The man stood in the gap, his eyes glassy and his mouth hanging open. A drool of spit trickled like that of someone about to take a bite of the best meal he’d ever had.
* * *
A tropical sky on a moonlit night has a certain glow, not quite indigo, not quite purple, and softening to a silvery mauve where it meets the sea and the tops of the jungle trees.
Major Genda Shamida saw only blackness. Even the notes rising from his flute did not satisfy his tortured mind. Escaping into music helped him recover from the horrors he’d seen; not just battles, but the beasts released in ordinary men, men he might once have viewed as honourable.
Tonight Yamamuchi was claiming his prize. Nadine would be waiting for him. The thought of it made him feel sick.
He’d seen the colonel beat raw recruits who had not responded quickly enough to orders, shivering young men, no more than boys; wetting themselves when Yamamuchi’s cruel eyes fell on them. There was only one thing the man loved better than power and that was money. Madam Cherry, although she might not admit it, satisfied his greed rather than his lust. What she could not know was how much he enjoyed torturing and debasing all that was good. But Genda Shamida knew and wished with all his heart that he had not taken that visit to Japan to see his family back before the attack on Pearl Harbor. He had satisfied family obligations in the home of his fathers, but America was the land of his birth and his heart.
Wishing to lose himself in music, he touched the flute to his lips, fingered the notes and heard them rise, but they did not please him. There was no purity left in the sound. Not tonight. Not on this very dark night.
The flute lived in a very smart leather case bought as a present by his mother back in California. His parents were of the old school, tolerated his playing, but as a descendant of samurai, the old man had been keen that his son return to Japan, join the army and study modern techniques of battle under old masters. Out of a traditional respect for both parents, he had obeyed and had reached the rank of major by the time of Pearl Harbor.
He felt a pang of regret closing the case that in itself was like a bridge between his past and the present, modern America and Japanese tradition.
He found himself walking towards the Bamboo Bridge House like a man in a dream, his hand resting on his sword. He was off duty. He did not need to wear it.
The smell of roasting meat lay lightly on the air. A private had caught a wild pig earlier and it was being turned on a spit at the back of their hut.
He looked over to the wire surrounding the internment camp. A group of women and children were standing on the other side of the fence looking out. The children were sniffing the air.
‘How about us having some of that instead of that swill you gave us earlier,’ one of the women shouted.
He saw a guard slam his rifle against her so hard that she fell backwards, then raise the rifle.
‘Soldier!’
The soldier snapped to attention.
Genda faced him, fists clenched behind his back, itching to smash his knuckles into the private’s peasant jaw. ‘What are you doing?’
Keen to impress, the private poured out his story in rapid Japanese. ‘The woman shouted abuse at me.’
‘So! You understand English?’
The man faltered. ‘No, Major Shamida-san, but her tone…’
‘Have you eaten yet?’
‘No, sir. I am on duty until…’
‘But you smell it.’ Shamida sniffed the air. ‘It smells delicious, does it not? Are your colleagues saving some for you?’
‘I have told them to, Shamida-san.’
‘Then be glad you are not as these women. It is punishment enough that you will be devouring what they can only smell!’
There was something of a joke in his comment. Inside he didn’t feel amused at all, but the man understood, his stupid face cracking into an equally stupid grin.
‘Continue your patrol, soldier. Leave the woman to her torment.’
He knew as he proceeded that the woman he had saved from a beating had spat in his direction, but he gave it no regard. Already his mind was on saving another woman though this time he was far from sure of success.
He was jeopardizing his own safety; he had taken such care to prune the Americanisms he’d grown up with, to convince himself that he was following an honourable tradition. He kicked at a stone. Who are you kidding? There it was again. He was thinking in English. The truth was always there. Like a painted actor on a cardboard stage he was playing a part strutting around in an imperial uniform to which he felt no affinity.
