The Harbour

by Francesca Brill

  And he sent the cable in words quite other than those he had rehearsed.

  Only then did he set about the lengthy process of finding his way home.

  The terminal was busy. Stevie pulled Hal through the milling travellers, negotiating the usual obstacle course of luggage. She stopped in front of the national arrivals board. Pan Am from Los Angeles. On time. There was a strong smell of burned coffee and, as they were early, she drew Hal towards the cafeteria. To his surprise and delight she ordered him a milkshake, while she endured the bitter taste of the percolated coffee before relenting and adding the dusty-tasting cream and two spoonfuls of sugar from the bakelite bowl on the counter.

  As Hal sucked the milky glass dry, Stevie’s mind kept turning to the moment in which she would see Harry, and the moment was blank. She could see him. She could imagine his familiar long-strided walk across the hall, though of course he would be thin, but she could not imagine his face. There was a gap in her mind where his face should have been. She compulsively checked her watch. The second hand seemed to have slowed to an infuriating crawl. She patted her hair, the hair which had never recovered its former glory and sheen. It was short and she liked to think, gamine. Catching sight of herself in the distorting chrome of the coffee machine she quickly looked away. Who was this woman anyway? Her expression was taut with anxiety, lines cutting across her forehead, blue eyes dull, glints of silver gilding her boyish hair. Oh God, would this wait never end?

  As soon as Hal had licked the glass clean, digging as far down the slippery sides as his tongue would allow, she helped him slide from the high stool and took him to the restroom. He was bound to need a pee at the crucial moment. Passing the mirror, she checked her reflection again. What would Harry make of her? Would he take one look and see the alteration in her, see that she was no longer the girl he had loved? Would he recognise her at all or would he pass his eyes over her face without halting? As usual she was surprised by the lack of visible scarring. To a casual glance she might be any woman who had endured the war years worrying about her loved ones. She dug the tube of lipstick out of her pocket and re-applied the red slash across her lips. She swivelled away from the glaring reflection and checked her watch again. Then, steeling herself, she took Hal’s hand.

  Something had changed in the hall. The atmosphere had shifted from waiting to high alert. It was all noise and action. Above them in the rotunda the mural seemed to spin with unlikely colours. She and Hal were part of a surge of forward movement towards the barrier. And now she saw that among the swollen crowd were men with cameras and recording equipment. There was even a large film camera being manoeuvred into place and focussed directly at the doors through which Harry would come. Still, Stevie did not understand that this might have something to do with her. It was an annoyance she had not envisaged, but then she had imagined this moment a million times, each time a little differently, so what did it matter that the reality was different again? Holding tight to Hal’s slippery hand, Stevie strained to see between the slicked heads of the newsmen. Any minute now . . .

  Then one of the men glanced at her. His eyes narrowed with recognition and the sour smell of him enveloped her.

  ‘Hey, Stevie Steiber! How’re you feeling? Nervous, I bet. How long’s it been?’

  And a microphone was thrust in her face and more questions were being shouted and the crowd changed its focus and was drawn to her so close that in the crush the faces and voices were a blur.

  ‘I read in your book how you and the major met. Anything to add to that?’

  ‘Did he get a divorce yet, doll?’

  Then there was a sudden easing in the clamour and a surge forward towards the gate. And through a gap in the crowd Stevie caught a glimpse of a slightly stooped middle-aged man. Harry! Or a new version of him. He was in his uniform and flanked by two American army officers. He looked much older. The skin of his face was burned dark and there were deep lines across it like furrows in sand.

  In the instant that she caught sight of him she saw something of what survival had cost him. And she knew the reality of their meeting would be quite different from any of her fevered fantasies. Deeper. Darker. And she understood that he in turn would be able to see what survival had cost her.

  She watched him blink in dismay as the camera flashes ripped through the hall and the yells of the newsmen echoed.

  ‘Over here, Major Field, sir! Over here!’

