Jasmine

by Noboru Tsujihara

  “I went to your room. The door was locked.”

  “I know. I was right there, on the other side of the door.”

  “Later I dreamt of an empty room. Woke up in a panic and went to your room again. This time the door was open, the place empty.”

  “I know. I got back on the boat.”

  “But Liu Hong never did get arrested. Yin Dan was lying.”

  “No, he wasn’t. He really was arrested.”

  The information Yin’s operatives had picked up was accurate. Much later, Li Xing learnt the details from Cai Fang.

  Liu Hong’s capture occurred at a roadblock a hundred and fifty kilometres south of Shanghai. But as he and the gang member with him were being escorted back to Shanghai, their jeep driver took a shortcut, leaving the main road to go fast down a road parallel to a creek. Seeing his chance, Liu dived into the water. A strong swimmer, he swam underwater for nearly fifty metres, heading downstream. Along the bank were fields of hemp where it was possible to travel a long way undetected. He walked all night till he came to the city of Hangzhou.

  Luckily for Liu, the gang had given him the fifty thousand yuan from Aki. Their plan had been to get him as far as Ningpo, then put him on a fishing boat and help him escape to Taiwan. The money was supposed to go to the local snakehead gang leader in Ningpo.

  Opting for neither the southern route to Hong Kong nor the eastern route to Taiwan, Liu had instead headed west, arriving in Urumqi a month later. His reasoning was simple: the escape route to Hong Kong was too dangerous, and to the east lay the ocean; by heading due west he could perhaps go overland to Europe. There was something else he couldn’t get out of his mind, what Vice President Wang Zhen had said at an emergency meeting of the Party’s Central Committee to declare martial law: “To reform the four thousand Beijing intellectuals who’re in opposition to the Party, we should pack ’em all off to Xinjiang!” This induced him to go there, to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region – of his own free will.

  The money was a godsend. Without it, he could never have made it all the way to Paris. Some public security officials in central China were sympathetic; others were amenable to a bribe. In Urumqi he got in touch with members of the underground separatist movement. They, too, wanted cash. He crossed the border at Yining and travelled on to Almaty, Kazakhstan.

  Li Xing finished her account by saying, “So you see, Aki, your money was put to good use.”

  As for herself: following Yin Dan’s instructions, and with the help of his organization, she had taken shelter with the underground Catholic Church in northern China. The Chinese Communist Party boasts a membership of fifty-eight million, but there are eighty million Christians in China. Guided by staunch Catholics, Li Xing managed to escape to the northeast, and began working in a handbag factory near the city of Shenyang. This black-market sweatshop, owned by a Hong Kong businessman originally from Shenyang, turned out imitations of deluxe brand goods from Italy and France and shipped them to Hong Kong. The local authorities were all on the take, and turned a blind eye. Most of the workers were women without proper documents; they were paid 1.6 yuan per hour and worked thirteen hours per day.

  Having decided to make her way alone in life, Li Xing never thought of turning to Cai Fang for help. And if Liu Hong was behind bars, then even a man in Cai’s position would be helpless to intervene on his behalf. She continued working in the handbag factory for a year and a half. Then the Hong Kong owner was arrested, and the resulting police investigation reached all the way to the sweatshop in Shenyang. And so, ironically, Li Xing was arrested, not for her participation in the pro-democracy movement or the Tiananmen Square demonstrations, but for involvement in illegal business activities and graft. She and two hundred co-workers were rounded up.

  After a one-week trial, the factory management and the city authorities who had accepted bribes were all sentenced to death and publicly executed by firing squad. Most of the female workers were released, but a dozen heads of the various production lines, Li Xing among them, were sentenced to three years of “labour education” and consigned to a laogai, a forced labour camp, in Xining City, Qinghai Province. This form of punishment, imposed without benefit of judicial procedure, was determined solely by local public security forces; no courts or prosecuting attorneys were party to it.

