The Japanese Lantern

by Isobel Chace

  It was only then that Jonquil was able to see the Japanese girl properly. Before in the half-light she had seen that she was beautiful, but now she saw that she was exactly like an exquisite little Japanese doll.

  She was dressed in the traditional dress of a kimono made from the most beautiful of silks and a highly embroidered obi, or cummerbund, that fitted from her waist up high over her tiny breasts. Her face, too, had been powdered until it was quite white, accentuating her scarlet lips and her soft, glowing eyes that at that moment were still filled with unshed tears.

  Everyone in the cabin began to stir and wake up. Those few who had been awake during the storm gratefully accepted hot drinks from the stewardess and began to tell the others all that they had missed. Jonquil accepted her own cup of coffee and turned round in her seat to see if Mr. Tate had awakened. His dark, navy blue eyes met hers like two daggers of light and then he grinned.

  “You’ll be able to see the sun come up in a moment,” he told her. “Tell your friend, it might cheer her up a bit.”

  Mitchi Boko turned also in her seat and gave him a quick, nervous glance. Then her whole face lit up and she giggled with startled pleasure. “Jason-san!” she exclaimed.

  It was a curious impression for Jonquil to have received, but for a moment she had thought the other girl was afraid. A sudden tenseness of the body and a fleeting glance of dismay from her normally enigmatic black eyes, was that it? Or had it been more a quick look of calculation, adding them both up? She didn’t know.

  “Hullo, Boko,” he replied easily. “How was America?”

  Mitchi Boko’s face took on a look of awe.

  “Big!” she said solemnly. “Very, very big! But tell me about Yoshiko. Is she married yet?”

  Jason Tate frowned, giving his strong face an angry look.

  “Not yet,” he said brusquely.

  Mitchi Boko turned to Jonquil.

  “Yoshiko is the daughter of one of Jason’s chemists,” she explained prettily. “Her mother was an American and sometimes she feels it very much. Now I understand it so much better. The States is not at all like Japan, and she pulls both ways!” She nodded her head wisely and smiled. “Me, I am all Japanese!” she sighed.

  Hardly had she said the words when the sun edged over the horizon in a splendid crimson glory.

  “Asahi!” she exclaimed.

  Jason Tate gave a rather wry smile.

  “The Rising Sun,” he translated for Jonquil’s benefit.

  Jonquil went back to her own seat for breakfast. It seemed a little odd to be eating bacon and eggs at such an early hour, perched up above the world which was spread out beneath her like a map, but she enjoyed it immensely.

  During the night they had travelled hundreds of miles northwards and now odd bits of Indonesia came into view; small islands and one, or two larger ones that she felt she should have known by their shape but did not. Bali, Java and Borneo were all too far west for her to see, Jason told her, but she was too excited to feel more than the merest prick of disappointment.

  She found herself telling him all about her trip to Japan. How she had seen the advertisement in the local paper and how she had answered it, hardly daring to hope that she would be accepted for the post.

  “But I was lucky, I asked the people who own the cattle station next door to ours to give me a reference, and, quite by chance, the Buckmasters knew them—and so I got the job! I’m to look after their little boy, you know,” she added. “They’re going to America on business and didn’t want to take him with them.”

  A flicker of amusement crossed Mr. Tate’s face.

  “You are?” he teased her. “And who is to look after you?”

  She remembered her former irritation at his high-handed treatment of her, and frowned.

  “Why, no one, Mr. Tate,” she said lightly.

  His amusement grew more obvious.

  “I shouldn’t rely on that, Miss Kennedy,” he drawled. “You’ll probably find yourself in the centre of a horde of friends and relations, all reassuring themselves that you are doing your job properly!”

  Her dismay was so obvious that he felt a little sorry for her.

  “I shouldn’t worry too much,” he advised her; “you’ll soon have them all eating out of your hand, especially if you look at them like that!”

