The Language of Threads (23 page)

“Did you tell Song Lee we won't be here for the rest of the day?” Pei closed the drawer.

“I'm going right now,” Ji Shen answered.

Pei nodded. “Hurry—Mr. Ma won't like having to wait too long for us.”

She watched Ji Shen swing open the door and bound down the stairs of the boardinghouse. Pei stood in the warmth of the sunlight wishing every day could be so simple.

With every passing month, as they drove through the city to Stanley, Hong Kong's decline under Japanese occupation grew more pronounced. In three and a half years, the occupiers had given Japanese names to streets, hotels, and restaurants, but had done little to improve Hong Kong. The van still had to maneuver carefully through the torn-up streets, while buildings bombed, shelled, and burned during the early fighting remained in disrepair. Food and fuel were always in short supply, and as the occupation dragged on, it was clear the Japanese would not be lifting Hong Kong out of its destitution, but pushing it down further. The streets were still desolate, but at least, in the past year, there'd been fewer and fewer Japanese patrols. All the while, the Chinese had simply found ways to survive.

Most Hong Kong Chinese had learned to coexist with the Japanese aggressors with as little bloodshed as possible. They
banded together, bartered with and stole from each other, and did whatever it took to keep going in the face of the fading Japanese dominance.

June was stifling. Pei and Ji Shen were sweating by the time they came in sight of the arid, colorless camp. Pei prayed that Mrs. Finch was feeling better. She'd looked so pale and thin last month; her words had been brief and labored. All Pei wanted was for the occupation to end so that Mrs. Finch could regain her health.

A group of internees was already gathered at the barbed-wire fence, writing IOUs to the hawkers, who now did most of their selling in the mornings before the day became too hot. She imagined the sales were now more charity than business, since she couldn't see the boys ever being able to collect on all the IOUs.

Pei worried about how Mrs. Finch was holding up in the heat. The overcrowded buildings must be stifling at night after baking in the sun all day. Mrs. Finch had reassured Pei visit after visit that she'd seen the camp doctor, but each month she appeared weaker.

The day before, Pei had stopped by the old herbalist and told him of Mrs. Finch's shortness of breath and swollen ankles. He shook his head. “I lost so much in the fire. This will have to do.” He sprinkled equal amounts of dark leaves and small dry branches from various jars onto white pieces of paper, then folded them into individual packets. Pei noticed the combination was different from the last herbs she'd brought to Mrs. Finch. “Tell her this one is ginseng tea. It will be less foreign to her then.”

Pei nodded gratefully.

“She must drink all of it,” the old herbalist instructed. “A bowl every day for the next ten days, or it's of no use!”

They hurried down the path, the heat of the sun pushing against them.

“I don't see Mrs. Finch,” Ji Shen said.

Pei squinted hard against the bright glare. “It's better she isn't waiting out in the sun.”

“There she is!” Ji Shen pointed toward the redbrick building.

Mrs. Finch walked slowly toward them. Pei waved, her hand pausing in midair when she saw her friend's even thinner frame and the new hesitation in her step. Pei's heart ached to see how Mrs. Finch was wilting with each passing month.

“How are you?” Pei called, trying to smile.

Mrs. Finch waved. “I'm fine.” She smiled as she approached. “It's just that the heat has made my ankles swell a bit.”

Pei pressed closer. “You look a bit pale.”

Even the flowers on Mrs. Finch's dress had faded from much washing. “Just the heat. Nothing to be concerned about.” Mrs. Finch wiped her forehead with a handkerchief.

Ji Shen swung the bag down from her shoulder. “Look what we've brought you!” She pulled out a can and slipped it through the barbed wire.

“My God, peas! And to think I always refused to eat them as a child. Now they're as good as gold!” She laughed and grasped Ji Shen's hand. “Thank you, my dear.”

“Try to stay out of the sun as much as possible,” Pei continued. “And drink this ginseng tea.” She handed Mrs. Finch the bag of white packets she'd gotten from the old herbalist. “Just let it steep in hot water for a little while. Promise me you'll drink a bowl every day. It'll give you more strength.”

Mrs. Finch reached for the herbs and nodded. “Don't worry so. You're acting as old as I am! Now, what news do you have to tell me?”

