Aunt Sass: Christmas Stories

by P. L. Travers

  Even the garden, a sickly graveyard under Sam Foo, lifted its head for Ah Wong. Flowers bloomed, green rows of vegetables appeared, watermelons swelled like balloons. It was our belief that Ah Wong blew them up at night.

  The only one of the household he never quite convinced was Kate Clancy. She spoke of him as ‘that heathen idol’ and treated him with contemptuous condescension. But she did not scruple to pile work that was rightfully hers upon his shoulders. It was Ah Wong who starched the frills and laces worn by our unfortunate generation, until our clothes stood out from our bodies like boards. It was Ah Wong who watched for the first hints of malaria in the rainy season. One shiver and quinine from the black bottle would be spooned into our mouths. If we refused the bitter draught his eyes would flash threateningly.

  ‘You wanta make-im dead? All-along underground? Give Ah Wong big-mob bellyache here?’ he would cry, slapping his hand dramatically over his heart till we gave in and swallowed.

  Where, we wondered, had Ah Wong learned his persuasive secrets. We never knew. Nor did he ever give us an inkling as to why he had come to us. Perhaps Sam Foo, convalescing in Cooktown, had told him the job was vacant. What did it matter? We needed him and he came. That, for the children, was enough. It was obvious that he had had some experience of the aboriginal part of Australia for he spoke English with the same intonation and singsong phrases that the black-fellows use. But beyond guessing at that we knew nothing.

  His consistent answer, whenever anybody enquired into his past, was–‘Me come from China. Velly good place.’ That was the final word. He never elaborated. Once we asked him what he thought of the Japanese. Even in those days the projected ‘Japanese invasion’ was common conversational currency in Australia.

  I shall never forget Ah Wong’s face when we asked him that. His eyes shrank and darkened until they were small black holes in his face. He fixed them upon us with passion, as though the question had outraged his inmost heart. He said nothing. But he pursed up his mouth into a terrible O and–suddenly–he spat. Full and round and venomous, his contempt dropped sizzling upon the hot planks of the veranda.

  Deeply impressed, we gazed at it. To us it seemed the only comment upon Japan. So, swizzling the saliva round our mouths, we spat, too. Immediately the staring idol sprang to life.

  ‘You big-mob bad-fellow childens! Spittee like that! Wheresa manners? My word, I tell-im Boss. Boss’ll make-im plenty hiding. Smack-smack, the bottom!’ And he looked down with shocked disdain at our little dribbles of spit drying beside his own.

  He was proud of us, however, particularly the girls. He distinguished between myself and my sister by calling us Big-fellow Little Missy and Small-fellow Little Missy and continually assured our mother that we would fetch good prices when the time came to sell us in the market.

  ‘I make-im fat,’ he promised her. ‘Bimeby, all-along fourteen, they fetcha ninety pounds longa Cooktown.’

  When she demurred he mistook her meaning and agreed that perhaps the market place was hardly suitable and that it might be better to sell us privately. After all, he intimated, we lacked the lotus-skin and full moonface that in Chinese beauties brought such high prices. The Boss would probably make a better deal if he palmed us off quietly on some of his personal friends.

  Ah Wong had only one possession–a set of small handleless pale-green tea cups, like the bowls of a doll’s dinner service. One day, after he had been with us for some time, he invited us to his home in the cane cutters’ quarters. Trembling with anticipation, we knocked at the door and were ushered into a room so neat that it might have come straight from a shop. It smelled deliriously of what we at first took to be pine-tar soap.

  From a little cupboard Ah Wong took the fragile cups and set them carefully upon the floor. ‘Chinese cups,’ he explained proudly. ‘Now, all-fellow dlink-im tea like in China.’ He bowed low and with the gesture of one performing a ritual handed us each a cup. We sipped the thin green tea cautiously for fear of biting bits out of the edges.

  There was a feeling of great peace in that room. Perhaps it came from the bareness of the place, or Ah Wong’s ceremonious movements or the sweet foreign scent that filled the air. We breathed the room into us, tasting, smelling, absorbing. We gazed at the little beaded curtain that was rigged up in one corner. Before it, in an old jam jar, three scented sticks were burning. Watching the red ash creep down the green stems we were seized with curiosity.

