by Alisa Smith
She would not be that girl anymore. She would be thirty-four years old, I reckoned. Old enough to know her own mind, and to have grown out of girlish attractions to dangerous men.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THROUGH THE PORTHOLE
WE HAD ENTERED the body of water named for my destination: the Gulf of Siam. I felt excited, for arrivals are always exciting somehow—nothing has gone wrong yet in a new place. Perhaps later I would be wretched here, but for now, I couldn’t keep foolish hopes from taking over.
The weeks had felt long and I would be glad to leave the Quarlo. While my seasickness had subsided, whenever the waves swelled too high I was ill again. Christmas had come and gone. Being single, I never expected much of the holiday, but this had been the worst. I spent the day heaving over the rails and couldn’t touch the cured ham that Frederick cooked up special. Finally, we had sailed past the southern tip of French Indochina and were heading northwest through the turquoise sea. A boat travels slowly enough that one hardly notices the changes in the water or sea air, but now the scent of land wafted on the sunrise breeze, and it smelled like flowers and rot.
Small mountains rose in lumps on the horizon, indistinct in the humid air. In the grey-pink light, a V of huge white birds flew silently overhead, their wings pumping slowly, as though they were kept in the air only by great strength. Beyond them, higher and smaller, dark birds yelled eeee with a sound of fear. I rubbed my arms and descended the stairs to the galley.
It was still dim inside, and the kerosene lantern flickered in the small sitting room. Frederick offered me the sole easy chair. He perched on a wooden stool, looking worried. I felt my landing was all worked out between us, but I bit my tongue, because it seemed to make Frederick feel better to go over it. He traced his finger over the map.
“There’s islands we can creep between on our approach and not be seen from a distance. Where we’ll land, Bang Saray, looks like a small fishing village. Hopefully not too many people about when we get in after dark. There’s a road marked here, and you follow it about two miles to the railway tracks. This line goes to Bangkok.” Frederick shook his head as he looked up from the map. “Lena, I don’t feel so good about dumping you alone in this foreign place. Can I go as far as the train with you?”
“I’ll be all right. I learned way-finding and such.” I turned my face away so it wouldn’t betray me—I was nervous about what I had to do. I’d never been in a foreign country. Also, I was sad to be leaving my old friend. I could not tell him everything, of course, but I trusted him with my life, which was more than I could say for anyone I’d met since my time with the gang.
Through the porthole I saw the sun rising, a red orb leaping from the horizon. I had not slept well and I rubbed my eyes at the sudden brightness. I had dreamed last night of Fala, back on Shemya, and in the dream he was shot. The real life story didn’t end that way, but it easily could have.
During the summer, three airmen out for a walk had found an abandoned fox pup. They bundled it in a jacket and carried it back to the base, and they connived canned milk from the cook to nurse it with. The men were bored between missions, which were not frequent in the months leading up to the Japanese surrender in August. It was touching to see the pilots, who normally swaggered like cowboys, lavishing love and attention on the little fox. It was adorable as any tame pup: it looked like a teddy bear with its tiny ears and thick red-brown fur. They called him Fala, after FDR’s dog, and he would wait devotedly outside the mess hall for the pilots who rescued him to emerge. One day I hid around the corner from the mess until all the men were inside. I approached the puppy casually and then, looking around to be sure I was alone, I picked him up and cuddled him. I did not want to be seen in this girlish weakness. I did not necessarily like my reputation as cold and distant, but this brought me whatever little respect I managed to command among the men. The puppy was warm and his little heart beat quickly though he did not struggle in my arms. He felt so vulnerable, never believing for a moment that anyone would harm him. I brushed my cheek against his soft fur. I wished for the first time in my life that I could have a dog. I had never wanted to be tied down by any creature. But after all, a dog was man’s best friend for a reason. Loyalty, unconditional love. Did I not deserve it? Wasn’t I capable of giving it? Why did they have to call him Fala anyway? It was too sad. Fala was a famous dog, true, and famously loyal; more so than even your average dog. When FDR died last spring, the story went, Fala howled at the funeral as he stared glumly into the grave. Afterward, at home, if he heard a motorcade approaching he perked up his ears, but of course his hopes were always dashed. FDR was dead. Was the result of love and loyalty always so tragic? I had put the little fox back on the ground and walked away.