  The laogai proved to be yet another black-market factory. Here, counterfeit brand-name leather goods and clothing were manufactured for export to Japan and Australia via the Shanghai branch of another owner based in Hong Kong. All that distinguished this factory from the previous one was that it was run by the state and its workers were prisoners. Li Xing and the others were sometimes forced to stand waist-deep in huge vats filled with toxic chemicals, tanning sheep hides.

  Fifteen prisoners were housed in a cell fourteen metres square. There were no beds; everyone slept huddled on the damp floor with a single blanket. The air was filled with a fetid smell. There was one small window high on the wall through which a bit of natural light came through, but the burnt-out light bulb hanging from the ceiling was never replaced.

  The Shenyang handbag factory incident went unreported at the time. A year later, however, early in 1993 when the Party and the government began a campaign to eradicate corruption, the press took it up as a model case. Details of the scheme received ample coverage, and the names of prisoners consigned to “labour education” were made public.

  Cai Fang read the articles and found Li Xing’s name among those mentioned. That she had parted company with both Liu Hong and Aki and was in hiding somewhere on the continent he already knew, but after her dealings with the Catholic Church in north China, he’d lost track of her. Now he set about appealing to executives in the relevant bureau to grant the female workers involved immediate amnesty, arguing that they had not participated directly in any bribery or corruption, they had simply found work at a black-market factory. The Party, he reminded them, should always deal harshly with those in authority but generously with the people.

  Li Xing was released. Thanks to Cai’s efforts, her old personal register was switched with a clean, fictitious one created in its place. Her new name was Li Yan. As she had officially ceased to be Li Xing, there was no further possibility of her being accused of the crimes of procuring funds for the pro-democracy movement or of harbouring a wanted criminal and abetting his escape.

  It came as a relief to her to hear from Cai that Liu Hong had made it safely to Paris.

  What had these five years of separation meant to her? Her feelings for Aki during their brief, intense affair had not been suddenly extinguished, nor had they burnt themselves out. But while her love for him had, if anything, matured with time, she understood that there was little chance of ever being with him again, and therefore felt no impatience or anguish. Rather than oblivion, she accepted resignation.

  After she was rescued from the camp and freed from the rigors of physical labour, she became seriously ill. She couldn’t eat, and developed a lingering fever. For six months she was in a hospital affiliated with the Ministry of State Security in the suburbs of Beijing. It was there that she heard of the death of her beloved nainai.

  As her condition gradually improved, her spirits rose with it. The moment her feet were back on solid ground, she began to feel hope. She would go to Japan. To Kobe, her mother’s birthplace. It was also where he was born and raised. What the world of overseas Chinese might be like she could scarcely imagine, but if her grandparents were still alive, she wanted to see them. And if she could, she wanted to live a life of her own, however modest, in that same world.

  A few days before she was due to be released from the hospital, Cai Fang came to see her. She greeted him with surprise: “Goodness! You’ve put on weight, haven’t you?”

  “Yes, it’s doubled over the last five years.”

  “No, really?”

  “Really and truly.”

  “You look like Orson Welles.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “Lis
ten to you. You sound exactly like an official in the Ministry of State Security taking me for an American spy.”

  “Good one. But now that you mention it, you’ve put on a little weight yourself, Li Xing. I’m glad.”

  She nodded, then asked diffidently, “I wonder if you could tell me something. Is… is he okay?”

  “He’s fine,” said Cai, who then proceeded to fill her in on what had happened in Shanghai after she left Aki.

  “Why wasn’t he punished?”

  Cai’s only reply was a shake of the head.

  Li Xing confided her plan to him. He promised to give it some thought, and left.

  She was released from the hospital and, again at Cai’s doing, stayed for a while in a guesthouse in an old part of Beijing. Her new quarters were located on a narrow lane lined with small siheyuan, the city’s traditional courtyard dwellings.

  After a couple of weeks, Cai appeared and asked, “Any change in your plans since we last talked?”

  She shook her head.

  “In that case, are you willing to get married?”

  “To you, you mean?” she said with a burst of laughter. “You’ve already got a lovely wife and daughter!”

  “No, no.”