  ‘What’s behind that curtain?’ said somebody suddenly.

  Ah Wong’s eyelids came down like shutters over his eyes; his face was as expressionless as a closed door. We glanced questioningly at each other. What secret did the curtain hide? What possession? What image? Then, sudden as lightning, the truth struck home. Kate Clancy’s phrase clicked into place in our minds. The heathen idol! At that moment we realised that Ah Wong was not a Christian.

  Without a word to each other but as if at a signal, we rose, thanked him perfunctorily and hurried away. We needed to communicate our discovery and digest its implications. The excitement we had felt in drinking tea with Ah Wong faded beside the majestic news that his silence had made plain. For here was an opportunity such as is offered to few in this world, and we seized upon it greedily.

  We were going to convert Ah Wong.

  At this period we were immersed in those old stories wherein small children of extreme physical debility set so saintly an example that grown-up sinners were thereby brought to repentance. ‘Misunderstood’ was perhaps the best–or worst–of them.

  It was unfortunate, of course, that none of us was in the least sickly. But we did not let that deter us. Luckily for the scheme, Ah Wong liked to be read to. His favourite story to date had been what he called ‘The Siss Fambly Lobinson’, particularly the part where the boa constrictor strangled the donkey. From this to the Book of Common Prayer was, we realised, a long jump, and we introduced it to him gradually. To our surprise, he was delighted with the new story. He loved to hear us intoning the responses and took pleasure in interjecting Amens.

  The plan was working. In a short time he knew Peep of Day, our Bible primer, by heart.

  ‘My word, Him bin pretty big-mob good fellow!’ he would say appreciatively as the mighty story of the Gospels unrolled and he nodded over a favourite incident. Our hearts swelled. We decided to add hymns to the curriculum. It would never do for Ah Wong to be silent when, at the end of his mortal journey, St Peter handed him his harp. This move was particularly successful, and Ah Wong would top our shrill voices with his high tuneless singing that was like the cry of a sea bird.

  Dere’s a Flend for little childens

  Above a blight, blue sky-ee…

  he would chant with relish. But his best efforts were reserved for

  Hark, de helald angels singe-ee

  Gloly to de newbone king-ee

  Peace on earth and mercymile

  Goddam sinners reconcile.

  He sang this every day as he cooked the dinner.

  At last the course seemed to us complete. Nothing remained but to take Ah Wong to church and get him christened. After the ceremony, our work done, we would decline and die, surrounded by proud and mournful relatives. It was a big price. But it was worth it.

  Here, however, for the first time, we reckoned without Ah Wong. He had taken so kindly to the teaching that it was a shock to find he was not in the least interested in getting ‘clissened’. In fact, quite definitely and mistrustfully against it.

  ‘Me got jolly good-fellow Chinese name. What for me go to church, hey?’

  We explained, patiently and with some reservations. We had not as yet revealed to Ah Wong that he was being turned into a Christian. Already we were aware that it is sometimes better not to tell the whole truth–at least, not all at once. It would be time enough for the disclosure when he had been baptised.

  ‘Listen, Wong!’ we said, and painted a festive picture of the joys of going to church. He would hear the organ, sing the hymns and kneel on a little
red hassock. We told him about Mr Preston, the vicar, who would help him to get into Heaven. But Ah Wong was not impressed. He didn’t want to go to church or to Heaven. He wanted to go to China. If he couldn’t go to China he preferred to stay right here on the plantation. And who was ‘Mister Pleston’? A big-mob good-fellow? One who would read him ‘The Siss Fambly Lobinson’?

  Well, we admitted, not that, exactly. But he would read the prayers beautifully.

  Ah Wong snorted. He didn’t need Mister Pleston. ‘All you-fellow childens readee players jolly nice. Goodanuf for Ah Wong.’

  This was an impasse. We were baulked. And angry. Ah Wong, we felt, had no right to come so far if he did not mean to go farther. Then somebody had an inspiration. As a crowning bait we told Ah Wong how, if he went to church, he would see our father, in his white silk suit with the crimson cummerbund, taking round the plate. This, to us, was a sight ever glorious. Sunday after Sunday we thrilled with pride as, singing the last hymn in a roaring baritone, Father took up the collection. Ah Wong, we added, would share with us the privilege of putting money into the plate.

