World of Suzie Wong : A Novel (9781101572399) (24 page)

“No, as a matter of fact she was my grandfather's wife's amah.”

While this sank in there was another silence, broken only by the rattling of skeletons in the cupboard—two skeletons now, the twin skeletons of Chinese blood and illegitimacy.

At last one of the guests, a matron with loud downright voice, decided that the time had come to change the subject.

“Hilda, I told you that I couldn't play bridge tomorrow, didn't I?” she boomed across the room. “I hate letting you down, but it's my day at the Services' Club. And it does mean so much to those poor lonely boys to see a real Englishwoman's face behind the tea counter.”

Half an hour later O'Neill, saying that he was an old man and liked early nights, took his leave, and I made an excuse to depart with him. We strolled together along the road that led to the mid-level station on the Peak tram, with the lights of Hong Kong and the harbor spread below.

“Were you pulling their legs?” I asked him. “Or was your grandmother really Chinese?”

He chuckled. “One of my grandmothers came from Richmond, and the other from Bury St. Edmunds. No, I'm afraid I was just having a lark. I've rather a schoolboy sense of humor, and I couldn't resist it.”

I laughed. “It was a terrible shock to them. To think you'd been allowed to get away with it for thirty years!”

“Of course you don't want to take those people too seriously. They don't mean so much nowadays. That mentality's as doomed as the Empire which bred it—and which they have somehow got the impression bred the Empire, though of course it did nothing of the kind. In fact it has done a great deal, with its inflexibility, to hasten the losing of it. With due apologies to our hosts, I am afraid that most of our fellow guests tonight were second-raters. And the real Empire builders, in their own way, were first-raters.”

We became so absorbed in conversation that to prolong it we walked down into the town instead of taking the Peak tram; and when we reached the Gloucester, where O'Neill was staying, he invited me in for a nightcap. I thought him charming, and by now had begun to tell him about the Nam Kok and Suzie. Over the whisky I described our last meeting in my room, and when I had finished, he said, “Of course you were mad to let her go! Quite mad!”

I watched his twinkling eyes, not sure whether or not he was pulling my leg. “You mean I was mad not to take her, sailors and all?”

“Certainly! Mad as a hatter! She sounds to me a girl of quite remarkable character, and obviously devoted to you—and speaking as one for whom the greatest pleasures of life have always been derived from the opposite sex, I know that such a girl is not to be sneezed at. Naturally there is always some drawback or other, whether a taste for expensive jewelry, or a husband, or lack of a husband—which of course can be much worse, if she starts to fancy you for the role. And it seems to me that as drawbacks go, a few sailors are really quite trivial.”

I laughed. “I don't believe you mean a word of it. I'm sure that if you'd been in my place you'd have behaved in exactly the same way.”

“Nonsense, my dear fellow. I was once in a very similar situation and did nothing of the kind. The lady was an actress in Chinese opera in Hankow, and I assure you very bonny. She was the concubine of a rich old gentleman, who was by no means too old, however, to enjoy her. She had also taken on a second rich gentleman, purely for financial reasons, since she was supporting a dozen members of her family. She then fell in love with me, an attitude which I heartily reciprocated.

“Now, naturally she did not tell the first rich gentleman about the second rich gentleman or myself—and indeed, if he had ever found out he would have been most displeased, for as the first comer, he was in the position of husband. On the other hand the second rich gentleman, in the position of lover, knew all about the first rich gentleman, and of course had no objection whatsoever—in fact it gave him a certain satisfaction to think that he was daily making the other a cuckold. But he naturally knew nothing about me, and if he had done so he would have taken the strongest exception.

“As for myself, the last arrival on the scene, I knew about them both and had no objection to either. In fact I thoroughly approved, since they relieved me of any financial burden and kept the lady out of mischief, while presenting no rivalry for her deeper affections.”

“And supposing she'd taken a fourth lover?”

