The Water Beetles

by Michael Kaan

  When Ah-Tseng and I got back from the market, we found a family sitting in the front hall with their belongings rolled up in a single blanket. They said their house had burned down and they’d heard ours was safe and that my mother had let them in. That evening an old couple arrived, followed by their son and his family. Over the next four days, at least fifty people showed up at our gates. My mother took them all in.

  By the fifth day, the number of people staying with us was becoming dangerous. The house was crowded with refugees, sleeping on blankets and mats in every available space. The constant foot traffic and the noise were noticeable from the street, and my mother and elder brothers feared it would make the house a target. Tang shut the front gates just as another family was approaching, and he and my mother had to tell them to go somewhere else. The father shouted at my mother that he had nowhere else to go. He tried to climb the gate, and Chow pushed him off it. A grandfather with two children also begged to be let in, a crowd forming behind them. Finally, Chow took the pistol from his belt and waved it in the air. In a cracking voice, he threatened to fire it. The refugees scrambled into the streets. My mother ran back into the house, her hand twisting the dress at her heart.

  I shared my room with five younger boys. At bedtime, after Leuk and I came in to sleep, they darted back up from their blankets on the floor and ran out to find their parents where they slept in the hall or other rooms. All night long there were children wandering tearfully through the house until they found their parents. Finally I gave my room up to a family of six. The Yees slept in a single room. Leuk, Wei-Ming, and I moved into my father’s study. We found it comforting to sleep in a triangle around the old stock ticker with its glass dome still intact, an emblem of a quieter world. A childless young couple and the husband’s parents joined us there at night. Sometimes I opened my eyes and saw the wife sitting up and watching us with her hand resting on her belly.

  Wei-Ming, who was now seven, hated losing her room. The first night we slept in the study, she refused to lie down and would only sit on her blanket and beg to be taken back. Leuk was asleep. I moved over and sat beside her with my back against the heavy wooden legs of the stock ticker table. I decided this was the time to do something adult, so I took her hand. She pulled it away and whispered that she wanted to go back to her room.

  “You can’t. Other people need it now. There’s a family with a baby and a grandmother.”

  “I want my room back.”

  “Go to sleep.”

  “I want to sleep in my room. Why are they here?”

  I knew an adult in my place would have invented something. I told her to go back to sleep or our mother would be angry. She started crying at the mention of her and got up and ran into the hall. She shouted in the hall and up the stairwells, and immediately there came the clattering slippers of parents who mistook her for one of their own. I lay down and stared at the moonlight bending over the glass dome. An hour later, Ah-Tseng came into the study with Wei-Ming asleep on her shoulder and laid her back down beside me.

  The following morning, I ran to the window of my father’s study when I heard a noise. Two Japanese military vehicles, a truck and an officer’s car, appeared at the gates. A dozen soldiers jumped out of the truck, and at a shout from one of the officers the truck, reinforced with a heavy grille, backed up and smashed through the gate. I ran back out to the landing to look for my mother and stopped as the soldiers broke open the front doors. They stood in the doorway, the dawn light spreading around them with theatrical power.

  An officer stepped forward, followed by a civilian in a black suit. The civilian looked around with an air more commanding than the officer’s. Sheung ventured towards them and tried to speak, but they ignored him. The senior officer turned to the man in the suit and spoke to him in Japanese. The civilian was neatly turned out in his clothes and polished spectacles, and he looked around authoritatively as he spoke.

  “This house is to be vacated by midnight tomorrow. Those remaining will be arrested or shot.” He was Chinese.

  Sheung stepped forward and addressed the civilian. “Sir, I am the —”

  “The military government is assuming control of all large facilities and buildings,” he continued, parroting the officer. “Chinese civilians must relocate within the curfew period. All goods, including money or other valuables, other than personal belongings, must be left behind in this house. The resident family of the house may stay but must move to one of the upper floors.” The officers looked around the hall, while the civilian made a point of looking people in the eye.

