The Piano Teacher (32 page)

“If I lose my pass because of this, you’ll be the first to pay,” she says lightly. She pushes the door open. “Otsubo-san! The valiant Will Truesdale is here to tell us of the wonderful resortlike conditions in Stanley. Was it coq au vin at dinner last night? And I heard you have entertainment now. The Stanley Players?” And she’s off, bubbling with vivacious energy, going around the room, dispensing kisses and quixotic pronouncements, clinking ice in highballs, as if she hasn’t a care in the world, as if she hadn’t fixed him with a long, pleading look right before they entered.

Dominick joins them for lunch, and Will notices the way Otsubo looks at him with barely disguised contempt, and yet, now his hand lingers on Dominick’s shoulder longer than necessary, he allows Dominick to serve him food, and Dominick treats him with a servile facility that sickens Will. So that’s how it goes, he thinks. The sophisticate becomes the dog and the soldier becomes the master. Brute force trumps all in the end, doesn’t it.

Still, this is not what concerns him. What’s been eating at him since they alighted from the car and made their way to Trudy’s suite is something else entirely.

What is making him uneasy is his own unwillingness to compromise and where it might be coming from—the niggling feeling that he cannot shake: that he is calling his reluctance integrity, but what it might be is simply cowardice.

ARBOGAST IS SCREAMING. Will cannot stand to hear it, cannot stand not to hear it. He is frozen, wants to clap his hands over his ears, wants to scream himself. Around Will, the adults are pale and silent, mothers rushing the children away.

Usually the guards take the unfortunate suspects away to a far-off house where they are made to sign their confessions, written long before they start to talk. But Arbogast! They had come silently, grimly, filled with purpose—two men—and seized him under his arms and dragged him to Ohta’s office, just next to the officers’ mess. He had gone quietly, but then the screaming started.

It has been three days since Will returned from his furlough and he has made it a point to avoid Arbogast, as if even coming close to the man will transmit his secret to him—a secret he has no intention of learning if he can help it.

He doesn’t want to know anything about Arbogast. If he is the type of man to keep a secret to the end, if he is the kind of man who will value his family more than his country, or if he is the kind of man who will take a deal to better his circumstances. He wants to know nothing. Instead, he tries to ignore him—the once proud man with his swollen beriberi feet, dragging around the camp, complaining about his wife and his dysentery.

The door opens and Arbogast is brought out, bucking. Strange how violence is not as vivid in real life. There are only a few streaks of blood. Mostly the impression is that he is wet. The water torture. They take him to the outskirts now. He is still screaming but his voice is starting to fray from the exertion. Will’s own throat hurts from the tearing sounds coming from Arbogast’s mouth.

So this is the man he reveals himself to be, Will thinks suddenly, inappropriately, bloodlessly—a man who screams when he is in danger. He hopes he himself will be silent. But one never knows.

 

Johnnie is at his side suddenly. They watch the man being dragged off again.

“That poor devil,” he says. “I wonder what they think he’s done.”

“Does it matter?” Will says.

“Not at all,” Johnnie says. He glances at Will. “What a cynic you’ve become.”

The next day, Arbogast is brought by two soldiers to his room and dumped unceremoniously on his bed, where Regina has a fit, falling and having hysterics on the floor while her husband lies, nearly unconscious, above her. His right hand is gone, the stump of his wrist wrapped in bloody rags.

Some sensible women drag Regina away and ply her with tea while the doctor is summoned. He shakes his head, powerless without any equipment, any medicine.

“What can I do?” he says. “He will live or die. That is all.”

They leave him there, with the powerless doctor, his face swollen blue beyond recognition, blood from the wound soaking through layers of ripped sheets. In the morning, the other residents of D Block will complain they could get no sleep because of the old man’s moaning. Arbogast, the rich businessman, has been reduced to this, and the others have been reduced to that.

The secret must be out now, Will thinks. And that should be that.

VICTOR CHEN was in a panic. Even Claire could see that, hidden away in the piano room. He was streaming from room to room, shouting at the servants, shouting at Melody, picking up the phone and banging it down again.

For the sake of the child, she tried to keep the lesson going but it was almost impossible. After a door slammed for the third time, she reached over and shut the instruction book.

“Well, Locket, what do you say?” she said.

“About what, Mrs. Pendleton?”

For the first time, Claire felt sorry for Locket. What must it be like to live in a house like this with parents like Melody and Victor? The child’s face was heartbreakingly smooth, the Oriental skin almost glossy, her eyes curious hazel orbs. Claire reached over and tucked a loose strand behind Locket’s ear. The maternal gesture surprised her almost as much as it did the girl herself, who gave a quick, shy smile.

“How about we finish a little early?”

“All right, Mrs. Pendleton.” Locket got up quickly, bumping the piano, and spilled the glass of water that had been sitting on top. “Oops,” she giggled. “Mummy says I’m very clumsy.”

“You just have to be more careful,” Claire said. “All children are careless.”

“Mummy says I give her a headache,” Locket said more somberly. “I’m not to disturb her in the afternoons anymore so that’s why she’s got me signed up for so many lessons.”

“I’m sure she wants you to grow up to be an accomplished lady with many interests.” Claire patted her head.

“We’re having a party!” Locket brightened. “For the queen’s coronation. Daddy got a big honor from the queen, you know.”

“Yes, I heard. You must be very proud.”

“I’m getting a new dress. It’s a tangerine silk taffeta with guipure lace,” the girl recited carefully. “Mummy had the lace flown in from France and it’s the only one of its kind in Hong Kong.”

“That sounds lovely, Locket.” The girl beamed, then looked uncertain.

“Of course,” Locket faltered, confessed, “it’s just the leftover from Mummy’s dress. She had some extra so she gave it to me so I could have it put on mine.”

