The Flowers of War (18 page)

A Japanese soldier started kicking Wang Pusheng and shouting, ‘Get up! Get up!’

The boy moaned in agony.

‘I’ve never seen soldiers behave as brutally as you!’ Father Engelmann protested, attempting to pull off the soldier whose foot was poised to kick Wang Pusheng in the belly. ‘For God’s sake, spare this child’s life!’

The officer brandished his sword to keep Father Engelmann at arm’s length. At this, Sergeant Major Li, who was standing close by, was suddenly galvanised into action. He hurled himself on the officer, his left arm hooked around the other’s neck, his right hand reaching for the officer’s windpipe. For a moment, no one moved. The Japanese
soldiers dared not fire in case they hit their commanding officer. Then they launched themselves at Li with their bayonets. Again and again, the officer’s subordinates twisted their bayonets in Li’s guts, but with each terrible stab, his grip on the officer’s neck tightened. The officer was crumpling, almost unconscious, but this climactic effort was Li’s last – then it was over.

His hands stiffened, and his eyes glazed over. Only his teeth were still bared, the strong, uneven teeth of a Chinese peasant used to coarse, humble fare. The sort of teeth which, clenched on a curse, were enough to make the officer quail.

The officer gave a hoarse command and his soldiers began a search. The compound was filled with criss-crossing torch beams. Father Engelmann remained where he stood uttering a passionate, silent prayer. Fabio watched panic-stricken as the beams searched the printing workshop. Upstairs, sixteen beds all stood in place, and they, as well as sixteen choir robes, would all offer clues to the Japanese. If they made the connection between these black gowns and the young bodies which they clothed, the consequences would be unimaginable.

It was not hard for the searchers to spot the trapdoor
to the attic, and Fabio soon saw the torch beams filter through the gaps between the blackout curtains.

The soldiers who went to search the kitchen and refectory had returned empty-handed. Fabio sighed in relief. He had placed a brazier over the cellar entrance and jammed all their cooking implements into the kitchen so there was scarcely room to move.

In fact, the soldiers had been distracted by something else: they had broken open George’s locked store cupboard and pulled out a bag of potatoes and half a bag of flour. Hundreds of thousands of the invading forces had endured hunger and thirst along with the Chinese, so there were cheers when they found the food.

*     *     *

Down below, eyes of all shapes and sizes stared unblinking at the ceiling, and watched the torchlight which filtered down through the edges of the trapdoor.

Several of the girls were moaning in terror. Yumo hissed in her fiercest voice: ‘If you young misses make another sound, I’ll come over and kill you!’

Nani smeared her face with coal dust. Jade looked at her,
then groped around until her hands too were covered in cobwebby dust, which she smeared all over her face. Yumo smiled wryly to herself. Had they not heard that the Japs were making ‘comfort women’ out of seventy-year-old grannies? Only Hongling ignored the light coming through the trapdoor. She sat staring into the darkness, giving occasional sobs. She could hardly believe that George had just been transformed from a living being to a bloody lump of flesh. She had been with countless men, but only this one, with whom she had snatched a few moments of pleasure amid the horrors of war, had aroused such tenderness in her. And now George, with his protruding ears and his wordless smiles, was gone. It was too much for her to take in. George used to say: ‘Better a rascally life than a good death.’ But now not even this cheerful, obdurate and single-minded ‘rascal’ was to be granted his desire. My poor George, Hongling thought numbly.

Yumo’s heart was pounding for Major Dai. The night before, she had climbed the church’s ruined bell tower with him. They had scrambled up the bomb-damaged steps with Dai stretching out his hand to steady her in the darkness, saying, ‘Let’s explore as if they were ancient ruins.’

The wind up in the tower was different, colder, but
somehow freer. The destruction had created a jagged space into which humans had to mould themselves. Dai brought out a pair of pocket binoculars. He looked around, then passed them to her. In the moonlight, she could see the dark streets; alleyways branched off them, sprouting with dwellings like leaves. All these houses looked as if they were burned out. It was only the intermittent gunfire that told them this was not some desolate, long-abandoned city devoid of human habitation, and that there were armed prowlers on the hunt out there.

‘Your home must be in that direction,’ said Major Dai, thinking she was using the binoculars to find the Qin Huai River and the brothel.

‘I wasn’t looking for that,’ she said with a desolate smile. ‘It’s not my home.’

After a few moments, he asked what she was thinking about. She was actually thinking that she should ask him where his home was, if he had children and how old his wife was. But these were the kind of questions people asked when they planned to spend a lot of time together.

So she said, ‘I was thinking … I’d like a cigarette.’

Dai smiled. ‘Just what I was thinking,’ he said.

They exchanged complicit glances then turned to look out
at the streets and alleyways of the ruined city. If they could hear the cries of the cigarette hawkers down there, it would prove that the city was coming back to life and they could leave, Yumo thought. The cigarette hawkers were a prelude, and would soon be followed by the shouts of the noodle sellers. They could find somewhere nice for an evening meal, and then go and dance the night away in a dance hall.

No doubt Dai was thinking along the same lines because he heaved a sigh and said, ‘It must be fate that brought us together. Otherwise, a junior regimental officer like me could never have aspired to a date with you, Miss Yumo.’

‘You haven’t asked me for a date, so how do you know?’

‘Didn’t I invite you to come and enjoy the view from up here?’ He smiled, and nodded to the destruction around them and the dismal scene beyond.

‘Does this count as a date?’