  One of the refugees, a newlywed who had arrived with his wife and her parents, rose angrily. He stepped over mattresses and jumbled clothes, moving towards the door and shaking his fist at the interpreter.

  “You are Chinese! How can you —”

  A soldier came forward from behind the officers. He swung his rifle around and butted the man’s face with the wide steel cap of the weapon. The man staggered back and tripped on a mattress, and even as he fell, the blood was already pouring from his ear and mouth. He landed on a suitcase and no one touched him.

  “A guard will now be placed on this house,” the civilian echoed. “Unauthorized persons must start leaving it immediately.” Then the officer turned and left.

  A woman crawled sobbing over the piled belongings on the floor and cradled the wounded man’s head. She gently touched his hair, ignoring the blood soaking into her dress.

  Within an hour, four more truckloads of Japanese soldiers came to occupy our house. The refugees tried to clear out quickly. My family and the servants were moving our possessions up to the fourth floor. We couldn’t help the refugees anymore.

  The family living in Shun-Yau’s room came down the stairs. The father and sons carried heavy suitcases and bundles tied awkwardly with mismatched straps and cords. The mother walked slowly between two ancient grandparents. She held each of them by the arm as the grandfather gripped the railing tight. The grandmother had a huge goitre on her neck, and she wobbled down the marble steps as the woman tried to keep her steady. The grandfather had a bamboo cane hung over his wrist where he held the railing, and it swung and ticked against the banister as they descended. His face was red and screwed tight as though he was in pain, and his bone-white hair hung limp around his skull.

  The soldiers brought in supplies and quickly scouted out the kitchen and bedrooms. Yee-Lin and Sheung stood together against a wall in the parlour near the staircase. Two soldiers strolled past them as they looked around. One of the soldiers stopped and stared at my sister-in-law. He smiled and said something to the other soldier that made them laugh, and then said something to Tang. Yee-Lin held his arm. My brother darkened in humiliation. He stood silently and avoided their eyes. They laughed again and went on exploring the house.

  The woman and the grandparents were nearly down the stairs. The daughter looked angry as she tried to keep them all steady. The grandfather’s face was strained and he stammered through pursed lips. The woman hushed him with a few short words as she concentrated on their feet going down the steps. Then he stopped and grimaced, stammered a single, desperate syllable, and twitched. Standing at the base of the stairs, I heard the shameful sound of his rectum opening and caught the foul scent spreading through the air. I backed away and kept my arms stiffly at my sides as though I could protect his dignity by not covering my nose. The grandfather hung his head and made strange swallowing sounds while the grandmother asked why they had stopped.

  Between them, the woman stared at the hall floor only two steps away. Her chest rose and fell and she shut her eyes for a moment as though remembering something. Then she took a breath. She walked the grandparents down the last two steps just as her husband returned from outside, and they crossed the front hall and left the house.

  As many people left as could before the curfew, preferring the burned-out streets to a house full of Japanese soldiers. Tang bravely convinced the Chinese collaborator that the Yees were our co
usins, and so they would be allowed to stay. When morning came and the curfew lifted, the last of the refugees left. A few bowed to my mother and thanked her as she stood by the door. She bowed back to them and said each time, “We will meet again soon.” Then a soldier warned her away with a shake of his rifle. We ran upstairs as he slammed the front doors shut.

  NINE

  All of us — my family, the Yees, Chow, Ah-Tseng, and Ah-Ming — now lived in the fourth-floor parlour. The only furniture was a single chair, and we slept on blankets and mats.

  Every day, the servants and my older brothers went to the market and were harassed by soldiers on the street. Tang came back one day with a black eye but said nothing about it, and Ah-Tseng refused to go outside without one of the men. I doubt they felt they had much safety to offer. Daily we heard shots and the sounds of people being arrested or beaten. At night, violent sounds broke in from outside. There were shouts and cries and gunfire. And I heard the screams from encounters between soldiers and women in the streets, and in the dying terror of their cries I conjured images of teeth.

