The Harbour

by Francesca Brill

  Harry threw off the sheet but still the night air lay heavy on his body. His wife was an ocean of linen away from him. He knew she was awake too.

  ‘While I’m in Australia you can decide what you want, Harry.’ Her voice was small but clear.

  He waited a moment before he answered, the darkness soaking him. ‘What do you want?’

  Another small pause. ‘A man who loves me.’

  ‘Yes.’ And the weight of it was crushing. ‘I’m sorry.’

  He could see Sylvia, the young girl of a few years ago, as distinctly as if she were standing at the end of the bed. There was always something unclear about her, smudged somehow around the edges. That was part of her charm, a wispy transparent effect that made him feel that he would never fully understand the shape of her. Pale, small and fair, she was in his mind permanently out of focus and this fragility seemed to him alien and female and quite how it should be.

  The romance of their meeting had sealed their fate. He was the new young, promoted officer joining her father’s regiment in Hampshire. She was nineteen, recently released from boarding school and discovering her power in a world of men. She was much sought after. There was even the occasional tussle among the men. And this in itself fired Harry’s resolve.

  He won the day and their wedding photographs were a cliché even as they were taken. He, straight-backed and handsome, his hair slicked so tight to his head he looked like a seal, she delicate in cream lace and a veil the length of the aisle. But even as they ran under the arch of honour what Harry felt most keenly was not passion but victory. As for Sylvia, she did not seem able to dispel a veil of disappointment that her moment of glory was over so fast. Neither had any idea of how to live.

  They instantly established separate spheres and crossed the lines only on occasion and with fair warning. The delicacy of intimacy was marked by resignation on her part and damaged by fear on his. Her skin seemed so thin he felt he might tear her.

  And now he had.

  Chapter Ten

  Harry was already frustrated. The transcript of the week’s communications between the Japanese occupying forces on the mainland and the collaborating Chinese government in Nanching was not being taken seriously enough by anybody. Even Ken Ramsay was shrugging at it.

  It seemed so clear to him that the long-standing policy of the official Kuomintang government, led by Chiang Kai-shek, of fighting the encroaching Communist Red Army, ‘first internal pacification, before external resistance’, was allowing the Japanese to push further and further into China. Chiang Kai-shek’s personal stance that ‘the Japanese are a disease of the skin, the Communists a disease of the heart’ wasn’t working. The Chinese army was ill equipped and under-trained and had been facing one of the most efficient, aggressive and brutal armies in history for the last eight years. The losses had been catastrophic. The Japanese had shown themselves to be merciless in victory. Poison gas, air raids, massacres and rape – they used whatever weapon served them best. They had even resorted to the bizarre but effective tactic of dropping plague-carrying fleas from their planes, causing mass deaths from outbreaks of bubonic plague. Harry knew only too well from his familiarity with the country that the Japanese would be as stubborn in their pursuit of victory as they were in their pursuit of pleasure and culture. China was effectively split, and weakened by years of both civil and defensive war. The Communists had just renewed their offensive by blowing up a coal mine in the north and there were open conflicts between the Nationalists and the Communists in government territory.

  In addition, it seemed equally obvious to Harry that Japanese aggression would only be increased by the proposed boycott on oil sales recently suggested by the Americans. As the war in Europe accelerated, with Britain suffering terrible nightly assaults from the air, the Allies’ eyes were turned away from the East. Nobody was paying enough attention.

  He turned his anxiety on the stocky figure at the next desk.

  ‘It may be innocuous to you, but has it occurred to you that there might be a reason why I’m the senior officer, Ramsay?’ Ken blushed scarlet instantly. Harry knew he was being heavy-handed but pressed on, his general sense of frustration growing. ‘Any mention of Hong Kong by the Japanese on the airwaves is relevant, regardless of whether it actually says “we are planning to bomb it until the whities burn”.’

  The door burst open and Harry wheeled around, blazing. But it was Stevie who got the first words in, propelled by her own fury that had brought her running through town to his door.