‘Of course it does!’

He stood awkwardly, no doubt because his wound hurt him, and shifted so that he stood in front of her. She looked at him in the pale moonlight. She knew just how fatally attractive she was when she looked like that.

‘Of course it doesn’t,’ she said.

‘All right, it doesn’t count then,’ he said. ‘We’ll wait till
the war’s over, then I’ll take you out to dinner and we’ll go dancing.’

‘I’ll remember that,’ she said slowly. ‘If you don’t keep your word and come and make a date with me, then I’ll …’ Her voice trailed away.

‘What’ll you do?’

‘I’ll come and ask you out.’

He laughed. ‘A woman asking a man out?’

‘It would be the first time in my life I’d asked a man on a date, so you’d better watch out.’

She reached over and gently brushed his cheek with her fingers. It was the touch of a whore. She did not want him to marry her. He must be fed up with women like that. What she wanted him to remember was that she owed him a good time, the kind of top-quality good time that only a whore could give him. And, for her to keep her word and for him to enjoy this sensual feast, he would have to go on living and not engage in senseless, bloody fighting.

‘I’ll remember.’

‘What will you remember? Tell me.’

‘I’ll remember that the famous beauty of Nanking, Zhao Yumo, is going to invite me out and for that reason I can’t die.’

‘That’s right,’ said Yumo with a flirtatious smile. ‘But tell
me, Major Dai. You were planning to leave us, weren’t you? I saw it in your eyes. You were going to abandon us to our fate.’

‘I was,’ said Dai with a wry smile. ‘But then I realised something was keeping me here.’

Yumo remembered that wry smile now.

‘Stop crying, Hongling,’ she whispered sharply. ‘You might be heard.’

Hongling saw that Yumo was clutching something. It was a small pair of sewing scissors, no bigger than the palm of her hand but very sharp. She had seen Yumo use them to snip the ends of threads or make paper-cut window decorations. When Hongling was younger, Yumo had used them to trim Hongling’s eyelashes. If you did that a few times, it made them grow back thick and up-sweeping, she said. Yumo always kept them with her, together with her few pieces of jewellery.

Yumo had never told any of the other women the story of her scissors. They were her most prized possession. She loved them more now than the diamond ring which her faithless lover had given her. She had had the scissors since she was thirteen years old. The brothel madam had lost her needlework scissors and had beaten her for stealing them.
Then when she found them again, she had given them to Yumo by way of an apology. That was the moment when Yumo had made up her mind that she was going to haul herself up to the top of her profession so she could no longer be humiliated over a pair of scissors.

Above them, the soldiers were still turning the kitchen upside down and muttering unintelligibly among themselves. At every noise from above, a sob would be heard from one of the schoolgirls.

‘Give me one half of your scissors, Yumo,’ said Nani in a low voice.

Yumo took no notice. No doubt they could be pulled apart but who had the energy for that now? Besides, it would make a noise, it would be asking for trouble. Everyone envied Yumo her scissors. They might only give a nip like that of a dying rabbit, but they were better than nothing.

‘No need for scissors, just knee them,’ said Jade. ‘With a bit of luck and if you’re fierce enough, you can do a lot of damage to their privates so long as your knees are not tied.’

Yumo shushed them but Jade continued to whisper advice. Her pimp was a hired thug and he had taught her a few kicks and punches. It was best if your hands were free, she said, then you could grab their balls and give a twist, the way
you got a kernel out of a walnut. A good sharp twist and they would not be fathering any more little Jap animals. Yumo thumped her hard, because the kitchen above had gone quiet.

They stood, or crouched, or sat, completely motionless, their slender fists filled with a fierce energy. Twist as if you’re getting the kernel out of a walnut, that’s what Jade said, as hard as you can, concentrate all your strength into your palm and fingers, crack, crack …

Yumo found the scissors she was holding were slippery with sweat. There was a sob from one of the schoolgirls and Yumo pulled the dividing curtain back, hissing: ‘What are you crying about? You’ve got us for scapegoats, haven’t you?’ Then she went back to the other side of the curtain and peered up the ventilation shaft. She could see the Japanese soldiers dragging Wang Pusheng’s bandage-swathed body towards the entrance.

The boy moaned in pain. ‘He won’t last more than a couple of days, why are you bothering to –’ shouted Dai.

Dai’s words were cut short by a loud chopping sound. The night before, Yumo had enticed him to live with a promise of sensual pleasure, and he said he would remember that. Now the head which held that memory dropped to the ground.

There was a sudden croak from the dying boy. ‘Fuck you and all your ancestors!’

The interpreter did not translate this country boy’s curse.

Wang Pusheng carried on. ‘Fuck all your Jap sisters too!’

The interpreter was forced to supply a translation. The Japanese officer then used the sword soaked in Dai’s blood to administer a final, gratuitous stab into the festering wound in the boy’s abdomen.

Yumo pressed her hands over her ears. The boy’s last cry was too distressing.

The torches were switched off and there was a clatter of army boots in the direction of the side door. The truck engine started into life, its roar a final blustering farewell. As it faded into the distance, the women and girls saw the feet of Father Engelmann and Fabio move effortfully, in trepidation. They were shifting the dead bodies.

Yumo burst into tears. She stepped back from the ventilation shaft, one hand still gripping her scissors, the other wiping the tears from her face, smearing it with dust in the process. She had loved Major Dai. And not only him; she was promiscuous in her love, and had given her heart to each of the three soldiers.