by Graeme Hall
After six days it was Granny Sun who broke the silence. She called out to Kwok-wah one morning as he was leaving the building.
‘Xiaoyang. Come and have some tea.’ Kwok-wah was in no mood for work and didn’t need any encouragement to skip a seminar and join Granny Sun. She gestured for him to take her single chair. Neither of them spoke while she made the tea. When it was ready she poured two cups and took her seat on the bed. ‘So,’ she said at last, ‘your young woman has gone.’ It was a simple statement of fact.
‘So it seems.’
‘You’ve heard nothing, I suppose?’
‘No, nothing. When I ask people who knew her they clam up. It’s ridiculous. These are people who only last week were laughing and joking with her. They shared a room. Now they don’t even want to hear her name. I’m just so angry with them. Do they think I’m stupid or something?’
‘No Xiaoyang, but it’s not ridiculous. It’s perfectly sensible. It’s their survival mechanism. It’s how it is here. You do what you need to do to survive. These young women are thinking about the rest of their lives, not the here and now. They’re thinking about their studies. Getting a job later. Getting a husband. Cause trouble now, get thrown out of the university, a black mark on their record and that’s it. Life over and done with before it has even started.’
‘You think it’s okay for them to act like that?’ Kwok-wah was a little surprised at Granny Sun’s attitude.
‘No Xiaoyang, I don’t. But I understand them. That’s what you have to do in this country. We’ve all done it at one time or another. All I’m saying is just don’t be too hard on them. Perhaps when the fuss has died down they’ll talk to you about her. Quietly when nobody is listening. Don’t go on at them too much now, give them a chance and see what happens.’
‘I can’t believe she was involved with drugs. I just can’t. It doesn’t make any sense.’ Kwok-wah was fighting hard with himself trying not to cry. A fight he was in danger of losing. ‘I never saw anything to make me think she was. And why would she be? Such a dangerous thing to do – especially here.’
‘Xiaoyang, Susan came to see me two weeks ago—’
‘She did?’ Kwok-wah interrupted.
‘Shut up and just listen to me. She sat where you’re sitting now, drinking tea out of the same cup.’ Kwok-wah looked at the cup as if it could tell him something. ‘She seemed to me to be a good girl. I’d seen her around with you, of course, but I hadn’t spoken to her before. Nothing more than a polite greeting anyway. But this time we had a good long talk. She’s a nice girl, I could tell. But …’ Granny Sun paused for a moment and took a sip of her tea. ‘But there was something about her I couldn’t put my finger on. There was something she wasn’t telling me. When you get to my age you develop a sense for these things.’
‘You think she was involved in drugs?’ Kwok-wah couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
‘Drugs? No. Like you say she’d have to be an idiot and she wasn’t stupid. No – it’s something else but I don’t know what. The thing is, we talked for quite a while, an hour or so, and when she left she said something strange.’ Granny Sun broke off to give free rein to a hacking cough.
‘What did she say?’
‘She said,’ continued the old woman, when she was ready and not before, ‘that if something was to happen to her I was to tell you not to believe anything they said about her.’
Kwok-wah didn’t know what was going on or what to make of this message. He was silent for a moment while he tried to work out the implications of what Granny Sun was telling him.
‘She expected something like this to happen?’ It wasn’t really a question.
‘I suppose so. I didn’t really understand what she was saying at the time but now … yes, I think she must have known. The thing is, Xiaoyang, she obviously wanted you to know that whatever happened, or whatever they say happened, it wasn’t true. She didn’t want you to think badly of her.’
‘The worst of it is I feel useless. I really want to do something. Find out where she is. Get in touch with her family. The American Embassy must know something, maybe I should speak to them?’
‘You’re a good boy, Xiaoyang, but take my advice: don’t. Leave it be. If they don’t want you to know what has happened to her there’s no way you’ll find out anything. You’ll just be putting yourself at risk. I don’t know – I must be getting soft myself in my old age – but something tells me that if you’re meant to meet again, you will.’
