The Devil of Nanking (38 page)

I got up, crossed the train and rested my hands on the window, looking up at the building. It was him, a much younger and thinner Bison than the one I knew, head on one side, holding his hand out to the camera, his image repeated and repeated, reminted and reminted, hundreds of times, until he covered the building, a thousand
doppelgängers
moving and talking in unison. In the bottom left of each screen was a logo that said
NHK Newswatch
. The news. Bison was on the news. Just as the train was about to pass the skyscraper his face was replaced by a hazy shot of a police car parked outside a nondescript Tokyo house.
Police
, I thought, pressing my hands flat on the window, gazing back at the skyscraper disappearing behind the train. My breath steamed up the glass.
Bison. Why are you on the news?

It was getting dark when I got to the Takadanobaba house, and none of the lights was on, except in the stairwell. Svetlana was outside, staring at something on the ground, the door open behind her. She was wearing go-go boots and a knee-length fluffy pink coat, and was holding a dustbin-liner full of clothes.

‘Have you seen the news?’ I said. ‘Have you been watching the television?’

‘It’s covered in flies.’

‘What?’

‘Look.’

The foliage that usually surrounded the house had been trampled. Maybe the Nurse and the
chimpira
had stood out there to watch our windows. Svetlana used the toe of her pink boot to hold it aside and point to where a dead kitten lay – the pattern of a shoe sole stamped into its squashed head. ‘
Suka
, bitch! It only leetle kitty. Nothink dangerous.’ She dumped the bin-liners on the roadside and headed back up the stairs, brushing off her hands. ‘Bitch.’

I followed her into the house, shivering involuntarily. The smashed lightbulbs and bits of shattered doors still lay on the floor. I looked warily along the silent corridors.

‘Have you seen the news?’ I asked again, going into the living room. ‘Is the television still working?’ The TV had been tipped on its side, but it came on when I righted it and tried the switch. ‘Bai-san’s just been on television.’ I bent over the set and pressed the button that changed channels. There were cartoons, adverts for energy drinks, girls in bikinis. Even singing cartoon chipmunks. No Bison. I went through the channels again, getting impatient. ‘Something’s happened. I saw him twenty minutes ago. Haven’t you been watching . . .’ I looked over my shoulder. Svetlana was standing very quietly in the doorway, her arms folded. I straightened. ‘What?’

‘We getting out.’ She waved her hand round the room. ‘Look.’

Grey and white Matsuya carrier-bags, belongings poking out of them, were propped everywhere. I could see a clutch of coat hangers, toilet rolls, a fan heater in one. There were more bin-liners full of clothes on the sofa. I hadn’t even noticed. ‘Me and Irina. We find new club. In Hiroo.’

Just then Irina appeared in the corridor, dragging a whole swathe of Cellophane-wrapped clothes. She was also wearing a coat and had a foul-smelling Russian cigarette in her free hand. She dropped the clothes and came to stand behind Svetlana, propping her chin on her shoulder, giving me a glum look. ‘Nice club.’

I blinked. ‘You’re leaving the house? Where’re you going to live?’

‘The apartment we stay is, what you call it? In top of club?’ She bunched up her fingers, kissed the tips and said, ‘High class.’

‘But how?’ I said blankly. ‘How did you . . .’

‘My customer help. He take us there now.’

‘Grey, you don’t say
nuh-think
to no one, eh? You don’t tell Mama Strawberry where we going, and not any of the girls neither. ’Kay?’

‘Okay.’

There was a pause, then Svetlana bent towards me, put her hand on my shoulder and gazed into my eyes in a way that made me feel slightly threatened. ‘Now listen, Grey. You better speak to him.’ She jerked her head to where Jason’s door was tightly closed. ‘Something serious.’

Irina nodded. ‘He tell us, “
Don’t look at me
”. But we seen ’im.’

‘Yes. We see him trying to move around, trying to . . . how d’you call it? Krewl? Down on his hands? Like dog? Krewl?’

