The Rose of Singapore (16 page)

Further along the street, seemingly oblivious to the fact that they were in a red-light district and that they might be seized at any moment by the military police, a group of rowdy British soldiers returning to their unit split the night air with their hollering. One of the soldiers, following in an unsteady gait some distance behind the others, began a bawdy song about a girl who sold her ass in Piccadilly, but his comrades drowned out his feeble efforts with their own rowdiness. A taxi glided alongside them and with a lot of shouting and coarse language they all bundled into it, and the taxi sped away.

Nearby, another British soldier, tall, broad-shouldered and clad in a jungle-green uniform, stood outside the bar chatting up a vivacious and petite Chinese girl of less than five feet in height, dwarfing her. He had consumed a few Tiger beers, but not enough to make him drunk, just a little tipsy. And why shouldn't he be a little tipsy? This was his first night of R and R on the island after spending eight months with his tank regiment up in the northern part of Malaya. He had done his share of killing, and he had seen several fellow British soldiers in his regiment killed. Now, he just wanted to forget the war and have a woman. Those were his regiment mates who had bundled themselves so noisily into the taxi. They were looking for a rowdier bar and more beer but he needed a woman, not more booze. Bareheaded, his khaki beret loosely rolled in his hand, he stood looking down at the lovely almond eyes beneath silky black hair which reached no higher than his navel. He liked the smiling little face that peered mischievously up at him. He also liked the way she was dressed; her light blue
cheongsam
hugged her smooth and tightly, accentuating the curves of her petite body. Admiringly, he looked her up and down, at the little mounds that were her breasts beneath the tight-fitting dress, and at the creamy-coloured thighs displayed provocatively between the splits in her dress. Her hands, too, he noticed, were delicate and tiny, and her arms soft and creamy-coloured in the moonlight. Under her arm she carried a small handbag that matched the colour of her dress. He looked into the uplifted face again. She had a lovely face, he thought, not a hard face that one might expect of a prostitute; and he liked the way her shining, jet black hair fell in waves down around her shoulders. He wanted her, and he wondered how much she charged.

She, in turn, was studying him. Could he be more than just a little drunk? Was he a mean or nasty type, or violent, or an abuser of women? Almost always these thoughts went through her mind during the initial encounter and bargaining time which normally followed. But whatever her feelings towards him, he had money, and she needed money. Obviously he had consumed alcohol but he was steady on his feet and his voice was not slurred. He seemed all right, so she hoped to make him a customer.

So far that night business had not been good, she had had only the one customer. At the Butterfly Club the competition had been fierce. There had been too few men and far too many younger girls than she, so she had left there unescorted. The Long Bar at the Raffles Hotel was surprisingly quiet and lacking in men, too, so, disappointed, she departed from there also without a client. And on catching a taxi to the Lucky World amusement park she found that the open-air coffeeshops, where at times she solicited her business, had been drowned out by the many hours of rain. Most people, on coming out of the theatres, night clubs, bars and dance halls, finding a deluge of rain pouring from the heavens, had done the sensible thing, they had gone home, or back to their unit, or had returned to their ship. Because of the rain most men had not made that planned excursion to have a quickie or an all-night session with one of the girls; that venture could wait until a drier night. So now, this prostitute, as well as the majority of the other girls who worked the streets, had had very little, if any, business. They cursed the rain, even though it had ceased over an hour ago. Now, a bright full moon shone overhead in a cloudless sky full of stars.

The Chinese girl talking to the soldier had been lucky enough to have already entertained an Australian sailor that evening, but it had only been for a ‘short time'. The sailor had, however, made a date to spend Saturday night with her. Financially, Saturday night was usually her busiest and best night of the week, so the price agreed upon was high; it had to be high, as generally she could earn far more money on ‘short times' than by men paying her for an all-night session. But her price had not appeared to daunt the Australian sailor, for on leaving her home his last words to her were that he was prepared to pay any amount she asked, and that he looked forward to seeing her again on Saturday night. He had spent a little more than half an hour in her bed, had paid her well, departed satisfied, and ten minutes later she was back on Lavender Street.

