He took Nina to a museum with skeletons and stuffed animals, showed her scientific laboratories and made her peep in a microscope to see a cut open body of a worm. Then they went to the museum with displays of intricate embroidery, paintings of saints and religious posters.
“Now you see what level of skill we’ve achieved,” Father Nicolás kept exclaiming. “And all of it is done by the hard work of our orphans. Their items are highly sought after in Europe and we often arrange charity sales. But to bring up a real master we need colossal funds.”
This wretched Jesuit wanted money. However, when Nina gave him five dollars, he looked at her as if she’d insulted the whole of the sacred Catholic Church.
“Listen,” Nina said, “I can provide a work place for one of your student-orphans and, if you help to find a suitable candidate, I promise to give you money for your holy business. But first, I need your student to produce work I can sell.”
In reply, Father Nicolás told her a parable about a merchant who amassed earthly riches and never thought about the treasures of his soul. “Robbers rushed into his house, pillaged everything and burned what was left,” sighed the monk, humbly.
5.
Nina complained to Klim about Father Nicolás and he roared with laughter. “That’s how it is: the Catholic Church is the most profitable company in the world. The monks arrived in Shanghai hoping to sell the locals onto the idea of salvation. But the people went to sermons mostly for the charitable rice, and then the brethren thought up a new scheme: now European and American Christians pay for saving poor Chinese souls.”
Klim explained that the Church gather donations across the whole world. In numerous religious magazines they print heartfelt appeals:
One franc can change the destiny of a native perishing in ignorance.
And the Christians believe them. The price is not too high, so why not try?
“All gambling machines in bars and restaurants of Shanghai belong to the mission of Saint Francis de Sales,” Klim said. “By the way, the main goal of the mission is to help orphans and promote the good upbringing of youths. Augustinians produce fake perfume; in other missions, they process sums sent by Mussolini for promotion of the Italian language and the Catholic Church by investing them into real estate. Fortunately for them, the prices in Shanghai are always on the rise. So, the brethren deal in everything you can think of—from theater advertising to sausage casings.”
Nina was thinking intensely. She would need not only one artist, but several, otherwise she would have too small a turnaround. Also she would need a printing office with the most up-to-date equipment, just like the Jesuits had. Nina carefully examined posters with the Blessed Virgin and Jesus, which were exhibited in the museum: the quality was superb.
The mission was selling its pupils’ artworks, meaning that the Jesuits must have connections with art collectors. And by the sound of it, the brethren weren’t too scrupulous when it came to their sources of income.
Nina stood up. “Klim, I need to show you something. Come with me.”
They made for the furniture store and went upstairs into the storage room stuffed with unsold cupboards. Nina told the owner to go and mind his business and waited until he was gone. Then she opened a pantry. Klim looked curiously at the dusty gray boxes. “What are they?”
“Our future.”
Klim wasn’t a connoisseur of Asian art, but he immediately realized the contents of the pantry were worth a lot of money. He carefully flipped through the albums saying from time to time, “Holy moly…” with utter amazement on his face.
“Where did you get this from?”
“From Aulman. One of his clients gave him the collection as a payment and Tony didn’t have any idea what to do with it. Do you think it’ll be possible to sell these things to Jesuits? I mean to donate? In return, I want them to help me with the calendars.”
Klim could not resist smiling.
“What?” Nina became worried.
“I was just thinking how you’d be offering the monks pornography.”
Nina’s face fell. “I don’t know. … I’d never have enough courage. Father Nicolás could easily report me to the police and then everything will be confiscated.”
Klim put the album on the table and moved close to Nina. “I’ll go to Siccawei and talk to the Jesuits.”
She looked at him. “Really?”
“I promise.”
Nina couldn’t help herself and kissed his lips.
CHAPTER 36
A SCANDAL AT THE OPERA HOUSE
1.
Klim brimmed with happiness and exhaustion as he walked along the street. His head was buzzing from a recent event: a narrow room, dappled sunlight on the floor, an album with prints opened in the middle.