As the summer went on and Fala got bigger, he liked to play rough wrestling games with the airmen, clamping onto their forearms and calves. That was fine when his teeth were not sharp but soon, I thought, it would get out of hand. He was a wild creature. The men carried guns and their nerves were strung tight.
In the dream, Fala bit too hard and drew blood. The man who’d saved him, who had loved him best, pulled the trigger.
Fala yelped, twitched, bled from the mouth, and was dead.
I had been covered in sweat when I woke at his last cry. Was it a warning? That those who once cared for me were the most dangerous of all?
I tried to calm my breathing. In real life, Fala had left in time. When the first frost rimed the ground, the news went around that he had vanished. He must have gone back to his kin. When out on my walks, if I saw a flash of red-brown fur, I always wondered if it was him, and I wished him well. It was better to be free than anything, I reminded myself. If Link did not forgive me, I’d still have that much.
To prepare for landing, I opened my Siamese grammar book, but nothing new would sink in. When I imagined my meeting with Link, I was scared of what condition I might find him in. The Japanese had treated their POWs worse than even the Germans. The genocide of Jews was a horror the Nazis kept in its own compartment. They followed the Geneva Convention to the letter when it came to the soldiers they captured in battle. I found this inexplicable. Evil and honour. How did the human heart hold so many contradictions?
I put the grammar book away and went into the adjoining galley to fix coffee for Frederick, who’d been up in the night sailing the ship. We were in more sheltered waters, so I was not feeling sick. I could most likely keep down some breakfast. As soon as the coffee percolated on the burner, I yelled to let Frederick know it was ready.
We sipped our coffee in silence, while Frederick examined a nautical map on the table. I scooched over to the porthole and stared out at a curving shoreline dense with forest, forbidding and dark. A small white beach made my heart glad, I suppose from memories of childhood, digging in the sand at English Bay with my father. Sand always means summer to a Canadian, but I supposed it was just ordinary life here. One would more likely hide from the sun than seek it out, as I was used to doing. In Alaska I had found a straight-backed boulder I used as a chair on the rare sunny days—it collected the heat and was sheltered from the wind. I would sit there with my eyes closed pretending it was summer when it became warm enough to take off my jacket, though I still kept on a heavy sweater. Small pleasures, there. Mostly, it felt as if I was crawling through each day as over sharp gravel on bare knees.
“That’s Koh Kut Island,” Frederick said.
Grey cliffs streaked with orange rose straight up from the small white beach. “It’s beautiful. Don’t you wish you could lose yourself here forever?”
“Hawaii’s my paradise. Still part of the good old USA.”
A rhythmic thumping sound came from the deck above us, and Frederick paused in the middle of slurping his coffee.
“What’s that?” he asked. “Something come loose?”
“I’ll go check. Just enjoy your coffee.”
I went upstairs, shutting the door behind me. Everything looked in place on deck, but
I was startled by the sight of a large boat pulled up behind us. We hadn’t heard it coming from downstairs because it had arrived under ragged sails. It was a strange creation, stitched together like Frankenstein’s monster. There were no windows in the stern and the upper cabin was made of metal scraps welded together inexpertly. Things were sticking out of a skinny rectangular window, though it was more of a gap in the patchwork. I walked to the railing to get a better look. The things were hands and feet, both. The bodies inside must be stacked up like cordwood. Were these prisoners?
An arm closed around my neck, squeezing from behind so I could hardly breathe. I felt the metal of what must be a gun pressing into my back.
“Stay quiet. Put up your hands,” a man hissed in my ear.
I did what he asked, my mind paralyzed. My arms quivered.
“How many more on ship?” His accent made his words clipped.
“One.”
“Truth?” he asked, tightening his grip.
