by Meira Chand
A car waited outside. As it moved away from the kerb he looked up at the squat façade of the Embassy and beside it Ginling Women’s University. He remembered the wave of terror, the screams that had taken him there that night weeks ago, in an effort to stop the mayhem. Soon the shadowy bulk of Military Headquarters loomed over the car. He was marched upstairs.
Colonel Kato leaned back in his chair and observed him unhurriedly. ‘It has taken time for us to gather proof. What has amazed me is that you expected to get away with it.’ His tone was nonchalant, almost conversational.
Then, as if a switch had been pushed, he swung forward, eyes blazing, and brought his fist down on the desktop. Kenjiro started between the two men who now reached out to grip his arms. Saliva gleamed upon Kato’s irregular teeth. His lips were cracked at one corner.
‘Traitor. Is there anything worse in this world? Maggots in the sewage pits, pale and fat from filth I would place higher than you. Only you knew that Communist, you and your Russian girlfriend. What were you doing the night he escaped, in a car by a broken gap in the wall? There are soldiers who saw you, whom you spoke to. How did you get that file to him? Who helped you?’ Kato roared.
‘I was authorised by the Embassy to liaise with the foreigners. That evening I was on my way to one of their hospitals.’ He attempted to bluff again, but he knew already it would not work.
‘At ten-thirty at night? That part of the wall is very far from any hospital.’ Kato came round the front of the desk to stand before Kenjiro. He hit him suddenly about the face with such force Kenjiro keeled back between the two men who held him.
‘Where is the woman, where has she gone?’
‘I know nothing of her,’ Kenjiro stammered, the blows reverberating through him.
‘Liar.’ Kato slapped his face again. ‘You were seen with her also. She has married the British newspaper man who is filling the foreign press with evil talk about Japan. Who is giving the man this information? Who has given him the pictures of Nanking he has printed abroad? Only through a Japanese here could he have got these pictures.’ Kato was incensed.
‘Ask the Russian woman,’ Kenjiro replied. ‘I know nothing of any pictures.’ His lips were beginning to swell. Kato made no sense to him. Perhaps the woman had spread some lies about to save herself.
Kato’s eyes filled with fury. The slapping began again. ‘As you well know, she has left the country. Gone to Hong Kong, maybe even America I am told.’
‘I know nothing of her,’ he managed to answer. Blood was running down his chin. Everything Kato told him was news.
‘But you know the Chinese Communist,’ Kato screamed. ‘Where is he? Do you work as a cell? Who are your connections in Tokyo? Who are your connections in Moscow? You Communists, you liberals, you traitors make me sick.’
Soon, as he knew they would, they dragged him down into those rooms where Nadya and Teng had both been taken. The windows had been bricked up, but for a slot near the ceiling. The beatings began.
Now that the immunity of privilege was gone, now that there was no deeper place into which to fall, now that he retained nothing of himself but those thoughts that came weakly into his mind, he saw that this moment had waited for him. If he looked back down the tunnel of his life, it appeared like a dark shape, moving towards him. He looked up from the floor of the cell, to the slit of light near the ceiling. A strip of blue sky lit the dark, damp bricks. By the changing intensity of light he came to gauge the time of day. He wondered if at the Embassy they had tried to secure his release, if the Ambassador had made an effort on his behalf? Probably they would want nothing more to do with him, once the accusations against him were known. In the dimness he watched a beetle scuttle from a crevice and disappear through the slit of light out into the world. He had never expected to envy a beetle.
At times they seemed intent on killing him. Through the labyrinth of pain he clung to the thought, sinuous and unbreakable in him, that this was not his end. It was difficult to understand why this thread twisted through him, and would not disappear. And for some reason, the pain was always stopped short of that moment beyond endurance. Perhaps they had decided he had nothing of worth to say. They asked always about the Indian, Dayal, and about Teng. The questions about Teng never ended. Kenjiro said nothing.
