The Piano Teacher (31 page)

“It’s too late, Melody,” Will said. “There’s nothing I can do now.”

While they spoke, Claire let herself out, quietly, and stood in the corner of the driveway, heart pounding, waiting.

When Will walked out, he looked angry, his hands shoved deep into his pockets.

“Who is Trudy?” she asked, stepping forward.

He started.

“Not now,” he said. “Not now, Claire. Come with me. Let’s go for a bathe.”

THE SHARKS WERE BACK. They had been sighted off Stanley Beach and Shek O as well. A local man had been dipping his hands in the water while on a diving platform in South Bay, and had a finger nipped off. He had sat in blind panic waving his hand about while screaming until a woman on the beach had heard his cries and they sent a boat out to get him.

Claire and Will liked to bathe at Shek O but they could only go in the early morning or in the late afternoon during the week, when it was unlikely that anyone they knew would see them. On this day, they drove in silence to Will’s flat and picked up some bathing clothes, drove to the beach, and parked the car. They were in luck. The beach was empty.

The sand in Hong Kong was gritty. Will had told her of beaches in India where the sand was like sifted flour, so fine you could almost inhale it. But at Shek O, when the tide went out, there were tidal pools filled with hermit crabs, and in the past they had caught them and Claire had brought them back home and put them in a bowl with seawater until they had started to smell fetid.

“You are a mermaid,” Will said, finally breaking the silence. He was sitting on the straw blanket they had unfurled on the beach, watching her as she undressed.

She still got tongue-tied around him, unable to respond to his teasing. She folded her clothes and put them in her basket. He stood up.

“Let’s swim to the dock,” she said, then remembered. “Do you think there are sharks around?”

“The unfortunate man from last week would say it is a certainty,” he said, getting up.

“Should we bathe, then? I’ve been longing to all day.”

“How adventurous are you feeling?” he asked. They were both facing the water, she slightly behind him.

“Never very, but it’s so hot.” She put her hands flat on his back. He had taken off his shirt and his back was already slick with perspiration. “Do you ever get used to it? The heat?”

“No, you just live in it.” He reached behind and took her hands off his back. He did things like that a lot, gestures that felt like rebukes, ways to keep a distance between them. She pretended not to notice and moved away, walked into the water up to her knees.

“And the water’s never cold here either, is it?”she called back to him. “More like a bath.”

“Yes, Claire,” he said. “Hong Kong is not England.”

She looked toward the horizon. This day had had a jerky quality—things happening that were out of control, that she didn’t know how to react to or how to feel about.

“Why so rude?” she said, but he didn’t hear her, or pretended not to.

He plunged into the water.

“Last one there loses.”

“Wait,” she called. “I don’t . . .” But he was already in the waves, swimming a fast crawl toward the diving platform. She hesitated but, watching him grow smaller and smaller, knew she would have to follow.

“Damn you, Will Truesdale,” she said.

The water had two levels—the warm layer above, heated by the sun, and, somewhere below waist level, the frigid water of the deep. She tried to swim in the warm part, frightened by the cold, but her legs sometimes sank into it.

She did a leisurely breaststroke and tried not to think of sharks. Ahead of her Will pulled up onto the diving platform. His body glistened in the sun. His was an older body, but still lean. He evoked desire in her, so strange when her body was surrounded by water. She swam on, pushing away the panic, the desire.

By the time she got to the platform, she was furious.

“I told you I didn’t want to swim out here.”

“You didn’t.”

“Only because you were so far out already you couldn’t hear me.” She sat away from him, on the bobbing disk. “You gave me no choice.”

“Don’t be angry, kitten.”

She didn’t answer, just twisted her hair into a ponytail and squeezed the water out. The drops puddled onto the wood and disappeared into a large dark stain.

“Do you remember the first time we were on a platform?” He was trying to make amends. “Doesn’t it seem so long ago?”

On the beach, a local couple appeared, set up a blanket and an umbrella.

“It does, yes,” she allowed. Then, “You should know I can go. You could lose me.”