It had started to rain and raindrops were collecting on the window before forming tracks of water that ran down the glass. Kwok-wah watched as sometimes two tracks would come together only for the combined stream to part again and form two paths that went their own way. Now and then – just occasionally – they would come back together.
Chapter 17
‘The bad news is that he’s still under arrest. The even worse news is that there are rumours he’s going to be charged.’
Good Friday and Kelvin was updating the group with the latest information on Yan Xiao-ling. The medical researcher with his unwelcome opinions on infectious diseases was still one of their main concerns. Kelvin had been using his university connections to keep in touch with Yan’s family and find out what was going on. The news wasn’t good. According to his wife, Yan had been followed by two plainclothes policemen for weeks; his arrest had come after he had applied for permission to travel to a conference in Singapore where he was going to present a paper reporting his concerns about the increase in outbreaks of bird flu in China.
‘Charged with what?’ asked Lily.
‘Spreading false rumours, causing public anxiety, anything like that. I’m sure they can think of something. The question is, what do we do next? I was thinking of going to the conference myself and saying something there about him. I’m not sure what I’d say though or even if the organisers would let me. You know what Singapore can be like at the best of times, they’re not likely to be keen on making a fuss.’
‘Wasn’t it a little foolhardy?’ asked Liang-bao. ‘Wanting to go abroad to talk about an outbreak of bird flu in China was asking for trouble, surely? He must have known they’d never let him.’
‘Foolhardy? Perhaps you could say that – or perhaps he was just being brave. One of the two anyway. Or both. Who knows? I’ve been trying to persuade some of my colleagues to help me smuggle copies of his paper into Hong Kong so we can publish it here, but none of them have been particularly keen to get involved. The trouble is they all have their own research projects, many of which rely on collaborations with people and institutions in China. I think they’re worried that if they help then their own work is at risk. I was thinking of going to Shanghai myself to see if I could get to speak to Yan Xiao-ling, but now he’s been arrested I don’t know that I could do any good. I might be able to see his wife, but unless she has a copy of his work there wouldn’t be much point. It’s a possibility though.’
‘Wouldn’t that be a bit dangerous? Putting yourself at risk like that?’ asked Alice. She was sitting next to Liang-bao on Kelvin’s sofa. ‘I mean, they are bound to be watching her and who she meets. They’d know if you met her and then they’d just put two and two together. You’d be certain to be stopped from bringing anything back. Couldn’t she just post it to you, or is that too simple?’
‘If I could get my address to her – and, of course, assuming she has a copy of the paper anyway – but they may be listening to her calls and checking her mail.’
‘How about your cousin?’ Emma asked Alice. ‘Could he help, do you think?’
‘Kwok-wah? I don’t know … perhaps, but I wouldn’t want to put him in any danger.’
‘Who’s this?’ asked Kelvin.
‘My cousin. He’s studying in Shanghai at the moment. If you were to write a letter, I could send it to him to post in Shanghai. That would have a better chance of getting through than anything with a Hong Kong stamp.’
‘Well, let’s think about it some more and
come back to it later. We seem to be going round in circles getting nowhere and none of the options are very good. Let’s move on to something else.’
‘Do you think we’re doing any good?’ asked Lily. ‘Or are we only making things worse?’
‘What do you mean, Lily?’ asked Alice. Lily was always one of the quieter members in the group, often letting her sister speak for the pair of them. But for once Yannie wasn’t there; expecting a second child, she had decided to give the meeting a miss.
‘I don’t know. I just wonder if by making a fuss we’re just provoking China. Sometimes it’s like the more we go on about something, the more Beijing gets really heavy-handed. Perhaps we should turn it down a bit? There’s a limit to what we can do, maybe we need to realise that? Concentrate on fights we can win. Suppose Kelvin can get a copy of this research paper and gets it published here – will that help Yan Xiao-ling or just put him in more danger? He might find himself in even more trouble because they’ll say that he’s been collaborating with people from outside of China. They might even accuse him of spying for imperialist powers – you know the sort of thing they say.’