He saw that this breaking of another’s body was a job to his torturers, as was killing a job to the soldier. He had always thought such men must derive sadistic pleasure, but now he was not so sure, in spite of the energy they showed. There was something impassive in their faces. This impassiveness frightened him as much as any spark of sadistic life. They obeyed orders, as had those soldiers in Nanking, locked into their situation, powered by authority, a belief in their right and his own meaninglessness to them. It seemed as if something essential within each man had shut down, and another unknowable part opened up. In repose the men had not the faces of killers. They stopped at times to drink green tea. Once, they offered him some. And yet, they were impervious to his agony and degradation.
Half-stupefied later in his cell, unable to move for pain, thought floated strangely in and out of his head. Now that he was also a victim, like the multitudes of this city had been victims of similar soldiers, he wondered about the nature of these men. In fitful sleep questions of inordinate complexity appeared to him. The answers drifted through him as spiritual illuminations. They piled up in his mind, like scientific equations on a blackboard that attempted to answer the meaning of the universe. When he awoke they were gone. The great meanings he had grasped vanished as his sleep dissolved. Only one thing remained in his mind. He was sure now that all men were no more than the sum of their deeds. It was as the old wisdoms said. Men became what they did. The deliberate decision to do evil must lead to a man becoming evil. Its root would be planted within him forever. He felt a strange compassion then, for those who waited to beat him.
He thought then too of those hundreds of thousands of his countrymen who had swarmed so viciously upon this city, and every other hamlet or town in China. He knew them as simple country boys, who lived near the earth and its laws. He knew their commanders as men of sophistication, who relished honour, beauty and discipline. Restraint was ingrained in their lives. And yet now all were touched, whether they recognised it or not, by this one inescapable darkness, like a bruise spreading through their soul. When the war was over and they returned to lives of normal humanity, how would they forget that darkness? Would they live in some state of internal crucifixion, carrying forever the tension of their opposite souls? These questions had a weird beauty and seemed, in those hours he lay inert, far bigger than his pain or the question of whether he lived or died.
The beatings stopped. He was no longer dragged in and out of the cell at unpredictable times. He wondered if they would release him, shoot him? Instead the days passed in darkness. Nobody came. At certain hours the door was opened and he cringed, but it slammed again once a bowl of food was pushed through. Strangely, the food was not bad. There was enough and it was not without taste or variety. Here prisoners were not in the normal order of things, but a rare punctuation between the shooting of criminals. The food he received was, he guessed, leftovers from the officers’ mess in the Military Headquarters.
The jagged edge of terror that had sharpened each day as he waited for the beatings, was blunted. Now time entered limbo. He realised with a new and duller fear that he could be left here indefinitely, for years. Forever. People would forget him, think he was dead. In this darkness he would fade, his strength sapped slowly. Perhaps this was what they intended. Death was too easy. They wished for the destruction of his personality. Pain and fear had become his only existence and through it he had lost significance, in not only the eyes of his torturers, but also to himself. They had pushed him to the limits of their own darkness. And yet something still struggled in him to exist.
Now his past life seemed as narrow and cramped about him as this cell. He thought of the tube of a kaleidoscope through which o
ne gazed at the illusions of light and shape. When dispassionately examined all that had held one transfixed was a slither of glass and some bits of coloured paper. Perhaps life was really like that. A great trick, an illusion, a sleight of hand. Perhaps this blackness pressing about him, and that great pit of depravity to which he had stood witness for so many weeks, perhaps that was the reality. Light, in every manifestation appeared unreal now. He could no longer even gauge the time he had been by himself in the cell. Perhaps the force of darkness was the true reality, and not the force of light. What was the sum of these two forces in the universe? Did they balance forever between them some immense, unknowable conundrum? Were they two faces of the same thing? His mind ached with confusion.