Her thoughts returned to Peter, and she winced at the thought of him finding out what she was doing. He would be asleep now, in the cooks' billet at the camp, unsuspecting, trusting and completely ignorant of the life she led. What would happen if he found out the truth about how she earned her livelihood, she wondered. But how could she keep it from him? She had thought of him often and she was thinking of him when, at the entrance to the bar, she had met the soldier who now stood towering over her. Almost angrily she had shaken Peter from her mind. She needed money, and the only way she could get money was to earn it—the old-fashioned way.

“Hello, soldier,” she said. “You like go my house for good fucky-fucky? I give good ‘short time'.”

The soldier winced, momentarily taken aback by the crudeness of this lovely little woman. But he asked her, “How much?”

Without hesitation, she replied, “Twenty dollars.”

“Aw! Come on, luv! I want to borrow it, not buy the damned thing,” he said.

The girl shrugged, laughed, and she again thought of the funny little Frenchman who had visited her some nights ago and who, while in bed with her, had jokingly said that Parisian prostitutes had the saying, “Beesness is ze beesness, and love is ze bullsheet.” The saying and the way the Frenchman had said it had amused her; she had remembered it and now wanted to repeat it to this potential customer balking at her price.

Stifling a giggle, she said, “My price is twenty dollars.”

“That's too fucking much,” said the soldier.

“Have you spent all your money on beer?” asked the girl.

“So what if I have?” the soldier replied irritably. “Today's my mate's birthday, and we've just come down from up north. We've been on a bit of a piss-up.”

The girl ignored his remarks. “My price is still twenty dollars,” she said, and she gave him a big smile, “Come on, Johnny, you look a nice boy. I give to nice boy very good short time for only twenty dollars. Don't you think me worth twenty dollars?”

“Hell, I don't know! But I can't afford that much.”

“Then I suggest you go back to camp and do what other boys do,” she said indifferently. “You know, wanky wanky, money in the banky.”

Annoyed, the soldier said, “Go to hell!”

Also ignoring this remark, the girl turned from him. She was disappointed. For a Sunday night, customers were few and far between. Still, it was not yet two o'clock. She might find someone yet, especially as it looked as if the rain would keep off for the remainder of the night. She would walk Lavender Street for another hour, then, with or without a client, she would return to her apartment, go to bed and sleep. She had walked only a few yards when she heard heavy footsteps following her. Turning, she saw that it was the soldier, who with long strides was catching up to her.

“I thought you were on your way back to camp,” she said.

“Look ‘ere,” he replied. “Stop a minute. Let's talk.”

“Well, you heard my price,” she said.

“Look! I'm not a bloody officer, and I'm not a rubber planter. I'm a squaddy. I can't afford twenty bucks, but I'll give you ten.”

“Make it fifteen and I'm yours,” she said. “Because I like your looks.”

“Atta girl. Now we're getting somewhere,” said the soldier. “You make it twelve and you've got yourself a deal.”

She studied his face for moments before replying. He was very young, probably not yet twenty. It was a pity he had been drinking, she thought. She never trusted men who had had too much to drink. They could be dangerous. However, a client was a client, drunk or sober, and she thought of the money. Twelve dollars wasn't much, but it was better than nothing. She knew that it was a lot of money to this young soldier on his lowly pay; not like that of many of her customers. Low ranking servicemen were the lowest paid white men in the colony, which made her feel some empathy towards him. Agreeing, she said, “OK Johnny, twelve dollars. But you pay taxi driver.”

“What taxi driver? We'll walk!” said the soldier.

“OK! But it would be safer if you go my home in taxi.”

“Why?”

“Don't you know what street you are in? This is Lavender Street. You're out of bounds.”

“Christ! Am I? Well, who gives a fuck?”

“You should. So far you have been lucky. If you get picked up by the military police you will be in big trouble, and there will be no fucky-fucky for you tonight.”

