by Meira Chand
She looked down at her hands and beyond them at the wastepaper basket Rachel had forgotten to empty. A silk handkerchief had been discarded there, because of a tear. Jessie bent to pick it up; a mended tear would not bother her – she had no men to catch. As she retrieved it there fell away the small shreds of a torn-up letter. Jessie Flack picked up and turned over the pieces: ‘… free woman I would …’ she read, ‘… a passion for you … happiness my heart … love … loving …’. Each piece yielded words that made her blood throb anew. Suddenly she laughed and laughed again. She knelt down beside the basket, retrieving the bits of paper in a ragged little pile. Soon she could find no more and placed them in the handkerchief, wrapping it about them.
She turned in dismay as the door opened, but it was only Rachel, giggling, gormless, half-caste orphan Rachel. She had brought a jug of water to leave upon the wash-stand. ‘What are you doing?’ she asked in surprise, but without accusation in her round, heavy face.
‘Never you mind,’ … Jessie said firmly, getting quickly to her feet. ‘Master Tom lost a toy, I was looking for it.’ Rachel’s eyes were upon the silk handkerchief clutched in Jessie’s hand. Jessie waited for the girl to place the jug on the stand and then followed her out, shutting the door behind her.
She undressed and lay down again on her bed, no longer alive with feelings fierce as pain. She had caught the Devil by his tail. She held Amy Redmore in her hand, exposed and observable. It was enough to make her smile in the dark and narrow room.
*
The Bluff Gardens expanded in the sun, the green geography of lawns and paths was sculptural and still. Bertha Kaufmann unwrapped the silk handkerchief, and Jessie turned her body upon the seat to shield them from the amahs squatting on the grass. Cathy and Charlie Phelps bowled hoops about the bandstand, Tom crouched with Mary and Eliza Phelps to examine a dead bird.
‘And then … there they were as Master Tom threw open the door. I could scarce believe my eyes. Oh the shame of it. Nearly naked she was in that dress – flaunting herself, tempting him.’ Jessie shut her eyes.
‘And the child, he saw too, all of this?’ Bertha determined. Jessie pursed her lips and nodded.
‘It is very bad. Very dangerous.’ Bertha shook her head. She turned over the bits of paper on her lap, quickly matching their ragged edges, her head on one side. Jessie looked anxiously at her impassive face.
‘It is good you found this,’ Bertha reflected at last. ‘It will be a useful thing to have in your hand. For who is knowing what may happen in a house like that? We must know exactly what it says. I will keep it. I will put it together. You cannot do these things in that house, you may be seen. You must collect any more you can find. People like us sometimes need such things. Life is not always behaving as we would wish.’ Bertha’s eyes were bright and consuming.
‘Now tell me again,’ she lowered her voice, her detachment breaking for a moment. ‘I must know everything to advise you properly.’ Jessie nodded and began again, the words taking hold of her, growing and embroidering. Her heart beat and her belly contracted in a strange way. She could not stop the words, filling out the image of Amy Redmore and Dicky Huckle before the mirror until, like a sketch beneath a finished painting, the image faded and she was left with the brilliance of her own work of art.
Bertha nodded, her eyes glazed in her solid face. Her voice cracked as she spoke and she stopped to clear her throat. ‘Collect the letters,’ she ordered. ‘And watch. Tell me everything.’
*
It was Sunday, but Tom had no sense of occasion. He smacked a spoon onto his peas, scattering them over the table. He laughed as they rolled upon the floor, Cathy looked at him in disgust.
‘You’ll go back to the nursery if you cannot behave,’ Amy told him. Sunday lunch was a formal meal, the only one for which, with Jessie, the children joined them at the table. Cathy piously opened her mouth for a neatly speared forkful of peas. Tom screamed loudly in defiance.
‘Let the boy alone,’ said Reggie, washing down his beef with a tankard of beer. ‘He’s a Redmore. Needs to break out now and then. I’d do the same if I were molly-coddled like him, by a crowd of women.’ His voice was primed with beer, empty bottles stood upon the sideboard like depleted ammunition.
