The Headmaster's Wager

by Vincent Lam

  Finally, Percival woke—his sheets soaking.

  Again, the same nightmare. Each time, he thought it was real until it was over.

  THEY NAMED THE BABY LAING JAI, meaning the beautiful child. Percival was grateful that the baby was healthy despite the circumstances of his birth. It was all he wanted. During daytime, it was as if only Jacqueline and the boy were real. Everything else was a dream. Percival would gently cradle the child close to him and let him fall asleep on his chest. As Laing Jai rose and fell lightly with his father’s breaths, Percival inhaled deeply, took in the milky floral smell. Dai Jai had once had that scent. When Percival had last smelled it, the rice mills still churned and clanked in Chen Hap Sing, and he had thought it was the rice dust settling on the baby’s skin. But Laing Jai smelled the same. Perhaps it was an odour emitted only while babies dreamed. If he could know his ancestral home by a scent, this would be it.

  Percival would watch Laing Jai nurse, both mother and child satisfied by the feeding. When the baby paused and took a deep breath, he inhaled with the effort of the whole world. When he let his tiny breath escape, so too did the world’s worries. Jacqueline refused Percival’s offer to hire a wet nurse and instead fed the baby herself. Her breasts grew heavy, her nipples thick, and Percival allowed himself the intoxication of being in love with both mother and child. Occasionally, he cautioned himself to at least try to preserve his judgment. After all, she was not Chinese. Yet, more and more it felt that he was forcing this thought upon himself.

  About a week after the birth, Percival said to Jacqueline, “Today I am having Dr. Hua come to examine the boy.”

  “That’s not necessary. He’s fine, don’t you think?”

  “But what if something is not right with him? He arrived under such difficult circumstances.”

  When the doctor arrived, Percival welcomed him. Dr. Hua whispered nonsensical reassurances to Laing Jai in French and Cantonese. He poked and tapped, all the while making strange facial contortions that seemed intended, without success, to amuse the screaming child. He listened with his stethoscope and pushed on the baby’s flesh with his fingertips. Finally, he said, “Everything is in order—ten fingers, two testicles, and all the appropriate portions are present.” The child wailed. Jacqueline snatched him to her breast and retreated to a corner.

  “Any concerns, then?” asked Percival.

  “I recommend a special syrup of concentrated vitamins. I happen to have a vial of this excellent medicine with me, and will offer it to you at a good price. Only fifteen thousand piastres for a full month’s supply—it is all you need.”

  “Good, good,” said Percival, taking the brown glass bottle. “This is a special mixture for babies born under stressful conditions?”

  Dr. Hua took his stethoscope off his neck and absently folded it into his brown leather bag. “It’s good for any babies.” He looked up. “He is a beautiful, healthy boy.” He smiled at Percival. “Congratulations, Headmaster.”

  Percival returned the smile with considerable relief. “We were worried,” he said, bowing and offering a red envelope, “since the fighting shocked the child into the world.”

  The doctor accepted the red envelope and nodded.

  Laing Jai had a reassuringly solid build. A shock of rippling brown hair had been passed to him through Jacqueline. Percival thought the boy had his nose, and he made a long examination of himself in the mirror to be sure. Yes, it was. The baby had Dai Jai’s bright, darting eyes, and Percival often found himself staring into them. The baby returned Percival’s stare with neither cunning nor expectation. Percival resented the idea of Jacqueline going back to Saigon. Why should she? In any case, it seemed their secret had leaked to the teachers even before she appeared during the Tet banquet. He liked her and the child being here. Wasn’t this his house?

  It had been different when Cecilia gave birth to Dai Jai. She had handed the baby immediately to Foong Jie to care for, leaving Foong Jie scrambling to find a wet nurse. Cecilia had bound her breasts with strips of cotton to discourage them from producing milk, and complained bitterly about what Percival had done to her by making her bear a child. He spent more of the first few months of Dai Jai’s life at Le Grand Monde than at home. Meanwhile, the servants were on edge, hurrying to fulfil Cecilia’s wishes—to sniff the baby’s feces to see if he was sick, to prepare foods that she requested, to bring the boy because he was crying for her, to take him away because she had heard enough crying.

