The proprietress of the hotel was an ex-geisha, a woman in her thirties and still very pretty; and on my arrival she had greeted me in kimono and old-fashioned hair style like a figure from a Japanese print.
The next day in the garden I saw a slim woman sauntering in yellow slacks. Her hair was tied in a bandanna and there was heavy Swiss jewelry on her wrists. I thought she must be an American. Then she turned and smiled, and behind all the modernity I recognized the ex-geisha.
The occupant of the next room to mine performed a similar astonishing transformation in reverse. On my first evening at the hotel I had seen him in the corridor carrying a leather dispatch case and wearing black jacket, striped trousers, and stiff white collar. Then only an hour later, passing his room when the sliding door screen stood open, I caught a glimpse of this same little businessman squatting on the mat floor, against a background of typical Japanese simplicity: a vase containing two flowers and a leaf, and a single scroll picture on the wall. And now his black suit had been replaced by a kimono, and every other vestige of the West had been shed. It might have been a scene from one of those historical Japanese films, and I half expected to see a posse of heavy-breathing Samurai leap out of hiding and butcher him before my eyes with their great curved swords.
This duality in the life of the Japanese was in evidence everywhere. It was not a very original discovery on my part but it was so fundamental, and often so amusing, that I decided to make it the theme of my drawings. And with this important matter settled I set out on my travels south.
There followed a month of utter enchantment, for I had never before been in a country that so delighted my eye, nor met with such kindness and hospitality; and my only regret was the absence of Suzie. I was astonished to find how much I missed her. Before leaving Hong Kong I had half considered broaching the subject of marriage but had not done so, for I had thought rather guiltily that in the excitement of seeing a new country and meeting new people I might begin to forget her. Yet now, traveling round by myself, I constantly suffered pangs of loneliness that the beauty of the countryside only made more acute. And at every delightful experience—as I gasped at the splendors of Nikko, or sat cross-legged eating sukiyaki, or wandered at night through a wood among a myriad twinkling fireflies—I told myself, “How wonderful this is, but how much more I should enjoy it if Suzie was here!” For she would have so enjoyed it herself; and her company always touched off in me a kind of childish gaiety, as I saw the world through her eyes and shared the innocence of her vision.
It was in Kyoto that I received my first post card from her, forwarded from the Tokyo office. I had left her a number of addressed cards, telling her just to sign her name on them and post them at intervals to let me know she was all right; but this first card was one that I had written as a joke, like an official form with various alternatives to leave or cross out, such as “I adore/detest you. Since you left I have had no/two/six/seventy-three sailors.” She had left adore in the first sentence, and seventy-three in the second, with an asterisk drawing attention to a note in Gwenny’s handwriting below:
This is just a joke about the sailors. I cried after you left. Please bring me a pink umbrella that you can make small if you have enough money. I have seen Japanese umbrellas, they are very nice.
Love, Suzie.
The signature was her own with the usual large reversed Z.
A week or two later when I returned to Tokyo there were two more cards from her at the office, both with little messages written by Gwenny. There was also a post card signed all over by a dozen of the girls, with their names in Chinese characters followed by their adopted European Christian names in brackets. In prominence were Fifi and Wednesday Lulu. I do not know what the Japanese secretaries in the office had made of this but when the manager asked me “Did you get your mail?” I fancied from the odd look he gave me that the card must have done the rounds.
I spent an afternoon in a store and bought small presents for all the girls and several for Suzie. I had no difficulty over the umbrella because there was a whole department devoted to nothing else, with a vast range of gay, modernistic patterns that made them equally suitable for sunshades. I bought one with a pink base and blue pattern like the spattering of ink from a pen, and with a collapsible handle as requested. It cost only one pound, but looked so original and smart that it would have created a sensation at Ascot.
A few days later I received another post card from Suzie, in Gwenny’s handwriting.
Something terrible has happened. That Canton girl said a very bad thing that made me angry. But all the girls helped me so it is all right now. Gwenny is writing to tell you everything. That Canton girl is no good.
Love, Suzie.
I found this rather disturbing. I knew, of course, that “that Canton girl” meant Betty Lau, who had been the only fly in the ointment since Suzie’s return to the Nam Kok; for after claiming me for so long as her own boy friend, Suzie’s reappearance had much displeased her and she had lost no opportunity for the oblique expression of malice. Once or twice she had made remarks that had upset Suzie for days; and now clearly she had taken advantage of my absence to give her malice full rein.
I waited anxiously for the letter from Gwenny. It turned up three days later on the morning that I was due to depart for Hokkaido, and I took it across the road from the office to read in Hibiya Park. However, when I opened it I found that, although the envelope had been addressed by Gwenny, the letter itself was written in an unfamiliar hand. Evidently the gravity of the matter had called for a writer who was more at home with the language.