“The Japanese don't know what to do with us anymore,” Ji Shen volunteered. “They've been in Hong Kong for over three years now and have yet to turn us into their little Tokyo. Nothing has changed, except that Hong Kong is still a shambles and they're losing their hold all over the Pacific.”

Mrs. Finch looked relieved. “Now that's good news. An end to this occupation!”

“And we'll be back together again,” Ji Shen added.

“I'm afraid there won't be much to go back to.” Mrs. Finch looked wistful.

“My mending business is doing well. We'll start all over,” Pei said. “You'll be out of here before you know it. . . .” She felt a sudden emptiness swallow the rest of her words.

“Until then, what a treat!” Mrs. Finch cradled the tea and canned goods against her chest. “And just wait until I get you on the dance floor,” she teased Ji Shen.

“I can't wait,” Ji Shen responded. Neither of them mentioned the Victrola.

“Please, stay inside today if you can,” Pei said.

Mrs. Finch nodded. She put down her goods, then reached through the barbed wire and took their hands. “Promise me you'll always take care of each other.”

“Don't worry about us,” Ji Shen said.

Pei held tightly onto Mrs. Finch's hand; she didn't want to let go. “We'll be back next month. Just make sure you drink the tea every day, and try to rest.”

“You both have meant more to me than I can say.” Mrs. Finch gave Pei's hand one last squeeze.

The finality of Mrs. Finch's mood and words alarmed Pei. “You took us in when no one else would.”

Mrs. Finch laughed. “And never regretted it for a moment.” Then she looked at them long and hard. “Just remember that life is made up of change. We can't run away from it.”

“You'll be able to move right into the boardinghouse with us,” Ji Shen said.

Pei swallowed. “We'll take it a month at a time,” she said softly.

“Yes, a month at a time,” Mrs. Finch repeated.

Mrs. Finch stood longer than usual watching them climb up
the dirt path. When Pei looked back, she was still standing by the fence, gazing up at them as if they were a sky full of stars.

Since the beginning of the year, Mrs. Finch had been making one excuse after another to her friends: “I'm fine, I just ate something that disagreed with me,” or “You go on ahead and start the game, I didn't sleep well last night.”

It didn't take long before Isabel Tate realized her illness was serious and persuaded her to go to the hospital for a checkup.

The pills they'd given her for her heart did little good. Most of the useful medicines were confiscated or destroyed by the Japanese. “We can calm diarrhea, bandage a cut, or give you aspirin for a headache.” The young British camp doctor shook his head sorrowfully. “But we have little else to offer you. Even our monthly supply of calamine lotion, alcohol, and bandages lasts barely two weeks.”

“No need to apologize.” Mrs. Finch tried to smile and put the doctor at ease. “I'll try to accept each day as a gift.”

She thought of how lovely it been just that morning, how clear and in focus the colors of the sea and mountains appeared to her. They seemed close enough to touch. How could she be dying when everything felt so alive and real?

“If you don't strain yourself and get plenty of rest, who can tell, you may even see the end of this war!” The doctor took her trembling hand in his.

Mrs. Finch ate less and less each day; she felt as if a tight band were pressing against her chest, making it hard to swallow. The only time she made any real effort to eat was after a visit with
Pei and Ji Shen. Mrs. Finch could almost see her own deterioration in Pei's dark eyes, and in the edge of fear that traced her voice as she pleaded with her to take care. Caroline had wanted to tell the girls that life was coming to an end for her, that even her love for them couldn't stop her tired heart from failing. So many times the words lingered on the tip of her tongue, before she would swallow them back down again. They had enough to worry about.

So Mrs. Finch lived her life carefully, taking nothing for granted. She wondered why wisdom came so late in life, when there was so little time left to enjoy the gifts of knowledge and acceptance. She'd had a good marriage and a full life. Her one wish was for a few more years to spend with Pei and Ji Shen. But for the most part, it had been a grand life and she had lived each day on her own terms.

