‘Chang An Lo, you bring light to our humble home and joy to my unworthy heart.’
Chang bowed low to Yi-ling, wife of the shoemaker. ‘It is an honour and a pleasure to see you again. I have travelled far and your home is as always a bed of rose petals for my weary bones.’
He bowed again to emphasise his regard for her. He was always tongue-tied and awkward in her presence, uncertain of how to express his gratitude to this woman. She was broad-hipped and broad-cheeked, with a high forehead, but it was the warmth in her eyes that made her beautiful. He would not presume to guess her age, but she was old enough to be his mother and kind enough to have taken him into her home during that desperate time when his parents were beheaded in Peking.
Yet it was Yi-ling’s husband, Hu Tai-wai, who widened his world. He was the one who had introduced the young Chang, son of a court adviser to the Empress of China, to the ideals and aims of Karl Marx and Communism; the very reverse of all he had previously been exposed to. But Chang had not stayed long, unwilling to endanger their lives by association with him. So he had moved on and that had become the recurring pattern of his life, but a part of his heart had always remained in this woman’s pocket.
She poured tea for him now into small, handle-less cups. ‘The gods have kept you safe. I thank them for that and will take a gift to the temple.’
‘They have been kind to you too. I have never seen Hu Tai-wai so fat and relaxed. He sits out front there at his work, as contented as a cat in the sun.’
She smiled. ‘I wish I could say the same for you, Chang An Lo.’
‘Do I look so bad?’
‘Yes. Like something a dog has spat out.’
‘Then I’ll take a bath, if I may.’
‘You’re welcome. But that’s not what I meant. I was looking only in your eyes, and what I see there tears at my heart.’
Chang lowered his gaze, sipped his tea and for a moment silence settled in the small, humid room, where the air moved sluggishly and reluctantly each time they spoke. Eventually Chang raised his eyes and they both knew that part of their conversation was over.
‘How is Si-qi?’ he asked.
‘My daughter is well.’ Yi-ling’s face lit up, as if the sun had rolled over it. Her eyes met his, intent and hopeful, and instantly he realised what plans blossomed behind them. Si-qi was sixteen, of marriageable age.
‘Go,’ she said and flicked a delicate hand to urge him on his way. ‘Go and speak to her. She’s in the courtyard.’
He stood and bowed with respect. She snorted gleefully.
‘Before I go, Yi-ling, I would like to give you a gift.’
Her thin straight eyebrows rose and she brushed at her black skirt uncomfortably. ‘That is not necessary, Chang An Lo.’
‘I think it is.’
He opened his leather saddlebag and removed something bundled up in an old shirt. He held it out to her. She rose to her feet and accepted it, but when she felt its weight, her smile grew full of curiosity and she unwrapped the gift.
‘Chang An Lo,’ she whispered. Her breath shuddered.
In her hand lay a gun.
‘Yi-ling, I know that your husband refuses to own a firearm any more because he says he is finished with violence. But I fear violence has not yet finished with him, nor with China, so I want you to have -’
Her eyes darted to the door, but Hu Tai-wai was still outside with his leather and needles. Deftly she rewrapped the pistol and slid it into the embroidery workbox beside her chair.
He stepped nearer to her. ‘This is just between us,’ he said. ‘For you.’
She nodded and for the first time in his life she leaned close, smelling of sandalwood, and kissed his cheek. An intense little brush of her dry lips.
‘And for Si-qi,’ she breathed.
Si-qi was tall, with long skinny legs and one wooden foot. But it was hard even to notice her foot because her face drew men’s eyes the way a pot of honey draws bears. Whereas her mother’s face was broad, hers was slender and delicate with skin pale as fresh cream and eyes that were soft and patient. She was wearing a pale blue dress and was seated on a bench under a fig tree, her dark head bent over sheets of paper.
At the sight of Chang she started to cry.
He bowed a greeting to her. ‘No tears, my beautiful Si-qi, look what I have brought you.’ He laughed and took out a book from his saddlebag. ‘It’s to improve your English.’
Each time he’d visited Hu Tai-wai during the years spent in Canton, he had laboured diligently on teaching Si-qi to speak English. Without a strong foot, lost as a baby to a snakebite, her choice of work would be limited and neither he nor her father wanted her to be dependent on a husband. So their plan was that she would become an interpreter. She was quick; her mind retentive, eager to learn. Though sometimes he wondered if she was doing it for herself… or for him.
‘Xie xie,’ she said shyly. ‘Thank you. The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling.’ Her eyes shone with pleasure and he wished he’d brought her more than one book.
‘It’s about a boy who is brought up in the jungle by wolves.’
She slid a glance at him under her long black lashes. ‘Is that what you feel happened to you? Brought up in our household by Communist wolves?’ She laughed and something about the sound of it shortened his breath.
‘If your parents’ house was a jungle, then you were always the golden flower that enchanted us all with your perfume.’
She laughed again, delighted, swaying her long hair in a luxurious ripple of velvet, and opened the book. He sat down beside her and together they began to read, word by word, page by page, and all the time he was aware of the nearness of her, the softness of her, and what a perfect wife she would make for him.
Only once did she turn to him and enquire in a whisper, ‘Have you news of my brother, Biao?’
‘No. None.’
Her eyes clouded with disappointment and she returned to the book.
A flicker of movement inside his mind. That was all. As though Kaa, the snake, had slid off the pages, silent and stealthy. Chang raised his head, listening.
‘What is it?’ Si-qi asked softly.
He shook his head, attentive to every sound. The sky was leaking colours on to the roofs, reds and yellows and secretive misty purples. The day was changing, preparing for evening, insects thickening the air, strange harrowing sounds rising like ghost-spirits from the jungle.
Was that what he’d heard? That shift in the day?
Si-qi touched his hand, warm and weightless on his skin. ‘What is the…?’
But Chang was on his feet, saddlebag over his shoulder, and moving fast to the far end of the courtyard where a black wooden door would open on to a back alleyway. He turned the handle. It was locked. As he took two steps backwards, giving himself the impetus to spring to the ridge tiles on top of the wall, the door to the house burst open. Hu Tai-wai and Yi-ling were marched into the courtyard by a troop of five soldiers. The red band of Mao’s army was emblazoned on their sleeves.
‘Chang An Lo,’ their leader said firmly, but with unmistakable respect. ‘I apologise for disturbing you, but you are summoned to Guitan.’
‘Summoned by whom?’
‘By our Great Leader, Mao Tse Tung.’
11
The door banged open. A blast of icy air tore through the tavern. It carved chunks into the solid pall of smoke that hovered like death over the heads of the drinkers. Alexei glanced up from the playing cards in his hand. So. Popkov had at last turned up. The big Cossack was brushing snow from his shaggy beard but his movements were unsteady; he was swaying on his feet, his single eye already bloodshot as a pig’s heart.
You stupid fucking bastard. We were meant to be watching each other’s backs tonight. What good are you to me in that state?
Alexei returned his attention to the game in hand. His mind was struggling to concentrate. This was his fourth session of cards in as many bars, each one buried in a back alley that stank of cats’ piss and despair. The bare wooden tables were stained with beer, the floor etched with vodka and waxed with tears. These places were strictly all male. Not a smooth cheek or a shapely leg in sight. Just a huddle of men determined to drown their day’s cares and the screech of their women’s voices in the glorious oblivion of a glass.