one of the temples she had been to or somewhere in the town. He drew the dots in either side of the wavy separation.

  ‘Yin in yang, yang in yin. Yin, you, soft, water. Yang, man, hard. Zhen is fire but can be water.’

  When Zhen had taken the decision to kiss Xia Lou, he had been yang, fiery and bright, but when he had knelt at her feet, he had surrendered to her yin power, soaking it up and turning it to his advantage. Qian felt certain of this. He had put his head in her lap and become liquescent, entering the fissures of her resolve as water fills up the crevices and cracks of a dry riverbed. This was Zhen’s power. His ability to be hot light but soak up the cool darkness made him composed under pressure, pliant but disciplined, impulsive but not reckless.

  ‘Careful, please.’

  He bowed and left her contemplating the image. Charlotte realised there was so much she did not know. Unfortunately Zhen’s mysterious side simply made him more attractive.

  Crimoney, Kitt Macleod, I think you’re in trouble if he can be fire and water. She thought she might need some of the yang stuff if she was to resist him. She could still feel the pressure of his lips on her mouth, the soft strength of his arms around her, the sorcery of his kiss. But Qian’s simple explanation had somehow clarified her thoughts. She wanted this kiss again, and probably more, she could not deny it, but if this was his yang-ness, his hard fire, then, if this Chinese philosophy were right, she could absorb it too. Smiling, she turned into the gate of the chapel.

  Before Governor Bonham felt forced to act, Chen Long called off the attacks. Coolies would think twice before joining this interfering sect. The violence had started to open up old suspicions between Teochew and Hokkien. Peace returned to Singapore.

  29

  The Christian Chinese had largely dispersed. The dead had been buried in a corner of the Christian cemetery on the hill. Of the survivors, some went off to work in the tin mines, some to the islands; others stayed to find work in the town or in the market gardens, but many returned home to China. A few were sent to seminaries in Penang to prepare them for the priesthood. Most of the women had simply vanished from the town, but quite a lot had converted. Father Baudrel hoped they would make good wives for the Chinese Christian faithful who had endured so much. Father Lee had recovered from his beatings. Evangeline returned to her more regular work. Charlotte resumed her teaching of the younger boys, and Zhen and Qian went back to the English lessons.

  Over the next weeks Charlotte and Zhen met in the chapel gardens after the lesson for a while before he had to go back to town. On a Sunday, when Robert went to church or disappeared off somewhere, Charlotte would meet Zhen in the orchard in the early morning, for Baba Tan paid little attention to him on that day, which he spent with his family in Kampong Glam. Then they would try to talk about each other.

  The first time she went, Zhen had shaken a nutmeg from the old tree and opened up the hard sheath with his knife, revealing the beauty of the shiny black nut and its lacy red mace caul. In her heart she felt that he was like the nut, hard and glowing, and she the delicate enveloping arms of the
caul, which she longed to entwine around him. She could never tell him this, but when they looked at the nutmeg together she felt he understood the sentiment. He tried to explain the legends and properties of this spice—how in China it was used in cooking but also in medicine for indigestion and as oil for muscle aches. If you took the right amount it made you euphoric; if you took too much it killed you. So she learned that he knew about medicine and herbs. Sometimes he would bring dried up roots and kernels from the fragrant and pungent Chinese medicine shops in the town and show her something of their use; or he brought pretty spices: star anise and cassia buds.

  He discovered she could sail small boats and admired her bravery. She tried to tell him she had had an accident, a blow and deep cut to her arm when the jib had swung back onto her. Miming the word accident, she had pretended to stumble and fall, which had precipitated an actual fall, and he, alarmed, had picked her up, and she had laughed, unhurt, and he had understood and laughed too. They grew easier together and smiled at their constant misunderstandings. Zhen now made a huge effort at learning English and was making rapid improvement. He told her about China, the village where his family lived, the poverty which had forced him to leave.