A butterfly wafted through the window and landed on the corner of a page. Klim and Nina carelessly frightened it away.
Under Nina’s dress was a crimson camisole—something bright and unexpected. In fact, everything was unexpected: her sudden desire for him—who cares about the shop owner!—her passion and her soft, barely audible “Love you”, snuggled into Klim’s shoulder.
The night was slowly engulfing the city. A half-empty tram shot past. Low singing voices and the even sound of a drum were heard from a Buddhist temple.
“Wow! Is that you?” somebody called to Klim in Spanish.
He spun around. Don Fernando’s drunk, happy head stuck out of a car parked nearby.
“Go away, my sweetheart,” the Don said to a young Chinese man sitting next to him. “I’ve met my dear friend and would like to spend some time with him.” He turned to Klim, “Let’s go!”
“Where to?” Klim asked.
“You’ll see.”
Don Fernando leapt onto the pavement and pulled Klim into the car.
“Seen this before?” he said taking out from his pocket a pink tube. “It’s a tooth cream, Colgate! It comes out as a flat strip and has a nice mint flavor.”
With wry amusement, Klim played with the tube. “What’s happened to the Flying Dutchman?” he asked. “Did they close it?”
Don Fernando laughed, “Who would dare to close me? I’m the one who gives money to the city fathers to buy milk for their children. Everything’s up and running again: new premises better than the old ones.”
The car stopped at the entrance to a Chinese theater. Don Fernando pulled his hat onto his forehead. “You understand Shanghainese, don’t you? You’ll sit next to me and listen to what Pockmarked is saying. It’s such luck I met you. Chinese translators always cover their countrymen and you never know whether they’re stabbing you in the back.”
Klim frowned. “Who’s Pockmarked?”
“The head of the Chinese detectives in the French Concession police. Well, that’s by profession. By passion, he’s a bandit, of course. A big wig! But, don’t you worry—he doesn’t eat people. The most important thing to remember is to mind your own business and be careful.”
Adventures are misfortunes that you didn’t manage to cop out of in time, Klim thought.
The theater doors were guarded by stone lions. Even on the streets, Klim could hear the sounds of cymbals and the unnaturally high voices of the actors inside.
A performance was in full swing, with warriors dancing on the stage acting a sword fight. In a large, red and gold decorated hall, the audience was sitting at tables, drinking tea. The big ornate lanterns illuminated their enthusiastic faces; shadows moved on the patterned walls.
The Chinese could not conceal their astonishment at seeing foreign devils in their theater.
“What’re you gawping at?” grumped Don Fernando squeezing between the tables. He headed to the other end of the hall. “Never seen a white man before?”
The meeting was scheduled in a separate room. The Don stopped in front of a beautifully carved door and turned to Klim. “Everything you hear inside stays inside, got it?”
“E-eh…I’m not that good at Shanghainese,” Klim started, but Don Fe
rnando knotted his eyebrows fiercely. “Don’t upset me!”
Two bulky security guards searched them and let them into a room decorated with opera masks.
There were chairs and a low table laid with tea sets. A fat Chinese man with an inscrutable face covered in pockmarks walked in. So this was Pockmarked.
Don Fernando introduced Klim to him, “This is my partner. He would like to invest a share in the new casino.”
Klim was about to exclaim, What? but the Don immediately gave him the secret sign: Keep quiet!
The situation amazed Klim. He should start advertising his services:
Young man of respectable appearance is ready to act as a fake fat cat in any chance deals of great importance.
By the looks of things, he would be in great demand. Martha had already employed his special talent, but got away with just a heart-felt thank-you.
I should get the Don to pay for it, Klim chuckled to himself.
They started negotiating in English. Don Fernando offered a joint deal to Pockmarked that involved opening half a dozen casinos in the French Concession. The Don proposed the clients would be picked up and dropped off by a limo; all drinks would be on the house; all the waiting gals would be wearing dresses side-slit up to their armpits. But for such a project the Don needed a serious patron.