  With Jacqueline, the servants did not know at first whether they should attend to her or discreetly pretend she was not there. They did what they thought would be helpful, and found it was well received by Jacqueline. But when Percival appeared, the servants stopped talking to her, as if they would be faulted for having noticed the headmaster’s lover. Percival instructed Foong Jie to have Dai Jai’s old room scrubbed clean for Jacqueline and the baby. Foong Jie waved her hands before her, a rare objection. He must show that the head of the house did as he saw fit. “I am the boss. It must be spotless for Jacqueline,” said Percival.

  Seeing the room made him miss Dai Jai, but wasn’t that all the more reason to allow the life and light of a mother and child to fill it? Dai Jai’s next letter, which arrived soon after Tet, ranted that his father was a “puppet lackey of the American oppressor.” Dai Jai hoped through service to the working people to “atone for the sins of his shameful landlord family.” By filling his room, was Percival trying to fill the empty space that Dai Jai had left? he wondered. Meanwhile, however angry he might be at the disrespect in Dai Jai’s letters, Percival concluded that it had been right to send him. What if the boy had been in the army during the recent offensive? All the cities in the South had been attacked. Dai Jai might have been shot by the communists, or later could have been targeted by the South Vietnamese. They would need people to blame, in order to distract from their military humiliation.

  Police Chief Mei came to speak to Percival. “If the newspapers ask, can you say some good things about me, maybe that I spent the night of Tet protecting the school? I’m getting a hard time from Saigon.” The newspapers had published a photo of Police Chief Mei taken on the day after Tet, wearing the dress uniform that he had donned for Percival’s banquet. The servants said that he had put it on as soon as it was clear that the battle had turned in favour of Saigon’s soldiers. In the photo, Mei stood above the four dead bodies of the Viet Cong assassination squad, his .38 Colt in his hand pointed down at one of their shattered skulls. It looked like he had just shot the men.

  “But aren’t you a hero for having shot those Viet Cong?”

  “I would have been, except that the newspaper photo was shown in America. Some reporter wrote that obviously they had been kneeling, that they must have surrendered before they were shot. They all fell neatly in a row. The bullets went in from above their heads.”

  “Let me guess, the Americans thought you should have taken the men for questioning instead of killing them.”

  “I didn’t even shoot them. One of my men did. They were dead by the time I got there. But when the newspapers asked me, I posed for the photo. I thought it might help me get a promotion, maybe even a trip to America for a training course. Instead, the Americans are talking bullshit about the Geneva Convention.”

  “The Americans’ problem is that they don’t know what they want. Shoot this one. Help that one.”

  “They killed all the Viet Cong who attacked the American embassy, but I shouldn’t have shot those ones in front of your school. Cold blood, they say. Bad press. I should have allowed my officer to take the credit. Now, I could be reprimanding him to earn my promotion.”

  “The Americans have no concept of loyalty. They don’t stand by their friends, but then they can’t tell their friends from their enemies,” said Percival. “Yes, you were defending my school all night long.”

  “Thank you.”

  “Remember the favour.”

  “Of course.”

  Now, in the wake of all this
, there would be disappearances, bodies found in the morning, relatives outside the gates of the National Police Headquarters. The quiet police would be compelled to show their vigilance. Yes, he might write in his letters along with some fatherly admonishment, that it was best that Dai Jai was in China.

  —

  MAK HIRED MASONS TO REPAIR THE shrapnel damage and gouges made by machine-gun fire on the face of Chen Hap Sing. He hired labourers to fill in the holes in the street left by shells that had landed in front of the school. It would be bad luck if someone rode a bicycle or moped into one of those holes. It took some time and several red packets to obtain glass to repair the shattered windows. In the wake of the Tet fighting, many people in Saigon and Cholon needed new glass. The windows of St. Francis Xavier had all been shattered, and Percival contributed to the priests’ appeal for their repair, as well as giving extra alms to the monks whose monastery had been hit by a stray mortar. Schools remained closed. Nonetheless, the school inspector came to visit and said that he was renewing licences for the upcoming semester. He couldn’t name an exact opening date, but said it would be soon. Percival provided a suitable sum of cash. The calls of the vendors and the chatter of trade gradually returned to La Place de la Libération.