‘One, two, buckle my shoe.’ Tom blew at a pea until it rolled across his plate. ‘Silly Huckle. Tell him to go away.’ Tom inflated his cheeks until they were round and red. ‘Hate him,’ he shouted suddenly. Amy blushed. Jessie looked up expectantly.
‘Now Tom, Mr Huckle is a friend of the family. You must not be so rude. I’ve told you before. He is always kind to you.’ Amy scolded the child, taking no notice of Reggie’s glare.
‘Can’t pull the wool over Redmore eyes, Amy,’ Reggie snapped. He cut himself a slice of bread and took another spoonful of potatoes. It made him mad the way Amy now coolly defied him. In public she played the devoted wife, nobody suspected the degree of independence with which she ran her life. When he had suggested that compromise, so long ago now in Miyanoshita, he had had no doubt he could still control her. Looking back, it was difficult to determine how she had established the balance of power existing now between them. Sometimes, watching her, he felt a surge of hatred. The ideas she had of leaving him seemed not to concern her now. It was since Armitage’s death that there had been this change.
It had infuriated him the way she traipsed about with the silly fellow, doing those drawings while he filled her head with crackpot ideas. Reggie had put up with the whole thing because so many people appeared impressed. But there had been gossip. He was ready to turn the tables on her and threaten to divorce her himself, then the fellow had suddenly died. Since then Amy appeared resigned to a life at Reggie’s side. She no longer talked of withdrawing herself and her money, and he no longer held her to him with the weapon of the children. It was a strange consolidation of events. The only ammunition each was left with consisted of humiliations.
Reggie looked at Amy across the table. It was difficult to find the old chinks in her armour. She had definitely changed with the death of Armitage. Reggie never let himself contemplate the possibility of anything between them. The thought of that fellow with Amy was simply too absurd. No, it was the ideas he had filled her with that had done the damage. All that telling her about what women should do, how they were equal to men and should fulfil themselves intellectually. All the rot that was now in vogue at home. New Women and their Rights. She had told him about it one day, he had been ready to explode. It was that that had changed her. She was all puffed up with false ideas and no longer knew her place.
And yet there was also something more he could not put a finger on. The sensuality that had drawn him to her originally, before which she had herself been helpless, seemed also changed. It was as if something raw in her had at last distilled. He caught those new depths in her face and was frightened. He had no defence against her. At times he found he desired this new woman as he had never desired the old one, but he kept his distance, apprehensive. However, he was not putting up with the same thing again, with that schoolboy Huckle, even if the fellow might be no serious competition.
‘I told you I don’t want that Huckle here any more,’ he said. ‘What does he come for anyway?’
‘He does not come often. He brings me his newspapers, sometimes a book from the library,’ Amy said. ‘There’s no need to raise your voice or speak like this in front of the children.’
‘I’m not raising my voice, and don’t give me those lies. I don’t want to hear he’s been over this threshold again, do you understand?’ he growled.
‘One, two, Huckle my shoe,’ the child sang. Cathy stopped eating and stared at him and then at her parents.
‘Ssh,’ Jessie told him. ‘Be quiet and eat up and you’ll have a ride on the swings in the Bluff Gardens.’ Tom smiled smugly down at his plate, his lashes touched his cheek. Jessie waited, she saw Reggie’s pale eyes, bright and predatory. Her heart began to beat. Now he would speak. Now Mrs Redm
ore would get all that was coming to her.
Amy was silent, she appeared unconcerned. ‘He bores me,’ she declared, turning over apples in a dish, choosing the one that pleased her. She hated these scenes in front of the children and Jessie. She tried by her casualness to defuse the situation.
‘He’s just a youth,’ Reggie sneered. ‘It’s what I’ve always called him.’
‘He’s inoffensive; he admires me.’ Amy smiled, disposing easily of Dicky’s adoration. It was a relief and a clear advantage, she decided, to have no emotional investment in one’s lovers.