“I’m sure you’ll both look a treat,” Claire said.

The reason Victor Chen was in such a state, Claire surmised, was what had appeared in the paper today. It had been relegated to page 7, pushed back by the relentless, breathless coverage of Princess Elizabeth and the latest details of her procession to Westminster Abbey, but it was still there—a small column about the formation of a War Crimes Committee, to be headed by a Sir Reginald Lythgoe, based on new information that had come to light. Will had pointed it out to her earlier in the afternoon.

“It’s bloody unfathomable!” she heard Victor shout into the phone. “It’s a witch hunt. The war’s been over for a decade and they want to dredge up this rubbish. You tell Davies I won’t forget this. It’s pure anti-Chinese sentiment. They can’t stand to see someone do well, and the OBE was just the last . . . That wretched old woman was playing Chopin on the Government House piano the entire war, drinking scotch and dining on veal, under my protection! She has no right . . .”

Someone shut a door so his voice was muffled.

Locket smiled.

“So I can go?”

“Yes,” Claire said. “Run along.”

Claire let herself out quietly, without running into Melody or Victor. She had an appointment with Edwina Storch.

The old woman had rung her up last week, asking to get together for a cup of tea. They decided on the Librarians’ Auxiliary in Mid-Levels, and Claire had arranged to meet her on the next Thursday, today.

The bus stopped outside the building on Tregunter Path and Claire got out. Miss Storch was just entering the clubhouse. Claire stopped to watch her. She had on a pink hat, under which her salt-and-pepper bun peeked. Her bottom was wide and encased in a matching pink cotton skirt that went to the knee. Varicose veins trailed down her thick calves, and as she walked with her cane, she swayed ever so slightly from side to side. She stopped to catch her breath outside the door, then stepped up and went inside.

Behind her, Claire waited, then walked to the door and pushed it open herself. Inside, it was dark and cool, fans swaying as they turned, and heavy damask curtains shielding the furniture against the bright sun outside. Claire squinted, trying to make out the shapes in the room.

“Hullo,” said Edwina Storch. Claire jumped. Edwina Storch had taken off her spectacles and was rubbing them with the hem of her jacket. “They steam up in this humidity, you know.”

“Hello, Miss Storch,” she said. “I was right behind you on the path but it was just too hot to rush.”

The old woman did not reiterate her past desire to be addressed by her first name.

“Yes, it’s terrible out there, isn’t it,” she said, pulling out a white handkerchief and wiping her forehead. “Does something to the character but I haven’t pinned it down yet. It’s something that people who live here over twenty years develop but I can’t put a name to it.”

“The heat?” Claire said.

“Yes. Most of your day is spent trying to avoid it. And the endlessness of it. Always at war with the elements, instead of in harmony with them. That’s us, the British colonials, battling against our circumstances, always.” Miss Storch peered at Claire. She was reminded of the first time she had met her and the gaze that had almost made her faint. “Shall we sit?”

“Certainly.”

Claire was unsure as to why Edwina Storch had rung her up. The old woman moved slowly, and was treated with great respect by the staff.

“Lovely to see you again, Miss Storch,” said the manageress, who had come out to greet them. “So nice that you can come into town and see us.”

“Do you know Mrs. Maxwell?” Edwina asked Claire. “She’s been around almost as long as I have.”

They shook hands and were escorted into the dining room—more of the heavy damask curtains, a mix of old, good tables and new chairs, too shiny.

“We have your favorite currant scones today,” Mrs. Maxwell said. “And the good Chinese oolong.”

“Splendid,” Edwina said as she lowered herself carefully into a chair. “You’re too kind, Harriet. We’ll both have the high tea, please.”

“It’s very pleasant here,” Claire said. “It’s my first time.”

“Not too bad,” Edwina said. “During the war, I spent a few nights here.”

“Yes,” Claire said.

The waitress came over and poured water for them into faded, scratched glasses.

“There’s something sad about the Eurasian, isn’t there?”Edwina Storch said, looking after the girl as she left. “Something incomplete, something wanting in them. I always feel they are searching for something to make them whole.”

“Do you think so?” Claire said politely. “I find them very attractive, actually, with their beautiful skin and golden eyes and hair. When I first was in Hong Kong, I did find them odd-looking, but now I think they are just splendid.”

“Hmph,” snorted the old woman. “You’re young and romantic. The children feel dreadful because they are not accepted by either race.”

Claire had not thought Miss Storch to be so narrow-minded when her own lifestyle was not at all conventional.

As if she could sense what Claire was thinking, Miss Storch drew herself up slightly. “Mary and I have always led our lives with good Christian values!” she said. “We love all of God’s creatures, even the less fortunate.”

“Of course,” said Claire.

The Eurasian girl came over again with a pot of tea. She set down the cups and put a strainer on each of them. Her eyes were downcast, steady on the table.

“I’ll pour,” said Miss Storch, dismissing her.

“You don’t think she’s attractive?” Claire asked. She felt an obstinate urge to pursue the matter.

“Claire,” Miss Storch said. “I do not. She is unfortunate. She is lucky to have a respectable job because I am sure that her father left her mother after he had his fun with her. You know, that’s how most of these situations are.” She poured the hot tea into Claire’s cup. Claire lifted up the milk pitcher.

“You don’t pour milk into this sort of tea!” Miss Storch barked. Claire’s hand hung suspended in the air, frozen. “The whole point of this tea is to have it unadulterated. Put that milk down. I don’t know why they even give us milk.”

Claire paused and then poured the milk into her tea.

“I prefer my tea with milk,” she said.

Miss Storch stared at her, then took off her spectacles and started rubbing them again.