The Harmony Silk Factory

by Tash Aw

  I had never before known the meaning of the expression “with all my life,” not truly, but in those few moments I did. I clung to the wooden rail on the side of the boat with all my life. I wanted to say “sorry” to Johnny with all my life, “sorry I made you love me.” And with all my life I wanted to see Mamoru again.

  I fell into the sea as I knew I would. I had been stupid to believe I could resist its force. Still I kicked against it. The warm foamy wash swept into my mouth, my eyes, my nose and lungs, but I kicked some more. I felt my limbs begin to tire from the struggle. Where were the others? I had not seen any of them. I thought of surrendering, but my stiffening legs continued to kick as if obeying a will greater than my own.

  Were the waves beginning to calm? Over their crests I thought I saw Johnny’s head bobbing lifelessly not five yards from me. I tried to call to him, but when I opened my mouth I was dragged underwater. Somehow my body rose to the surface again, and that was when I saw Mamoru. He looked straight at my face and called out to me, I know he did. It was him, swimming powerfully towards me. In the distance, another swimmer: Peter? Johnny’s head was barely visible now, even though the waves had calmed further. My own body felt heavy and tired, and I realised that both my legs had seized up. Yet I was not scared. I knew that soon I would be saved. Mamoru was now only twenty yards away and still making progress. I could see the boat now too, far away in the water-washed distance. Someone was standing on the deck, looking out at us. I looked to see where Mamoru was. Why was he swimming away from me? Half-choked, I screamed his name, and he paused, looking in my direction. But then he put his head in the water again and continued on his course. A few seconds later I saw him pull Johnny to the surface. With his body under Johnny’s, he began to swim back to the boat. He cradled Johnny’s face between his hands, pointing it to the sky and the open air.

  I stopped kicking. A crushing numbness gripped my legs, and my eyes began to sting. I let myself sink, feeling the sea pull me into its depths.

  And then I felt hands; hands on my body, grabbing at my arms, breasts, hair, pulling me to the surface. I coughed, water burning my throat. “Snow! Snow!” I heard as I felt life return to my lungs. It was Peter.

  “Don’t struggle, Snow, let yourself go limp,” he said as he pulled my arm over his shoulder. I felt his hard bony back beneath me all the way to the boat. His legs and arms pulled unevenly, jerking rather than propelling us along. His breaths rasped as he swam, and it was some time before I realised he was singing a song. I could scarcely believe it. Over the waves and the dying rain, he was still trying to sing his silly songs.

  WE WATCHED THE STORM CLOUD as it swept away from us. Sunshine and flat green waters returned in an instant. The sodden deck began to dry, steam rising thickly in the heat. Our clothes, too, felt heavy and clammy.

  Honey, it seems, had hidden below deck in the cabin. He said it had been a terrifying experience, being tossed about like a cricket ball in that tiny space.

  Mamoru came to where I was sitting and asked if I was alright. I did not answer.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I did not know where you were. I thought I heard your voice but I saw only Johnny. I knew he couldn’t swim. If I did not save him he would have drowned. Peter was there too and I thought—I don’t know. I am sorry.” A pained expression settled on his face and I thought he might cry.

  “I cannot swim either,” I said, closing my eyes tightly. I did not cry.

  He bowed his head and touched my arm. “I did not know that.” He remained next to me for a while. I felt his slow, warm breath on my arm. When he had gone I saw that he had left something for me. It was the small soft bag that I had been carrying with me, the one in which I kept my diary. I had forgotten all about it during the storm. I undid the straps of the bag and searched its damp contents. It was still there, wrapped tightly in its wax cloth. Mamoru must have rescued it for me. He had saved it from the storm.

  Peter approached me but I shut my eyes.

  23rd October 1941

  IT WAS CURIOUS, the way the Seventh Maiden finally revealed itself to us. Thinking about it now, less than two days later, I still cannot decide if the sudden sight of it was an unexpected shock or something entirely predictable and perfectly natural. We had not spoken much after the storm, and so I do not know what the others felt. I cannot determine the sensations I myself experienced on first seeing it.