  ‘They’ve arrested Chen. You’ve arrested Chen. He’s just a boy. What the hell’s that about?’

  The two men looked at each other, dumbfounded. Ken’s face could only have been more red if it were actually on fire. His powers of discretion had been severely tested during the weeks of Harry’s dalliance with this cavalier American woman with the fierce eyes. But he had no idea what the etiquette was for this situation. The rule book had utterly let him down.

  ‘You’re taking children away now, are you? The glorious British Empire scared of a little boy? Call yourselves men? Hah!’ This last, an expression of contempt in any language.

  Harry mustered every remaining scrap of patience and turned to Ken. ‘Excuse me, Sergeant Ramsay.’

  He stood up, cold and firm. ‘I’ll give you two minutes, Miss Steiber.’

  It was with enormous relief that Ken realised he was being invited to leave the room.

  The minute the door was safely closed behind Ken’s broad shoulders, Harry tore into Stevie.

  ‘Don’t ever, ever do this again.’

  ‘You stop taking children from their homes at gunpoint and I’ll stop complaining.’

  ‘This isn’t a game, Stevie.’ She could feel the sharpness of him and recognised the sting of fear. ‘The world’s your playground, I know, but there’s serious business in it. Stick to your idealistic debates and let the grown-ups get on with keeping you safe.’ Harry walked towards the door. ‘I’ll see you out.’

  Stevie knew she’d overstepped the mark and her courage was receding with every moment.

  ‘No need.’

  ‘Yes, there is.’ His hand was on the door handle. ‘I want to be absolutely sure you’ve gone.’

  Stevie, glittering with passion, gestured to the huge map of the world pinned to the wall.

  ‘You’re entitled to your soldier’s high ground, Harry, and I know you think I’m some kind of dilettante fool and you can dismiss me all you like, but what do you know about how people live? It’s all papers and theories and reports for you, but have you seen the men and women of mainland China struggling to keep their families alive against the odds? Have you? I have, and it’s a depressing sight. But it’s also a real sight. People, Harry, people. In the end that’s who it’s about and if you don’t respect that and if you just fling your force around to pick on young boys just because you can –’ she paused ‘– you’ll lose.’

  Harry, loving her more in this moment than ever before, was determined not to show it. ‘All right, you’re travelled and open-minded and the lucky people who get the benefit of your wit and wisdom are quite right to worship you. This isn’t a popularity contest, it’s a war. Now, if you don’t mind I’ve got a territory to help protect.’ He turned the door handle.

  Stevie stood her ground. ‘What about Chen?’

  ‘As if you don’t know. He’s part of a Communist destabilising cell, that’s why he was arrested. He’s busy spending his time spreading the word to the good people of Hong Kong that supporting Britain is supporting their own oppression.’

  Stevie reeled for a moment. The article Chen had written for Direct Debate had been didactic and somewhat adolescent but he hadn’t expressed anything too inflammatory and she and Jishang had both agreed that it was valuable to have a contribution from a fresh voice. His admiration for the leaders of the so-called war of liberation was clear but he hadn’t expressed any antipathy to the British. She squared her shoulders.

  ‘Yeah? W
ell, good for him.’

  Harry closed the door again. He tried to keep his voice calm but didn’t do a very good job of it. ‘You won’t think that when those real people of yours, your Chinese neighbours, hold a knife to your throat in the mistaken belief that the Japanese will be kinder masters and give them their freedom.’

  ‘Maybe they’re right. You should question some of your own loyalties. Do you know what the British did to the Indians in the revolution?’

  ‘Mutiny.’

  ‘Whatever. They made them lick up the blood on the roads.’

  He took a step towards her. Incensed. ‘You’re only pretending to be so stupid, aren’t you? You know, all that travel, what’s it done for you? I’ll tell you what – it’s been an excuse for you not to make a personal commitment to anything. But neutrality is a luxury you may not always be able to afford.’ He turned away from her. ‘Congratulations, you’ve found a way to escape from real life and avoid loyalty to anything.’

  His words sliced into her. Somewhere deep down she knew he was right.