  All she wanted was to get away. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Panic gripped her. She turned away. Pushing. Pushing against the crush of the crowd. Hal’s hand was slipping, her grip tight now on his wrist. Hal was crying. But the reporter with the bad breath had his hand on the small of her back and hustled her in the direction of the barrier. She struggled but could not dislodge his heavy, pressing hand.

  And then there he was. His startled eyes were upon her as he was buffeted by the jostling crowd. But she could hear nothing. See nothing. Only Harry, his neck too thin for his collar. And all she could feel was the blood pulsing around her body.

  Flash.

  ‘You gonna marry her?’

  Flash.

  The reporter leered – his microphone thrust between them, breaking the silvery thread of connection.

  ‘Time to make an honest woman of her, buddy, don’t you think?’

  Harry bowed his head in confusion as he said unhappily, ‘What’s going on?’

  Stevie murmured, ‘I don’t know. I’m sorry. I think maybe the book –’

  ‘Ah, yes, the book.’

  ‘You’ve seen it?’

  ‘I’ve seen it.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I had no idea it would be read by anybody.’

  Harry smiled and raised his eyebrows. It was a familiar look, half-teasing, half-cross, but he was being directed onwards by one of the army officers and as he walked away he raised his voice and addressed the reporters.

  ‘I owe my life to her. That’s all I can say.’

  In a pincer movement the other army officer held out both arms to prevent the crowd following Harry. ‘All right, folks, stand back, please. Major Field is here on official business, not as a private citizen. He is not yet discharged.’

  And the circus dispersed as quickly as it had emerged, disappearing into the hall as if it had all been a dream. Stevie stood staring in the direction that Harry had gone. It took her a while to realise that she was not in fact nailed to the spot and that it was Hal’s arms clinging round her legs that prevented her from moving.

  Chapter Thirty

  A dull, chalky taste was in her mouth. It didn’t matter how many times or how ferociously she brushed her teeth, the taste remained. She thought she had suffered the worst of it. She thought the waiting and the hoping and the refusing to believe the reports of his death were as bad as it could get. But she had been wrong.

  Declan had found her that night curled into a corner of the living room. She had managed somehow to walk across the airport arrivals hall and climb into a cab and open her apartment door and feed Hal and put him to bed. But then she was spent. For the first time since that terrible day in Hong Kong she had nothing left, no resources to cushion her from this new reality. Harry’s face, so loved, so worn, so familiar and so pained, hovered in front of her eyes whether they were open or shut. There was disappointment and recrimination in it. There was resignation and recognition. But mostly what she saw was his utterly unfamiliar lack of certainty. And she was afraid.

  From the moment the cable had arrived she had gone into a kind of trance, she could see now. A madness. The news of Harry’s survival had filtered pretty fast into the media. It turned out that the appetite for this particular story with all its irresistible elements of scandal was not easily sated. Two days after the cable had come she had arrived home to the sound of the ringing phone and picked it up.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Is that Stevie Steiber?’

  ‘Yes, speaking.’

  ‘How are you planning on celebrating Major Field�
�s liberty?’

  ‘I’m sorry, who is this?’

  ‘Are you expecting him to join you or will he return to his wife?’

  She had the wherewithal to stutter, ‘I have no comment at this time,’ before dropping the telephone receiver violently enough to distract Hal from his car race across the rug.

  Everything was concentrated on finding information about Harry. It was impossible to speak to him. He had been immersed in a lengthy British debrief. Then there was another cable. With the minimum of information it said he was heading for Los Angeles to help the American military collate their information about the war in the Pacific. After that he would come to New York. During this time Stevie formed a love–hate relationship with the telephone. It was an instrument of exquisite torture. She established a routine in which she would answer – in case, just in case it was Harry – but say nothing until the caller had announced themselves. Mostly it was the press in various guises. Sometimes it was Madame Kung or one of her people. Sometimes it was her family. Stevie would pick up the telephone, a rush of pointless adrenalin streaming through her, to hear her mother’s anxious, ingratiating tones and she would sigh with the disappointment and tell her she was fine and could they talk tomorrow?