‘You think it’s our fault?’ said Emma, staring at Lily.
‘Well, I—’
‘We can’t just let these bullies get away with this sort of thing,’ Emma continued, animated now and looking around the room. ‘That’s what they are – bullies. Thugs. You’ve got to stand up to them or they’ll just think they can do what they like and they’ll just carry on like that – or worse. That’s what happened to me at school; I used to get picked on because of my hearing. At first it was just words – the other children liked to think I was stupid, I got called a retard, a spastic and so on – but then it got worse, became more physical. They liked to play this game where they would creep up behind me, quietly so that I wouldn’t hear them, then pull my hair or hit me in the back. It went on for ages until Pete … until someone showed me how to stand up for myself.
‘School playground or Chinese politics, it’s just a question of scale. Give one person power over another and the one thing you know for sure is they’ll abuse it. It’s the mentality of these people that really pisses me off. The way they push everybody else out of the way to get what they want. It doesn’t matter to them who they hurt in the process, the lives they ruin and destroy, the little people they trample over. And what do we do about it? Nothing. We might just as well sit at home and watch TV all day. Let them do whatever they want while we eat pizza and soak up mindless pap.
‘And what about after the handover? It’s all very well when it’s somewhere else. Somewhere far away that doesn’t affect us. But soon they’ll be here, and you can bet they’ll be in charge no matter what any agreement says. Bit by bit, they’ll change things. I expect we won’t notice it at first. “Look,” we’ll all say, “everything’s just the same,” and people will relax. Then there’ll be some small changes, but that will be okay, we’ll tell ourselves, “We can live with that, the important things haven’t changed.” Who knows, we might even believe it. But slowly, bit by bit, everything will be different and then what are we going to do about it? Say that we shouldn’t create a stir? We don’t want to upset people in case things get worse? But it will get worse. You know what they say about frogs and boiling water? Drop a frog into hot water and it will try and get out, but put a frog in cold water and slowly bring it to the boil … Well, that’s what will happen to Hong Kong unless we stand up and do something.
‘And Lily’ – Lily was looking down at her hands – ‘what about your nephew, what future is Thomas going to have? Don’t you want him to live in a place where he can feel free to do and say what he likes? Pursue his dreams and ambitions in whatever way he wants? Or would you rather he lived a life where he was always having to watch his back? Making sure he doesn’t say the wrong thing? Doesn’t upset the wrong people? Come on, everyone, isn’t that why we’re all here? Otherwise why bother? Let’s just give up now and do something else with our lives.’
There was silence in the room interrupted only by Charles clearing his throat. Emma began to think that perhaps she’d gone too far.
‘Sorry, I’m not getting at any of you – especially not you, Lily – it’s just that … Oh, I don’t know. Take no notice of me.’
‘No need to apologise, Emma,’ said Kelvin. ‘But let’s take a break. I’ve got some food ready in the kitchen. I’ll go get everything.’
Emma fiddled nervously with her hearing aid. Perhaps she should think about leaving after that outburst. What must the others think of her? None of them would have had a clue what had brought it on. Only Yannie might have understood if she was there. Emma’s reaction had surprised even herself, though she knew where it had come from. She thought about how Brian Lo had been forced to move abroad, leaving family and friends behind, too scared even to come back for a funeral, and she thought about Cheung Wing-ho. Twenty floors was a long way to fall. She’d been thinking about him ever since she got back from Sydney. She wondered if he’d had time to understand why he was being killed. Did whoever killed him say anything? Did they explain? Did he have time to regret making a fuss? What thoughts went through his head in those final seconds before he hit the pavement?
Was she making a nuisance of herself that she might one day come to regret? What would Peter say? That was something Emma often asked herself when she didn’t know what to do. She remembered how he always used to stand up for things that he thought were right; she hoped he’d be proud of her, though she suspected he’d also be more than a little bit surprised that his baby sister was becoming so forceful.
‘Perhaps I’d better leave …’ she began.