  We were still permitted to use the toilet down the hall. One evening, a week after the Japanese took over our house, I went down there after our meagre supper. It was dark in the hallway as most of the windows were shuttered. I stayed in the bathroom a few extra moments, savouring the privacy and the small space, and examined my teeth. My gums looked red and I wondered if the coarse food we ate was harming me, and I touched my gums and teeth carefully with my fingertip. I grimaced and made faces in the mirror, until a noise outside reminded me to return to bed. Then I opened the door.

  I jumped back and hit the door, which flew back into the wall with a bang. A soldier was standing in my way, one hand resting on his hip. He looked at me and said something in Japanese.

  I froze and met his eye. I don’t think he liked that, because he shouted again. I stared at the floor and tried to control my breathing. He spoke again. Thinking he was angry at me for not looking at him, I raised my eyes, and he barked at me and stamped his boot on the floor. Behind the door to our room down the hall, I heard scuffling.

  Even though I had just been to the bathroom, my bowels started churning. I set my hands over my stomach and held myself, fearing I would lose control and make things worse. He shouted louder and slapped my hands away.

  I thought saying something, anything, would help. I took a breath with an audible shake, but all I could manage was a stammered, “Excuse me…”

  He yelled and grabbed me by the top of my hair and pulled hard, and I screamed. I thought my voice was echoing strangely, but then I realized it was my mother screaming through the parlour door.

  Still holding me by the hair, the soldier dragged me down the hall. I thought he was taking me back to the room, but he passed it. I stumbled and my scalp burned under his grip. As we passed the room, I heard the door rattle and bang as though people were fighting behind it. My mother shouted at me and I called back to her, and then I heard Chow telling my mother to move back.

  The soldier dragged me to the top of the stairs and put one boot on the first step. He pointed to the bottom of the stairs and said something. I pleaded with him to let me go. He began to swing his arm back and forth, and I stumbled and slipped onto the first stair. I knew he was threatening to hurl me down the stone steps, and the pain began to radiate down my neck all the way to my feet as I braced myself to be thrown.

  The door opened and Tang hurried out. He crouched in supplication with both arms out, nodding and bowing at the soldier as he crept forward in a waddle.

  “Please, sir, let him go. Tell me what you want, but don’t hurt the boy.”

  The soldier yelled back at him. With a last, decisive swing of his arm, he hurled me away from the steps towards the door. I screamed as I felt my scalp tear and my shoulder hit the hard floor. I heard another thud, and at the same moment my mother and Chow ran out and pulled me into the room. The soldier kept yelling. A moment later, as I was sitting by my mother clutching my scalp, Tang staggered back in. His nose was broken and he clutched his groin, and Sheung helped him to the chair. The soldier appeared in the doorway, shouted, and spat on the floor before slamming the door shut.

  Two days later, our food was nearly gone. The Japanese had instituted rationing on Boxing Day and the quantities were hardly enough to live on. They allotted 6.4 taels of rice per person per day, about half a pound, and a small amount of peas or beans. I had recovered quickly from the assault in the hallway, but Tang’s face was a mass of bruises. Because Sheung had been the last to go out, Leuk and I offered to get the rations.

  As we prepared to go out on our first errand alone, Sheung had us repeat the route in detail. When we were done, my mother asked us if we were sure we wanted to go, but Sheung interrupted her.

  “It’s all right. They can do it.” He waved us off.

  We hurried down the stairs carrying old rice sacks. I didn’t look at any of the soldiers, keeping my eyes on the floor until we were out the door.

  We stood on the sidewalk and I looked down at the dry gutter. The wind lifted the lapels of our jackets as we walked. All the way down Wong Nai Chung road, we clutched the rice sacks and they flapped around us, twisting as the wind deflected off the buildings. I saw a man walking down the other side of the street. He carried a large box tied with a string handle, and from the way it swung I could tell it was empty.

  Across the street, an old couple hurried, clutching bags of rations. Most of the windows in houses and apartments had the curtains drawn, and the streets were nearly empty. It had been a long time since my walk with Ah-Tseng and I felt sorry that she had been made to go out so often since.

