Gai-Jin (35 page)

Above the gate, a series of Chinese characters were etched elegantly into the wood. “They mean,
Lust is pressing, something must be done about it.”

Tyrer laughed nervously. Many guards inside and outside the gate. Last night when André had volunteered to escort him—they were in the Club then, drinking—he had mentioned a trader had told him the guards were there not just to keep the peace but mostly to keep the whores from escaping, “So they’re really all slaves, aren’t they?” To his shock he had seen Poncin flush angrily.

“Mon Dieu
, don’t think of them as whores or call them whores as we understand the word. They’re not slaves. Some are indentured for a number of years, many sold by their parents at an early age, again for a number of years, but their contracts are Bakufu approved and registered. They’re not
whores
, they’re Ladies of the Willow World and don’t forget it. Ladies!”

“Sorry, I …”

But André had paid no attention. “Some are geishas—Art Persons—those trained to entertain you, sing and dance and play silly games and are not for bedding. The rest,
mon Dieu
, I’ve told you, don’t think of them as whores, think of them as Pleasure Women, trained to please, trained over many years.”

“Sorry, I didn’t know.”

“If you treat them properly they’ll give you pleasure, almost any kind you want—
if they want to
—and if the money you give is correct. You give them money, which has no significance, they give you their youth. It’s an
odd bargain.” André had looked at him strangely. “They give you their youth and hide the tears you cause.” He quaffed his wine and stared at the cup, abruptly maudlin.

Tyrer remembered how he had quietly refilled their glasses, cursing himself for breaking the feeling of easy friendship, to him valuable friendship, swearing to be more cautious in future and wondering why the sudden fury. “Tears?”

“Their life isn’t good, but even so it isn’t always bad. For some it can be marvelous. The most beautiful and accomplished become famous, they’re sought after by even the most important daimyo—kings—in the land, they can marry in high places, marry rich merchants, even samurai. But for our Ladies of the Willow World who are just for us gai-jin,” André had continued bitterly, “there’s no future but to open another house here, to drink saké and employ other girls.
Mon Dieu
, treat them all properly, because once they’re here they’re polluted in the eyes of all other Japanese.”

“Sorry. How awful.”

“Yes, no one understan—” A burst of drunken laughter from the men around drowned him out for a moment, the Club filled, raucous and steaming. “I tell you these cretins don’t care or give a damn, none of them, except Canterbury, he did.” André had looked up from the dregs of his drink. “You’re young and unsullied, here for a year or two and seem willing to learn, so I thought … there’s so much to learn, so much good,” he had said suddenly, and left.

That was last night and now they were within the Yoshiwara gate, André took out his small pistol. “Phillip, are you armed?”

“No.”

André gave the pistol to the unctuous attendant who gave him a receipt and put it with many others. “No weapons are allowed within the fence—the same in all Yoshiwaras, even samurai must give up their swords.
On y va!”

Ahead of them now, on either side of the wide street and alleys leading off it, were lines of neat little houses, many for eating or just small bars, all built of wood with verandas and oiled paper shoji screens, and raised off the ground on low pilings. Everywhere color and sprays of flowers, noise and laughter, and lanterns, candles and oil lamps. “Fire’s a huge hazard, Phillip. This whole place burned down the first year but within the week was booming again.”

All the Houses bore individual signs. Some had open doors and sliding shoji windows. Many girls were in them, ornately or demurely dressed in kimonos of varying quality, depending on the standing of the House. Other girls were promenading, some with colorful umbrellas, some attended by maids, paying little or no attention to the gawking men. Intermixed were vendors of all kinds, and swarms of maids shouting the virtues of the
Houses in versions of pithy, raucous pidgin, and sounding over everything the happy banter of potential customers, most of whom were recognized and had their favored places. There were no Japanese except for guards, servants, porters and masseurs.

“Never forget, Yoshiwaras are a place for joy, the pleasures of the flesh, eating and drinking as well, and that there’s no such thing as sin in Japan, original sin, any kind of sin.” André laughed and led the way through the typically well-ordered crowd, except for a few brawling drunks who were quickly and good-naturedly pulled apart by huge, expert bouncers, at once to be sat on stools and plied with more saké by the ever attentive maids.

“Drunks are welcome, Phillip, because they lose count of their money. But don’t ever pick a quarrel with a bouncer, they’re fantastically good at unarmed combat.”