‘Why?’ asked Alice. ‘That was magnificent but, well, not exactly like you … Are you okay?’
‘I should apologise to Lily, I wasn’t meaning to get at her, or any of you, and I’m no better really. I mean, what do I do? I come to these meetings, write a few letters, and that’s it. It makes me feel better about myself, but I don’t suppose anything I do makes a blind bit of difference one way or the other. Who knows – Lily may be right. In the end perhaps all we do is make things worse.’
‘You don’t really mean that,’ said Alice.
‘Don’t I? Sometimes I wonder, but then …’
Kelvin was bringing plates of this and that into the living room.
‘I’m sorry, Kelvin, I think I might make a move if you don’t mind.’
‘Really, Emma? Do you have to?’
‘My hearing, you know …’ Emma’s gaze fell on Liang-bao still sitting on the sofa. He seemed to be looking at her with interest. Emma remembered the man she saw leaving the Xinhua building. ‘Oh, Liang-bao,’ she said, ‘there was something I meant to ask you. A couple of weeks ago I was coming out of the Queen Elizabeth Stadium after playing badminton’ (this was a story Emma had prepared earlier, ready for the opportunity to ask Liang-bao) ‘when I saw a man coming out of Xinhua who looked just like you. Did you know you have a doppelganger? Or a dubbelganger as my father would have said in Dutch.’
‘A doppelganger? What’s a doppelganger?’ asked Liang-bao.
‘Sorry. A double. A lookalike. Someone who looks just like you.’
‘Ah, I see. No, it might have been me. What day was it?’
‘It was a Monday, what – two weeks ago? Really? It might have been you?’
‘I was there a few weeks ago … Let me think, was that on a Monday? Yes, I think it was. Yes, it must have been a Monday because that’s the one day of the week I don’t have classes.’
‘Why were you at Xinhua?’ asked Alice. ‘What on earth were you doing there?’
‘I was delivering the petition.’
‘What petition?’
‘You know – the one we talked about? The petition about academic freedom after the handover? I was getting some of my fellow Masters students to sign it?’
‘I suppose so …’ Alice looked doubtful.
‘You’re getting forgetful.
Come on, let’s see what Kelvin has made for us. You too, Emma, stay and have something to eat.’
***
The ferry pulled away from the terminal in the morning sunshine of Easter Saturday. The vessel moved slowly at first while it negotiated the crowded waters of the inner harbour, and then once it reached the main fairway it picked up speed, raising its body on submerged hydrofoils until the hull was completely out of the water by the time it was moving smoothly past Green Island and Peng Chau, and then on through the channel separating Cheung Chau from Lantau. The ferry was packed. Sam and Emma evidently not the only ones who had decided on an Easter weekend in Macau.
Sam was slightly hungover. The night before while Emma was at her meeting, he’d made the mistake of joining Kate and Rob for dinner to celebrate the conclusion of a deal they’d all been working on, following which a gang of them had hit the bars. Sam had been one of the first to leave, but even so he hadn’t made it to bed until three. He had taken a masochistic delight in being interrogated by Rob and Kate as to why he was going to Macau for Easter. He took pleasure in being the subject of sexual speculation for once. Emma, on the other hand, appeared to Sam to be in a very exuberant mood. (‘Oh dear, you look … Am I speaking too loud? Late night I guess?’) The seating was airline style and they had been lucky to get a couple of seats by a window. Sam gazed out at the passing view. He had offered Emma the window but she had hastily declined it. (‘No thanks, I’m not that good on boats, I’d rather pretend I’m on a plane.’) He wasn’t exactly seasick, but in his fragile state, and even though the hydrofoil rode above the swell, he could have done without the vibrations from the engines, the smell of diesel, and the loud laughter and chatter of the other passengers. He tried to concentrate on the horizon. This was only partly to help quell any sense of queasiness but it also distracted him from thoughts of the night ahead. He wondered if Emma was as nervous as he was. If so she wasn’t showing it, her head buried in a newspaper.