“Yes.” My voice rasped, like air straining through a reed. The man’s arm forced my chin upward so that I stared at the sky. How could it be so blue, cloudless, portending nothing?
“You tell him, come up now. Be good or I kill you.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
JANUARY 10, 1946
I LOOKED AT my watch and it was 3 p.m. I no longer had the pocket watch Bill gave me long ago as a birthday gift, inscribed with his nickname for me, BY GOD. I lost it during our final wilderness journey together back in Washington. In any case, such a thing was out of style now, with everyone wearing wristwatches. A pocket watch had been a little quaint even then, but I had liked its dandiness.
So Lena was coming. I didn’t feel like working anymore and decided to cut out early. I would take one of the local ferries down the length of the Chao Phraya. It was peaceful on the water. I liked the sight of the golden temple spires, more fanciful than any church tower, rising up from the trees as I sailed by. I supposed if I did not get on the boat to the palazzo, Dass would accompany me anyhow. He never let me out of his sight, and I was starting to find him almost as annoying as that Shively. No, I would not go that far. There was something of the graveyard about Shively. Bill picked some mighty strange companions, but I guess they all had their uses. Perhaps I just needed to make more of an effort with Dass. He was an exotic, genteel fellow and I would like to know more of his history.
Aboard the ferry, I put up my umbrella and was glad I had brought it. It was a hard thing to remember, since it had the opposite purpose as in Washington State: there it was for rainy days, here it was for sun. Not every longtail boat had an awning. In Siam, things were not designed around the frailties of the white man. We were a small minority, and the British had never ruled here to mold the country to their needs.
“Have you ever had a sunburn, Dass?”
“No.”
He kept his back to me while the boat cut smoothly through the water. Well, I’d just try to enjoy the ride. It was peaceful. While the ferry was motorized, most of the boats in the river had silent oarsmen. The clatter of automobiles was like a headache I never knew I had until it was gone. It was the same with the trains that clanked into Bangkok, steam engines of a type I had not seen since I was a child. I wondered if Lena would step off one of these antiques, appearing out of the smoke like an apparition.
Standing at the edge of the ferry, I stared into the tree branches overhanging the water. Not one bird to tempt Dass into conversation. I had never seen the river so devoid of life.
Dass stood silently at my shoulder.
We approached five grey towers washed out to nearly white in the harsh sunlight. They struck me as more ancient than the gold ones, as though their outer coating had been worn off over ages. “What’s that temple called?” I asked.
“Wat Arun.”
“Do you know its history?”
“Not much, sahib. I am no Buddhist. But the base of the temple is from Siam’s Hindu era, which is the religion of my ancestors,” he said. “Arun is the god of the rising sun. He was born too early from his egg and so did not achieve the beauty of the noon sun, like his brother, who was born at the correct time. But Arun has the consolation of the paler beauty of dawn.”
“I like it. Shows not everything goes to the top gun.”
We stood admiring the temple as the boat slowly passed by. I shaded my eyes but it was still too bright. I should come at dawn one day to appreciate it fully. The more I thought of it, the more I liked Dass’s story. I preferred the soft early light to the glare of noon myself. My eye caught a bobbing motion from a tree branch overhanging the river—a spot of pink, like a bird spun from candy floss.
“What’s that?” I asked, pointing.
“Black-backed kingfisher,” he said. “Nice find.”
“How’d you know from this distance?”
“Bright colour, small size, large beak, and most of all, that bobbing motion. Every bird moves in a unique way. It’s no trick. It’s the same as how you would recognize your love, even from far away.” He rotated his body as the boat moved past to keep his eyes on the bird. It shot at top speed out of the tree and low across the water, and was suddenly gone.
I was uncomfortable about his reference to love. How was my face composed when he saw me open the telegram about Lena? “How do you know so much about birds?” I asked instead.
“When I was a boy, by accident I shot a bird that was special. I had never seen one like it before. I took it to the Bombay Natural History Society to learn what it was. The president of the group took a liking to me and encouraged me to keep a journal of the birds I saw. I studied biology for a year at university but my family fell on hard times and I could not continue. Perhaps if I had been allowed to join the Society my life would have been different. But natives were not allowed.”