They counted money and argued. The Don shouldn’t have worried about the translation issue: in Shanghainese, Pockmarked said to the servants nothing scarier than “More tea” or “Close the door, idiot”.
“Would you like to stay with me and watch the rest of the opera?” he asked his guests when the terms were set.
“Pockmarked is a great fan of these concerts with screeching cats,” Fernando whispered to Klim. “Let’s make the old chap happy.”
Immediately, waiters set a table for them in the hall. On the stage sat an actor with a glued beard. A lady danced in front of him with two swords, keeping in time to the strokes of a two-stringed violin.
“It’s a man in disguise,” said Don Fernando to Klim. “In Chinese opera they’re all men. Hey, look at that bastard! I could easily take him for a girl, especially in the dark.”
A young Chinese in a military uniform stumbled up to their table. His buddies followed close behind.
Pockmarked grudgingly introduced him to his guests, “It’s Mister Lu, son of our governor Lu Yongxiang. This is Don Fernando Burbano and Klim Rogov.”
The guy was drunker than a sailor. His epaulet was beautified by a noodle stuck to a button.
“What are your foreign devils up to?” he said in Shanghainese.
Pockmarked looked at him with hatred. “Go home.”
The guy took a cigarette out of Pockmarked’s pack, lit it up and for a while played with the match.
“Foreign devils are sucking our blood,” he said. “There are not too many of them in Shanghai and if we had more strong people we would already squashed their skulls like the shells of wretched tortoises.”
“What’s he saying?” asked Don Fernando, looking worried.
Klim stood up. To hell with Chinese ceremonies.
“It’s time to go.”
Lu seized his shoulder. “Sit down! Fernando Burbano and Klim Rogov,” he changed into English, “I’m not accusing you of anything. I’m not even accusing your servant, Pockmarked: he’s a venerable man. … What’s really driving me mad is the talentless mediocrity on stage!”
He snatched a hot kettle from the table and hurled it at the actors. The music stopped. The sound of a teapot lid rolling along the floor was heard for a long time.
Pockmarked jumped from behind the table. “Kick this scum out!”
Security guards rushed to the guy and knocked him down. None of his buddies intervened while Lu was pummeled by guards’ feet. He was dragged out of the hall; waiters quickly cleaned up the blood from the floor, and, in under a minute, the performance began again.
“Pockmarked’s opera turned out to be not so boring after all,” Don Fernando told Klim back in his car. “If Lu wasn’t a governor’s son, he would have been killed on the spot. Pockmarked is a serious man: he is the head of the Green Gang, if that tells you anything. This pup’s daddy is in Hangzhou now, and I wonder if he and Pockmarked come to terms or they shoot each other?”
Klim didn’t answer. The receptionist in the Palace Hotel had told him how young Lu got grumpy at Marc Donnell and his fidgety horse. It wasn’t good that Pockmarked introduced Klim and Don Fernando to him: China’s petty tyrants not only chop up their enemies, but their enemy’s families and friends.
2.
It was after midnight when Klim arrived home. Ada was already asleep. The window was wide open and Mitya was sitting on the sill.
“Get out of here,” he said to Klim quietly.
“What?”
Mitya’s eyes reflected the moonlight. “You’ll be cut up.”
“By who?”
“By soldiers.”
Six men wearing Chinese uniforms were running up the street. They came up to the locked gates of the House of Hope and pounded on them with all their might. “Open immediately!”
“Run!” Mitya whispered to Klim. “While the owner is opening the gates you’ll have time to get over the fence. A neighbor was fixing a washing line there and left his ladder.”
3.
Klim walked quickly along a dark road. No doubt those were Lu’s people. Oh damn…what rubbish he’d gotten himself into!
I should warn Don Fernando, Klim decided. He probably doesn’t know they’re after us.
Several trucks were parked outside the Flying Dutchman. The windows and sign were smashed; soldiers were dragging some people out by their arms.
