The Jo Fletcher Books Anthology

by Frank P. Ryan

  I was too young to know what my father was trading. He had no use for a cripple, but this busy and prosperous gentleman welcomed extra hands, however feeble the body to which they belonged. A lifer: a century ago who would ever have dreamed of such a creature? Less likely than a centaur, this combination of programmer, chemist and artist. We were a new breed, not yesterday’s proud buffoons. We have our sins, but egoism is not amongst them. That’s how it is these days: artists are retiring, soldiers fight from afar, spies are indiscreet and emperors invisible. Tomorrow is never the answer we expect.

  My random search came to a sudden end when I saw a pair of frightened eyes looking back at me from under the table. Down on my hunkers I pulled the box out. Lying within in a bed of foam packing was a face I recognised – not personally, of course; we were street people and this was the face of a celebrity, a popular singer of salacious love ballads, quite forgotten now. I wondered why he was so scared. On that morning the studio was a kingdom of wonders to me. His eyes were open wide and periodically he blinked in a sudden involuntary way. His mouth made vowelish shapes, though he emitted no sound, nor any trace of breath. I felt sorry for him and so picked him up by his ears.

  Nearby, my father mumbled, ‘How much?’

  Perhaps understanding then, or maybe just startled by the expectancy – the lust, almost – in my father’s voice, I looked up suddenly and in my haste I dropped the portrait. It hit the ground with a thud, landing face-down on the concrete floor, and rolled slowly over. Its nose was broken: the skin of the philtrum had cracked open where it led into the mouth, making a gaping starfish crevice. There was no blood, of course, but it was quite ruined.

  ‘Young criminal!’ my father shouted and grabbed me. The elegant man picked up the portrait and studied it. Its mouth was still dumbly gaping like that of a goldfish. The man extinguished his cigarette in the ruined mouth and carelessly dropped the head back into the box. He gave quiet instructions to one of the eager apprentices hovering about; the boys were clearly delighted at the accident and eager to see its conclusion. The Maestro (thus Zhiang pretentiously styled himself – the only vulgarism I ever knew him to make) walked over and, ignoring my father’s apologies, struck me. My father was delighted, rightly taking this as evidence that the eminent lifer now considered me his own property.

  I was used to beatings delivered by my father’s heavy unskilled hands but this stung like a whip and I cried out. The pain, like a paper cut, seemed to grow and spread, and in spreading, to change pitch. The burning blow was the first of many I was to receive at the Maestro’s hand, but I fancy I feel that first caress even now. I put my hand to my cheek. It was hot enough to boil tears.

  Today I can cause that pain.

  A little more talk and they shook hands. My father, somewhat disappointed, left without saying goodbye. Because of the accident, my price was less than expected. Today I know how much I had cost Maestro Zhiang that day – and I still think it was unjust. Such careless behaviour is to be expected from untutored street children. I have seen much, and know what to expect from the boys I buy from their desperate parents, from my boastful clients.

  I am rarely surprised.

  The talkative gentleman sitting before me, however, was acting unusually. My clients were, as a rule, unimaginative. If I made an act of paying attention to their wishes they would be docile as I worked, mentally counting money or mistresses or whatever it was they collected. But this gentleman was not satisfied with my usual complimentary platitudes; he begged to hear my opinion, to hear of my training, to see the other projects I was working on. I promised a tour after the session, but still he was restive. Presently, just as my irritation retreated before the tranquil cloud which always descends when the work is going well, his expressionless face began to change. A smile creased his face like a shadow creeping across a room. ‘Very well, Maestro,’ he said quietly.

  I gave no sign that I had heard the unexpected Europeanism. My face, I am sure, was a study in coolness, though the word echoed in my memory like a shotgun report.

  Quickly I said, ‘I’ve taken measurements, all I need, and I shall send a quote tomorrow. If it’s agreeable, arrange another session with my secretary.’

  I was not worried about the price. If there were arguments, they were seldom about money. I charged enough for my clients to know they were getting quality.

