Quin’s Shanghai Circus

by Edward Whittemore

  In addition he quickly lost a great leal of weight due to the calisthenics forced on him by nis new employer, the cigar-smoking poet who staged the magnificent funeral and saw to it that most of Tokyo’s twelve million inhabitants spent an entire day watching the black procession circle the city.

  As soon as the ship was out of sight of land Big Gobi sat down on the deck beside Quin’s chair and admired the green glass paperweight that had been stolen from the desk of a customs official in New York. Gently he turned the paperweight over and over and held it up to the sky.

  Jade, Quin. Geraty brought it all the way from Japan. It comes from palaces where princesses live. And there are dragons there and people speak a funny language no one can understand. But they’ll probably understand me sometimes because I look a little like them. Geraty said so.

  Big Gobi smiled shyly. He placed the paperweight carefully on the deck and with a deep breath touched the small gold cross that was hanging from his neck. Along with the paperweight it was Big Gobi’s most treasured possession. As far as Quin knew these two objects, given him by Geraty, were the only belongings Big Gobi had wanted to take with him when he left the orphanage.

  The paperweight was a personal gift from Geraty. The small gold cross was supposedly a gift from Father Lamereaux that Geraty had been asked to deliver. The cross had unusual markings on it. To Big Gobi it was no more important than the paperweight, but Quin had been curious enough to ask one of the priests at the orphanage about it.

  I suspect it’s very valuable, the priest had said. The markings may be an ancient form of Syrian which means it could be a Nestorian cross. If it’s genuine it could go back very far indeed, a thousand years or more, perhaps as much as fifteen hundred years. If you ever have a chance, I suggest you ask the former owner.

  I intend to, said Quin. By the way, Father, what can you tell me about Father Lamereaux?

  Nothing, answered the priest. He was apparently known by one of the fathers here before he went to Japan, but that was fifty years ago, long before my time. I suppose Father Lamereaux contacted his former acquaintance here when he was, trying to find a place for his orphan just before the war.

  And by reputation?

  Nothing. Nothing whatsoever except that old story they tell in seminaries about him and Aquinas.

  What’s that?

  Well it seems that when Father Lamereaux first began studying Aquinas, he memorized the entire Summa theologica. They asked him why and his answer was that the thirteenth century seemed crucial to him in the history of the church. Something of an eccentric, I’d say.

  The priest smiled. Quin thanked him and said good-bye.

  He had learned a little about Father Lamereaux, less about the small gold cross that in fact was not a gift from Father Lamereaux, who had never seen it although he knew every step of the strange journey that had brought it across central Asia. Yet the small gold cross would turn out to be vital nonetheless, for as Quin eventually discovered, it had belonged at one time or another not only to his mother and Big Gobi’s mother but to the two men who had played the most significant roles in his father’s life, the one his chief collaborator, the other the Russian linguist who had assembled the vast collection of pornography that Geraty tried unsuccessfully to pass off as his own in the customs house in New York. The ancient Nestorian relic, then, had a long history prior to its arrival in Shanghai during the 1927 Communist uprising, there to entwine the lives of many people before Geraty finally intervened one night, ten years later, to steal it from a drugged woman who came to him with a confession.

  Quin was leaning back in his chair, his eyes closed, when Big Gobi suddenly exploded beside him. A lump of seagull droppings had landed in his lap. He was shrieking and beating the deck.

  Fuck suck kill, he screamed. Shit cunt triple sea cocksucker.

  Quin grabbed him by the arm.

  Easy, Gobes, remember the cross. It was a present to you. Remember the cross and think about that and forget the other things.

  Big Gobi moaned. He lowered his eyes and wiped his hand with the seagull droppings on the back of his shirt. He was glad Quin was holding him by the shoulder because that meant that Quin liked him. Quin liked him and he wanted to do what Quin said, so he kept his head down and he stared at the cross, he didn’t look at the sea. But his anger was still so great that one of his hands, the one soiled by the seagull droppings, crept across the deck and took hold of a large metal fixture protruding from the bulkhead.

  The hand squeezed, the flesh went white. The metal snapped, the fixture struck the deck. With one twist Big Gobi had ripped apart the thick metal fitting.

  Quin watched the hand clutch the jagged edge where the fixture had been. He saw the fingers tighten once more, heard the flesh tear and the bones crack, watched the blood trickle down onto the deck.

  He clamped his teeth together and pressed Big Gobi’s shoulder as hard as he could, pressed and waited, knowing nothing could be done because Big Gobi’s ageless childish brain was trying to save him from an even more impossible pain, trying to protect him from the overwhelming insults he had known in life by making him feel instead the shattering bones and muscles of his hand.

  • • •

  When they arrived in Tokyo Quin wrote to Father Lamereaux explaining who he was, who was with him, and why he had come to Japan. Then he went to the bar where Geraty had said he could be found.