  Jonquil wondered uneasily just how she had looked at him. It was so very difficult to know when to take him seriously. He had a way of looking at her as though he was thoroughly .enjoying some secret joke all of his own. He was quite the most irritating man she had ever met!—But also, she felt obliged to admit, quite the most exciting.

  She might have pursued this interesting train of thought further, but at that moment the Captain of the aircraft came through the door from the cockpit and began to tell them about the flight. From time to time charts had been passed round, showing how high they had been flying and giving them some idea of their geographical position. But it was all much more graphic having it explained by the man who had actually been guiding the giant aeroplane across the Pacific.

  “If you look down now you should just see the Philippines below us,” he ended with one last smile. Then he had a brief conference with the stewardess in the galley at the rear before vanishing back into the control room at the front.

  Jonquil stared down at the land beneath them, watching the aeroplane’s shadow as it glided along the tree-tops, flicking down on to fields and up again to the top of hills. She expected to see a countryside devastated by war, remembering what her brother had told her, of the war in the Pacific, but they were too high up to see more than the lush greenery of any tropical land.

  On and on they went and then, when Jonquil was least expecting it, they began to lose height, going down in steps with much the same sensation as going down in a fast lift.

  The red light came on asking them to do up their safety belts and below they were able to catch their first glimpse of Manila Airport. Runways criss-crossing each other in all directions, so as to allow the aircraft to land no matter from which quarter the wind was blowing, and a few modern-looking buildings that formed the reception centre and the Customs offices.

  “By the time we’ve passed through the Customs and been taken into Manila it will be just nice time for lunch,” Mr. Tate said comfortably.

  “Lunch?” Jonquil repeated. “Surely not! We’ve only just had breakfast!”

  “Things in the Philippines don’t move very fast.”

  “Couldn’t we hurry them?” she asked breathlessly. “We only have a few hours as it is—and”—she coloured slightly—“I’m so sorry,” she went on quickly, “I’d forgotten that you probably have plans of your own. Will—will you be staying at, the same hotel, do you suppose?”

  She could feel his eyes on her face in spite of the fact that she was concentrating almost desperately on the instructions in front of her, telling her what she should do to get out her lifebelt in the event of some emergency.

  “I think we might hurry them a little,” he said at last, indulgently. “And as I do not feel you should be let loose on your own in Manila, Miss Kennedy, you should, I think, stick pretty close to me. I’m sufficiently tall, you see, for you to be able to find me in almost any squash”—she could have sworn that he was smiling, though she had not the courage to look up at him and find out— “whereas you are somewhat smaller and therefore more easily lost!”

  The slight jerk of the wheels hitting the runway caught her by surprise and she jolted forward in her seat.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed.

  “Are you all right?” he asked.

  She nodded, and this time she could not avoid his eyes. Manila, she thought, was going to be something wonderful. Something that she would never forget.

  CHAPTER II

  The stewardess flung open the heavy doors with a flourish, allowing the hot, heavy atmosphere to pour into the air-conditioned cabin. Outside, laughing Filipinos hurried backwards and forwards bringing the gangway up
to the aircraft, and the enormous petrol pumps so that it could be refuelled as soon as possible. The passengers made their way to the back of the aeroplane and then, one by one, stepped out into the steamy, humid day, wondering that such heat should exist anywhere in the world.

  To Jonquil the whole scene was fascinating. Along the aisle she followed Mitchi Boko, whose wooden sandals kept her going at a half-run for fear that they should drop off, and she had the comforting knowledge that Jason was close behind her. In his company the exotic seemed more normal and she could enjoy it, without being swamped by its strangeness.

  Mitchi Boko said goodbye to them at the entrance to the Customs. She, she explained, was flying on that same day.

  “But I shall see you in Tokyo,” she insisted. “Show you much of Japan. Things only true Nippon would think to take you to.”

  “Oh, I should love that!” Jonquil exclaimed, her mind filling with pictures of tea ceremonies and age-old protocol designed to delight the eye. “But how shall I know your address?”