He twinkled. “I should have been extremely angry. However, that only goes to support my contention that the act of making love has no intrinsic importance, and that its importance depends entirely on the point of view. And in my opinion you should have been no more discouraged by those sailors than I was by my Hankow lady's two rich patrons; and indeed you might have derived the same satisfaction from contemplating their financial advantages.”

I laughed. “You're an old cynic.”

“On the contrary, I am an incorrigible romantic. There is nothing in the world that touches me more than to see two young people in love. And since I myself am too old to participate without making a tedious old fool of myself, nothing delights me more than to give them advice: which usually amounts to telling them not to expect every circumstance to be perfect, not to waste their precious youth because of trivial difficulties, and—in short—to get on with it.”

“Well, I'm afraid it's too late for me to do much about it now,” I said.

I met O'Neill several more times during the next ten days, and finally went to the boat to see him off when he sailed for England. After he had gone I felt that I had lost my only real friend in Hong Kong, and was plunged back into depression. His parting advice to me had been, “Go and grab that girl back—or else forget about her and take another girl. But at all events make up your mind to do one or the other, and do it resolutely.” I knew this was good advice, and considered the former alternative of grabbing Suzie back; but although it would have been a fine dramatic gesture, I still did not think I could reconcile myself to the sailors, and we should simply have found ourselves back in the same situation as before. Then go down to the bar and take one of the other girls? No, it would somehow be a breach of faith. It would cost their respect for me.

So I did nothing, but continued to wake each morning with a sickening dread of the day stretching bleakly before me, and to wait longingly for the knock on the door.

Then one day I heard from Typhoo that she had met Suzie in town. She had come up for a day's shopping, and had told Typhoo that she did not intend to pay me a visit; she had decided that while living with Rodney it was better not to do so. And so now there was no longer even hope to sustain me, and I fell into a worse state of desolation than I had ever experienced before, a spiritual vacuum in which all seemed futility, a dark night of the soul. It was not a negative state, but as positive as some sickness: I could feel the ache of it like poison in my blood. I tried to make myself work—stood staring, pastel in hand, at an unfinished drawing on the easel, wondering blankly what to do with it, feeling already exhausted by the effort of overcoming my inertia enough to make myself stand there at all. Blackness enveloped my mind. I gave up and went out, and walked the streets carrying my desolation about with me like a shroud. I came back and sat alone on the balcony. The magnificence of the view meant nothing to me; I would have derived as much pleasure from a brick wall. I opened a book, but lacked the concentration to read. Nobody came. Nobody was going to come. I heard voices behind the wooden partition dividing my balcony from its neighbor: a man whispering, a girl giggling. I closed my eyes. I had no existence except as an ache. The long, long ache of loneliness.

And then I could no longer bear it, and I thought: I will take O'Neill's advice. I will be resolute. I will go down and get a girl, and bring this loneliness to an end. And then my interest in life will come back, I shall be able to work again.

I went downstairs to the bar. I felt as guilty as if I was intending to pick a friend's pocket. I sat down at a table, and Gwenny came over to chat.

No, I thought, not Gwenny. I know Gwenny too well. Like a sister.

I watched Wednesday Lulu go to the juke box, put in a coin, press a button. She is very pretty, I thought. She is beautiful. I could grow very fond of her. But what about her principles? She would say I was Suzie's boy friend and refuse me, and I would feel ashamed because I had asked. No, it couldn't be Wednesday Lulu.

Gwenny said, “Oh, good, there is Fifi—I must pay her back the five dollars I borrowed last night for mah-jongg. Will you excuse me?”

She went away. I saw Typhoo sauntering among the tables. Typhoo with her ugly little monkey's face and her shiny blackberry eyes. Typhoo with her sparkle and her long beautiful legs and her naughty split skirt and long sliver of thigh.

Yes, Typhoo, I thought. Typhoo is the medicine I need.

I caught her eye. She came over, grinning, and sat down. Round the edge of the table I could see her long thigh through the gape of the skirt. We talked for a bit, then I told her I would like her to come to my room. She looked puzzled. She said, “But you're Suzie's boy friend.”

“She's been gone a long time now, Typhoo.”