Finally Kato came, stepping into the darkness of the cell, bringing light through the open door. He stood, legs apart, haloed by brilliance, appearing huge and powerful from the mat where Kenjiro lay. He said nothing, looking down silently upon Kenjiro’s inert form. The door closed upon him, there was darkness again.
Soon soldiers came, dragging him out into an open courtyard. The searing light, after so many buried days, dazzled him. He saw that there were men with guns. They blindfolded him roughly. He felt the hard wood of a post up against his back and more ropes pulled tight about him.
Now that he knew no further effort was needed, a calmness filled him. Something must lie ahead. And that journey would be stranger than this earthly one. Pain now meant little to him. This would be a blacking out, a cutting off from it all at last. He turned his face up to the sun, feeling its warmth after all the dank, nightmarish days. It appeared to him then as a sudden last gift, to guide him forward. The heat sank into his flesh. Even through the blindfold the light blazed hotly upon his eyes. He turned his thoughts then to that force of goodness he had thought about upon the Nanking river bank. It could not actively save, and yet it would save. It was there behind everything, waiting. He was filled by some immense conviction that he could frame in no thoughts or words. He found the strength then to pull himself up against the wooden post, to stand erect. At last he heard the bark of command. The shots came suddenly, slicing the air near his ear. He felt nothing and the post still pressed against his back.
Slowly then, he became aware of a sound. His knees were trembling and, but for the ropes, he would have fallen. He strained to make sense of the noise. At first he thought it the cawing of crows. Then he realised it was laughter. His blindfold was removed, and also the ropes. Colonel Kato stood to one side; he laughed, but his face held no humour. Kenjiro was pushed forward, and stumbled at Kato’s feet.
The Colonel bent forward. His eyes were narrow, dark as granite. ‘You are lucky, traitor. It seems you have friends in Tokyo. Very high-up friends who have spoken for you. Since we have no solid proof of your involvement in the matter of the Communist’s escape, they have demanded your release. But of course, we both know, proof or no proof, that the man Teng is free because of you. We know, you and I, who is a traitor. You are to be returned to Japan. Do not think you will have it easy there. You return in disgrace. Maybe soon you will wish we had killed you.’
Kenjiro remembered little of the journey back to Japan. He was held in a cabin on his own on the ship, and not allowed up on the deck. Fukutake brought his belongings to the dock and was allowed to speak to Kenjiro before he sailed.
‘There was nothing anyone could do. The Ambassador’s efforts were useless. And of course there was proof against you, although circumstantial. You have brought this upon yourself, I did warn you. All I could do was to inform your father. I thought if anyone could do anything, it would be he with his connections. I was just hoping they didn’t shoot you before he could arrange something. You are lucky.’
Kenjiro was taken on his return to a gaol. It was comfortable in comparison to the damp dark cell in Nanking, but nobody contacted or visited him. It was some weeks before he was released. His father came to collect him.
They sat in silence in the car. Kenjiro was shocked at the change in his father’s appearance. It was several years now since Kenjiro’s last visit to Japan. Yuzuru Nozaki stared straight ahead. He had suffered a mild stroke two years before and he walked now with the help of a cane. One side of his mouth sagged slightly. He had aged, shrunk into himself in a way Kenjiro had not imagined possible. Yuzuru lived now in semi-retirement, going into the Ministry occasionally, in the capacity of a consultant.
‘How did you manage to free me?’ Kenjiro asked.
‘There are those who still owe me. People at the pinnacle of power. But in these difficult times everything seems a matter of luck.’ Yuzuru nodded at the chauffeur’s back to indicate discretion.
His mother wiped tears from her eyes as he entered the house. He watched emotions struggle in her face and felt guilt settle heavily upon him. Naomi had grown; already he could see the woman in her. She hung back shyly and he as yet knew no way to reach her. He pressed her arm and looked at the grey eyes, so much like Jacqueline’s.
