White Gardenia

by Belinda Alexandra

  Ivan was sitting with his back curved and his arms on his knees, lost in his own thoughts.

  ‘There’s the Southern Cross,’ I said. ‘The sailors in the southern hemisphere use it to guide them.’

  Ivan turned to me. ‘You’re talking,’ he said.

  I blushed although I had no idea why I should feel embarrassed. ‘Can’t I talk?’

  ‘Yes, but you said you didn’t want to.’

  ‘That was an hour ago.’

  ‘I was enjoying the silence,’ he said. ‘I thought I was getting to know you better.’

  Although it was dark he must have seen me smile. I felt him smile too. I turned back to the stars. What was it about this curious man that made me feel brave? I never would have thought it could be so comfortable to sit with anyone for so long and not say anything. Ivan had presence. Being with him was like leaning against a rock you knew would never falter. He must have been in pain too, but his loss seemed to have made him stronger. I, on the other hand, thought that if I suffered any more loss, I would go crazy with it.

  ‘I was only joking,’ he said, passing me the basket of cakes. ‘What did you want to tell me?’

  ‘Oh no,’ I said. ‘You are right. It feels good to be quiet and still.’

  We were silent again and it was just as comfortable as before. The waves settled down, and one by one the camp lights started to go out. I glanced at Ivan. He was leaning against the rock with his face turned towards the sky. I wondered what he was thinking.

  Ruselina had said that the best way to honour the Pomerantsevs was to live with courage. I had waited for my mother but she had not returned to me nor had there been any news about her. But I was not a little girl any more, restrained by the whims of others. I was old enough to search for her on my own. And yet, despite my longing for her, I dreaded the idea that I might discover that she too had been tortured and executed. I squeezed my eyes shut and made my wish on the Southern Cross, asking Boris and Olga to help me. I would use my courage to find her.

  ‘I’m ready to go back,’ I told Ivan.

  He nodded and stood up, holding out his hand to help me to my feet. I took his fingers and he gripped me with such strength that it was as if he had read my mind and was supporting me.

  ‘How would I go about finding someone in a Soviet labour camp?’ I asked Captain Connor when I arrived for work at the IRO office the next day. He was sitting at his desk eating a poached egg and bacon. The egg was bleeding across his plate and he soaked it up with a slice of bread before answering me.

  ‘It’s very difficult,’ he said. ‘We are at a stalemate with the Russians. Stalin is a madman.’ He glanced up at me. He was a man of good manners and didn’t ask any questions. ‘My best advice,’ he continued, ‘would be for you to get in touch with the Red Cross in your country of settlement. They’ve been doing marvellous work in helping people trace their relatives after the Holocaust.’

  The countries of settlement was the question occupying everyone’s mind. After Tubabao, where would we go? The IRO and the community leaders had petitioned many countries, begging them to let us in, but they had not received replies. Tubabao was lush and fruitful and we should have been enjoying the respite, but our future was uncertain. Even on a tropical island we were always in the shadow of gloom. There had been one suicide and two attempted ones already. How much longer could we be expected to wait?

  It was only after the United Nations forced the issue that the countries started to respond. Captain Connor and the other officials met at the office. They arranged their chairs in a circle, donned their eyeglasses and lit cigarettes before discussing the options. The United States government would only accept those people who had sponsors already living in America; Australia was interested in young people on the condition they sign a contract to work in any job required by the government for the first two years; France offered hospital beds to the elderly or the sick either to live out their days or to recover until they were fit to be moved elsewhere; and Argentina, Chile and Santo Domingo opened their doors without restrictions.

  I sat at my typewriter, staring at the blank paper, paralysed. I had no idea where I would go or what would become of me. I could not imagine myself anywhere but China. I realised that ever since I arrived in Tubabao I had kept a secret hope that we would eventually be taken home.

  I waited for the officials to leave before asking Captain Connor if he thought it might be possible for us to return to China one day.

  He looked at me as if I had asked him if I thought it was possible that one day we would all grow wings and turn into birds. ‘Anya, there is no China for you people any more.’

