The Piano Teacher (27 page)

The black night beyond the window was velvet and welcome in its anonymity. He got up and opened the windows. Hong Kong’s warm, intimate smell came into the room, redolent of human bodies and the ever-present sea, even at this elevation. It was never crisp here, just moist and close, though not always unpleasant. The darkness enveloped him. A lone light winked in the distance—a boat? A fellow insomniac?

He heard her voice again. It sounded more desperate now, more shrill.

He knew it was time to act.

CORONATION FEVER had hit Hong Kong. The imperially slim Princess Elizabeth and her handsome prince had seized the imagination of expatriates and locals alike, and all through town there were placards declaring coronation sales, tailors advertised coronation gown specials, and special coins and stamps were being processed to mark the occasion. Society matrons were planning their coronation parties and teas and all the hotels were booked up for balls. Claire found herself waiting for the newspaper delivery every morning so she could read about all the details and preparations.

She had always been fascinated with the princesses, had read the scandalous book by their nanny, Marion Crawford, and devoured the details of their private lives. And now the princess was becoming the queen!

In Hong Kong itself there would be grand parades and decorations. Both the
South China Morning Post
and the
Standard
devoted much of their front pages to the impending event. There was to be an illuminated fountain in Statue Square with a royal blue Maypole topped by a crown, and four lions to symbolize the United Kingdom and four braziers to represent the flame of Commonwealth unity. It was to be guarded day and night by Her Majesty’s personal representatives. There was also a Coronation Garden in Kowloon planted with blue hydrangeas and red and white water lilies, in the pattern of the English flag. The newspapers also dealt with the mundane. The Building Authority had warned that verandas and balconies should be sufficiently buttressed if property owners felt that they might be filled to capacity with revelers.

Claire read carefully about the arrangements the post office was making so that the high demand for commemorative coronation stamps would be adequately handled. There would be dedicated counters for selling the stamps, and more counters would be added. She planned to go to the Des Voeux Road branch to get hers. She had also put aside money for commemorative plates with the image of Princess Elizabeth stamped on them.

Will laughed at her when she told him of her excitement.

“Why on earth do you care about a silly woman getting a crown because she happened to be born into a certain family? And also because her uncle fell in love with someone that others find objectionable?”

Claire was shocked.

“You sound Communist, Will,” she warned. “I wouldn’t go around town airing those kinds of views.”

“Sometimes you are such a ninny,” he said, but his voice was kind. “You are the silliest woman I care to know.” And he kissed her forehead gently.

 

They had been together for some eight months. Long enough to have a rhythm, but new enough that her palms still tingled, new enough to still check her reflection in any available surface before she was to meet him. Martin’s steady hours gave them time together, but it was Will’s work that confounded Claire.

“They never use you,” she said. “They have two others, local Chinese. Why did they hire you?”

“I’m useful in my own way,” he said. And refused to elaborate further.

But his lack of work meant they could spend afternoons together, in his small flat, having sent Ah Yik on one of many endless errands. How to deal with the small woman was one of Claire’s regular ordeals. Her illicit status ate at her, making it difficult to look Ah Yik in the eye. She worried unceasingly about what to say, or what not to say, or whether to even acknowledge her presence. When asked his opinion, Will claimed not to care, even more maddening than usual.

“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “She is the soul of discretion and loyal to a fault.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about,” Claire said.

“You’re worried about her opinion?” he needled.

“I find it uncomfortable, Will,” she said. “That is all.”

“I understand. But she doesn’t care at all what we do. She’s seen much worse.”

“And how is that?”

“She’s been with me for years.”

“Are you saying . . .” She stopped. “Never mind.” She didn’t want to know what he meant.

“Why do you care about the queen?” he asked suddenly.

“She is our queen,” she said. “What do you mean, why do I care? Why would I not care?”

“You believe in empire?”

“Of course,” she said, although she didn’t know exactly what he was talking about.