Something in his father seemed irrevocably changed. He did not yet know if it was the stroke or his own disgrace that might have brought about this new submission. He had expected only rebuff from Yuzuru. No one could deny the shame he must now live with because of the manner of Kenjiro’s return. And yet, instead, Kenjiro felt his father’s support.
Yuzuru poured a drink. They sat together overlooking the garden where, in the past, they had so often sat and argued. Kenjiro stared at the old lantern, standing as he had left it. He felt returned to himself in this house. The last year appeared now like figments of a nightmare, dissolving before the morning light.
‘Did you do what they said? Did you help this Communist escape? What is the truth? You owe me at least the truth.’ His father spoke gruffly, and threw back his drink.
‘It was Teng.’ Kenjiro explained everything then to Yuzuru. The sake hit his weakened body hard. His head swam suddenly and he felt sick.
‘They will shoot you if they ever know. Will this Indian keep his mouth shut?’ Yuzuru asked, his face lined by sudden anxiety.
‘I do not know,’ Kenjiro admitted.
‘These things you have told me, did they really happen in Nanking? Is it possible that our army can have behaved like this? Is it not an exaggeration? Here we have heard nothing. We are fed news only of victory.’ Yuzuru sighed, and then continued.
‘We are now all but in the hands of Colonel Tojo. He is to be elevated to the rank of General and it is rumoured is soon to be made Vice Minister for War. These military men run the country now. It is not to my liking. We no longer produce men of genius. The military takes a dim view of genius.’ Yuzuru’s voice was filled with resentment. ‘I fear the Kempeitai will now marry itself to us with your return. We will be observed day and night.’
‘In this country we seem not to know ourselves inwardly in anything but a rudimentary manner. If we did we could not do otherwise than assert ourselves. But self-assertion is immoral and self-sacrifice the sensible course. In this war we have all become deaf mutes. We crush anything that resists society. And we exalt anything, good or bad, that serves it. This is dangerous.’ Kenjiro spoke bitterly.
‘As a society we run well enough. Better than many. You have imbibed too many Western ideas. I believe in our society.’ Yuzuru frowned, happy to mount his high horse for a moment.
‘There is danger in these mass-produced army heroes,’ Kenjiro replied. ‘We lack moral courage in the Western sense, but we have physical courage in excess of any nation. Is this not a dangerous paradox in these militant times? We follow where we are led, never querying what we are told by our leaders.’ He thought again of Nanking, of those killing fields that seemed to him suddenly the very image of the future. A sudden fear filled him, and he turned to his father.
‘This lauding of physical courage in its narrowest way, has become a national industry. Ideas are feared, only instincts are cultivated. We have never been afraid of death. But this age offers something different, a debasement of t
hose values that Japan grew strong upon. There is no nobility in this industry of killing. The killing of others, or of oneself or of being killed, this is now all being manipulated in our minds into a single notion of heroism. This is what the military wants. It will sacrifice our people to their ambition. Our military leaders are not men of any great stature. They set no example of greatness. And yet they demand from the people the ultimate sacrifice of greatness. They demand their very lives.’ The words poured from Kenjiro.
Yuzuru Nozaki looked into his sake cup and did not answer. He appeared old and tired. Once he might have argued any number of points in Kenjiro’s impassioned outburst. Now, after some moments, he changed the subject.
‘I have arranged for you to work at the Ministry. For the moment, because of these circumstances, the job is not much. Ill health is the best explanation we can give for your return. And judging by your appearance many will have no trouble believing you. If times improve, we must trust, so will your future. For now you must lie low. And even here, in this house, unless we are alone, do not speak freely. The Kempeitai are everywhere. They plant their spies amongst even the servants. Nowhere are we safe. They may come for you again at any time.’ His father spoke in a whisper.
‘I have brought disgrace, and persecution upon us all,’ Kenjiro answered, lowering his eyes.
‘It is late. I am tired. I am an old man now.’ His father began to rise from the table. Kenjiro bent to help him and Yuzuru accepted his arm.