  A few days later I received a letter from Dan Richards urging me to come to America under his guarantee. ‘Don’t go to Australia,’ he wrote. ‘They are putting intellectuals to work on railways. South America is out of the question. And you can’t trust the Europeans. Don’t forget how they betrayed the Lienz Cossacks.’

  Irina and Ruselina were despondent. They wanted to go to the United States but didn’t have the money or sponsorship requirements. I ached for them each time I saw how they would listen with keen ears and longing eyes whenever anyone mentioned the lively nightclubs and cabarets of New York. I replied to Dan that I would take up his offer, and asked if he could do something to help my friends.

  One evening Ruselina, Irina and I were playing Chinese checkers in their tent. The sky had been overcast all day and the humidity so oppressive that we’d had to call a nurse to the tent to massage Ruselina’s lungs to help her breathe. It was the dry season, which on Tubabao meant it only rained once a day. We had been dreading the wet. Even when it rained lightly, all sorts of jungle creatures took refuge in the tents. Twice a rat had jumped out of Galina’s suitcase, and our tent was riddled with spiders. The transparent lizards were famous for laying their eggs in people’s underwear and shoes. A woman from the Second District woke up one morning to find a brown snake coiled on her lap. It had curled there for warmth and she had to lie still for hours until it slithered away of its own accord.

  It wasn’t the season for tropical storms yet but that day there had been something menacing in the sky. Ruselina, Irina and I watched it, seeing evil shapes form in the clouds. First a goblin-like creature with burning eyes where the sun shone through; then a round-faced man with a malicious mouth and peaked eyebrows, and finally a shape that moved across the sky like a dragon. Later in the afternoon a strong wind picked up, knocking over plates and bringing down washing lines. ‘I don’t like this,’ Ruselina said. ‘Something bad is coming.’

  Then the rain started. We waited for it to stop, which it usually did after half an hour or so. But the rain didn’t cease, it became heavier each hour. We watched it overflow the trenches, washing mud and anything else that stood in its way down the road. When it started to flood the tent, Irina and I ran outside and, with our neighbours’ help, dug deeper trenches and furrows leading away from the tents. The rain whipped against our skin like sand, turning it red. Tents without good centre poles collapsed in the downpour, and the occupants had to struggle against the wind to re-erect them. By nightfall the power was down.

  ‘Don’t go home,’ Irina said. ‘Stay here tonight.’

  I accepted her invitation without hesitation. The track to my tent was lined with coconut trees and, whenever the wind picked up, dozens of the rock-like fruits would crash to the ground. I was afraid that one would fall on my head and always ran through the grove with my hands raised above me as a shield. The girls in my tent laughed at my paranoid behaviour, until one day a coconut fell on Ludmila’s foot and she was in a cast for a month.

  We lit a gas lamp and continued with checkers, but by nine o’clock even games couldn’t relieve the hunger pangs pinching our stomachs. ‘I’ve got something,’ said Irina, shuffling around in a basket on top of the wardrobe. She took out a packet of biscuits and laid a plate on the table. She tipped the packet and a fat lizard fell out among the crumbs, followed by
dozens of her wriggling babies. ‘Pffumpt!’ Irina screamed, dropping the packet to the floor. The lizards scurried in all directions and Ruselina laughed so much she began to wheeze.

  The camp siren blasted and we froze. It sounded again. One blast signalled twelve noon and 18:00 hours. Two was to call the district leaders to a meeting. The siren repeated its shrill cry. Three was for everyone to meet in the square. We looked at each other. Surely they couldn’t expect us to meet in such weather? The siren blasted again. Four was for fire. Irina crouched beside her bed, frantically searching underneath it for her sandals. I grabbed the spare blanket from the wardrobe. Ruselina sat stoically in her chair, waiting for us. The fifth blast sent a chill down my back. Irina and I turned to one another, mirroring each other’s disbelief. The final blast was long and sinister. The fifth call had never been used before. It meant typhoon.

  We could feel the rush of panic in the tents around us. Voices cried out in the storm. A few minutes later the district official appeared at our tent. His clothes were saturated and clung to him like a second skin. The dread in his face ignited our own. He tossed us some pieces of rope.