  We all saw it at the same time. Once the storm had passed, it took us a while to reorient ourselves. We headed back to the first island, all five of us searching the seas around us with added vigilance. We counted the islands and—we thought—anticipated finding six, as we had before. It was only when we passed the fifth, the one closest to our original island, that we saw it. It lay exactly where the first island had been. I could have sworn it did. But where that small island had been there now stood a new one, ten times the size of the previous one and larger by far than any we had seen. It too had a covering of scrubby forest on the edge of its rock-and-sand coast, but behind that rose a dense green jungle, quite unlike anything we had seen since coming to sea. Its rich colouring seemed at odds with the yellowish, sun-bleached foliage of earlier islands. The coconut trees were tall and stood firm and erect, unbowed by the sea breeze. How far it stretched I could not say.

  We drifted slowly into its shallows, surrendering to it. The cries of strange animals punctured the air.

  “You see?” Peter said quietly to me. “Life.”

  We set up camp in a shaded clearing on the edge of the jungle, within sight of the beach. Mamoru hacked at some saplings with a parang, felling them with single strokes of the curved blade. The clearing was ideal, Mamoru said. The ground was dry and covered with short grass and sand. Around it stood trees with firm trunks—perfect for hammocks—and thick foliage offering cool respite from the sun; the barrier of scrub at the edge of the beach provided a natural windbreak.

  The men left in search of fresh water. Mamoru said that he sensed it close at hand. Once we had a reliable source of water for bathing and drinking, there was little else we needed, he said. He lifted his head as if to smell the air. “We will not want for much in this place.” They split up, Mamoru pairing with Honey, and Peter with Johnny.

  “Coming, Snow?” Peter said. I looked at him and Johnny and then turned to catch Mamoru’s eye.

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “I think I will stay here and get things organised for your return.”

  As soon as they left I took out my diary and began to write.

  Recording the events of the past few days has not been easy for me. The reliving of certain moments has been more painful than I had anticipated. Whilst writing these last entries, I have found myself pausing in order to contemplate the words, to rethink the sequence of events. I have never done this before. It is as if I am unsure of everything. The world in which I seek refuge—this world, my world—is no longer as assuring as it once was. This diary is still my own. I can still be alone within it. But I am not certain now of what it means to be alone.

  24 th October 194 1

  MAMORU AND HONEY RETURNED FIRST. It was as they had expected. A freshwater stream was close by, barely half a mile away. “Let me show you,” Mamoru said, extending his hand to me.

  “Yes, what a good idea,” Honey added. “I’ll leave the two of you to enjoy the walk on your own.” He had a smile on his face, yet he looked as if he was frowning with worry. I could not decipher this expression.

  We walked through an ancient and silent jungle, the tread of our feet crunching loudly around us. Hazy sunlight filtered through the foliage and conjured shadowy shapes in the air.

  “I am sorry about what happened at sea, during the storm,” Mamoru said.

  “Please,” I said before he could continue. “I do not want you to apologise. You did what you believed was right. That is all we can do in our lives. You did not know where I was—how could you have saved me? If you had not acted as you did, Johnny would be dead. I do not want
to hear any more on the subject.”

  We walked in silence for a while. I reached out and felt for his hand. When I touched it he clasped mine in return.

  We reached a clearing by the stream. A grove of wild bananas and elephant grass encircled us.

  “Please forgive me,” said Mamoru, unbuttoning his shirt. “I need desperately to bathe the salt from my body.” He waded into the water, his khaki shorts ballooning as he did so. When he reached the middle of the stream and the water was at waist height, he curled his body and plunged underwater. After a few seconds, he surfaced some distance away, breathing out with a strangled yell of exhilaration. “The water feels wonderful,” he said, his whole face shining. “You should come in.”