  But that, to our shocked surprise, was the last straw. Ah Wong shied away as though we had bitten him. What! Money on a plate! You put puddings on a plate, or lamb chops. But money—

  ‘Whassa dam-silly-fellow nonsins?’ he shouted wrathfully. ‘Boss take-im money? I don’t tink so. Boss all-along jolly fine fellow. Boss not take-im Ah Wong’s money. And where I get-im money, hey? Ah Wong bin big-mob poor chap–no gotta no money!’ But we knew better. Month after month Ah Wong added his new pay-cheque to the little package of cheques in the kitchen drawer. Again and again the Boss urged him to cash them but each time the shutter came down over Ah Wong’s face as he shook his head.

  ‘Me save-im,’ he always said. He was polite, but final.

  ‘But, Wong—’ we protested, ‘everybody goes to church.’

  It was no good. ‘Church pretty silly stuff, I tinkim,’ he said crossly. And that was the end. Our high hopes had come to nothing. As soon as he realised that Peep of Day and the hymns were stepping stones to church and not a new kind of entertainment, he resolutely put them aside. He even became suspicious of the ‘Siss Fambly’. If the boa constrictor and the donkey had anything to do with being ‘clissened’ he was not going to have anything to do with them.

  We were deeply conscious of failure. Yet we were aware, somehow, that it was not due wholly to our inadequacy. Dimly we realised that something else claimed Ah Wong, and that the symbol of its power was hidden behind his bead curtain where the sticks of incense burned. Thereafter we loved him with a deeper love for now it was mixed with sorrow and disappointment…

  If this story had no sequel it could properly end here. Indeed, we thought it had ended when a year or so later we said goodbye to Ah Wong. The Boss had died suddenly and we were going south with our mother to a life which would never again include plantations and Chinese cooks.

  Ah Wong stood on the murky station platform waiting for the train to move. The black eyes gazed broodingly in through the window upon the family he had tended. Nothing was said for a long while. It is difficult to speak when there is too much to say.

  The guard waved his green light. Ah Wong put his fingers in our mother’s black-gloved hand. In them he held a small red calico poppy.

  ‘Belonga flower-hat,’ he explained. ‘I find-im. Maybe Missus put on flower-hat again some day-ee!’

  Her mouth trembled as they gazed at each other. She took the poppy and the whistle blew. ‘Goodby-ee!’ he said shrilly. ‘Be good, all-fellow childens!’

  ‘Don’t forget to cash your cheques, Wong!’ we cried, waving wildly. He smiled and shook his head.

  ‘I save-im,’ we heard him say as the train steamed out…

  That, we thought, was the end of him. And so it was, for the rest of the family. But I, through luck, chance, coincidence, was to see Ah Wong once more.

  Some years later I was taken on the staff of a well-known Australian newspaper. The youngest cub reporter was detailed to take me on his assignments and teach me the trade. He was nineteen and, to my eyes, a man of considerable experience and learning. When the editor handed me over he regarded me gloomily and with marked distaste.

  ‘What am I to do with it?’ he enquired bitterly. ‘Wheel it around in a perambulator?’

  Outside the office he made it clear that I was to be his slave. And in that capacity I trudged after him from assignment to assignment, rejoicing in any crumb from his journalistic table.

  He met me one day, looking as though he had just been done out of a legacy. ‘Listen, kid! We’re up the spout,’ he said gloomily. ‘We’ve got to interview a fellow who can only talk French. And I don’t know a word of the beastly lingo.’

  As humbly as possible and secretly blessing the names of departed Mademoiselles, I intimated that I could speak French.

  ‘Only a little—’ I added hurriedly, so as not to offend him. He looked at me disbelievingly. It seemed to him hardly possible. A cub reporter’s cub reporter!

  ‘All right,’ he said finally, his face clearing. ‘You do it and I’ll sign it. Here’s the address.’ And he strode off leaving a slip of paper in my hand.