  We passed a butcher shop we knew. Its windows were smashed and the meathooks, still smeared with grease, creaked in the wind. We passed a Buddhist temple where many of my friends went. The gate was open, but it looked empty. The incense rings swung coldly from the beams and the statues loomed in the shade. Then I caught a glimpse of a monk between the columns. His slippered feet moved slowly over the flagstones while a hanging banner veiled his upper body.

  We turned down a lane towards the ration centre. This was the sloped road that ran past the stables where workhorses and racehorses for the Jockey Club were kept. The stables had large wooden doors with grated openings on top. In the summer we avoided that road because of the smell, but otherwise we liked to walk down it and see the animals in their stalls. Today the doors were all shut, and as Leuk and I walked, I noted the deathly silence.

  “I wonder if they took the horses,” Leuk said.

  One of the stable gates was open. The large green panels of its doors had been drawn wide, and a man leaned against the frame smoking a cigarette. When he saw us coming, he straightened up but left the cigarette between his lips. He watched us as we approached, and stepped back into the shade of the doorway.

  There was a large cart in the stable, the kind farmers brought their goods to market in: flat with low sides, usually filled with cabbages or bamboo crates of ducks. But this cart was piled with corpses. At first I saw only their empty faces, resting on their sides or hanging upside down, pressed together but registering no discomfort. An image of cabbages tumbling off a cart came into my mind, and of a farmer’s wife standing by it, weeping at the ruin of her goods.

  I knew it was wrong to think like that, to daydream while I stared at these lost faces. But the image came quickly. More and more it was becoming my habit to see one thing and envision another, to transform the world’s images as they opened up to me. Until now I never knew I had this ability — not to change the world, but to remake and reduce it to my vanished world of gardens and schoolyards, of the kitchen and the library. And then nothing might be remembered, only retold. For there are times when we absorb the world as we grow and learn about it, but others when we make a dark exchange with it, casting out memories, pocketfuls of time, and future selves as its brutality marches into our lives.

  I began to shake, and Leuk gaspe
d and gripped my arm. There were men and women and some children. I had seen the marbled discoloration of death once before, in a beggar who had died behind our house. These bodies were smooth-skinned and clear, newly dead, but they bore the vestiges of fear: a hint of distress in the caving of the mouths and cheeks, the closed and unclosed eyes, the limbs pushed around in ways ridiculous or intimate. Though the cart was stationary, I heard it creaking on its axle as though it were being drawn away.

  Inside the doorway, leaning and immersed in shadow strung with sawdust, the man stood very still and smoked and watched us.

  A faint, sweet smell of drying manure drifted from the stable. The rice sacks hung weakly on the crook of my little finger, ready to blow away into the wind. I shifted uneasily where I stood. The cobblestones seemed sticky. My right leg shook uncontrollably.

  “You probably didn’t know them,” said the man in a slow, level voice. He was a local too, just like the civilian who’d come to our house with the Japanese. “Not from this neighbourhood.” When he stopped speaking, the ash on his cigarette glowed like a serpent’s eye.

  The wind was chill and damp, but I felt sweat seeping into the back and collar of my shirt, and again I sensed the stickiness of the ground beneath me as I shifted where I stood. I couldn’t move. I stared at the dead faces. I wished for all those bodies to be somehow…dry. Bloodless maybe, or undamaged, as though they had been gathered up in silence from the roadside after entering eternal sleep.

  I seized my brother by the arm, closed up my coat, and ran with him to find the street. We looked back only once, to see if anyone was following. But there was no one in the lane. We were running from nothing. As we turned into the street, I turned around again and caught a last glimpse of the black hole we had gazed into.

  “Wait, just wait!” shouted Leuk. He grabbed the back of my shirt to stop me the instant we turned the corner. He seemed winded, but he wasn’t breathing hard. He leaned back against a wall and looked up, squinting.