  I stood uncertainly for a second, my toes curling into the mud at the edge of the stream. He turned away from me to swim down-river with the current, and I began to unbutton the blouse of my samfu. I was unsure as to what to do with my trousers, but finally I undid them too and stepped into the icy water.

  Mamoru turned around as I called out with the shock of the cold. He swam towards me, but by the time he reached me my skin had acclimatised to the temperature of the water. I experienced the most curious sensation. Whilst my skin tingled with cold, a warmth I had never known grew from the core of my body, spreading inside me, into my chest, stomach, neck, fingers. Where the warmth met the cold, a glow covered my body, sheathing me in a new, different skin. My old flesh no longer existed.

  “How is it?” he said.

  I simply smiled.

  He scooped some water in his cupped hands and brought it to his lips. As he drank a trickle ran down his chin and down his chest. He cupped his hands again, and this time moved towards me. Without thinking, I opened my mouth and drank. The water tasted of palm syrup and stale rice.

  We bathed for a while, paddling silently in the shallow water.

  “I promise I shan’t look,” he said as I went back to the bank.

  I laughed. “That might be wise,” I said. “You might be shocked if you do.”

  He turned away and swam gracefully, hardly causing a ripple. Against the dark, tree-shaded water, his skin glowed a pure white.

  We had only been back at our camp for a short time before Peter and Johnny appeared, breathless from their walk. Johnny was rubbing his shoulder, and Peter’s face and arms were flecked with little red cuts.

  “I’ve seen something,” Peter said. “I’ve found a ruin.”

  25th October 1941

  IT LOOKED MORE LIKE an abandoned house than a ruin to me.

  “It is a ruin,” insisted Peter.

  “It has doors and part of a roof,” Honey said.

  Peter was not deterred. “It’s not the Parthenon, I grant you, but it’s still a proper ruin. Look at it!”

  I had never seen anything like it. It was a large building with ornate adornments over its façade—hideous carved animals I did not recognise.

  “Interesting,” said Mamoru. “Some of the decoration looks almost European, neo-Gothic. We know that a few Englishmen built fantastic palaces at the turn of the century—such as Kellie’s Castle—which imitated High Victorian architecture, but this is different. It looks like a Mughal dwelling. I cannot place it. There is something in the construction of this place that suggests it is older than the Edwardian castles I have mentioned.”

  “Oh, much older. It’s clearly ancient,” said Peter.

  “There are traces of paint on the doors,” Mamoru said.

  “I do not want to go inside,” said Johnny.

  But there was no stopping Peter. He had already bounded up the stone steps and was trying the door. It fell open without resistance.

  We hesitated awhile. Mamoru was very interested in the exterior of the building. He looked at it so intently it was as if he were taking photographs with his eyes. I knew he was committing to memory the image of that house, down to the tiniest detail.

  “I’m not going in,” Johnny said again in a small voice.

  “It’ll be an utter waste but we might as well,” said Honey as he started towards the house.

  By the time we stepped through the broad stone threshold Peter had explored much of the house.

  He ran down the wide stone staircase, leaping the final few steps.

  “It’s magnificent,” he said. “You’ll gasp when you see what I’ve found.”

  I looked around me. The walls were built of a pinkish stone that looked soft in texture. I put my hand on a wall; it was crumbly to the touch. Although the floors were covered in a scattering of dust it did not feel damp and I could not smell any guano. In every way the house seemed remarkably well preserved.

  “Who on earth would build a place like this in the middle of the bloody jungle on a godforsaken island?” said Honey.

  As we ascended the sweeping staircase and my eyes adjusted to the dim light, I thought I could pick out cobwebs hanging thickly from the ceiling; they appeared to adorn the walls, too, like necklaces. Then, as we stood at the top of the stairs and looked down the long hallway that stretched into darkness, I realised that they were not cobwebs but something firmer, less tentative. Their shapes curved into the darkness, forming an uneven carpet over our heads.