Reggie reached forward for his beer. ‘Can’t stand the little squirt, as I’ve told you before,’ he snorted contemptuously. Beer glugged down his throat until the glass was drained. Amy shrugged the comment away; she began to peel an apple with a slender silver knife.
‘I hear Mrs Bolithero is back in town and will rattle the boards of the Gaiety again.’ The sun flashed upon the knife. ‘I don’t know what you see in her. She is so loud and vulgar.’
‘I like vulgar women,’ Reggie replied, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. ‘I’m vulgar myself. Nothing wrong with a bit of vulgarity. It’s the saving of the world. I shall ask her to dinner one evening.’ His eyes held Amy’s testily.
Jessie twisted her hands in consternation, unable to evaluate what she heard. It was like trying to piece together a puzzle in which half the parts were missing. She was conscious of disappointment. It seemed that Mr Redmore was aware of the visits to his home of Mr Huckle in his absence. And it seemed there was dubiousness in his own life that Mrs Redmore was aware of and that they openly discussed. Jessie’s head buzzed with the shock of it all. The Redmores practised nothing more than a diseased parody of marriage. She must be even more careful than Bertha had warned. Across the table a rope of apple peel fell unbroken from Amy’s knife. Jessie scrutinized her face and found it unmarked by any shame. She was in a world whose depths she feared she could not even gauge.
*
It had rained all night and was still wet. A wind shook the loquat trees and whined in the cracks of the windows. Clouds streamed across the sky, a mist obliterated Mount Fuji. Soon Amy heard the bell and turned as Dicky entered the room, holding out her hands to him. He closed the door behind him. Almost immediately it opened again and Jessie appeared.
‘Ma’am, excuse me. Did Master Tom leave his toy train here?’ Jessie had not waited after she knocked. Dicky started back, releasing Amy’s hand from his lips. At the door Jessie scanned the situation. Amy turned upon her angrily and the girl backed from the room with a nervous giggle.
‘She does it purposely. She spies on me to chew it over with that prim puss Bertha. Wherever I turn, I find her. I can’t stand it any more,’ Amy said.
‘You can imagine in her eyes how it looks,’ Dicky replied. ‘I don’t want to cause you any trouble.’
‘I’ll speak to her,’ Amy decided.
‘You must be careful. Don’t upset her; it’s you who are vulnerable. If she talks you’ll suffer.’ He took her hand again. ‘My worry is only for you. Perhaps we should meet in the hills, or on the course.’
‘Yes, it would be better. Reggie’s in one of his moods; he won’t hear of you visiting the house much more.’ He still held her hand. She did not want his touch – she felt no desire, he seemed to her like a brother. But she could not escape a benevolent obligation to the devotion she knew she inspired. He would come only as near as she let him. And the little she let him was, she felt, due as reward for such unassuming fidelity. He seemed transparently grateful for her patronage. He sent her letters every day to consolidate in his absence all that he confirmed by his presence. She replied to these letters in their set vein but without the weight of sentiment he infused so heavily into his ink. He had begged her dramatically to burn them, but instead she tore them up and tossed them into the wastepaper basket. Had the letters touched the substance of her, relighting the mystery she had known with Matthew, she would have burned them, burned herself.
Amy waited by the window when Dicky had gone. She had already summoned Jessie. She heard the door close, Jessie cleared her throat. Amy turned and saw that the woman was fixed with a pert expression, as if she would brazen it out.
‘I will have no more of this,’ Amy told her. ‘Master Tom will stay in the nursery when I have guests. And so will you, Jessie. So will you.’
‘But ma’am, I came only to look for his toy,’ Jessie said, widening her eyes.
‘A toy that wasn’t there and never had been,’ Amy replied.
‘And it is difficult to restrain Master Tom, ma’am,’ Jessie informed her self-righteously. ‘Both the children are upset. They don’t like, if I may say so, ma’am, to see a strange man so often in the house. And it is not right, ma’am,’ she said suddenly, stepping boldly towards Amy, her face alight with a fierce expression. ‘In the name of God, it isn’t right that he comes so often to the house. People will talk, ma’am. You know what people are.’