  ‘What do you want us to do with these?’ Irina asked.

  ‘I’ve given you four to tie down the things in your tent. The others are for you to bring to the square in five minutes. You are going to have to strap yourselves to trees.’

  ‘You must be joking,’ said Ruselina.

  The district official shivered, his eyes bulging with terror. ‘I don’t know how many of us are going to make it. The army base received the warning too late. They think the sea is going to cover the island.’

  We joined the rush of people crashing through the jungle to the main square. The wind was so strong we had to dig our feet into the sandy soil to struggle against it. A woman collapsed to her knees nearby, crying out with fear. I ran to her, leaving Irina to look after Ruselina. ‘Come on,’ I said, pulling the woman up by her arm. Her coat flapped open and I saw the baby in a sling on her chest. It was tiny, with closed eyes, no more than a few hours old. My heart stung at the sight of its helplessness. ‘It will be all right,’ I told the woman. ‘I will help you.’ But terror had got the better of her. She clung to me, weighing me down and holding me back. We were drowning together in the angry air. ‘Take my baby,’ she pleaded. ‘Leave me.’

  It will be all right, I had said. I thought of all the times I had thought things would be all right, and loathed myself. I thought I would have been reunited with my mother by now, I had been convinced my marriage would be a happy one, I had trusted Dmitri, I had run to Raisa expecting wonderful stories about my mother. I had never been in a typhoon before. What right did I have to tell anyone that things would be all right?

  In the square volunteers perched on tree stumps held up spotlights so that people wouldn’t trip on the ropes and bags of emergency supplies. Captain Connor was standing on a rock, shouting directions into a megaphone. The district officials and the police were sorting people into groups. Small children were taken from their parents and herded into the walk-in refrigerator in the main kitchen. A Polish nurse was put in charge of them. ‘Please take them too,’ I said to the nurse, leading the woman and baby to her. ‘She’s just given birth.’

  ‘Take her to the hospital,’ the nurse said. ‘That’s where they are going to keep the sick and the mothers with young babies.’

  Ruselina took the child from the woman’s arms and Irina and I helped her towards the hospital. ‘Where’s the father?’ asked Irina. ‘Gone,’ replied the woman, her eyes distant. ‘He left me for another woman two months ago.’

  ‘And he didn’t even come back to help his child?’ Ruselina shook her head and whispered to me, ‘Men are no good.’

  I thought of Dmitri. Perhaps it was true.

  The hospital was already crowded when we arrived. Doctors and nurses were pushing the beds together to make room for more stretchers. I recognised Mariya and Natasha, busy nailing planks across the windows. Ivan was dragging a cupboard in front of a door. A harried-looking nurse took the child from Ruselina and led the woman to a bench where another young mother was nursing a child.

  ‘Can my grandmother stay here too?’ Irina asked the nurse. The nurse threw up her arms and I could see that she was about to say no when Irina flashed her dazzling smile. The nurse’s refusal never left her mouth. Her lips twisted, as if she were resisting the smile that was breaking out across her own face. She nodded towards the rooms at the back of the hospital. ‘I can’t give her a bed,’ the nurse said. ‘But I can put her in a chair in a consulting room.’

  ‘But I don’t want to be here alone,’ protested Ruselina when we helped her into a chair. ‘I’m well enough to come with you.’

  ‘Don’t be foolish, Grandmother! This building is the best on the island.’ Irina rapped her knuckles against the wall. ‘Look! It’s made of solid wood.’

  ‘Where are you going to go?’ asked Ruselina. The frailty in her voice pricked my heart.

  ‘The young people have to run to the top of the island,’ Irina said, trying to be cheerful. ‘So you will have to imagine Anya and myself doing that.’

  Ruselina reached out and grabbed Irina’s hand, pressing it into mine. ‘Don’t let go of each other. You’re all I’ve got.’

  Irina and I kissed Ruselina and hurried back out into the rain to join the line of people picking up the ropes and torches and scrambling up the mountain track. Ivan struggled through the crowd to meet us. ‘Actually, I’ve saved a special spot for you two,’ he said. We put down the ropes but kept one torch and followed him to a small Nissen hut in a clearing behind the hospital.