  ‘Sailing ship Santa Lucia, coming from Lima, calling at all eastern Australian ports,’ I read. ‘Interview Third Officer Alexis Bronowsky. Russian, but speaks French. Get a story on his cargo.’

  My heart thumped. Here was I, on my first assignment. My own name was shouting to me from all the books that eventually would result from it. And there was the Santa Lucia, a grimy, battered ship crouching against the wharf, her furled sails grey with wind and water. But I saw, as I came up the gangway, that her decks were white and every strip of metal twinkled in the sun.

  The third officer had a slow, lounging sailor’s walk. He was very young and his manner, as he led me round the ship, suggested that the whole of time was at our disposal. He insisted on having every landmark in Sydney Harbour pointed out to him. Indeed, it seemed as though he and not I were doing the interviewing. He spoke at length of his own career which seemed to me, as to himself, thoroughly glorious. Only after that did I get a chance to remind him about the cargo.

  Nom de Dieu! He had entirely forgotten it! ‘Allons!’ he said and led me down ladder after ladder until we seemed to be in the hold of the ship. Standing beside a door, he paused and beckoned.

  ‘It will be very dark,’ he whispered warningly. ‘They are so old. They do not like the light.’

  ‘Who are so old?’ I whispered back.

  ‘The cargo. The old men. They are going back to China to die. All their lives they have saved their money so that they may have enough to take them home. You will see.’

  Then, very quietly, he opened the door. Out of the darkness there rose a strong, musty human smell mixed with incense. As my eyes grew accustomed to the gloom I saw that the hold was filled with layer on layer of narrow bunks. And in each, passive and inert, lay an old man. Occasionally one opened his eyes and looked at us without curiosity. Grey pigtails swung limply from the bunks, wrinkled hands and feet hung over the sides seeking a little coolness in the hot, sleepy air. The imminence of death was everywhere but to my own surprise the scene had no horror for me. Life had come full circle in the hold of the Santa Lucia. The old men in their youth had scattered to the points of the earth. Now they were going home to die.

  The third officer touched my arm. ‘Come!’ he whispered, and drew me gently away from the door.

  At that moment a thin voice spoke from a bunk beneath me. ‘Big-fellow Little Missy!’ it said softly.

  Oh, that familiar phrase! It came straight out of the past, dissolving me into my earliest elements. The green fronds of cane were about me, the smells of the hold mingled with the scent of incense in Ah Wong’s room on the plantation. I turned and scrambled down the ladder.

  ‘Where are you, Wong?’ I whispered. And then I saw him.

  He was lying in one of the lower bunks, his pigta
il dangling to the floor. His black eyes stared from his face. He was just the same–frailer, of course, a shrunken image of the old Ah Wong, but the same in essence. He smiled at me and I took his hands in mine as we gazed at each other. Once again there was nothing to be said because there was too much to say.

  ‘Did you cash your cheques, Wong?’ I whispered at last.

  He raised himself slightly and nodded. ‘I cashim, Missy. I all-along save-im, buy-im boat tickee. Now Ah Wong go home.’

  He slipped down to his bunk again and closed his eyes. Even so slight a contact with life was already too much for him. Very gently I pulled the blanket over his hands.

  ‘Tell Missus Ah Wong all-time tink-im velly kind thoughts.’

  ‘I’ll do that. Goodbye, now, Wong!’

  ‘Goodby-ee now, Missy. Be all-along good-fellow child!’ he said faintly and turned his head away.

  I stumbled after the third officer up the companionways into the sunlight. The sudden glare was dazzling. I was unsteady with tears and memory and the sight of dying men. Silently I prayed that he would not ask me to explain.

  But he asked nothing. Merely smiled at me. ‘N’expliquez-pas!’ he said gently and turned me towards the gangway.

  Happiness filled me. Running for the tram I was flooded with a tide of life all the richer for coming straight from death. Infinite with experience, the world opened before me, itself borne upon that living stream. And I knew that Ah Wong was flooded with it, too. Like all those who are very young I had made the mistake of thinking that there were separate rivers of life and death. Now I knew that there is only one tide, whole and indivisible. The same flood that was flinging me into life was taking Ah Wong home…

  To

  Frieda Heidecke Stern

  for showing me the way through the Canyon