The soldier began to laugh. “I don't give a damn about the military police, but I'd hate to miss the fucky-fucky. All right, twelve bucks it is. Get a taxi.” Then he said to her, “I hope you're clean.”

“I'm clean, Johnny. I can show you my card. It's stamped and signed up to date.”

“I believe you,” the soldier said.

Having watched and awaited the outcome of the bargaining from his cruising taxi, the driver, seeing his services were now required, drew level with the odd-looking couple standing talking together on the sidewalk. He reached back and flipped open a rear door. “Where to, Johnny?” he asked quite pleasantly. Business had been brisk for him while it was raining, but for the last hour fares were few and far between. Now, he did not mind going short distances, even a street or two.

“Wherever she wants to go,” answered the soldier.

“OK Johnny,” said the driver, smiling a hello to the girl. She used his cab often. He watched as the soldier followed the girl into the back seat, and when they were seated he spoke to her in Chinese. She nodded. He knew where to take them.

The taxi sped along notorious Lavender Street, a street where brothels, opium dens and gambling houses flourished. But for those who were unaware, it was just another street where dilapidated living quarters overhung shopfronts, the stone walls and woodwork a mass of blistering, dirty paintwork. In the daytime when sunny, laundry, like flags of many nations, hung from long bamboo poles stretched from window ledges out across the street. And where there were no shopfronts and tenements there were shoddy garages, scrap metal dumps, boiler repair works and other eyesores.

Passing a ship's boiler repair shop where several huge boilers lay grotesquely shapeless in the shadows of the moonlit yard, the taxi left Lavender Street and turned into Bendemeer Road. Soon the girl's home was reached, a building typical of the Chinese architecture common in that area—a house within a row of houses, the second floor overhanging the sidewalk and supported on stone pillars. Laundry hanging from poles sticking out of windows normally festooned this street, too, but not on this rainy night.

The taxi stopped. “Is this it?” asked the soldier.

“Yes,” replied the girl. “Give the driver two dollars.”

The soldier did as bid and, on alighting, he followed the girl into a narrow alleyway. A mongrel dog sniffed at his ankles, and chickens in a wire enclosure clucked nearby, annoyed at having been disturbed at such a late hour.

On their arrival at a green painted door near the end of the alley, the girl took a key from her handbag, unlocked the door, pushed it open and stepped inside. She beckoned the soldier to follow her. Locking the door behind them, she led the way through a small kitchen where a wok sat on a fire that had long gone out, and where there were blackened cooking pans hanging from a whitewashed wall. Watched by the eyes of a wrinkled-faced old Chinese woman, she ushered him up a flight of canvas-covered stairs where, at the top, she pushed open a sliding door made of wallpapered bamboo. Drawing aside a heavy curtain covering the entrance, she said, “Come, step inside, soldierboy. Don't be bashful.”

Again the soldier did as he was told by stepping into a room that was a living room and bedroom combined. The bed was the main feature of the room, its headboard backed up against the far wall. The soldier looked at the inviting bed, at the two pillows and he smiled ruefully as he read, ‘Good morning,' that was embroidered on both pillows in letters of silk. In a corner of each pillow, also in embroidered silk, was a pair of blue and yellow swallows in flight.

Casually, the young soldier looked about him, at whatever else furnished the room. This wasn't the first whorehouse he had been in, not by a long chalk, but he was curious; unless drunk he was always curious when visiting a whorehouse. The canvas on the floor was freshly polished he noted and the room was clean and tidy. But the majority of whorehouses were clean and tidy, those that he had visited these past two years since his arrival in the Far East.

“Do you like my room?” the girl asked.

The soldier shrugged his shoulders, “I've seen better, but I've seen a lot worse,” he answered. He walked to the door of the bathroom and looked inside. A look of surprise came upon his face. “Wow! Now that's different! That's the first modern bathroom I've seen in any Chinese whorehouse. Real plumbing, eh?”

“It was specially put in and paid for by me,” said the girl. “It's better for business.”

“You must be the queen around these parts to be able to afford a shithouse like that. Here's my twelve dollars. It'll help pay the water bill.”