Dear Sir,
I am writing this letter at the request of “Gwenny” and “Suzie” who say you are a friend of theirs and wish to acquaint you with a certain matter. I wish to state first however that I have no personal connection with this matter nor with the parties concerned except that as Chief Petty Officer in H. M. Royal Navy I am interested in fair play and justice, and having entered this bar for the sole purpose of drinking, being a married man and not otherwise interested, and having observed the two above-mentioned girls to be very upset, I am glad to help these girls without in any way committing myself.
They wish me to state that at approx. 3 p.m. on 17th inst. a third party named “Betty” used insulting words to “Suzie” in this bar, provoking the latter to strike her with a pair of scissors, and to cause injury necessitating her removal to hospital. “Suzie” was detained by the police overnight, suffering discomfort, and on morning of 18th inst. appeared in the magistrate’s court and was remanded on bail, this being provided in part by herself, and in part by sympathetic friends from this establishment. They further state that there is no cause for worry since it is general opinion that “Suzie’s” action was justified in view of the abusive attitude of the other party. They also wish to be remembered to you.
I must finally correct any misapprehension that this letter is intended to interfere with justice, but I am satisfied that the girl “Suzie” is a very decent sort considering circumstances and was acting in good faith.
Yours truly,
R. 0. Bridges,
C.P.O.
Below this was written “What day will you come back?” followed by Suzie’s signature. The signature was written jauntily and was frivolously surrounded with kisses.
The letter exceeded my worst fears. I found its apparent confidence far from reassuring. Obviously “general opinion,” according to which Suzie’s action was said to have been justified, meant nothing more than opinion in the bar—the opinion of the other girls. And the magistrate’s opinion would doubtless be very different. Especially with those scissors.
The scissors worried me most of all. What on earth had she been doing with scissors in the bar? Where had they come from? Her handbag?
But she never carried scissors in her handbag. I had never seen any girl with scissors in the bar. Yet
it was inconceivable that she had taken the scissors down to the bar on purpose: that the attack had been premeditated. It was out of the question.
Or was it? The more I thought about it, the less sure I became. I remembered how she had brooded after one of Betty’s slighting remarks. I remembered her eyes; and now, in retrospect, I fancied that there had been a much deeper hurt in them than I had realized at the time. I had been so busy with my painting that I hadn’t wanted to be bothered; I hadn’t wanted to see the hurt. Yet it was not surprising that she should have been so hurt, for Betty had struck at the most sensitive part of her—at her pride.
Suzie’s pride was often petty, but I had always been able to forgive her for it; for like the pride of most girls at the Nam Kok, it stood for her belief in herself and her aspirations to be something better. It stood for her refusal to submit to degradation, and the only girls who were truly degraded were those who had lost this bulwark of their pride.
And recently, since her baby had been killed, Suzie’s pride had centered round her relationship with me. It was the only tangible asset she had left. And nothing in the world mattered to her more than that it should be kept intact, not only in fact but in the eyes of the other girls. And it was this very relationship with me that Betty had always so maliciously disparaged. She had caused Suzie to lose face. And when I considered what this meant to Suzie, it no longer seemed so unlikely that she should have carried her grievance as far as premeditated attack.
And I groaned to myself at my own stupidity in not foreseeing the danger: at my own selfishness in not bothering to understand her. I could probably have prevented this from happening. There was nobody more to blame than myself. And now I wondered if I ought not to return to Hong Kong at once to help her out of the mess—if I ought not to skip Hokkaido, return tomorrow.
But that would mean breaking an agreement: it would be a professional breach of faith. My first job as an artist, and I fell down on it.
But what about the breach of faith with Suzie? Wasn’t my first allegiance to her . . . ?
I crossed and recrossed Hibiya Park in an agony of indecision. Finally I decided that I must go to Hokkaido and finish my job: after all, it was only another two weeks, and I might still be back in Hong Kong in time for her appearance in court, for which she had given no date in her letter. And I left the park and went over the road to the post office in the Imperial, and sent Suzie a cable telling her to contact a solicitor called Haynes. He was the only solicitor in Hong Kong whose name I knew, though I knew nothing else about him and had never met him—I had simply read his name one day in the newspaper as the defending solicitor in a rent case, and an hour later happened to see it again at the entrance of an office building in town, and because of the odd coincidence the name had stuck in my mind. And I told her not to worry, and that whatever happened I would be behind her, and sent her my love.
I also sent a cable to Haynes, and then remembered that in Suzie’s cable I had not told her the date of my return. I went over to the B.O.A.C. counter in the hotel foyer to make sure of my booking in two weeks’ time, then returned to the post office and sent her another cable about my arrival. And I added another reassurance, and told her about the pink umbrella, and sent some more love. And then I took a taxi back to my hotel where the flock of little sparrows went down on their knees in the porch, and I sat on the wooden step while two of them untied my laces and took off my shoes. I told the taxi to wait, and the little sparrows came twittering along to my room and helped to pack my bag; and I tied up all my Japanese drawings and gave them to the proprietress for safekeeping. Then the sparrows all went down on their knees again in the porch, giggling and shaking warning fingers and pulling illustratively at their hair, by way of telling me to behave myself with the aboriginal girls of Hokkaido who were commonly known as the Hairy Ainu; and then I got back into the taxi and drove out to the airport, and caught the plane for Hokkaido with ten minutes to spare.