  “Jason shall bring you,” the Japanese girl declared. “Never find right place otherwise.”

  Jason gave a half bow.

  “I shall be honoured,” he said dryly.

  Mitchi Boko smiled sweetly and blew him a gentle little kiss, her beautiful hands turning the gesture into something more than just a compliment. And then she was gone, teetering along in the strange walk that Japanese dress forces its women to adopt.

  “So you liked your first taste of Japan?” Mr. Tate asked.

  “She’s quite lovely!” Jonquil agreed enthusiastically.

  “But dangerous, my dear. Be very careful of young Boko. She’s a snake, and she makes a career of eating young women like you!”

  Jonquil’s eyes widened in astonishment. “But—” she began. “Oh, I thought it was we women who were supposed to be the catty ones!” Then she laughed, breaking off only when she saw the seriousness of his face. “Did you mean that?” she asked in uncertain tones.

  “Yes”—his smile broke out—“but let’s forget all about her. You, Miss Kennedy, are about to be given your first taste of the Eternal Patience of the Oriental!”

  But they were lucky. The young Filipino who was carrying their bags, combined his duties with a profitable sideline in bribes, discreetly carried out, without greed that would make them too obvious, but nevertheless carefully designed to fill out his wage packet quite considerably.

  “In great hurry, sir?” he asked, his velvet brown eyes gleaming in the sunshine; “very great hurry, sir?”

  “Two pesos’ worth,” Jason told him.

  “Si, senor!”

  His lithe, brown body wriggled through the crowd of passengers and onlookers, to appear again almost immediately.

  “Your bags ready, senor,” he sang out, his English resonant with a strong American accent. “You pleased, senor?”

  Jason agreed that he was and handed the youth the two pesos he was expecting.

  “Have you your passport and landing card?” he asked Jonquil.

  She searched through her handbag and triumphantly produced them, together with her certificates proving that she had had the various inoculations that were necessary, all neatly together in the cardboard wallet that the Air Company had provided.

  “I’m always terrified I shall lose something,” Jonquil confided wryly. “What will we need?”

  Jason took the wallet from her and took out her passport.

  “Just this for the moment, I think.” He paused.

  “Would you like me to look after these other things for you while we’re in Manila?’ he asked her diffidently.

  Jonquil hesitated. After all, the papers were very important. Then she smiled and nodded. They would in all probability be much safer with him.

  It took them only a moment or two to be checked out and then they were free to pass out of the airport buildings into the blazing sunlight outside.

  It was as well, Jonquil thought, meeting the full ferocity of the sun’s rays, that she had been brought up in a land almost as hot as this one. She was sufficiently acclimatized not to feel completely wilted in the glare from the buildings.

  Cars were parked everywhere, in higgledy-piggledy chaos, their drivers laughing and shouting at one another. Bicycles shot round corners without warning, adding to the general cheerful confusion. Horns blared and arguments broke out at the least provocation.

  Jonquil found herself clasping Jason’s arm as they found themselves in the centre of this milling mass of humanity, but she loved every moment of it. The men in their “tagalog” shirts, richly embroidered and never tucked in, and the women dressed in frocks with “butterfly” shoulders that stood up like gigantic puffed sleeves, giving the wearer an oddly winged appearance.

  “Here, quick,” Jason called out; “there’s the jeepney that takes us into Manila proper!”

  He hurried her across the only open space that could be seen between the vehicles and waved madly at the driver of the most comic form of transport that Jonquil had ever seen. Painted in ferocious colours, the bus held no more than ten passengers, who clambered into the back and sat in two rows facing each other.

  “Mabuhay!” the driver shouted.

  “Mabuhay!” they panted back, squeezing themselves into the already full seats.

  “Oh, this is fun!” Jonquil laughed. “But what on earth is it?”

  Jason put his arm round her to prevent her from falling out as they swirled round a particularly perilous corner, and laughed with her.