Klim slowly moved back and pulled his hat over his eyes. Too late, the Don had probably already been taken.
There was music and laughter at Martha’s place. Klim squeezed to the crowded bar. “Where’s the mistress?”
“Upstairs,” the bartender replied.
Klim ran into her in the corridor.
“What are you doing here?” Martha asked, looking frightened. “Five minutes ago they came…” “Who?”
“Chinese soldiers. They asked for you and Fernando and they weren’t here to pay a social visit. I don’t want to get into this story. Please, leave!”
Klim walked along the street without noticing where he was going. What should he do? Go to Nina? Impossible. It would bring trouble to her. What if the soldiers did something to Ada? Maybe she needs help?
In front of him, lit by neon lights, was a sign that read, Photo Studio.
Nazar! As far as Klim could remember, Nazar rented an apartment on Broadway. I should find him and then work out what to do next, he decided.
CHAPTER 37
THE JESUIT ART SCHOOL
1.
The Chinese soldiers spent a long time interrogating the landlord about Klim Rogov’s whereabouts. Then they rushed into Ada’s room, “Where is he?”
She screamed at them to get out, wondering afterwards where she found the guts to be so reckless. In her groggy, half-asleep state, Ada didn’t realize they could have easily beaten her up or shot her.
“Get out of here!” she yelled. “Or I’ll tell everything to Mr. Wayer! I’m the governess for his granddaughter!”
The soldiers didn’t understand a thing, but Mitya translated and added something himself. Then they left.
“I’m glad these people didn’t harm anyone,” he said. “I’ll pray for you and for Klim.”
Once he disappeared, Ada realized that Mitya must have climbed into her room while she was still asleep. How did he? The hatch was locked!
Ada was alone at last—the sole ruler of the four walls, a samovar and a pot behind the curtain.
For the first few days, she waited for Klim to come back. Then she changed everything in the room to her taste, washed the floors and put three white hydrangeas into a glass. The sky behind the window would swell with dark blue and then fall into complete darkness, bu
t Ada couldn’t sleep. She felt lonely: she missed the sound of someone else breathing in the room.
Where had Klim disappeared to? she wondered. What mess had he got himself into that he had to run away without even taking his belongings and the money he hid under the floor mat?
To be on the safe side, Ada took it away.
Or he’s gone to his wife? If that’s the case, he could have at least told me. But what if he broke his neck somewhere? That’s bad. … I need to talk to his Nina about my passport. Maybe just go there and ask her? Oh no, it’s scary. She’s an unkind woman.
2.
Nina had a feeling she couldn’t rely on Klim. But at the furniture place, she was so excited and hopeful that she came home and for a long time couldn’t do anything but wander about the house, smiling and humming tunes from Russian love songs. “Everything will work out wonderfully,” she kept saying to herself.
Vainly, Nina spent the next day waiting for Klim. He did not appear. Then she panicked. What’s happened? Did he change his mind? Do his Katya number two and I not interest him anymore?
Nina sent her chauffeur to the House of Hope, but his landlord said, “Mister Klim went away, I don’t know where.”
Stunned, Nina was sitting in her chair, her hands clenched so hard it was painful.
Well…I’ll sort everything out myself then. And let him go to hell.
To Nina’s surprise, Father Nicolás wasn’t horrified when she pitched her proposal. “Can I see the items we’re talking about?”
Nina unwrapped a heavy bundle on the table and gave Father Nicolás an intricately carved mammoth tooth.
The Jesuit examined it carefully through his magnifying glass.
“Do you have an inventory of your collection?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Never hurrying, he read through all ten pages.
“I have to talk to my brothers,” Father Nicolás said giving the papers back to Nina. “You do, of course, realize this is a tricky matter. But if the rest of the artifacts are of the same quality, then I’m sure we’ll come to an agreement.”
Nina spent two days on pins and needles. What did the Jesuits decide? Will they deal with her? Or report her?
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