‘There is only you to carry tales to our foreign community,’ Amy told her.
‘I don’t carry no tales, ma’am.’ Jessie stepped back, having said what she wished to say. Amy could see her already in a huddle with Bertha Kaufmann at the dancing class or in the Bluff Gardens, gorging themselves upon the scraps of her life. Two lonely, voracious, sharp-beaked birds, pecking, pecking. The monstrousness of it consumed her.
‘People might believe Mr Huckle comes here for you Jessie. You must watch your reputation. If there were to be talk I most certainly think it more likely to be about you than me.’ Amy was grateful for the words that came so unpredictably to her rescue. ‘And if such things ever reached your parents’ ears, Jessie, just think how they would feel.’
‘Ma’am, you wouldn’t …’ Jessie Flack drew back, stung. The insinuations she had tossed so smugly at Amy shrivelled to insignificance, she gasped and fled the room. Amy pursed her lips to hide her satisfaction. The woman had needed to be shown her place. But she found her heart was beating and the image of Jessie’s complacency did not fade immediately. She left the room and walked slowly up the stairs.
The dark, narrow stairwell was cramped and steep. Since Matthew’s death the depressing house seemed to tighten unbearably about her, like a chrysalis, she must burst. Its memories were full of painful learnings she felt ready to discard. There was a terrible restlessness building within her. She wanted another life, a life of her choosing and her own making, a life in which to bloom. Walter Landor had gone to Shanghai but would soon return to Tokyo, he would be rooted for some time in the country. She would persuade him to give her painting lessons. She wanted to stretch beyond the tiny universe of a delicate illustration. She wanted a world of colour and light; the reflection of her own expanding self.
She had set up a table on the glassed-in verandah upstairs. On it she had spread her paints and drawing board, the paper pinned to it. She would have an exhibition eventually; nothing would deter her. There was no reason, if circumstances and her own will conspired, for her to be any less than Edwina May. Fate had resigned her to Yokohama; it was destined to be her firmament. The question she saw now was not how to escape it, but how to turn her life to her own advantage. And as these thoughts consolidated, it no longer seemed imperative to be rid of Reggie. She had no one else she wished to go to, no alternatives awaiting her. And Reggie had his strengths; before a devious world he was an adequate protector. He was what he was, and to many it was enough.
The acceptance of these thoughts alone seemed already to change the balance between them. She realized now that nothing in their material life would alter unless she took matters into her own hands. Reggie had not the means. She wrote to her father explaining the need for a bigger house, asking for some of her money. He replied that two thousand pounds would be sent if the deeds of the new house were in Amy’s name. To this Reggie quickly agreed, delighted with her sudden financial participation in their lives. Cashing in on her mood, he suggested they think of r
eorganizing their status in Yokohama.
‘It’s time now, Amy, to go into silk or tea. There’s no further headway at the club. We need a business of our own. And I would eventually pay you back. I won’t be beholden to a woman, even my own wife.’ He was respectful suddenly of her power.
She wrote then to her Uncle Horace, who was her main trustee. It was silk Reggie finally decided on, buying into a partnership in Yokohama. It would take some months to finalize the negotiations, but their future seemed assured. Reggie was ecstatic. The money seemed to free them both. They had ridden to the course and raced each other beyond it like children through the hills. He had pulled her from her horse at last and kissed her in a manner she had not known him do for years.
*
The curtains were drawn; a greenish light filled the room. It was hot and sticky, she wiped sweat from her neck with a towel. Outside, from the Bluff, sounds carried into the room, detailed and clear. She was almost better. If only there was a way to eradicate malaria forever. Dr Charles had urged her to try arsenic again for these debilitating bouts of the disease, but she had stuck to quinine. Arsenic left her depressed in a way she wished to avoid. She would try a change of air up at Miyanoshita as they always did at this horrid, humid time of year. She could take the arsenic later, if Miyanoshita was no help. She did not know how Reggie took the stuff with such impunity, throwing back bottles as he did.