  “You’re saying that’s the only way I can leave the country?”

  He nodded. “If you marry, you can go to Japan.”

  “There’s no way I could go there alone?”

  “Absolutely not.” This came with a vigorous shake of his head.

  “Who would I be with?”

  “An employee of mine, Zhang Liang. Works at the Chinese consulate in Osaka, in charge of intelligence.”

  “Would you mind telling me one other thing?”

  Behind the rimless frames of his glasses, he rolled his eyes. His manner was not encouraging.

  “Is he married now?” she asked in a smaller voice.

  “I assume you mean Waki Akihiko, not Liu Hong.”

  Her head down, she nodded.

  “Liu got married in Paris. Waki’s unmarried. Still searching for his father.”

  That was all she needed to hear.

  “Just one thing more. Why are you doing all this for me? Because you’re Liu Hong’s friend? I mean, here you are, a top official in the ministry—”

  “Li Yan, let me be very clear. I’m not talking about a make-believe marriage, the kind that snakehead gangs arrange when they send women to Japan. You’d be Zhang’s actual wife, and as the wife of the Chinese consul, you’d have a considerable role to play.”

  “I understand. When I think of all I’ve gone through recently, this is nothing… well, not nothing, but…” Her voice trailed off.

  From the courtyard bench, Cai lumbered up and, with a little jump, grabbed a handful of silk-tree blossoms. He tried to throw them farther off, but they caught in the wind and ended up on Li Xing’s shoulders. His bulk shook as he uttered a raspy laugh.

  “I’m not the kind of man to swear mindless allegiance to the Party. I can’t say more than that. It’s the same with marriage, isn’t it, Li Xing?”

  Tacitly, he was telling her this: Marriage, too, is an interim thing, just as my being a Party member is. Any time you want to leave your husband, you can. I’ll gladly help you when the time comes.

  Li Xing understood and accepted this way of thinking. That’s how he’s managed to survive. I’ll do the same.

  “All right,” she said. “Of course I’ll work for you. Although I can’t say I know who you may be.”

  And so they made a deal, shaking hands on it in the new Chinese fashion.

  “When you get over there,” he said, “I want you to see your friend Waki.”

  “All right. But not straight away. When do I meet your friend Zhang?”

  “He’ll be coming to Beijing soon to file a report. That’s time enough.”

  “It’s a horrible plan,” she murmured.

  “Not at all. For this country, it’s better than most.”

  “Is it?”

  “Oh, yes. Shall we go for a walk? The old hutong neighbourhoods are disappearing fast in Beijing, the way old Shanghai is almost gone. But around here, things are much the way they used to be.”

  Li Xing shook her head.

  “You’re quite free to come and go as you please, you know. No one will be following you.”

  She shook her head again, more forcefully. After a few seconds of silence, she said in a somewhat brighter tone, “You know, you’ve changed. You don’t make jokes anymore, the way you used to.”

  “Don’t I? I suppose I don’t; you’re right.” With a handkerchief he wiped the sweat away from the folds of fat at the back of his neck.

  Her husband-to-be Zhang Liang was a trial, a hurdle she must somehow get past. Words she’d first heard at a Catholic service slipped into her mind: Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains by itself alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. Not exactly comforting, and yet the message was useful, she thought.

  In Japan she’d take her time, establish herself eventually on her own two feet, go back to being Li Xing. And when she was ready, Aki would be there, waiting for her. As the first step in this plan she decided to sail from Shanghai. Mentally, she said to her mother, Mom, you made the crossing from Kobe by boat; now I’ll go back by boat, in your place. Following the same route Aki had taken, and his father before him.

  But then, upsetting her orderly arrangements, Aki had suddenly shown up in person. That was why she’d murmured, It’s too soon.

  “It’s too soon, you see.” Her voice shook, and she bit her lip.

  Aki couldn’t hide a slight tremor in his own voice. “So that’s why you came. Just… to tell me this?”

  Without replying, Li Xing adjusted the mint-green shawl she was wearing, tied like a necktie. “I’m still Li Yan. It’ll take me a little time.”