Mrs. Finch shared her peas and sausages with Mrs. Tate and a few other women she played gin rummy with every Wednesday afternoon. The food was a welcome supplement to their three daily meals of rice, turnips, shallots, and weak tea. They had so successfully created a regular schedule for themselves that their routine in camp wasn't much different from their lives in free Hong Kong. After three and a half years at Stanley Camp, the British Empire remained alive and well behind the barbed-wire fence. During that time, fewer than a hundred and thirty prisoners out of three thousand had died, mainly of untreated illnesses. The rest of the sick and worn prisoners bickered among themselves and dreamed of soft beds and proper bathing facilities of their own.

“I'd die to have some tender asparagus tips right now!” Mrs. Tate said, wiping her forehead with a handkerchief.

Lately, they had found that talking about the food they missed offered a strangely satisfying substitute for actually eating it.

Louise Powell put down her cards, pulled at the front of her dress, and fanned herself. “A rare, juicy piece of beefsteak, smothered with onions, is what I'd want.”

Mrs. Finch laughed. “A well-done chop with some hot mustard on the side and a baked potato drowned in sour cream. Bread pudding for dessert.”

“And an ice-cold gin and tonic!” Mrs. Tate added.

“Why not champagne?” Mrs. Powell suggested.

Mrs. Tate threw down her cards. “Yes, why not? I do love a bit of the bubbly!”

Mrs. Finch laughed again, glad for a sweet moment in these increasingly difficult days when she'd felt herself losing control of her body. Lately, she'd found just the act of breathing more difficult; it was accompanied by a grasping discomfort in her neck and shoulders. Each day Mrs. Finch needed to rest for longer periods. The heat of summer pulled her down. Lying on the uncomfortable cot, she was reminded of her own mother's slowing down by a wicked spell of rheumatism. “My limbs are turning against me,” she'd said over and over.

“Well, that's enough for me,” Mrs. Finch said, pushing herself up from the makeshift table they'd put together of scrap board.

“Are you all right, Caroline?” Isabel stared hard at her. She knew the entire story, but respected her friend's wish to do things her way. She rose from her chair. “Have you been taking the aspirin they gave you at the infirmary?”

“I'm fine.” Mrs. Finch smiled reassuringly, sucking in the warm air and trying to catch her breath. “Please, go on with the game; I'll just have a little rest and return in a bit.”

She held herself steady and moved with assurance, turning back once to see Isabel's worried gaze follow her down the short hall into their cramped bedroom.

Mrs. Finch lay down on the soft cot, thumping hard against the wood frame, her bones sharp against the sagging canvas. She longed for her own bed on Conduit Road and the soft feather
pillows of her London childhood. She couldn't imagine that there was much left of the life she'd once known.

“Gin!” she faintly heard Mrs. Powell's cheerful voice pipe up.

“Not again, Louise!” Isabel's watery voice floated from the other side of the room.

Mrs. Finch smiled, closed her eyes against the rapid beating of her heart. Quick flashes of memory flickered through her mind—the glass figurines, warm bread pudding, Howard's white shirts, the Victrola spinning round and round, Pei clutching the cloth bag. It seemed so strange to think that one could experience so many different lives in a lifetime. Mrs. Finch opened her eyes, felt a gripping pain in her chest that gradually lessened as she lay still. She suddenly heard Howard's hearty laughter, his voice saying, “You're thinking too hard, old girl.”

Thinking of tall, kind Howard with each throbbing beat . . . thinking of Pei and Ji Shen's smiling faces on the other side of the barbed wire fence . . . thinking how everything felt as if it were slowing down, condensing into a dark, cool vacuum—then simply stopping.

Pei and Ji Shen hurried down the path toward Stanley Camp. The already-warm July morning left them hot and sweaty, but the sea air felt less sticky than the hot, crowded streets of Central and Wan Chai. Pei inhaled and tried to relax. For weeks after their last visit, she'd felt uneasy, worried that she'd forgotten to say something more to Mrs. Finch when they parted last month. She couldn't forget the sight of her standing at the fence and gazing up at them as they left.

“It's cooler here.” Ji Shen's voice roused Pei from her thoughts.

Pei smiled. “Yes, the weather should be much more bearable now for Mrs. Finch.”

She craned her neck to see as they waited by the fence. As always, a crowd had gathered to buy and barter from the boy hawkers.

Pei stepped away from the crowd and waited.