He nodded, understanding, capitulating for the moment.

“You don’t need me anymore, Claire, if you ever did.”

“Yes,” she said.

They sat together peaceably now, the pressure let out. The weather was perfect, the sun slowly sinking toward the horizon, a cool breeze coming off the water.

“Will,” she said. “What is going on?”

When he didn’t answer, she said, “You know what I’m talking about. Everyone is behaving in such a queer manner, and you’re at the heart of it.”

He lay down and shut his eyes.

“You know, the most absurd things happened during the war,” he said. “Do you know that while we were interned, the Japanese administration presented us with a bill for accommodation and food? Can you imagine? And we couldn’t very well throw it back in their face, so we had to tell them we would write promissory notes that would be honored by our government when everything had been worked out. They wanted us to pay for the rotten vegetables and cup of rice we got every week.”

“But now?”she asked.

“I’m getting there,” he said with an edge to his voice. “Just listen.”

He began again.

“And so we danced with them, our captors, although it was always a fine line between being good and being proud. We always hoped. There were small things like growing the vegetables in the garden inaVso that when it sprouted up, it would be a nice surprise and an encouragement. Childish, you know. One never gets used to being a prisoner, although we got used to our daily routine.

“And people were petty, of course. And others were unbelievably kind and generous. You had all sorts of behavior. The Japs too. There were good ones and bad ones.”

“There was a woman,” Claire said. “Trudy.”

“Yes, Trudy.” He stopped. “Trudy. I think you would have liked her.”

“We are different,” Claire said. She didn’t know why, as she said it, she felt that she was being kind to Will.

Will snorted. “Yes, you are. That’s an understatement. But you would have liked her, I know.”

“You were with her.”

He hesitated. “Yes.”

“And . . .”

“No longer. She’s gone,” he said.

“How? ”

“I failed her,” he said. “She wanted me to come out and live on the outside with her. She was on the outside because she wasn’t British. She got me a pass. But I refused.”

“You didn’t want to leave the people inside the camp?”Claire asked.

“Yes,” he said. “That was part of it. I was helpful inside the camp and could get things done. Certainly no one wanted me to leave. But—” He stopped.

“Yes?”Claire prompted.

“But I think I was afraid too,” he said softly. “If I went outside, it was a whole new world and I’d have to learn the new rules. I would have to start as a beginner, disadvantaged, get my bearings all over again.

“I was tired,” he said simply. “And I didn’t want more change. It was hard in the camp but if you obeyed the rules, you weren’t bothered. Outside it was chaos. Trudy had things snatched from her hands as she walked down the street. Once it was food and the boy crammed some bread in his mouth as he ran. He was starving and couldn’t run properly. He had no shoes and no shirt. I think all he had was the trousers he had on. There was starvation and desperation and misery. She told me about it. There was no filter. It was real.”

He looked at Claire.

“And she died,” Claire said, almost without knowing it.

“Yes, she died.”

“How?”

“Some would say by the hand of her benefactor,” he said. “A man who gave her many things, and took them away when he wanted. If I had been outside with her, he would have controlled me too.”

A mosquito buzzed between them, floating in the damp air.

“He made her do awful things. He found out she was smuggling messages into the camp along with the food, so he made her bring tainted food the next time. Not enough to kill, just sicken, and there was nothing in the way of medical supplies, so people suffered. That’s the kind of bastard he was. I had to tell her the next time she came, and her face just crumpled. She hadn’t known. I believe that still. She hadn’t known but she couldn’t do anything. She didn’t know if he would do it again, or if the food would be all right the next time, and we were in such desperate need that we just took it and ate it.”

“How do you know he did it?”Claire asked. “Maybe it was just a mistake.”

“Oh, yes,” Will said. “We knew. He asked her after she returned how her friends were doing, and he laughed in her face. She only told me that afterward.”

“And Victor?”

“Victor Chen.” He laughed. “Oh, yes, my esteemed employer.”