  Beyond the bullet in his chest which felled him, Han Bai’s body had been untouched through the night of the fighting. Percival visited his family and mourned with them. He could not bring himself to tell them that he had sent the driver out that night, but he bought a grave site on a hill, with a view of the canal. It was a site suitable for a wealthy man. He paid for a lavish funeral, and gave Han Bai’s family a year of the driver’s salary. Percival worried that Han Bai’s death might bring misfortune to the school, and hoped that his generosity might placate any bad feelings that Han Bai’s spirit might have.

  Percival asked Mak into the school office, and told him about the dark figure in his dream. Who else could he tell? He asked Mak if he thought Han Bai was haunting them, and whether the death would cast a shadow over the school’s reputation. Mak pressed his lips tight as Percival spoke. Finally, he said, “I know nothing of dreams. See the fortune teller. But I don’t think the danger to your school’s reputation comes from Han Bai’s death. I am sad like you, but if anything it makes the school more patriotic—we have lost one of our own to this war. The danger to your school’s name is the student whom you insist on bedding.”

  “Former student. You are fixated on this small issue.”

  The fan slowed, its squeaking stopped. The electricity had been unreliable since the Tet fighting. From time to time, Cholon’s fans, radios, and electric clocks came to a simultaneous halt, as they did now. Silence.

  Mak said, “Han Bai told me you won her at the Sun Wah Hotel.”

  “I asked you for advice on Han Bai’s death, about my dream. Not Jacqueline. Why does this matter concern you, Mak? It has to do with her mother’s death in Thanh Ha, yes? Some business of yours. Look, I don’t care if you have friends amongst every faction in this confusing country, which I’m sure you do. I hope you profit from each of them, but I love Jacqueline.”

  Mak sat forward. He put both hands on the table, fingers spread. “At the very least, send her back to Saigon. Your well-being concerns me. The well-being of the school concerns me. It is one thing for this house to know that you have taken her as your mistress. It’s another for all of Cholon to see you flaunting it. At least send her back to Saigon. People will know, but they will see that you are making an effort at discretion, at behaving the way a headmaster should.”

  Percival did take Mak’s advice on one thing. When he confided in the fortune teller about his dreams, the old man said, “Did someone leave your household when the child arrived? ”

  “My driver was killed that night.”

  “The ghost is jealous—on the night of his death, came life.”

  Behind him, the bead curtain rustled, and Percival was startled.

  “What can I do to avoid being haunted by the ghost of my driver? I have mourned. I have paid compensation to his family. Much more than would be expected.”

  The box was prepared and the sticks were rattled out. The fortune teller said, “To appease the ghost completely, the child must leave.” Percival left grumbling, wondering if Mak had somehow got to the fortune teller and told him what to say.

  PERCIVAL LIKED TO BE CLOSE TO Jacqueline without doing or saying anything. She slept when Laing Jai slept, and woke with the baby’s noises and movements so that they inhabited their own time. Sometimes, when they slept during the day, the room shuttered into a midday dusk, Percival crept into the room and watched them.

  Jacqueline seldom went out. When she did, she folded her hair into a conical hat and hid her face deep in the hat’s shade. She returned with magazines and newspapers and read them as she wandered the house with Laing Jai. She often wrapped Laing Jai with a length of cloth as a peasant would, so that she could carry the baby on her front or back, leaving her arms free. “Don’t worry,” she told Percival when he watched her curiously one morning as she wrapped Laing Jai. “There’s no chance I will become a country girl. I am a Saigon flower. This is just a good way to carry a baby.”

  “Are you sure? I don’t want to lose you to a rice farmer,” he joked.

  “I couldn’t survive in the countryside, anyhow,” she said. “I can speak like a countrywoman, but if anyone sees my face and hair, they’ll think I am a foreigner. Can you give me some money for today’s newspapers?”