She was silent, preoccupied. I had never known Typhoo silent. Then she said doubtfully, “All right, but—” She broke off as Doris Woo passed the table. She was ashamed of the conversation and did not want to be overheard.

“But what, Typhoo?”

“But you better go up first,” she said. “I don't want anybody to see.”

“Why not?”

“I don't want anybody to see, that's all.”

I left her sitting there and went back to my room. I was afraid she would not come. I wanted her to come very much now, for I found her attractive and liked her, and was certain she offered the solution I sought. After the dark night of the soul—Typhoo the dawn.

There was a knock on the door and she came in, still very subdued. We drank tea and talked until we both felt more at ease. I told her that I knew her too well to discuss money, and would just give her a present. I took her bag and opened it and slipped in some notes. She looked embarrassed and said nothing. She sauntered to the dressing table and lifted the silver box.

“Suzie give you this?”

“Yes, Typhoo.”

She nodded, looking worried. We went out to the balcony and leaned on the balustrade and she began to cheer up again, and was soon chattering brightly and grinning her wide monkey grin. I held her hand and we returned inside. She withdrew her hand to open her bag. She routed in the bag, but could not find what she was looking for and snapped it shut.

“I forgot something important,” she said. “I must fetch it. You don't mind waiting two minutes?”

She went away, closing the door. Five minutes went by and she had not come back. I became anxious. Then I noticed some money on the dressing table under the corner of Suzie's silver box. I counted the notes: it was the money that I had put into Typhoo's bag.

I stood staring at the notes in my hand. The telephone rang and I picked it up. It was Typhoo calling from the bar.

“I just want to say I'm sorry,” she said. “But I like Suzie. She's my friend.”

“But Typhoo, for heaven's sake! She's gone off with my friend—or so-called!”

“That's different. That's her job. You're Suzie's real boy friend.”

“A lot of good that's doing me now!”

“All right, you catch another girl. Not me, that's all. I don't want Suzie's boy friend to catch me.”

She rang off, and I slammed down the receiver. I was very angry. You little whore, I thought. You little sailor's whore how dare you trick me like that? Why couldn't you tell me to my face instead of sneaking off, telling me over the telephone? Were you afraid I'd have raped you?

And getting on your high horse like that, I thought. A little sailor's whore like Typhoo getting on her high horse and turning me down, throwing my money back in my face. The bloody cheek of it.

I kept up the anger as long as I could, because it was easier to bear than the humiliation which was buried underneath. But finally the anger subsided, and the humiliation was still there. And I knew that I did not have the courage to go down to the bar again, ask another girl, risk another refusal.

So much for my bold resolution, I thought. And I went out to the cinema which, since I had failed to get a girl, offered the only hope of distraction. I took a seat in the back circle. In front of me sat a sailor and a Chinese girl, who had evidently been westernized out of all her Chinese inhibitions, and they were petting and fondling. The girl's hair hung to her shoulders; in silhouette against the screen she might have been Suzie. And I was filled with such an unbearable yearning that after a while, although it meant disturbing a dozen people, I had to change my seat.

It was dark and drizzling when I left the cinema. I walked through the drizzle along the greasy pavements. The yearning still possessed me, I yearned with all my being.

There are always street girls, I thought. I could pick up a street girl.

I turned down a street where the girls stood in doorways, some because of the drizzle, others because they were old and the doorways dark. A girl said “Hello,” and the shadowy figure looked slim and young. A bar of yellow light slanted across her shoulder. “Hello, you English?”—and she made a little hopeful movement towards me, and a triangle of cheek caught the light, and the flesh was sagging and painted and old. I hurried on down the street, and turned along the water front toward the Nam Kok.

I saw a girl walking ahead of me under an umbrella—the silhouette of her neat ankles against the wet shine of the pavement, and her slender waist, and her abundant shoulder-length hair.

But it's no good, I thought, she's not a street girl. She's probably making for the ferry. And I tried to suppress the fresh waves of yearning that the sight of her had provoked.