He propped himself up on an elbow, interested now.

“Now, what about this. Do you think the queen cares for you?”

“What? You are asking such queer questions, Will. Sometimes I don’t understand you at all.”

“I just want to know if you think the queen, or rather, the queen to be, takes an interest in your well-being.”

“She has many subjects but I’m sure she wishes the best for all of us.”

“And you owe her your loyalty, and regard yourself as her subject.”

“I do, yes.” She shook her head. “Why are you being so obstinate? These are the things that we hold dear as British subjects, and it is not so uncommon to think this way.”

Will smiled, a lazy smile.

“I just think that lovely little Lizzie doesn’t care for you as much as you seem to think she does.”

“You’re incorrigible,” she said. “Let’s not talk about it anymore. It’s putting me in a bad mood. You’re a terrible person and you make me angry.”

He laughed. He liked it when she scolded him.

 

But Will was erratic. His temper flared at the oddest things.

She had locked the door after them once, and having heard the click, he had turned around with real anger in his face.

“I told you,” he said. “I never lock my door. Please unlock it.”

She had, feeling chastised, her face blooming with embarrassment.

Later, she tried to bring it up.

“Why do you get so angry about locking your door? It seems so silly.”

“It’s a long story,” he said. “But please don’t ever do it again.” He offered no apology or further explanation.

She tiptoed around him, but then he would pull her into bed or kiss her, and she would feel like it was all enough—that all the uncertainty and humiliation and guilt was worth it.

 

And there was this too. Claire wanted a baby.

It had happened all of a sudden. After years of regarding the mewling creatures as nothing more than nuisances, something had shifted inside her, and every particle of her yearned for a child, an infant to hold and smell and embrace. She longed for her belly to swell and expand, to feel the mysterious knocks from within, to walk around knowing that she was nurturing a child inside her.

She saw babies everywhere, strapped to the backs of Chinese women in their cloth sacks, towheaded infants playing on the lawn at the Ladies’ Recreation Club. She felt bereft, unwomanly, as if something vital had been torn from her. She recorded her menstrual cycles and wept when blood stained her undergarments. When acquaintances told her they were expecting, her stomach dropped, as if from the want.

And, of course, it would be Will’s baby. The thought of having Martin’s child was, while not entirely repulsive, foreign to her, as if it were hardly a possibility. Martin had in fact receded so far from her life as she lived it that she was always faintly surprised when she woke up next to him. His smell seemed strange, his skin too clammy and corporeal. She resisted his advances, and he good-naturedly acquiesced, which made her despise him, which in turn made her despise herself. Had she always been this cruel? What had made her this way? Martin simply worked harder, spent more time at the office, and made it easy for her. What had made him like that? What had made her like this?

A CHANCE to get to know the Chens better arose. Not that Claire felt she wanted to.

It had been an odd circumstance. Locket’s mother had come into the room after the lesson, looking rather harried. There was something about her that was different these days. She spent most of the time locked up in her room, it seemed, as she was now almost always home when Claire came for Locket’s lesson. And she had lost so much weight she was gaunt.

She started when she saw Claire.

“Oh, Mrs. Pendleton,” she said. “How are you?”

“Fine, thank you.” Claire started to put away her things. It was the end of the hour. Locket had scampered off as soon as Claire had leaned back from the piano.

“I say,” Mrs. Chen began. “You wouldn’t be free for dinner tonight, would you? You and your husband? I know it’s terribly short notice.”

Claire didn’t know what to say. Her mouth opened but nothing came out.

“It would be lovely to have you. Victor and I are having a dinner party, you see . . .”

And then Claire did see. It was a last-minute invitation. Someone had dropped out and they needed two people without other obligations.

“I’m afraid . . .”

“Oh, please say you’ll come,” Mrs. Chen cried. “It’s a nice group of people. Government officials as well, so I would think Mr. Pendleton would be interested.” She dangled this before Claire.