Inside the Bamboo Bridge House, women in various stages of undress were serving sake and small rice cakes mixed with fruit and sticky with sugar. A brazier smouldering with sweet-smelling leaves helped keep the cockroaches at bay.
Low tables were set at regular intervals around the room. The men were sweating, the talk and sake flowing thick and strong. The women’s pleasant expressions and tiny smiles were like masks held tightly as though they were wary they might slip and betray their distaste. Their stoic acceptance of their circumstances amazed him. The hungry women in the camp chose how best to survive. These women had no choice. Both sets were doing what they had to do.
‘Chinese dog bitch!’
The shout came from a young lieutenant who was dragging Nadine’s friend Lucy by her hair at the far end of the hut. Her face was contorted because her hair was straining at the roots and she couldn’t help rising from her knees. With each attempt he brought his clenched fist down on her head.
A few of the other men glanced in his direction. One or two frowned; others shook their heads and turned away, philosophically deciding that he’d paid for the woman so could do as he wished.
The lieutenant began dragging Lucy to where a bamboo screen shielded the private cubicles from the rest of the house. Genda followed, saw him tense and with a surge of sudden temper, knew what he was seeing. Feeling his grip loosen, Lucy escaped. Genda grabbed the man’s arm, pulling him back. ‘She’s not for you,’ he said in Japanese, his voice steady despite the churning in his guts. He could see her out of the corner of his eye, sitting there, naked and waiting for a man he knew was a butcher of men, women and children.
Unsteady on his legs, the lieutenant swayed slightly and attempted to focus his eyes on Genda’s face.
‘Huh! Is she yours?’ He grinned. ‘I thought you only made love to your flute. How about we swap girls. I know. I’ll fight you for her!’ He began undoing his jacket.
Genda pretended to be amused. He covered the man’s hands with his own and felt the other’s weakness. ‘I tell you what, how about you fight the man she belongs to.’
The lieutenant tried to recommence unbuttoning his jacket. ‘I will. Who is he?’
Genda clung to his hands. ‘Our honourable colonel.’
Resting on one elbow, Nadine let her eyes flitter between the two of them. Major Shamida’s voice was firm but not severe.
Suddenly recognizing he was addressing a superior officer, the lieutenant bowed. ‘Honourable Major Shamida. My apologies.’
Genda returned the salute. ‘Be on your way.’
Once the man was gone, Genda filled the gap quite adequately by himself. He knew it was wrong to observe Nadine as she was: if Yamamuchi arrived now he would be furious. Yet he could not take his eyes off her. There was much he wanted to say, but what would be the point? He turned and walked away, back into the dark night.
* * *
Nadine’s mind was hazy thanks to the drink Madam Cherry had given her. For a moment she had thought Shamida was about to say something, but changed his mind. His eyes dropped away before he let the curtain go and she had the greatest urge to call him back and beg him to stay.
Her eyes strayed in the other direction towards the wooden platform and the trees. There was a village beyond those trees, a headland and a jetty. Madam had taken her to dance for the crews of local patrol boats. Low, single-storey houses clustered around a rough woode
n wharf at the edge of the lagoon where fishing boats were moored.
The boats and their location had stayed in her mind. They hadn’t been very big, certainly not oceangoing, but escape would be about compromise. They’re just around that bend, she thought, just out of sight.
The idea was to sail south. Eventually she and whoever escaped with her would reach Australia – at least that was the plan.
Concentrating on what seemed an impossible plan helped her control the ball of apprehension knotting like barbed wire in her stomach. She was aware of the sudden lull among the women and officers on the other side of the screen and knew what it meant. Yamamuchi had arrived.
The effect of the drink was wearing off. Reality thudded behind her eyes. She attempted to focus, attempted to reason. This would be no different from lying with Martin who had always taken her without so much as a kiss. She’d survived one older man. She’d most certainly survive another.
The silk kimono was cool against her skin.