  “How much? Another five years?”

  “Don’t say that.” She paused. “I’ve already told you everything that happened to me after I left you in Zhouzhuang. And I’ve listened to your story as we walked along. So many things have happened, so many detours before we could be together like this again. Plus I got to see the puppet theatre that my mother wanted so much for me to see. It was worth it, coming to Japan.”

  Aki’s mood by now had given way to concern. Five years was not enough, she was saying. He understood her plan to become independent in theory, but the thought of her retreating from him was more than he could bear.

  “Coming here was worth it, you think? Let’s make it even better. You say it’ll take time for you to go back to being Li Xing. Then how about this? Say I fell in love with you at first sight as you are now – with Li Yan. Just like I wrote in that letter on the boat. You call yourself by a different name now. Fine. Why do you need to go back to being Li Xing?”

  “It’s just not possible,” she murmured. “We’d have to start afresh, all over again.”

  “And we will. We’ll make a brand-new start.”

  “But as long as the past remains, the present can never be the way we want it to be. It can never be happy.”

  “There’s nothing bad about our past.”

  “You know, I was sent here with a specific assignment – to keep tabs on you.” She tossed this out almost as if it didn’t matter.

  “What’s Cai Fang up to? Zhang could handle something like that.”

  “I wonder.”

  “Does Zhang Liang know that the Chinese authorities arrested me, then let me go?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “He certainly doesn’t seem to. Cai sent him to Japan and arranged for him to contact me. Yet, Zhang doesn’t know the crucial fact that I was let off by the Chinese government. Cai withheld that information. Why? He left out the most important bit about me – or he’s holding it close to his chest. I’ve been biding my time, wondering when he’ll try to use it. And then you came.”

  “Ironic, isn’t it? Considering it’s my fault you got caught.”r />
  They traded smiles. But Aki’s smile turned sour.

  “Should I really feel grateful to him? Sure, the pardon was good news. But he set it all up for reasons of his own. And Xingxing, I’m happy about what he did in coming to your rescue and getting you over here in one piece. But the upshot is, I’m sitting next to a woman named Li Yan, who’s another man’s wife. Was that really the only way?”

  For a few seconds, she covered her face with her hands. “His real reason…” Her voice trailed off, as if breathing were difficult. “I think his real reason for wanting me here is to keep an eye on Zhang.”

  “What? But Zhang’s his number one guy. Why would he want him watched?”

  “Something strange is going on. I have a feeling they’re not on the same team. Or worse – they could be enemies. I’ve been in Japan for three weeks now. It doesn’t sound like much, but…”

  Aki gently laid one hand over hers, wanting to reassure her. She shook her head and slid her hand away, as if she meant to get up and go. But she didn’t.

  A sudden memory came back to him. The time he first learnt that she was coming to Kobe was the afternoon when Zhang had summoned him to Tokyo Station on the pretext of sharing some oolong tea with him. Out of the blue, with studied casualness, he had quizzed him about the Tarim survey. Why did the Huxley report contain no mention of the high-quality cottonseed plant there? Aki must have seen something of it. Then he had said something unexpected: documents on the Tarim project were missing from the Japan International Cooperation Agency. And seven hundred million yen in gratuitous ODA was gone, vanished without a trace.

  The fact was, Aki had seen no sign of the cottonseed plant anywhere in the wilds of Tarim. The seven hundred million yen seemed just to have evaporated, like water on burning sand.

  Perhaps Zhang, in connection with this business, had become suspicious of his boss and launched a private investigation…

  Aki turned back to her abruptly, amazed at this possibility. She was staring off into the distance, her thoughts too far away for her to notice. She’s not a Japanese woman, he thought. Put into words, it was ridiculously obvious, but the reality of it hit hard. A Japanese woman could go pretty much where she pleased, stay as long as she liked. When she grew tired of one place, she was free to move to somewhere else. But a Chinese woman travelled because she had a duty to discharge. Li Xing, deprived of the freedom to come and go as she chose, was here on a mission.