  In the work of the day I managed to forget him, but later, as I descended into the Dragon’s Belly, his strange smiling manner came back to disquiet me. I was too late for the train and I studied my face in its windows as it left the station. I read in the tell-tale truth of physiognomy what I’d been denying all day. I was angry. I was afraid.

  It was irrational. My day was disrupted but the gentleman had done nothing other than engage in small talk. How was he to know what associations that exotic title stirred in me? I, who pride myself on being a businessman, was being as emotional as a stage-madam.

  Just as the long shrill note that heralded the next train’s approach sounded, a commotion made me turn. I’d not seen a vagrant in decades, not since the Great Renewal. They’d found work, or been put to it, or died. Not that I’d ever given their absence much thought. What a foolish sight this man presented. At first I smiled at him. It pleased me somehow that one leftover remained, one proud totem of our pathetic past. Today we Chinese are incontestably great. The Indians and the Europeans look to our decision, bow to our will. But this vagrant, with his coatings of grease and knotted hair, might have been sent by those ancestors to whom we are too busy or too embarrassed to pay homage. In his chaotic crooning I heard their reproach: You cannot forget us, wicked children.

  Nobody else heard him. Nobody paid him any attention. They looked though him and I wondered how they could ignore a ghost in their midst. People walked by, and those he accosted just shook their heads and tolerantly laughed.

  I did not laugh. I saw clearly the performance to which they were blind. The vagrant’s hair was identical to the Chairman’s, aping his famous habit of wearing his fringe soaring to the side. He was abusing the imbeciles’ licence to do the unthinkable. The vagrant’s walk, his swift impatient gestures, his every breath was a subtle imitation of the Chairman. And this grotesque parody was for me alone.

  I must explain before you decide I am paranoid.

  While it’s true that everybody over a certain age recognises the Chairman’s features and mannerisms, just as they could, if it were permitted, recite his gnomic sayings, those are merely an exterior description. There is a deeper reality to which the untrained are unconsciously blind. This animal essence is what makes a life so sublime. Its absence is what makes the portraiture of previous eras so facile. This knowledge is common, but the pain it takes to realise an essence is known to only a select few. Lifers enter into a state of sympathy comparable to that a mother feels for her newborn child. Our materials are expensive, but the real reason lifers charge so much is the pain. Breaking a bond is a self-administered rape of the psyche; that pain is why successful lifers hire armies of apprentices, proxies to share the daily ordeal and bear some of its brunt. One can break one’s heart only so many times; depression, despair and suicide are occupational hazards.

  Ah. I can tell you are not satisfied with this. You want to know why the vagrant’s satire was so disturbing. You need it spelled out. You’re entitled, like the rest of your generation. Very well then. Here, if you must have it, is my confession. You remember the colossal portrait of Chairman Hu installed for so many years at Gate of Heavenly Peace? It watched over the crowded square like a patient father, until it was burned during the May riots. The creator of that portrait was not Maestro Zhiang – he applied some finishing touches but I was the one who bonded with the chairman, not he! Me. I have said we lifers are not egotistical, but I will not ask you to believe I was humble when I watched the crowd part before the Chairman in the Mayday celebration. Indeed – why hide it? – I
was one of the madmen.

  That is how I understood the vagrant’s impersonation was as offensive as it was exquisitely subtle. Was this dishevelled creature a lifer once? Where had he met the Chairman? He didn’t appear to notice me, but who was his performance for, if not me? I was the only person alive who could truly see it.

  I wondered of course if my impression was accurate, or more a reflection of my concerns: an after-effect of that day’s disagreeable bonding. Sometimes, when a client’s personality is strong, one temporarily falls into the thrall of his passions – but why would my boorish client, a dull-eyed commodity importer, be interested in the long-dead Chairman?

  *

  That night I slept little and the next day I quoted high. I did not want the job. However, the ridiculous price was agreed and I spent the next week with the gentleman’s portrait layered on my psyche as I mothered it into life. He did not talk any more, which suited me fine, and the work went quickly. I was eager to be rid of it, of him.