  Harry glanced back over his shoulder as he opened the door wide. ‘I can’t do anything to get the boy out of jail, but I’ll make sure he’s all right.’

  Stevie held on to the pain inside as she walked past him. ‘Pompous suits you.’

  She didn’t look back as she walked along the corridor but she knew he was watching.

  They both knew it hadn’t been about the state of the nation.

  The day had started badly. The boat trip was usually a great pleasure. Madame Kung’s boat was a plaything. A yacht with a polished wooden hull and more luxurious white canvas chairs than the Metropolitan Hotel. Normally, Stevie was delighted when the entourage packed up and drove down the Peak to the waterfront. This time she had felt sick at the very sight of the waves – green and sparkling like tiny mountain ranges. By the time they were settled on the cushions and had cast off into the harbour Stevie was the same colour as the water, but most definitely not as sparkling. She was unusually quiet as Madame Kung and her coterie of lucky ladies chattered under the swaying awning.

  They had disembarked on the mainland and made their way to the estate and still Stevie had barely joined the conversation, let alone entertained Madame Kung as she was supposed to. She was, frankly, being a bit of a bore. They were assembled in the long, low-ceilinged drawing room that ran the length of the innermost courtyard. Outside, the yard was bleached by the fierce sun. Inside, an elderly woman was on her knees in front of Madame Kung, begging for her help. Her voice was shrill with despair. She didn’t raise her eyes to Madame Kung’s as her plea came to an end. The empress raised her languid hand and the woman shuffled forward, still on her knees, to kiss it. She thanked her over and over and pulling herself awkwardly to her feet, she backed out of the room, her eyes still on the floor.

  Madame Kung turned to Stevie, who sat with the other women on small formal chairs along the edge of the room. The high collar of her elegant black lace dress framed her impassive face and the huge pearls in her ears were translucent in the afternoon light. Her words were incongruous, from another age.

  ‘Her son is to be executed tomorrow. I can do nothing for her.’

  Stevie had been concentrating on her fight against the haze in her brain.

  ‘Executed – what for?’

  ‘He’s an opium addict. It’s hopeless.’ Stevie instantly had a flash of the comforting black stuff and felt a pang of desire. Madame Kung looked keenly at her and took in her untended hair, her unmade-up face. Worst of all, the girl didn’t seem to be wearing any lipstick. She raised a thinly arched eyebrow. ‘You must smarten up. Keep polished. Just because other people are getting into this ridiculous war panic you must not let yourself go.’ She stood up and there was much scraping of chair legs on wooden floorboards as the other ladies followed suit. Beckoning to Stevie to catch up, Madame Kung sailed towards the door. ‘I hear you have a new admirer.’

  Stevie was startled into a stutter ‘I don’t know what – I mean, no. Who says so?’

  Madame Kung’s small mouth was close to her ear. ‘Be careful, that’s all. Where there’s talk there’s trouble.’ She set off again, raising her voice, her French-heeled slippers clicking as she walked.

  ‘My husband wants me to leave Hong Kong, he says it’s too dangerous here.’

  Everybody present understood the warning. Things must be getting very bad.

  ‘Where will you go?’

  ‘Who knows – back to America, maybe.’ She reached the door and it swung open, pulled by the ever-vigilant but amazingly invisible servants behind it. Madame Kung’s voice lowered for another intimacy. ‘If you ever need me, Wu Jishang will know where I am.’ Her butterfly hand hovered for a brief moment on Stevie’s wrist. ‘You know, you could really be quite pretty if you made the effort.’

  Stevie was suddenly overcome with dizziness. She tried to speak but her legs buckled under her and she fell to the floor. All was nausea and darkness.

  She saw the intricate pattern and felt the fabric of the day bed. The light hurt her eyes and the taste in her mouth was bitter. But even as she struggled out of the haze she knew this was no hangover. For a blissful moment she was home. It was her mother’s sturdy figure that stood stiffly by the window. The word ‘Mother’ may even have escaped her lips. Relief and surrender held her captive and she never wanted to move again. It was shattering when she heard Madame Kung clear her throat to deal with this altogether nasty business and not her mother after all.