  A month into the waiting, Stevie, Hal in tow, was heading back to the apartment from the post office. She had sent Lily another package – the most recent of many. She had absolutely no way of knowing whether any of them ever reached her but that didn’t seem a good enough reason to stop sending them across the ocean like messages in bottles. She wrote letters full of Hal’s latest mishaps or funny sayings. She kept the tone relentlessly cheerful and she asked for news in return. One time she had sent a box of Animal Cracker biscuits. Another time a cashmere sweater. This last package had contained the news of Harry’s survival and a pair of navy-blue leather gloves with a rabbit-fur lining.

  As Stevie approached her apartment building a man’s shout rolled along the sidewalk from behind them. It came again – louder this time.

  ‘Hey, Miss Steiber.’

  Stevie glanced over her shoulder. An elderly man with thinning red hair was limping as fast as he could towards them. Stevie stopped walking and turned to face him.

  ‘Yes, that’s me,’ she said brightly. After all, the sun was shining and she was full of good will to the world.

  ‘I heard you on the radio at home a while back and as soon as I had the chance to come to New York I came. I’ve been waiting for you.’ The man spoke in a Canadian accent.

  ‘That’s nice. Thank you.’ Now the man was in front of her Stevie could see that she had been mistaken, he was not old at all. ‘To whom am I speaking?’

  She held out her hand. He looked at it for a moment before taking it and giving it a swift shake. ‘Sergeant Hopkins. I was in Argyle.’ His gaze was fierce.

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry.’

  ‘I’m not here to talk about your morals and all that stuff.’

  ‘Glad to hear it.’

  ‘I don’t blame you. You seem like a nice enough woman.’ He put his hand on her arm and leaned close, lowering his voice. ‘It’s not the little bastard’s fault, either.’ He gestured with his eyes towards Hal.

  Stevie, understanding with a sinking feeling the direction of the discourse, pulled her arm out of the man’s grasp and tugged Hal to her with one hand while the other started digging in her bag for her door key.

  ‘Your lover is no hero, Miss Steiber. He’s a traitor.’

  ‘How did you find me?’

  ‘It wasn’t hard.’

  ‘If you don’t leave us alone I shall call a policeman.’ Stevie had retrieved the key and turned to the door.

  The man’s voice was insistent. ‘I thought it was only fair you should hear the truth. You’ve fallen for his lies like everybody else. But I know. I was there. I know.’ His pale-blue eyes were wide. ‘One day the whole world will know what your Nip-loving Major Field did. I saw with my own eyes. Want to know why he was always talking to them? I’ll tell you why, he was feathering his own nest. Saving his own skin while the rest of us were left to die.’ His voice was shrill and crazy-sounding; there was spittle on his lips.

  Next to her Hal was silent but Stevie could feel him trembling. The key turned in the lock and as the door swung shut behind them she could hear the man still ranting. ‘Tell him Frank Hopkins is looking for him. The truth is on my side.’

  The effect of the assault was far more profound than Stevie wanted to admit even to herself. Hal mentioned something to Declan and when he asked her about it she brushed the incident away breezily. But she found herself constantly on the lookout for Frank Hopkins and the shadow cast by his words pointed her in the direction of what Harry’s survival might have cost. It was too dark to bear. She put it aside.

  Meanwhile, bit by bit, other news came. Trawling over and again through the lists of those released from the Hong Kong camps she found many names she recognised. Young men whom she remembered playing cards with into the night, recklessly driving up the perilous Peak roads after way too many cocktails and after finally taking ‘no’ for an answer, showing her wallet-sized photographs of their girlfriends. It seemed that Mr Evans from the Bank had walked out alive too. But far more disturbing were the names she did not see. Phyllis was absent. And so was her husband Dr Clarke-Russell. The gap where their names should have been told of their grim fates. The nights brought them to her – Phyllis’ desperate lost grief, her hands clutching at her. Stevie woke shouting, scrabbling, trying to prise Phyllis’ bony fingers away from her body.

  One day, a few weeks after the encounter with Hopkins, Madame Kung passed her a letter.