The screen made a clattering sound and there he was, Colonel Yamamuchi escorted by Genda Shamida.
She arose unsteadily and leaned forward from her haunches, bowing until her head almost touched her knees.
‘Welcome, Yamamuchi-san.’ Madam had coached her in the Japanese form of address. She hoped her voice did not tremble.
The sound the bamboo made as he let it fall was as if someone had dropped a bundle of stair rods, or a bucketful of hard-shelled beetles or the ever-present cockroaches.
Yamamuchi stood with his legs slightly apart, his fists perched on his narrow hips. He lifted her chin with the tip of a silver-handled cane. He always carried the cane. She’d seen him beating people with it. She dared raise her eyes to meet his, even to smile. A smile was disarming and also alluring; Zakia had taught her that.
Look beyond them. See the audience, a hundred strong, watching you as you take the stage, aching to see you move, to dance, to be as the cobra, weaving and circling, lithe as a river. It will give you courage.
Yamamuchi said something in Japanese.
Major Shamida looked embarrassed at whatever had been said.
‘He says everything has been done to his satisfaction. You appear an adequate purchase.’
The colonel said something else.
‘He asks if you are frightened,’ said Shamida.
She asked herself the same question. There was indeed a trembling in her legs. She wasn’t sure whether it was fear or the drink she’d been given.
‘I feel like a bride on her wedding night,’ she said.
Shamida interpreted it for the benefit of the colonel. The colonel responded.
‘He says that he has a wife.’
‘What would she say if she found out about me?’
Shamida’s eyelids fluttered. She sensed he did not want to put the question to the colonel, though he seemed to do so.
Again he translated the colonel’s response.
‘He says that even in the unlikely event that she protested at this, what she says is of no consequence. Wives are for making a family. Courtesans and concubines are for pleasure. Japanese women understand that. He also wishes you to speak English. He thinks he will learn that way.’
‘That’s nonsense.’
‘I will tell him you are pleased to comply.’
Looking pleased but arrogant in the extreme, the colonel dismissed the major. Shamida gave a final, unreadable glance at Nadine as he left the room.
Nadine bowed her head, her gaze following his exiting feet with a feeling of dread.
The fluttering of wings diverted her attention. By day every hut was full of flies; by night giant moths fluttered around the small kerosene lamps, their only form of lighting. Some were huge and brightly coloured. A thought occurred to her: Perform – dance for him as best you can.
She trembled with apprehension as he picked up the lamp and took it to where he had set down his drink. A droplet of spilled whisky shivered on the table. Colonel Yamamuchi was pouring whisky, the bottle poised over the glass. His eyes were on her.
She knew the light was flattering and had turned her skin golden. The look in his eyes was almost frightening. One moment he looked self-satisfied, the next he looked awestruck. She wondered what was in his mind.
A soft fanning of air against her cheeks gave her the answer: the moths, their wings a blur of violet, blue and yellow, followed the lamp, their wings a wreath of colour around her head and shoulders.
A breath of wind stirred the coconut trees that ringed the crescent of sand between the compound and the cool, green sea.
Yamamuchi cocked his head as though he had heard something else – or perhaps it was merely a welcome excuse to break the spell at the sight of her.
She waited, the fear she’d tried so hard to control was tingling in her muscles, urging her to flee. But where to? Thousands of miles of sea lay to one side of the camp, acres of tangled jungle to the other. She thought of Kochi and tried to slow her pumping heart and curb the weakness in her legs. She asked herself, what price survival? Her attention was drawn to the lust rising in Yamamuchi’s eyes and knew there was only one answer.
One of the men in the main room beyond the bamboo screen began to sing. Nadine turned to the sound. The song was Japanese and although the music was alien to her ears, she began to dance, adjusting the vibrancy of the Indian temple dancers to the slower tempo of the Japanese.