  ‘Some delicacy will be necessary.’ Stevie closed her eyes against the words. ‘I suppose the father must be informed. It is usually advisable.’ She paused. Stevie was acutely aware of the pulse in her neck. ‘You’ll have to go away for a while. You won’t be judged too harshly, one understands that accidents happen. Unfortunate, of course, but it’s not the end of the world. You know, I’ll never forget the birth of my first child.’ A small laugh. ‘I thought I was going to die.’

  Stevie was finally, terrifyingly, out of her depth.

  Part Two

  Chapter Eleven

  As August came to an end and the sweltering summer enveloped everything, Stevie found herself mercifully able to forget the crisis that was upon her. The magnitude of it allowed her a kind of paralysis and whole hours could go by without her thinking about it. Then something, a veil of nausea or a child’s cry in the night, would jolt her into herself and she would feel heavy with dread. The fact that Harry was away on some kind of mainland reconnaissance trip (she gleaned enough to guess he was liaising with both Chinese factions in Free China beyond the New Territories) was a huge relief and for the first time since he had taken root in her she barely noticed the days passing. His absence was a respite from reality.

  Madame Kung’s words echoed in her head only to be joined by others.

  Lily worked it out almost straight away but said nothing. She might have been young but her watchful, wily admiration made her zealously alert to Stevie’s moods. She noticed how Stevie seemed to be finding it harder to get out of bed in the morning. She saw how she didn’t leave the typewriter for lunch and that when she did eat, it was only plain rice and the occasional bowl of soup. But the biggest clue was that Stevie had somehow turned in on herself. She was quiet. She was quiet when Victor peed on her silk skirt. She was quiet when the war news got louder. She was quiet when Harry told her he was going to the mainland and might be gone for weeks. And most tellingly she was even quiet when, in a brief telephone call, Jishang told her that he’d taken it upon himself to send the as yet unfinished manuscript of her book to a selection of American publishers.

  Stevie struggled with the physical changes in her body. Every time the clammy film of nausea claimed her she resented it. Every ache in her swollen breasts, each light-headed episode gave more fuel to her sense of betrayal. It was her own body that was betraying her. It was engaged on an adventure that didn’t concern her and which bypassed her own needs without consultation. She felt utter
ly alienated from it. Occasionally, she looked at herself in the distorting mirror that leaned against the bedroom wall. It was as if she was assessing someone else’s body. Her detachment served her well.

  One day, not long after the conversation with Madame Kung, she was shifting the metal filing cabinet across the living room. It was preventing her from opening the window fully and had been irritating her all morning. She had been trying to read the corrected proofs that Jishang had sent back. It was her own article on the British government’s unfair and unreasonably jumpy treatment of the Chinese population of Hong Kong with particular reference to the arrest of Chen, as she put it, ‘a possibly misguided but essentially innocent seventeen-year-old boy accused of being a Communist agitator and held, pending a trial in the notorious Stanley prison’. She had read the same sentence about fifteen times, unable to concentrate, and had finally thrown the pages down in frustration.

  Putting her back into moving the filing cabinet instead, she was in the process of inching it out of the way when Lily rushed in, dropping her shopping basket as she came. ‘What are you doing? Are you crazy? You could lose the baby.’

  As the words left her mouth Lily tried to grab them back. It was too late. They stared at each other over the dented grey cabinet, both equally stunned by the acknowledgement.

  Stevie stepped backwards. ‘How did you know?’

  ‘I just knew.’

  ‘When? When did you realise?’

  ‘I don’t know. A few weeks ago.’

  ‘Have you told anyone?’

  Lily was indignant. ‘Of course not. Have you?’

  Stevie sighed a long sigh and sat down. ‘No.’

  ‘Nobody?’

  ‘Nobody.’

  Lily went back to the door and picked up the shopping basket.

  ‘I suppose you’ll have to sooner or later.’