  “Why don’t I buy you a record player? Or some novels? There are so many things you could enjoy. It is better to ignore the news. It can be upsetting.”

  Jacqueline laughed. “Like you do? I see you reading the papers that I buy, and hear you listening to the radio—both the Voice of America and the late-night Chinese broadcasts. I even heard you listening to the Vietnamese news one day. You don’t ignore the news. You just find it convenient to pretend to be oblivious. The question is, what do you do with what you know, when you feign disinterest?”

  “The Americans are talking about two hundred thousand more soldiers. They will need more translators than ever.”

  “Beyond what the news means for your business, do you have any thoughts?”

  “If I did, I would keep them to myself.”

  Even weeks after Tet, bitter and bloody fighting continued in some cities farther to the north. Long after the last of the Viet Cong had been killed in Saigon, the communists still controlled Hue. The American and South Vietnamese soldiers gradually took the city back, fighting block by block. It was reported that much of the beautiful old city, even the royal palace, was destroyed by mortars and grenades.

  Percival saw Jacqueline reading a Paris Match feature on the battle for Hue. There were colour photos of soldiers exhausted, wounded, of the dead residents of the city, their faces bloated like balloons of meat. Percival lingered. Jacqueline did not acknowledge him as she nursed Laing Jai and read about the mass graves. In her quiet was tension. He said, “It might turn your milk sour to read such terrible things.”

  “They had lists, you know? Of those who worked for Americans, or had business with American companies. Their spies had compiled them. You see these bodies? German missionary doctors—but their foreignness was enough to doom them.”

  Percival could not help looking at the blond victims, their hair stained with brown blood where they had been shot. He said, “But here in Saigon, everything is back to normal. Schools will open again soon. You should listen to music. It will soothe you.”

  “Is this what you call normal? In this country of blood, all you Chinese care about is sang yee, making money.” She looked up at Percival. “Have you wondered why those men came down from the roof as I was about to give birth?” Laing Jai lost the nipple and began to fuss. Jacqueline adjusted him and put him to her breast again. “They were looking for you.” Percival said nothing, stood unmoving until she conceded, “I like to read. You can buy me novels as well. And music too, if you w
ish.”

  Later that night, when Jacqueline and the baby slept, Percival looked for the magazine. He took it to the kitchen to dispose of it but could not keep himself from reading it. The more fortunate victims were the foreigners, army officers, and prominent local officials and business people. They were targeted on the night of Tet and shot by North Vietnamese assassination squads. Most of the Vietnamese who died in the drawn-out occupation of Hue—teachers, police, and anyone who spoke a foreign language—were bound by the hands and feet, pushed into pits alive, and buried by the shovels of those who were next to be killed. As the fighting dragged on, the Northern troops needed to conserve bullets. The graves were not deep and were easy to find, wrote the journalist, as the rotting bodies stank through the shallow mud. Percival read this, opened the coal-box of the kitchen stove, shoved the glossy magazine into it, and watched the pages burst into flames.

  CHAPTER 18

  THE REPAIRS ON CHEN HAP SING were ongoing, but the classrooms were useable, when, three weeks after Tet, the re-opening of schools was announced by the Ministry of Education. On the first day of classes, Percival stood at the door of the school to welcome the students. As they arrived, a dark Ford Galaxie stopped in front of Chen Hap Sing. The shirt-sleeved man in plain clothes, neatly pressed, waded through the students and stopped at the doorway of the school office. The officer held up a licence plate, which was blackened with soot, barely readable. “I want to speak to whomever this belongs.” These men from Saigon all had a similar bearing and reminded Percival of one another, even when he had never seen a particular officer before.

  Percival read the licence plate. “It is mine,” he said, his mouth dry. There was no point saying otherwise. The quiet police had traced the plate to him. “Thank you. My car disappeared on the night of Tet—I thought it was gone for good.” Percival had assumed the car was stolen. What did it mean, that this man from Saigon would bring him the plate? “Please, let me give you a gift for finding my car. I’m most appreciative.”