  Most of the men in the bar were foreigners, several of them long-term residents of the country. Geraty had not been seen there in over six months, not since before his trip to New York, but it seemed this sort of absence was not unusual for him. No one was aware that he had been out of the country. Over drinks Quin learned a good deal about both Geraty and Father Lamereaux.

  At the beginning of the war, he was told, Father Lamereaux had been interned in a special prison camp, a former mountain resort where a few Western scholars and missionaries were sent, friends of Japan who were now enemies because of the color of their skin. It was there that the renegade priest had become a drunkard, a minor scandal compared to others he had known.

  Before the war, in particular, he had been notorious for the ever-changing procession of young acolytes who followed him through the streets on Friday at sunset on the way to his Victorian house, there to be entertained by him far into the night.

  The priest was either a Canadian or a Belgian. He had arrived in Tokyo so long ago no one was quite sure of his origins. When he first came to Japan he studied No plays and Buddhism, in the Jesuitical tradition, in order to be able to wrestle with his theological opponents. He took instruction for ten years in the Buddhist temples of Kama-kura, coming to accept the fact that Gothic steeples were unsuitable in a land of earthquakes, learning to bend his beliefs as bamboo bends, again perhaps in the Jesuitical tradition.

  Soon after he went to Kamakura there were rumors that his love for nature and his appreciation of No had lured him into becoming a practicing Shintoist.

  Later there were more serious rumors that he had deserted his church altogether and taken Buddhist orders of initiation.

  Lastly there was his alleged crime of having collaborated with the enemy by informing on his fellow Westerners.

  Throughout the period prior to the war, supposedly, he had submitted regular reports on foreigners in Tokyo to the Kempeitai or secret military police, Japan’s principal intelligence and counterespionage agency. The evidence against him, considered conclusive, had been gathered over the years by a number of Westerners familiar with the operating techniques of the Kempeitai.

  The story began when Father Lamereaux was called in for an interview with the Kempeitai.

  This in itself was not exceptional. At the time, most Westerners living in Japan were periodically questioned or put under surveillance by the Kempeitai. But when they were questioned it was generally under some other guise, the Kempeitai officer posing as a civilian in a government office where the foreigner went on routine business. Only in the case of
a man who had many government contacts and traveled frequently in and out of the country, such as a journalist, might the interview be conducted by an officer in uniform for purposes of intimidation.

  Father Lamereaux never left the country. He traveled no farther than Kamakura and had no government contacts whatsoever. Yet when he was called in by the Kempeitai the interview was conducted not only by an officer in uniform but by a general in uniform, and by no less a general than Baron Kikuchi, the hero of the 1905 Russo-Japanese War who was thought by many to be the most powerful man in the secret police.

  Astonished by this, several journalists later asked Father Lamereaux in private to tell them what had happened. The Jesuit spoke directly and succinctly as was his manner, quoting the entire conversation verbatim.

  • • •

  Baron Kikuchi was a tiny man. Father Lamereaux was tall, and his gaunt figure gave him an appearance of even greater height. The General had therefore not gotten to his feet when Father Lamereaux entered the room. He stayed behind his massive desk and pointed to a chair. The chair was small and low so that it would be impossible for a guest to arrange himself comfortably. Father Lamereaux had not missed the fact that the desk was bare, the General’s way of saying he knew everything he wanted to know about the priest without consulting his dossier.

  The General spoke curtly, using the verbs and pronouns that were only appropriate when a man was speaking to his wife, to a child or servant or animal. Father Lamereaux had three choices. He could accept the gross insult and answer as an inferior speaking to a superior. He could use the same forms of speech and return the insult. Or he could ignore the insult and speak as an equal to an equal.

  He chose the last to show that he had nothing to hide and to prove that he was in complete command of his emotions no matter what the situation, an approach the General might find slightly humiliating after having adopted a superior pose. The strategem worked, for the General subsequently switched to Lamereaux’s idiom.

  Sit down.

  Thank you.

  How long have you been in this country?

  Over ten years.

  What have you been doing?

  Pursuing my Buddhist studies.

  Where?

  Kamakura.

  Why?

  In order to gather the skills necessary for my missionary task.

  What makes you think you have a missionary task here?

  God’s task is here and everywhere.

  Does it include what happened at your house last Friday night?

  There was a meeting for religious instruction.

  And the Friday night before that?

  Yes.

  The Friday night six months ago?

  Yes.

  How does it include all those Friday nights?

  Because the meetings for religious instruction are always held on Friday evenings.

  Night I said, not evening. What do you do with these young boys after you have finished your religious instructions early in the evening?

  Sometimes we have a discussion on some topic.

  What?

  Generally some aspect of No drama.

  Does one or the other of you act out a part?

  We may.

  Why?

  To illustrate a point we are trying to make.

  Do you dress up?

  We may.

  Why?

  Because No cannot be performed without the proper costumes.

  Do you wear masks?

  They are part of the costumes.

  Do you dance?

  In some No plays there are dances.

  Do you wear the dragon costume?

  If that is a scene we are illustrating.

  Not we, you. Do you wear the dragon costume?

  If that is a scene I am illustrating.