‘Crawl?’ A nasty sensation moved across my skin. ‘You mean he’s crawling?’

‘Yeah,
crawl
. He been trying to crawl.’ She gave Irina an uneasy look. ‘Grey, listen.’ She licked her lips. ‘We think it true – he need a doctor. He say he don’t wanna see one, but . . .’ Her voice trailed off. ‘Something bad wrong with him. Something bad bad.’

The girls went, chauffeured away by a nervous-looking man in a white Nissan, a blue tartan child-seat in the back. When they were gone the house seemed cold and abandoned, as if it was being closed down for the winter. Jason’s door was shut, a chink of light coming from under it, but no sound. I stood, my hand raised to knock, trying to walk my mind through what I was supposed to say. It took a long time, and I still couldn’t decide, so I knocked anyway. At first there was no answer. When I knocked again I heard a muffled ‘
What?
’

I drew back the door. The room was freezing, lit only by the flickering blue of his small TV up against the window. In the half-light I could see strange jumbles of things on the floor, empty bottles, discarded clothes, what looked like the tall aluminium pedal-bin from the kitchen. On the TV a Japanese girl in a cheerleader’s outfit was jumping across floating islands in a swimming-pool, her miniskirt flicking up every time she jumped. She was the only sign of life. Pushed in front of the doorway, blocking the entrance, was Jason’s desk.

‘Climb over it,’ he said. His voice seemed to be coming from the wardrobe.

I put my head into the room and craned my neck, trying to see him. ‘Where are you?’

‘Climb over it, for fuck’s sake.’

I sat on the desk and pulled up my knees, swivelled round, then swung my feet on to the floor.

‘Shut the door.’

I leaned over the desk and slid the door closed, then switched on the light.

‘
No! Switch it off!
’

The floor was covered in handfuls of tissue and paper kitchen towels, all wadded and stuck down with blood. Soaking red tissues overflowed from the wastebasket. Poking out from under the bloodied futon, I could see the yellow handle of a carving knife, the tip of a screwdriver, a selection of chisels. I was looking at an
ad hoc
armoury. Jason was under siege.

‘
I said, switch off the light. Do you want her to see us in here?
’

I did as he told me and there was a long, bleak silence. Then I said, ‘Jason, let me get you a doctor. I’m going to call the International Clinic.’

‘I said
no
! I’m not having some Nip doctor touching me.’

‘I’ll call your embassy.’

‘No way.’

‘Jason.’ I took a step across the floor. I could feel the adhesive clack as my feet peeled from the sticky floor. ‘You’re bleeding.’

‘So what?’

‘Where are you bleeding from?’

‘Where am I bleeding from? What sort of dumb fucking question is that?’

‘Tell me where you’re bleeding from. Maybe it’s serious.’

‘
What the fuck are you saying?
’ He hammered on the wardrobe door, making the walls shudder. ‘I don’t know what you think happened, but whatever it is
you’re imagining it
.’ He broke off, breathing hard. ‘You’re making it up. You and your dumb-ass inventions. Your
weird
fucking head.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with my head,’ I said steadily. ‘I don’t invent things.’

‘Well, baby, you’re imagining
this
. I wasn’t
touched
, if that’s what you’re saying.’ I could see him now, in the wardrobe, crunched up against the wall. I could just make out his outline, huddled under a duvet. He seemed to be lying on his side, as if he was trying to keep warm. It was spooky, standing there in the half-light, listening to his thickened voice coming from the wardrobe. ‘I don’t want to hear you even suggesting that – WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?
DON’T STAND NEAR THE WARDROBE!
’

I took a step back.

‘
Stay there. And don’t fucking look at me
.’ I could hear him breathing now, a laboured sound as if something was lodged in his airway. ‘Now, listen,’ he said, ‘you’ve got to get someone to help me.’