  He had three older brothers, a sister and three younger brothers. He was the second son of his father’s third wife. Though he could not articulate this to Charlotte, as a fourth son of a minor wife he had considerable freedoms not enjoyed by his elder brothers, whose duties to the family were greater than his. Charlotte was amazed at the number of wives Chinese men seemed to have. The thought of sharing him with another woman was already gnawing at her. She could not imagine putting up with three or four. Zhen tried to explain his obligation to grow rich and aid his family back home; he did not tell her of his father’s addictions, though, for he was ashamed of this stain. Charlotte told him about her island home, the loss of her parents and life in chilly Scotland.

  He did not touch her, though he longed to. He would wait, wait for her, half the pleasure in the waiting. He would know when she was ready. It was enough to be together for now. Wanting to touch him, she showed him some dance steps, a half-learned Scottish reel, wishing against reason that he would kiss her again, but he did not. He showed her the movement of the tai chi, knowing how graceful and lithe his body looked, enjoying her gaze, waiting, tempting her, turning her, drawing her. Watching him in the morning light as the sun slanted down through the old trees was, for Charlotte, like watching an ethereal and magnificent spirit of the wood.

  He gave her a mirrored pa kua, the tai chi symbol with the eight trigrams, and tried to explain that it would guard her against bad spirits. She brought a picture book of paintings she had found at the institution library, filled with images of China, and he laughed at the quaintness of these scenes so unlike the heroic landscapes and Taoist paintings of his homeland. ‘China not like this,’ he said, and Charlotte nodded. Of course China was not like this. For Charlotte, this man was China: fabulous, magnificent, the contours of his body the hills and valleys, his eyes filled with the dark rivers and streams of his land.

  He took her to Chinatown and tried to teach her how to use chopsticks in a dish of thick noodles. They both ended up laughing at her inadequacy. The shop owner had been astonished to see a white woman in his shop.

  Eventually, of course, their relationship came to the notice of Robert and Baba Tan.

  ‘Kitt,’ Robert began one day at breakfast, ‘people are talking about you and that Zhen. You know he is going to marry the baba’s daughter.’

  Charlotte looked up at him, displeased at his interference and at the mention of this marriage. ‘Are they, Robbie? And what are they saying?’

  He recognised the tone in her voice.

  ‘ Auch, Kitt, really. I like the fellow and you know I don’t like to interfere, but tongues wag.’

  ‘Well, Robbie, let them. There’s nothing but friendship there. He saved my life. Why, you should be grateful. He’s learning English. I know about the marriage. If it’s a problem for you, then tell me, for there’s nothing untoward going on.’

  Robert had dropped the matter, for he believed his sister, but Charlotte understood she should be more careful. Yet she felt a lightness of spirit when she was with Zhen that was hard to give up.

  Baba Tan had spoken with Zhen, too. He liked this young man who would be his son, did not mind that he might be enjoying some premarital fun, but white women were trouble on too many levels. Zhen had simply bowed to him and said, ‘Do not be anxious; there is nothing happening there. She was my teacher. I saved her life and feel she is like a sister to me. From her I learn a lot about the white people and their customs. But if you wish it, I will not meet her again.’

  ‘No, no,’ Tan had replied, mollified. ‘Discretion, though, is required.’

  They had been amicable, for Tan did not want to lose this young man who he knew now occupied his eldest daughter’s every waking thought. Since the day she had seen him, she had devoted herself to her trousseau with redoubled vigour and attended to her mother and father with a filial piety which bespoke her gratitude. Her joy was so palpable it touched his heart.

  Zhen had made such good progress in Baba Malay too and was proving to be a real asset to the company. Of course it was a good thing to get close to the white administrators. So Tan let the matter drop.

  In the meantime Qian had been growing increasingly anxious as the day of his own marriage approached. He now knew Sang’s business inside and out, and Ah Liang was happy to leave much of the day-to-day running of the company to him.

  The two friends met one evening on Boat Quay. Zhen talked to Qian of his growing love for Charlotte. Qian was the only person he could reveal this to, and he was grateful to his friend for his patient understanding. Tonight, though, he sensed Qian was uneasy. He waited for his friend to speak.