  And who wears the princess costume?

  Whoever is illustrating that part.

  Always one of the boys?

  Not necessarily.

  All right, you and the princess are doing your dance. What are the other boys doing at that moment?

  They play the part of the chorus and the musicians.

  You mean they sit around the room and watch? They make comments? They hum and make some private music of their own?

  They sing the verses of the chorus and play the instruments that accompany the drama.

  Playing their instruments, are they?

  The drum and the flute.

  What happens after you finish dancing?

  We have refreshments and they go home.

  Always?

  Yes.

  But sometimes it is very late?

  It may be.

  Dawn?

  If the No play is a long one.

  A long one, hissed the General, leaning forward over the desk. He rested his chin in his hands and stared at Father Lamereaux.

  You are an expert on No?

  I have studied it.

  You are one of the leading Western experts on No?

  I may be.

  Then you understand Japanese tradition and you know a Japanese warrior will not allow corruption in his country.

  Religious instruction does not corrupt.

  And what do you do with one boy while other boys watch?

  No drama does not corrupt.

  But you corrupt.

  If there is anything corrupting Japan today it is the army. It is you and men like you.

  Be careful, you know nothing about politics. You are not in this country to advise us on politics. If you were you would be expelled.

  I know I love this country, and what you’re doing to it is detestable.

  We are on good terms with the West. Of course we wish that to continue.

  Yes.

  So there is no question of a missionary being expelled.

  No.

  You may remain here as long as you have the sanction of your church.

  Yes.

  You are naturally free to carry on your religious work.

  Yes.

  Including religious instruction to young boys.

  Yes.

  Naturally in the privacy of your home as well.

  Yes.

  But I am concerned about the fathers of the boys who attend your Friday night meetings. Their sons may be enjoying themselves but their fathers may not be. Is it possible they’re in jobs that don’t suit them? Perhaps we should release them from their jobs so they can be free to pursue their interests, just as you are free to pursue yours. Of course it is difficult to find work today because of what Western capitalism has done to my country. The fathers might not be able to find other jobs, but then, they could always go into the army.

  And be sent to China?

  We will not allow the West to do to us what they have done to China. We will achieve the kind of strength the West appreciates, and at the same time we will save China with our strength. We are of the same race as the Chinese. We understand them whereas Westerners don’t.

  How could they when they’re foreign devils?

  You are knowledgeable in No, that means you know that devils exist. Evil exists. Do you know it?

  I do.

  I am sure you do. And would you deny that evil exists in the West? In Westerners? In yourself?

  I would agree it moves in the wind although its domain is a minor one.

  Good, you agree. Now what I would like you to consider is what Western avarice has done to China, which it will not be allowed to do to Japan. Or consider a more immediate problem, consider the difficulty of finding jobs in Japan because of the collapse of Western capitalism. Consider the fathers of the boys who attend your Friday night dances. You must care a great deal for those boys and you love our country, we know that. It would be unfortunate if these men could not find work and their families had to suffer as a result. Reflect upon this situation for a moment.

  The General stared at Father Lamereaux and a completely unexpected interchange began.

  The priest was still
slumped uncomfortably in the small, low chair. The General was still seated behind his massive desk with his chin resting in his hands. Now the General leaned forward and closed his left eye as if to multiply the acuity of his other eye, to increase his vision by narrowing it. The one open eye, round and unfathomable, stared at Father Lamereaux without blinking.

  A minute went by. Father Lamereaux didn’t move. He was staring back also without blinking.

  Two minutes went by.

  A full five minutes according to the ticks of the clock on the wall.

  Father Lamereaux kept a large collection of cats in his house. Sometimes to amuse himself he practiced outstar-ing the cats. Early in life he had discovered he had an unusual talent for concentration, so acute he could perform extraordinary feats of memorization. He could shuffle rapidly through a pack of cards once, and repeat the exact location of every card in the deck. He could memorize a list of random three-digit numbers, up to one hundred of them, in the time it took someone to read them off. He could enter a reading room in a public library, walk once around the room at a normal pace, and immediately upon exit give the title and author of every volume in the room.

  Later, when he found his vocation, this talent was made impregnable by the rigors of Jesuitical training. Nothing he had seen or heard was ever lost to him. A cat could stare at him for fifteen minutes or more but eventually it had to turn away, its dumb mind no match for the severity of his intellectual discipline.

  Yet he met his match that morning in General Kikuchi’s office. He met his match and lost a contest of intellect and will for the first time in his life.

  The break came after fifty-nine minutes of silent staring, fifty-nine minutes during which time neither man moved, neither man blinked. At the end of that agonizing period Father Lamereaux could no longer bear it. He knew he was beaten. As the clock struck the hour he blinked. He sighed and looked out the window.

  All right, he said.

  The General stirred. He opened his other eye.

  What did you say?

  I said all right. I’ll stop holding my Friday night meetings.

  It seems the wise thing to do, said the General. One might call it the safer course of action considering who you really are and what you are really doing.