‘I’ll take you to a doctor and—’

‘No!’ I could hear him trying to control his voice and get his thoughts in line. ‘No. Listen. There’s – there’s a number written on the wall. Next to the light switch. See it? That’s my – my mother. Call her. Go into a phone box and call collect, reverse the charges. Tell her to send someone for me. Tell her not someone from Boston, tell her it’s got to be one of the men from the house in Palm Springs. They’re nearer.’

Palm Springs? I stared at the wardrobe. Jason, part of a family where there were houses in California? Employees? I’d always imagined him as a real traveller, the sort I’d seen at the airport: a battered
Lonely Planet
under one arm, a toilet roll hooked on the back of a rucksack. I’d pictured him washing dishes, teaching English, sleeping on a beach with just a calor-gas stove and a patched bedroll. I’d always believed he had everything to lose – just like the rest of us.

‘What is it? What don’t you understand? Are you still there?’

An advert for Pocky chocolate wands came on the TV. I watched it for a moment or two. Then I sighed and turned for the door. ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘I’ll call.’

I’d never made a collect call before, and when the automated operator asked my name I almost said, ‘Weirdo.’ In the end I said, ‘I’m calling for Jason.’ When his mother answered the phone she listened in silence. I recited everything twice: the address, how to find the place, that he needed a doctor urgently and to please – I hesitated at this bit, thinking how odd it was talking about Jason like this – to please send someone from the west coast because it would be quicker. ‘And who, may I ask, are you?’ She had an English accent, although she was in Boston. ‘Would you be polite enough to give me your name?’

‘I’m being serious,’ I said, and hung up.

It was dark now, and when I got back to the house I didn’t switch on too many lights – I couldn’t help thinking of what it would look like from outside, blazing over the darkened neighbourhood. I didn’t know a customer who could lend me money, it was too cold to sleep in the parks, and I wasn’t sure Mama Strawberry would give me a sub before payday, certainly not a big enough one to afford a hotel. I couldn’t beg from Shi Chongming. After the club I might have to come back and sleep here. The thought made me cold.

It didn’t take me long to find a selection of tools from the store rooms – there were a lot of things in that house if you’d decided you had to defend yourself: a mallet, a chisel, a heavy rice-cooker that you could probably throw if necessary. I weighed the mallet in my hand. It felt good and heavy. I took them all to my room, rested them against the skirting-board, then packed my holdall with a few things: a big sweater, all the notes and sketches of Nanking, my passport and the remainder of Irina’s money. It reminded me of the earthquake kits we were all supposed to have – the few things you’d need in an emergency. I went to the window and, holding the strap, dangled it down, gently, gently, until my arm was straight. Then I let it drop the rest of the way. It fell with a very small
bump
behind the air-conditioning unit. From the alley no one would know it was there.

While I was standing at the window, suddenly, out of nowhere, it began to snow. Well, I thought, looking up, Christmas isn’t far away. Soft flakes whirled against the thin slice of grey sky between the houses, obscuring Mickey Rourke’s face. If Christmas was near then it wouldn’t be long before my little girl had been dead ten years. Ten years. Amazing how time just gets packed away into nothing, like an accordion. After a long time I closed the window. I wrapped a plastic carrier-bag round my hand and went out into the snow. Using my fingernails inside the plastic I scraped up the dead kitten and took it to the garden where I buried it under a persimmon tree.

I am writing this by the light of a candle. My right hand is painful, a thin burn running diagonally across the palm, and I am cramped on the bed, my feet tucked under me, the bed curtains drawn tight to make sure that there is no possibility, absolutely no possibility, of any light escaping into the alley. Shujin sits opposite me, mortally terrified by what has happened tonight, clutching the curtains closed and shooting glances over her shoulder at the candle. I know she would rather I had no light at all, but tonight of all nights I have to write. I have an overwhelming sense that any history written in these days, however small and inconsequential, will one day be important. Every voice will count because no one person will ever contain or calibrate Nanking’s story. History will fail, and there will be no definitive Nanking invasion.