“Well . . .” she said. She knew Martin would want to go.

“It’s settled, then. It’s at The Golden Lotus, a Cantonese restaurant in Central at eight. We have a private room.”

“Thank you so much for the invitation,” Claire had said.

 

“Do you think they’ll expect us to eat caterpillars or chicken’s feet?” Martin asked at home when told about their sudden plans.

“Who knows what they do,” Claire said. “I won’t eat anything like that.” She watched Martin wet his comb and draw it through his hair.

“What shirt should I wear?” he asked.

“I don’t know why we’re going to this dinner, I really don’t,” she said, but Martin had already left the room to rummage through his shirts. She stared at her face in the mirror. She looked drawn. She powdered her nose and pinched her cheeks for color.

 

The dinner did not go well. It was difficult to have a conversation with people who talked on a scale Claire was unused to. And they talked about themselves so much!

They had arrived on time, so they were the first other than the Chens, who were standing in a corner having a drink.

“Oh, I’m so glad you could make it,” Melody said, coming toward them. Her gaunt body was enclosed in a fantastic outfit of green silk chiffon with bell sleeves, and she had on emerald chandelier earrings and the most enormous emerald ring Claire had ever seen. She couldn’t take her eyes off the stone.

“Melody,” Claire said, feeling the unfamiliar name on her tongue. She had thought about what she was going to call Mrs. Chen and decided on the way to the restaurant it would be appropriate for her to call Mrs. Chen by her first name since it was a social occasion. “Melody, this is my husband, Martin Pendleton. We met briefly at the beach club.”

Martin and Mr. Chen shook hands.

“I understand you’re in water,” Mr. Chen said. He took Martin over to get a drink from the bartender.

“Your dress is lovely,” Mrs. Chen said of the simple shift Claire had also worn to the Arbogasts’ party on the Peak that day ages ago, when she first met Will. “I adore white, so fresh.” She seemed sincere. Her once-pretty face reminded Claire of a bony chicken, the flesh thin but sagging.

They were perfectly pleasant—ideal hosts, entertaining and engaging, introducing them to every single person who arrived, and yet Claire felt more and more uncomfortable as the night progressed.

She was seated next to a Mr. Anson Ho, who operated textile factories in Shanghai and was setting up new ones in Hong Kong. He made it very clear that the scale was large, and that the British had nothing to do with his success.

“Chinese are very entrepreneurial,” he kept saying. “We will find a way to make money anywhere. The old government did not give enough chances to the local population. The British are very arrogant but they need to realize it is a new age now. The Chinese in Hong Kong need to govern themselves.” He had a red, bulbous nose that suggested too many nights of Cognac. He drank his wine roughly, swirling it around in large circles, gulping it down. She nodded and smiled.

Martin was seated away from her, and was talking to an attractive Brazilian woman. He had drunk a fair amount and his gestures were becoming more animated. Around the table they spoke of Red China, the Koreas, “Rhee is playing with fire,” and what was going on in Myanmar. Opposite Claire was Belle, a woman from America, a journalist, she said, and she declared the harbor in Hong Kong to be inferior to the ones in Sydney and Rio. Belle smoked theatrically and asked Claire’s opinion about the harbor matter and Claire wiped her mouth with her napkin and excused herself to go to the powder room.

There, she found Melody Chen washing her hands nervously, wringing them again and again in the water, looking at herself in the mirror. She jumped when Claire came in. The ring rested on the basin.

“That’s a beautiful stone,” Claire said. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“I have to take it off before I wash my hands,” Melody said, drying her hands. “Emeralds are very fragile and I’m afraid I’ll do something to it. It keeps slipping off my finger too.” She picked it up gingerly and slipped it back on. “Such a bother!”

“You’ve lost such a lot of weight,” Claire said. “Are you all right?”

“Fine, yes, fine,” Melody said, not meeting her eye. “I must take better care of myself. Victor says I run around too much.”