  Towards the end of the week he turned to me. ‘I told a lie, Maestro.’

  The repetition of that title was a cold wind.

  ‘Indeed?’ I said trying to keep my voice distant and careless. ‘How so?’ The words sounded ridiculously loud.

  ‘I have been to a lifer studio before. I had almost forgotten – it was many years ago.’

  I made a show of stifling a yawn and began cleaning my tools.

  ‘Finished already? Don’t you want to know which studio I was in? It belonged to a great artist.’

  I hustled him out of his chair and towards the door, though I knew my assistants were staring at my odd behaviour. I had taught them that clients were to be treated like emperors until the transaction had been completed. But I didn’t care; too late, I had realised he was a spy of some sort.

  ‘It was Maestro Zhiang’s studio. In Shanghai, in the old suit-makers’ district. You have heard of him, surely?’

  I released him and he said with obvious pleasure, ‘I see that you have.’ From his breast pocket he produced a card, held it up so that I saw the pale red watermark. He placed it down on an empty plinth with a crisp snap.

  After he left, I watched the door for a long time, as if government agents would burst in shouting ‘Ah ha!’ the moment I glanced down at the card. I became aware of my apprentices staring, so I pocketed the card and finished for the day in a distracted way, peevishly snapping at the boys as they swept up the gelatine and opened the big windows to clear the vapours. Even as I chastised them, I heard the shrill sound of impotence in my voice; I knew and shared the contempt they felt for me.

  *

  I prayed that I would never see the agent again, not entirely wishful thinking – blackmail is a risky occupation, after all. But the next day he arrived on time for our penultimate appointment. I decided full disclosure was the best strategy: I would tell him everything – and tell him nothing. I brought him into my office; the last few days had provided enough fodder for studio gossip without adding to it. The story of my ruin was not for my students’ ears. I poured us both a drink and told it.

  It was not an unusual tale; the tumult of those years threw all in the air uniformly. Of course, I did not mention the Chairman – not that I have anything to hide, but in this degenerate age a blackmailer can destroy an honourable reputation and prosperous business with only a few well-placed hints. I had to convince him I was unremarkable.

  I told him how I had been sold, the lessons, the work, the beatings, but he kept asking about Zhiang – what his habits were, what type of girls he chose, what clients he had and, especially, to which party officials he was close. I gradually discerned that I was but a means to an end: he was not interested in me, which was a great relief, and I spoke more freely.

  ‘I served my apprenticeship with Zhiang – twelve long years – and trusting that those years would stand me in good stead when I set up my own studio, I took it all. Insults, abuse, slights, outrages.’

  ‘You hate him?’

  ‘I cannot forget how cruel he was, but I can forgive. I dare say it toughened me up. That was the way it was those days. I am a more tolerant master and yet—’

  He urged me on, and I said, ‘I cannot find it in myself to be open as Zhiang was. For every time he was cruel, I remember dozens of occasions when he would gather us round to show us some marvel, or lift us up to celebrate our progress. I am cold. It would please me to think my coldness a result of the hard years after the Renewal, but I have always been so. I cannot charge Zhiang with that crime.’

  The agent’s silence skilfully probed me, but in truth, talking was a relief. ‘Better to have a generous master, even if he has a temper. Students remember the good times and quickly forget the bad. That I am the opposite – that I am miserly, that I hate and cherish grudges – makes my studio unhappy. Even so I cannot pity my boys for I too must live with myself.’

  *

  The vagrant was asleep at the gate of my station when I went to work the following morning, crumpled in the midst of half-filled bottles with a bony dog licking his hand. Even sleeping he radiated the Chairman’s essence. However, I was convinced now that it was my client’s preoccupations filtering into the perceptions of my daily life. Such illusions are an occupational hazard.

  He arrived punctually for our final session and I continued my story as I had plotted, bringing it to its end while avoiding the subject he wanted most to know about. I was in control of the bond: my hand, the quill; he, the paper. He did not discern the deception as I let myself digress into maudlin self-pity.