  When he did, Zhen was taken aback, for it had never crossed his mind that Qian might prefer men.

  ‘Aiya, little Qian. This is a problem. Do you fancy me, then, blockhead? Why, by the red face of Guan Di, I believe you do.’ He punched Qian lightly on the arm.

  ‘Forget about it. The pleasures of the bitten peach don’t interest me, eh.’

  He saw Qian wince and was immediately sorry. It had been hard for him to reveal this; Zhen knew that. He did not especially disapprove. The fourth concubine often had a girl or two in her bed, even when he was there, for she liked him to watch them together, and he had enjoyed these romps, sharing himself between them all. Sometimes they were joined by boys, whom she trained in the erotic arts for her master, who enjoyed both sides of the bed. Zhen was not interested in this particular pleasure, but he had known homosexual men back home with whom you could get drunk as easily as the next fellow.

  Qian had begun to regret speaking to Zhen, but it was too late now.

  ‘No, thunder boy, I don’t fancy you so shut up. But what am I going to do on my damn wedding night? Look. I need the hard body, you know, the dick, all the bits. All that softness and roundness just turns me off.’

  Zhen shook his head in disbelief. All the softness and roundness turned him off! Aiya, truly he would never understand this kind of passion.

  ‘I don’t know what to say. You have to get it up for her once, on the wedding night.’

  They went round and round the problem, drinking grog and getting drunk to the point of laughter, but with no answer found.

  The next day, Zhen had decided that this was a serious problem for his friend and gave it more dedicated thought. His only solution was that Qian would have to practise on a woman at least a few times before the nuptials. He would have to go to Min and get one of the boys there—do it with them together.

  Qian was initially sceptical but in the end, what did he have to lose? Two nights later they met up at the ah ku house and waited for Min. When she saw Zhen she was, at first, annoyed. He hadn’t been to see her for weeks. He placated her and put a sum of money onto the dresser. He had already paid the old woman, but t
his would be extra for her.

  He explained what was required. Min was not very interested; she wanted time with Zhen. However, she finally agreed and sent for one of the young boys from the ah ku house next door. Zhen waited at one of the tea houses for Qian. When he emerged, Qian shook his head. It just hadn’t worked.

  ‘Aiya, Qian, then I can’t do anything more for you. Perhaps you should be honest with your poor new wife. After all, what does she want with an impotent blockhead like you in her bed? Then you can sort out some arrangement with a coolie that she might fancy. She gets some satisfaction at least and possibly a son for the house, and you go your merry way. Make her a good husband in other ways. Be kind to her. I know it sounds radical, but what’s the alternative? You need this marriage. From what I’ve seen of the Sang household, they could do with some happiness.’

  Qian knew Zhen was right. There was no other way. He would be useless to her in bed.

  Zhen went to thank Min, for he knew she was disappointed that he would not stay. He promised to come back soon, kissed her and departed. He needed a drink. Qian was on his own.

  In any case, Zhen was busy. The tailor came to measure him for the wedding suit and other clothes he would need. Many of the gifts that would be taken on the betrothal day had arrived at his house. Suddenly there seemed to be no time to see Charlotte, even at the chapel. He sensed her slight withdrawal. After his lesson, he approached her, trying to engage her but she seemed aloof.

  Charlotte, despite her sharpness with Robert, had been trying to decide what to do about her growing closeness to Zhen. Robert was right, of course, tongues would wag, and after all, Zhen was getting married soon. She decided that it would be better to see less of him. John Connolly had called on her many times, and she liked him a great deal. He was something of a younger version of Coleman, and she found him very seductive. John made her laugh; they shared a sense of humour, and he liked to sail also. He had prospects, she knew, and had recently started his own agency house with William Kerr, a new arrival. Lieutenant Gold, too, paid her attendance at parties but she had cooled towards him. He could be prudish and peevish, and she did not think she wanted either quality in a man, nor especially to be the wife of a soldier. John’s easy nature was a match for her own, which she knew could be occasionally serious, sometimes grimly determined.