Yamamuchi sat down, glass in hand, his eyes following her every move, the placing of one foot slowly before the other, the twisting and contorting of her limbs, her body, the feathery lightness of her hands fluttering across her eyes… Bare your soul with your eyes… Zakia’s words again.
Zakia! She and Sureya, Benares and the hole beneath the garden wall seemed a lifetime away.
This is to their memory, she told herself, her arms waving like the willow, her eyes shifting with the movement of her body. She was Kali, the terrible one, dancing as though she had many arms, her movements worshipping death as well as life. The smell of men, the flies, the snakes, the mosquitoes and the vermin that ate their food melted away. Tears came to her eyes as she imagined herself back in her father’s garden, dancing with her mother. Her mother: that loving woman who had never been allowed to declare herself to her own daughter.
Eventually the song ended. It felt as though her whole body had turned to water. The moment had come.
Yamamuchi got to his feet and slid off his belt.
Her eyes opened wide with fear. He was going to beat her?
‘Yamamuchi-san! No!’ She dropped to her knees, wishing she’d never thought of the virgin idea.
The leaves of the coconut palms rustled around the fringe of the hut. Something scuttled beneath the house: perhaps a rat or even a snake.
With one brawny hand he dragged her to her feet. Silly, but she couldn’t help noticing that his fingers were short and square-ended. Their strength was apparent when he wound them around her neck four fingers high, his thumb against her throat.
His gaze dropped to her breasts. He grinned and said something in Japanese. His teeth were yellow; his breath smelled of whisky. He said the same thing again and jerked his chin, indicating that her gaze should follow his to the mirror.
The sight of her hardening nipples filled her with shame. They looked lascivious, decadent. But she felt no arousal, only fear.
A sinking feeling dropped like a lead weight within her stomach. She attempted to collect herself. ‘Do you wish me to dance for you again?’ A foolish question! A last-ditch attempt to allay what had to happen.
Fool. He speaks little English.
She pulled herself together, worrying in case the blood-filled balloon chose that moment to leave her body.
Again he spoke in Japanese. She did not understand.
She turned her puzzled expression to face him.
He spattered words of exasperation.
She shook her head. ‘I don’t under…’
He swung her around until
she could feel the dampness of his uniform mix with the perspiration on her back. The flat of his hand thudded between her shoulder blades. She fell forward onto her hands and knees.
This was a place where anger must never be hot, but controlled to seep out at a later date like droplets of venom.
The mirror was directly opposite her. She saw her made-up reflection, the sootiness outlining her eyes, the dark hair pulled back into a cushioned design that framed her face.
He brought the light from the table and placed it on the floor. Her breasts and face took on its amber light. The moths formed a cloud of colour around the lamp, her face and her body.
Moths basked in the warm glow, their fluttering wings brushing her breasts. She saw herself in the mirror and saw what he was seeing.
She tensed. She’d never felt so sick. There was lust, malice and sheer glee on his sweaty, hot face, but also something else, something that became clearer as her breasts reddened from the heat of the lamp.
Forcing her legs apart, he thrust himself into her without pause or consideration. Her thighs strained, her shoulders tensed and her breasts scorched in the heat of the lamp. And all the while the brightly coloured moths fluttered around her, their presence duplicated in her shadowy reflection.
One of them landed on her back. Yamamuchi caught it and crushed it in his hand. And the same could happen to me, she thought to herself.
* * *
Genda listened in the semi-darkness beneath the house. There was not enough height to stand upright so he settled for standing slightly stooped, one hand resting on his knee, the other on the handle of his sword. Despite the likely presence of snakes, scorpions and rats, he would endure the stench of mildew, stagnant water and hordes of angry ants. No danger, no monster could compare to the man in the room above him.
Spears of light and clouds of movement pierced the gaps in the rough floor, bursting onto his face. He heard the singer lamenting about lost love and his sadness at being far from home. He heard Yamamuchi’s voice but his words were indistinct. He thought he detected a strangled gasp, but couldn’t be sure.
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