“In America we believe in equality,” I said.
“Are there not places the negro is not allowed?”
“In the south, yes,” I conceded. “But a Black man was a part of my former business with Mr. Yardley.”
“Did he have an equal share with the white men?”
“Yes. And the woman, too.”
Dass looked pensive. I hoped I hadn’t stirred up a hornet’s nest. I didn’t know what his arrangement was with Bill. But my own standing might be no better than Dass’s, or possibly worse. So far I had mainly been a financial drain. I would prove my worth to Bill when Lena arrived. Though how I was going to smooth things over, I didn’t know yet.
I got rid of Dass by telling him I had work to do on Bill’s orders. I went to scope out the port, so I was familiar with its layout should Lena arrive there. I’d only seen it for a few minutes when I came to Siam, what with Shively shoving me along. Then I took a taxi to get a closer look at the train station he’d also rushed me through. Where might Lena stand waiting? I wanted to be ready.
I asked the cab driver to let me out in Chinatown, which was a short stroll from the station, and had a reputation for better restaurants than the Siamese districts. I couldn’t read any signs so I picked a place that looked busy. Dead ducks hung from hooks in the window, but one had to learn to ignore such things. I managed to order a soup that I struggled with, the noodles slipping from my chopsticks. I was trying my best to learn them along with some basic words of Siamese. It helped that their word for thank-you, though difficult to say correctly, involved a prayer motion with the hands and a bob of the head, so I could always make myself understood that way. The soup lady responded with a brilliant smile as I paid my bill at the back counter. I don’t know, maybe she only spoke Chinese.
I realized I’d left my umbrella on the ferry in my hurry to leave Dass and cursed under my breath. To hide from the sun, I stayed underneath the porticoes of the shops, solid Victorian buildings of wood or plaster, lining Yaowarat Road. Shop owners swept their squares of sidewalk with handmade brooms, while chickens stood glum but resigned beneath rattan cages shaped like upside-down bowls. Ceramic pots by each door held small
trees and flowering shrubs, freshening up the otherwise grey street, which was paved on this main thoroughfare. There were some old billboards from before the war, in English, for Eveready and Coca-Cola, which made me feel briefly homesick. I was jolted back to the present by an ad with a ghostly Asian woman smoothing cream on her face, the only English words among the jumble of foreign characters being “Snail White.” A strange beauty aim given the lowliness of mollusks. I never did understand American women—in Siam it seemed hopeless indeed.
As I carried on past a white temple perched atop a high stone staircase, I recalled how Bill told me it contained a Buddha made of five tons of gold. I’d like to see it sometime, but I had too much to do before Lena arrived, so I carried on. The street was a chaos of people milling over the tram lines, a danger to themselves and a hindrance to public transit. The traffic here was mainly three-wheeled bicycle rickshaws, and the native drivers wore an odd uniform of British pith helmets and shorts. Was this some misguided government attempt at Westernizing the people? I suppose they looked happier than the men in traditional sarongs who played the part of mules, hauling loaded wooden carts. Everywhere little tables were laid out with fruits and vegetables in front of the real shops, with skinny country vendors squatting behind each one. Were they hopeful or hopeless? How long did it take for one feeling to bleed into the other?
Reaching Hua Lamphong station, I spent a good forty-five minutes circling it and examining all its corners. Every shady niche outside held a food stall, and small sparrows pecked at the ground, thin and barely feathered in the heat. Curs hung back, bedraggled and long snouted. Inside, underneath the high curved roof, some shops sold newspapers and cigars, while others displayed lengths of silk cloth, which young Siamese women eyed wistfully. Behind a tall teak enclosure, labelled in English, “Silence: Monks Only Waiting Area,” holy men in burgundy robes fanned themselves, expressionless, their empty silver bowls beside them on the benches. I thought of Smile’s ruse and peered uneasily at their faces before passing on.