  ‘After the war my association with Zhiang, far from helping my career, almost ended it. I was branded a reactionary and threatened with scrubbing. They imprisoned me, but after the Golden Light disbanded, I was released in the general amnesty, my notoriety forgotten. With every face wan from hunger and scarred by sickness, portraiture was far from most minds. That equality of suffering lasted about a year.

  I, student of the great Maestro Zhiang, had one more lesson to learn, and those years taught it well. Art is not the child of inspiration or truth or beauty. She is the whore of disposable income. I looked about me and saw new flags and uniforms and I understood at last what Zhiang had tried to teach me with his soft words and cigarette burns. People do not want a mirror – any fool could supply that; after all, the technical skills of lifeing, though exacting, are easy to learn, given time. No. Rich people – and for our purposes the poor do not exist – want to see themselves reflected in the eyes of love. What once required sacrifice now requires only cash.’

  ‘That’s life, isn’t it?’ the agent said neutrally.

  ‘Perhaps, but whatever you call it, do not call it realism. Zhiang always said we are creatures of emotion, not reason. You are too young to remember how our propagandists used to depict the Americans.’

  ‘Hordes of shovel-handed apes wolfing down hamburgers and Chinese virgins. I remember.’

  ‘Then you will also remember how we laughed at the caricature – yet who can deny its effectiveness? How our hearts cheered as our bombs bored from below their cities.’

  ‘I said I remember.’

  ‘Zhiang said lifers are propagandists too: propagandists of our clients. We take their dreams of ambition and self-love and make them real. He said a lie told that beautifully is worth a fortune.’

  ‘Very interesting,’ the agent said, clearly uninterested in my craft and philosophy. ‘What else?’

  I blushed, ‘There is no more.’

  ‘No? The strings to get you out of prison, who pulled them?’

  ‘None were necessary: my crime was merely to be born during the Chairman’s reign. In prison, I was re-educated. When I was released, I borrowed from relatives to set up a studio and built my reputation by hard work. When clients asked me where I trained I could not boast of studying under the recidivist Zhiang—’

  ‘So
you became a self-taught prodigy. Another lie.’

  ‘You don’t really want a portrait, do you?’

  ‘I want to know where Zhiang is.’

  ‘He disappeared.’

  ‘Into the dense cloud of Heaven, like the beloved Chairman.’

  I was getting worried now. ‘I know nothing of such things.’

  ‘You don’t know,’ he said contemptuously. ‘You don’t even know what everyone knows. You’ve been playing the fool for so long you don’t know when to stop.’

  ‘A few years ago, there was a rumour,’ I said at last, ‘that the Chairman was assassinated in Taiwan.’

  ‘I am not interested in rumours, at least not those that you’ve heard. Hu’s been spotted in Russia, in Mumbai. There was even word of him across the Pacific. The assassination rumour was just a pretext for the invasion. I know you’re smart enough to know that. I told you: stop playing.’ He looked at me searchingly. ‘Truth is we don’t have a clue where the Chairman ended up, whether he’s alive or dead. Him – or Zhiang.’

  At last I understood his purpose. The bond had taken.

  ‘You don’t work for the party, do you?’

  He smiled wider than ever and when I broke the bond he, of course, felt nothing. I tried to keep calm as I washed my hands. ‘Sir, you have mistaken me for someone with something to hide. I discern now you are a mischief-maker.’

  ‘Can’t I take my face?’

  ‘Please leave.’

  ‘Did you kill him?’

  ‘Leave,’ I repeated.

  He shrugged and sauntered out the door.

  He left me there under the mocking eyes of his portrait. I examined the work. It was accurate, maddeningly so. I tried to reset the expression of the lips, knowing that smirk would slowly blossom again after a few minutes. The eyes twinkled, no matter how I assaulted the ocular orbicularis. The bond is always strong when the subject’s personality is strong, when the subject is the indefatigable type. I took my scalpel and cut the smile away, one lip at a time.