Chapter Three
“Those police, you know, they gave me a bad time. Yes! They kept me in the monkey-house all night! Not the real monkey-house, but the little monkey-house at the police station, which was worse!”
We stood outside the airport building waiting for a bus into Hong Kong. The plane from Japan had been three hours late, but as I stepped out onto the tarmac I had recognized Suzie in her jeans behind the wire-mesh fence, excitedly craning on tiptoe and fluttering her hand, as if she had stood there ever since my departure two months before. During my absence full summer had arrived in Hong Kong, bringing with it a stifling heat and humidity that was worse even than Malaya. The perspiration trickled down inside my shirt. I mopped my forehead and neck with my handkerchief as Suzie exploded with indignation about her ordeal at the hands of the police.
“Oh, it was terrible, that place—all full of horrible, dirty people! Yes, those horrible police, they treated me just like a street girl!”
I said, “Suzie, what about Betty? Is she all right?”
“That Canton girl?” Suzie said. “Oh, yes, you needn’t worry about her.”
“I’m only worrying about you. I’ve been so scared about the consequences for you if she was really in danger. Is she still in hospital?”
“Yes, I expect so,” she said indifferently.
“But don’t you know?”
“Oh, yes, she is in hospital—but I haven’t finished telling you about my bad time in the monkey-house yet. Oh, it was terrible! I told them, ‘You let me out! I’m not a bad girl! My boy friend’s an Englishman. He’s in Japan just now for a big American company, getting more money in one week than your Number One gets in a month, or maybe even a year. Look, he gave me this check book, and I just have to write down on one of those checks how much I want, and the bank will give me any amount. Yes, my boy friend’s a big man, and when he comes back he will make trouble. He will see that you policemen get a bad time!’ But they kept me all night in that horrible place—oh, I couldn’t sleep a wink!”
I said, “Suzie, I wish you’d start at the beginning and tell me what happened.”
“I told you, that Canton girl said something bad to me, so I just stuck her with the scissors.”
“But what did she say?”
“Oh, I don’t remember exactly,” she said quickly. “I just remember it was something bad, that’s all—and I wish I had stuck her harder.”
“Thank God you didn’t! Anyhow, what were you doing with the scissors?”
“I just had them.”
“But what on earth—” I began, but she interrupted impatiently.
“Anyhow, why are you so worried about that Canton girl? She only got what she deserved. Everybody said so. Everybody told me, ‘Suzie, you did right. You did a very good thing.’ They all congratulated me, you know—all except those stupid police!”
On the bus, and again during the ferry-crossing to Wanchai, I taxed her for more details of the stabbing and of what Betty had said to provoke her, but her answers were vague and evasive; and when we reached the Nam Kok I was still little wiser about what had happened than I had been in Tokyo.
My shirt was wringing wet with perspiration after the brief trip from the airport and I was already breaking out in prickly heat. Suzie, who had put flowers in the room for my reception, helped me to unpeel the sticky garments from my body and laid out replacements. I sponged myself down at the basin, and Suzie sponged my back; and after this I felt quite refreshed and ready to tackle Suzie about her reluctance to impart details of the Betty affair. I made her lie beside me on the bed, and said, “Now let’s start at the beginning, Suzie. It was three o’clock in the afternoon, and you were sitting in the bar—were you alone?”
“No, I was sitting with Gwenny.”
“All right, and where was Betty?”
“She just came into the bar, and she walked past with that show-off wiggle-waggle walk. I think it�
�s disgusting that way she walks. She only does it to—”
“All right, and who spoke first?”
“She spoke—that Canton girl. She said something bad to me.”
“Well, what?”
“I don’t remember.”
“But you must remember, Suzie. If it was so bad that it made you attack her you couldn’t possibly have forgotten.”
“I just remember it was the same bad thing that she said the day before.”
“And what was that?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Suzie, look at me. No, look at me properly. All right, are you telling me the truth?”
“No.”
“You mean you do remember?”
“Yes.”
“Then what was it?”
She averted her eyes. “I can’t tell.”
“But why on earth not?”
She was silent. It was the first time she had refused me her confidence, and I was puzzled and hurt.
“All right, let’s leave that for a minute,” I said. “Just tell me what happened when she said whatever-it-was the first time.”
“I told her, ‘If you ever say that again, I will kill you.’”
“You didn’t really, Suzie? Not those very words?”
“Yes, I warned her. I told her ‘I will kill you.’”
“Oh, Christ!”
“And she said, ‘Pooh to you!’” Suzie went on blithely. “‘Pooh,’ she said, ‘I will say it any time I like—I will say it again tomorrow.’ So I went out and bought scissors.”
“You what?”
“Yes, from that first shop round the corner in Hennessy Road. Big scissors—maybe six, eight inches. I can’t show you because those police took them away—yes, stole them!”
World of Suzie Wong : A Novel (9781101572399) Page 29