  Shanghai, August 1945

  Dear Stevie, As part owner of Direct Debate you are entitled to half of what’s left. Unfortunately that does not amount to much. The press itself was destroyed in ’43 and the lease on the office fell into arrears not long after. The furniture was salvaged and donated to a school. Likewise the books that didn’t burn in the bombing. My family is living in the mountains. I can be contacted through the usual channels and am pursuing various interests. I am well, Stevie, and hear that you are also. I am happy that is the case.

  Wu Jishang

  P.S I thought you might be interested to see this picture of Comrade Li.

  A newspaper clipping fell on to her lap out of the envelope. It was a black and white photograph of some kind of Communist rally. A young man was speaking with passion on a platform. Behind him was a young woman. Stevie looked hard – she couldn’t see Chen anywhere. Then with a gasp she realised that the young woman in the plain peasant jacket and trousers was Lily. Her hair was hidden under a cap but there was no mistaking her fine features and the dimples in her cheeks. Stevie leaned closer – Lily’s hands were in her lap and she was wearing a pair of leather gloves, the fur lining just visible at the wrist.

  Stevie had held the paper close and cried as she sat in Madame Kung’s crowded little apartment. For a moment she was in the beautiful bedroom in the dark night of the mountains, lying in silk sheets, surrounded and cosseted by Jishang’s exquisite collection of lovely things. Of which she knew herself to be one.

  Then finally one ordinary lunchtime Declan had called. Stevie picked up the telephone in her usual manner, waiting for the voice at the other end.

  ‘Stevie. Maybe you’ve already heard this news.’

  ‘What news?’

  ‘Harry is back in New York. Apparently, he’s been here a week.’

  Stevie let her silence speak for her.

  Declan’s voice faltered most unusually. ‘I guess he hasn’t been in touch with you.’ A pause. ‘I bumped into a guy who’s covering a story on government plans for war crime trials. Harry is working with the prosecution team to get watertight cases on the senior Japanese officers.’

  ‘Thank you for telling me.’

  ‘Are you all right?’

  She kept her voice steady. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘Did you know anything a
bout this?’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’

  Stevie huddled as tightly into the corner as she could. Since the telephone call about Harry that afternoon she had withdrawn. Her breathing was so quiet and shallow that it barely registered. Harry was in New York. He was close. But he hadn’t told her. A week! Why hadn’t he contacted her? He knew she was waiting for him. Why didn’t Harry want to see her? What the hell was going on? Was he working for the prosecution or was Frank Hopkins right and Harry was being prosecuted himself?

  Declan’s voice was faint as he called through the letterbox of the apartment door. Stevie flinched at the intrusion but kept her eyes closed against it.

  When she didn’t answer, Declan pushed the door open. It had been some long time since he’d been there. He looked around the room and was glad when he noticed it to be no more disordered than usual.

  ‘Stevie?’

  There were no lights on – but by the glow from the street lamps below, Declan could make her out tucked beside the iron radiator.

  He was relieved. ‘How many times do I have to tell you, lock the door at night. You never know what dreadful person might come in. Me, for instance.’ His brittle lightness of tone did nothing to disguise his worry. ‘Come on, Stevie, let’s have a drink. How about it? For old times’ sake?’

  When there was still no answer he came close to her, squatting down.

  ‘Did you take something, Stevie? Did you do something stupid?’ He put a large hand gently on her knee. She flinched again but kept her head turned away and her eyes closed. Satisfied that she wasn’t dying, Declan rose again and took a couple of steps back, then he settled himself into the armchair facing her.

  ‘Know who you remind me of? Old Mrs Li, the old lady in Hong Kong with her face to the wall.’ He waited for a moment. ‘I know I’m the last person on earth you want to see but look at the state of you, girl. Someone’s got to talk some sense into you. All right, so you didn’t get the fairy-tale reunion at the airport and all right, Harry seems to be avoiding you. But for pity’s sake, you’re behaving like a little girl who hasn’t been invited to the Prom. What is this? Where are you, Stevie? You’re not giving up now, are you?’