“But Pwhat? ” she asked. “What of him?”

“What of Victor Chen?” Will said. “What of Victor Chen? How to begin?”

He slapped Claire suddenly on the arm.

“Got it,” he said, lifting up his hand to show a bloodied black spot, a tangle of tiny insect legs and antennae. “Damn bloodsuckers.”

He leaned over and rinsed his hands in the sea. He lifted them up. Drops of water sparkled and dripped from his fingers. He looked at them contemplatively.

“Victor Chen murdered Trudy,” he said.

“A GRATEFUL OTSUBO is what I want,” Trudy is saying. “If he’s grateful, who knows what he’ll do. Maybe he’ll get you repatriated! But you can’t leave. I don’t want to live in England.”

She never asks him again, not directly. She whispers, implies, ingratiates. She dangles rewards before him and then, finally, hate-fully, hints at what may befall her if she does not come through for the man.

“He wants one big payday, you know,” she says. “He is a simple man. He wants to go back to his country, buy some land in the country, and build a cottage for himself and his family. He wants to bring his parents out, take care of them. He’s really a family man.”

As she outlines this outlandish idea, he nods, pretends to listen, possibly agree.

“And he’s getting a wee bit impatient, but I think he’s getting close. He’s found out that Reggie Arbogast is indeed one of the people who was entrusted with the location. So you should know that. He has eyes and ears everywhere and I think they’re making progress. But he does get frustrated . . .” she trails off. “And when he’s frustrated . . .”

 

Three weeks later, another furlough.

“I’m working on getting it weekly for you. Do you like it?” she says when she picks him up. “All the bankers are outside, I don’t see why you shouldn’t be. They’re putting them up at the Luk Kwok and they escort them down to the office every day. I don’t think they’re getting better rations than us, but who knows.”

He gets in the driver’s seat.

“Have you seen Angeline? How is she doing?”

Trudy looks up at the sky.

“Angeline,” she starts. “Angeline seems to have suffered a crisis of conscience, is that what you call it?”

“What happened?”He starts up the car.

“She has gotten all up on herself and has decided that I am not a person that she wishes to associate with. Can you imagine?” She smiles tightly. “The godmother of her child!”

“Did she give you a reason?”

“No,” she says. “I went to visit her in Kowloon and her maid told me she wasn’t home. She was funny about it, though, and when I walked away I looked up and saw Angeline at the window. She

wasn’t even trying to hide. She looked at me straight and then drew the curtains. Very grim.”

“You are presuming . . .”

“Oh, no, darling,” she says. “I know Angeline very well and she doesn’t need to say anything to me for me to know exactly what she is thinking. I’m just hoping you won’t come to the same conclusion. I’m going to become a pariah; I can just see it now.”

He bursts with his own confession.

“Trudy, I haven’t asked.”

She knows immediately what he is talking about.

“Maybe the right time hasn’t come up,” she says.

He cannot lie to her.

“I will not ask,” he says. “It just seems wrong.”

“Oh! You won’t even try!” A choked sound comes from her throat. “Wrong! Well, I can see that.”

“And why would Arbogast tell me anyway?” he finishes lamely. “We aren’t friends.”

She doesn’t speak again until they’re at the Toa.

“Here we are,” she says. “Are you hungry?”

Always the Chinese with their damn food, he thinks.

“No,” he says, getting out of the car. “Are you?”

“Otsubo wants us to meet him for lunch,” she says. “He’s waiting upstairs.”

“And you were going to tell me this when?”he says. “When I sit myself down on his lap?”

“Will!” she cries. “This is serious. Dominick has promised Otsubo he will get the information and that I will help him to get it. I wouldn’t ask you if it weren’t important, but . . .” she trails off.

“Trudy, I can’t help you,” he says. “I cannot.”

“Will,” she says. “If you really knew what was at stake . . .”

But her mouth is set. She knows this man. The question is how much she can manage the other one.

By the time they get to the room, she has shaken off her bad temper. Her moodiness is like a cloak she can take on and off at will.