  “Can you see?” Peter cried. “Aren’t they wonderful?” He reached into his satchel and found a box of matches. After three or four goes—the box was probably damp—he finally succeeded. He lifted the match above his head. Its flared light danced towards the ceiling.

  “Dear God,” Honey breathed.

  Every conceivable space on the ceilings and the walls was hung with antlers. There were no stuffed heads or skins, no skulls or skeletons, merely antlers of every shape. They pointed downwards like twisted, ossified fingers reaching out to touch us. I felt Mamoru’s arm next to me and was calmed by his closeness.

  “Do you think they’re from hitherto undiscovered species?” Peter asked. “They must be. They must be!”

  That evening’s dinner—tinned rations, much to Honey’s delight, with some wild papaya Mamoru had found—was dominated by talk about the house. Who built it? What was it for? When? Peter insisted on calling it a ruin, and seemed offended when we did not follow suit.

  “To be perfectly honest,” Honey said, “that derelict house is of no consequence whatsoever.” He had gorged himself on corned beef and seemed very at ease, reclining against a log. He was himself again, speaking as if pronouncing Imperial edicts. “It’s an incidental structure, abandoned because it didn’t serve any purpose. It isn’t very remarkable. I’m not surprised you like it, Wormwood.”

  Peter smiled. “You simply can’t appreciate beauty.”

  “On the contrary,” Honey replied, “you see beauty even where it doesn’t exist.”

  We retired to bed and I checked, as I always do, to see if my diary was safe in my belongings. I don’t know if it was the result of having spent too much time out at sea, or if I was still suffering from the lingering effects of the storm, but I could not remember the exact position in which I had left it. I imagined that the wax cloth had been disturbed. Not much, but enough to make me notice it. I unwrapped the diary and found that all was in order. I tried to put the whole thing out of my mind as I fell asleep.

  26th October 1941

  I WAS AWAKENED in the night by a shrill cry, a thin, howling wail that came from the jungle and pierced the night like a dagger. It twisted and danced in the air, breaking now and then into coughing barks. I did not know what creature made that noise; I had never heard it before. From under my mosquito net I looked at Johnny. He was asleep. I could not see Mamoru in the dark—he was too far away. His bed looked peaceful and undisturbed. I listened for stirrings, the ruffling of bedclothes, but heard nothing, and so presumed Peter and Honey were asleep too. Why had no one else been roused by this terrible noise? The sound of it rang in my ears and I did not sleep again until it began to abate, just before dawn.

  29th October 1941

  I HAD JUST COME BACK from a long walk thr
ough the jungle with Mamoru. We had made it all the way to the waterfall and back, stopping every so often to fill my bag with fallen fruit. On our return, Mamoru went to the boat with Honey, to discuss rations and other logistical matters, as they always did. I was just settling down to write when I noticed Peter milling around the camp, tightening hammocks and clearing his things into neat little piles.

  “Why aren’t you with Johnny?” I asked.

  “He said he wanted to be left alone,” Peter answered quickly, “so I thought I’d come back and tidy my things.”

  “Why? It’s not as if you’ve ever done it before,” I said, meaning to sound jolly, but my voice sounded oddly flat and humourless.

  “I’m just following your example, that’s all. I mean, your things are always so neatly arranged. Nothing’s ever out of order.” He came and sat with me, and I closed my diary. He picked up a twig and began to draw in the sand, but the twig snapped and he picked at a scab on his leg instead.

  “Peter, is something the matter?”

  “Not with me, no,” he said. “Are you alright?”

  I felt irritation begin to rise within me. “What are you trying to say?”

  “Johnny,” he began, but he stopped.

  I did not say anything. My throat felt constricted. I opened my diary and flicked through its pages, pretending to read.

  “I was just going to say, I think Johnny’s feeling better,” Peter said.

  I looked up. “Is he really?”

  “Yes, I think so,” Peter said.

  I smiled. “Thank you for looking after him.”