  “A converted jeep. Left here by the Americans in the war. There are hundreds of them on the streets now.”

  And sure enough, the further into Manila they went, the more jeepneys there were to be seen, sporting such names as “Junior” and “Ave Maria!”, and tearing round the streets at breakneck speed, picking up and putting down passengers as fast as they were able.

  At last, they were deposited outside the impressive portals of the Manila Hotel and they paused a moment, with their night-stop bags at their feet, to catch their breath.

  “I wonder what they would think of them at home?” Jonquil said out loud, almost sorry to see the last of their unconventional transport.

  “They would laugh, calm them down, and finally make them quite respectable,” Jason hazarded. “We have more pity for our police!”

  Inside the hotel it was beautifully cool. It had a pleasant tropical air that appealed to Jonquil and was infinitely more comfortable than any of the places she had stayed in in Australia. Within seconds she had been given her key and a porter was waiting to escort her to her room.

  “I’ll meet you in the bar when you’re ready,” Jason told her, and she nodded gaily as the lift gates clicked to a close and they disappeared upwards to another floor.

  “Where do I find the bar?” she asked the porter. The size of the hotel she found secretly a little frightening. Her family had always used a small though comfortable hotel in Sydney, and elsewhere the hotel system of Australia had been hardly more than a series of uncomfortable houses where few people ever ventured actually to stay.

  The porter, however, was apparently quite accustomed to being asked such questions, for he gave her a very kindly smile and said:

  “It is directly opposite where you came in, Madame. The Jungle Bar.”

  That sounded exciting, and Jonquil hurried through her brief unpacking to get downstairs again.

  Neither was she disappointed. For Jungle Bar was no misnomer; there was jungle indeed, growing wherever one looked, in wonderful profusion. Indeed, so busy was she admiring the plants that it was some seconds before she saw Jason, and only then did she realize that he had been quietly watching her all the time.

  “What will you have to drink?” he asked her, his eyes alight with amusement.

  She told him, her eyes still a little dreamy and distant. It was so incredible to realize that only the day before she had still been at home on her parents cattle station, and now here she was a very, ve
ry long way from home, amidst surroundings she had not dreamed existed.

  “You look as though you’ve just arrived by magic carpet,” Jason teased her.

  “I feel a little that way!” Jonquil admitted, smiling. “I’ve never been outside Australia before.”

  He raised one eyebrow at her and grinned.

  “It makes you a very delightful companion,” he teased her. “I feel like the uncle showing Ali Baba the wonders of his cave.”

  The afternoon passed in a golden whirl. They walked the streets, laughing at one another’s jokes, past the bombed-out Spanish Cathedral and into the narrower streets, where the old women sat, their shawls wound round them, with their wares set out to attract the passers by. They stood beside the river and gazed down at the little boats, and, last of all, they took a ride in a “calesa”, a spindly, two-passenger buggy drawn by a horse.

  “Oh, I’m sorry it’s all over!” Jonquil sighed when they found themselves back at their hotel. “I could have gone on for ever.”

  “But it’s not over yet,” he protested. “We’re going out to dinner.”

  “But it’s late,” she reminded him. “I mean to dine out without dressing.”

  She cast her mind’s eye over her dresses, wondering if any of them would do for such a treat.

  “They don’t keep Australian hours here. It’s still wonderfully early in Manila,” he reassured her.

  Jonquil needed no further persuasion. The strange smells and the polyglot people pulled her back outside. She had completely fallen in love with the Filipinos.

  Jason was mysterious as to where he was taking her. She had learned during the afternoon that he knew the city well, speaking excellent Spanish and even getting along in the Tagalog dialect, left behind in Manila by a people long since vanished.

  So the big building meant nothing to her. A notice over the door told her that they were entering the Sky Room and she was very satisfied with that, but Jason did no more than make sure of their table, before insisting that they should go up to the third floor to have a drink before they ate.