  The hut had three barred windows and was dark inside. Ivan shuffled in his pocket and produced a key. He tugged my palm towards him and dropped the key into it.

  ‘No, we can’t,’ I said. ‘It’s a solid building. You should give it to the sick or the children.’

  Ivan raised his eyebrows and laughed. ‘Oh, so you think I’m giving you some special privilege, do you, Anya?’ he said. ‘I’m sure you two get a lot of favours on account of your good looks, but I’m putting you to work.’

  Ivan gestured for me to unlock the hut. I pushed the key into the lock and opened the door but I couldn’t see anything but darkness inside. ‘I have no spare volunteers left to look after them,’ he said. ‘All the nurses are occupied elsewhere. But don’t worry. They are harmless.’

  ‘Who are “they”?’ asked Irina.

  ‘Ah, my Irina,’ Ivan said. ‘Your voice has won my heart. But you need to win my respect too if you want me to truly admire you.’

  Ivan laughed again and bounded off into the rain, leaping over fallen branches and debris with the nimbleness of a stag. I watched him disappear into a grove and out of sight. There was a ‘crack!’ in the sky and a palm tree crashed to the ground, splattering mud over our dresses and missing us by no more than a foot. Irina and I clambered into the hut and struggled to close the door behind us.

  The air inside reeked of sun-parched linen and disinfectant. I stepped forward and bumped into something hard. I ran my hand around the edges of it. A table.

  ‘I think it’s a storeroom,’ I said, rubbing the bruise on my thigh.

  Something scuttled by us. Fur brushed across my feet. ‘Rats!’ I cried. Irina flicked on the torch and we found ourselves face to face with a startled kitten. She was white with pink eyes. ‘Hello, cat,’ said Irina, crouching down and stretching out her hand. The kitten scampered to Irina and rubbed her chin against her knees. The cat’s fur was shiny, not dusty like most animals on the island. I jumped back when Irina did, both of us staring at the same thing: a pair of human feet illuminated by the circle of torchlight. They were lying toes up on a sheet. My first thought was that we were in the mortuary but I realised it was too hot for that. Irina traced the beam up the striped pyjama pants to the face of a young man. He was asleep, his eyes tightly closed and a sliver of drool glistening on his chin. I edged closer and touched h
is shoulder. The man didn’t stir but his flesh was warm.

  I whispered to Irina, ‘He must be sedated because I don’t see how else he could be sleeping through the commotion outside.’

  She curled her fingers around my wrist, crunching the bones, and flicked the torch over the rest of the room. There was a wooden table with a pile of paperback novels neatly stacked on it and a metal cupboard near the door. We searched behind us and both jumped when we saw an old woman squinting at us from a bed in the far corner. Irina redirected the torchlight out of the woman’s eyes.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Irina said. ‘We didn’t realise there was anybody else here.’

  But in the instant the beam had illuminated the woman’s face, I had recognised her. She was better fed and cleaner than the last time we had met, but there was no mistaking her. All that was missing was her tiara and her worried expression.

  ‘Dusha-dushi,’ the old woman said.

  Another voice, a man’s, called out from a shadowy corner. ‘I’m Joe,’ he said. ‘Joe like Poe like Poe like Poe like Poe. Although my mother called me Igor. It’s Joe like Poe.’

  Irina gripped my wrist, making it ache. ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  But I was too occupied trying to believe what Ivan had done to answer her. He’d put us in charge of the mental patients.

  By the time the head of the storm hit the island, the hut was rattling and shaking like a motorcar on a bumpy road. A stone struck one of the windows and a crack began to zigzag across the glass. I searched the cupboard for tape to seal it. I managed to paste some down before the fracture reached the frame. We couldn’t hear anything outside above the howl of the wind. Only once did the young man wake up, looking at us through glazed eyes. ‘Whaat’s thaat?’ he asked. But before we could answer him, he turned over on his stomach and lapsed back into a deep slumber. The kitten sprang onto his bed and, after some deliberation over the most comfortable spot to settle, curled herself into a ball in the crook of his knees.