“Compared to our Drunk Town this place is as well disciplined as the Regent’s Promenade at Brighton.” A boisterous maid caught Tyrer’s arm and tried to pull him into a doorway. “Saké, heya? Jig jig plenty good, Mass’er …”

“Iyé, domo, iyé …”
Tyrer burst out—no, thank you, no—and hurriedly caught up with André. “My God, I had to really tug to get away.”

“That’s their job.” André turned off the main street through a passageway between dwellings, down another, stopped at a seedy door set into a fence, a grubby sign above, and knocked. Tyrer recognized the characters that André had written for him earlier: House of the Three Carp. A small grill slid back. Eyes peered out. The door opened and Tyrer stepped into a wonderland.

Tiny garden, oil lanterns and candlelight. Glistening grey stepping-stones in green moss, clusters of flowers, many small maples—blood-red leaves against more green—pale orange light coming from the half-obscured shoji. Little bridge over a miniature stream, waterfall nearby. Kneeling on the veranda was a middle-aged woman, the mama-san, beautifully attired and coiffured.
“Bonsoir
, Monsieur Furansu-san,” she said, put both her hands on the veranda and bowed.

André bowed back.
“Raiko-san, konbanwa. Ikaga desu ka?”
Good evening, how are you?
“Kore wa watashi no tomodachi desu, Tyrer-san.”
This is my friend, Mr. Tyrer.

“Ah so desu ka? Taira-san?”
She bowed gravely. Awkwardly Tyrer bowed, then she beckoned them to follow her.

“She says Taira is a famous old Japanese name. You’re in luck, Phillip, most of us go by nicknames. I’m Furansu-san—the nearest they can get to Frenchman.”

Taking off their shoes so as not to dirty the very clean and expensive tatami, then sitting awkwardly cross-legged in the room, André Poncin explained the
tokonoma
, the alcove for a special hanging scroll and flower
arrangement, changed daily, guiding him to appreciate the quality of the shoji and woods.

Saké arrived. The maid was young, perhaps ten, not pretty but deft and silent. Raiko poured, first for André and then Tyrer, then herself. She sipped, André drained the tiny cup and held it out for more. Tyrer did the same, finding the taste of the warm wine not unpleasant but insipid. Both cups were immediately filled and drained and refilled. More trays and more flasks.

Tyrer lost count but soon he was enveloped with a pleasing glow, forgot his nervousness and watched and listened and understood almost nothing the other two said, just a word here and there. Raiko’s hair was black and shining and dressed with many ornate combs, her face thick with white powder, neither ugly nor beautiful just different, her kimono pink silk with interweaving green carp.

“A carp is
koi
, usually a sign of good luck,” André had explained earlier. “Townsend Harris’s mistress, the Shimoda courtesan the Bakufu arranged to distract him, called herself Koi, but I’m afraid it didn’t bring her luck.”

“Oh? What happened?”

“The story told amongst courtesans here is that he adored her and when he left he gave her money, enough to set herself up—she was with him for about two years. Shortly after he returned to America, she just vanished. Probably drank herself to death or committed suicide.”

“She loved him that much?”

“They say that in the beginning when the Bakufu approached her she adamantly refused to go with a foreigner—an unheard-of aberration, don’t forget he was the first ever to be actually allowed to live
on Japanese soil
. She begged the Bakufu to choose someone else, to allow her to live in peace, said she would become a Buddhist nun, she even swore she would kill herself. But they were equally adamant, begging her to help them solve this problem of gai-jin, pleading with her for weeks to be his consort, wearing her down by what means no one knows. So she agreed and they thanked her. And when Harris left they all turned their backs on her, Bakufu, everyone: Ah, so sorry, but any woman who has gone with a foreigner is tainted forever.”

“How awful!”

“Yes, in our terms, and so sad. But remember, this is the Land of Tears. Now she is legend, honored by her peers and by those who turned their backs, because of her sacrifice.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Nor do I, nor any of us. But they do. Japanese do.”

How strange, Tyrer thought again. Like this little house and this man and woman, chattering half in Japanese, half in pidgin, laughing one with
another, one a madam the other a customer, both pretending they are something else. More and more saké. Then she bowed and got up and left.

“Saké, Phillip?”

“Thanks. It’s quite nice, isn’t it?”

After a pause, André said, “You’re the first person I’ve ever brought here.”

“Oh? Why me?”

The Frenchman twisted the porcelain cup in his fingers, drained the last drop, poured some more, then began in French, his voice soft and filled with warmth, “Because you’re the first person I’ve met in Yokohama with … because you speak French, you’re cultured, your mind is like a sponge, you’re young, not far off half my age, eh? You’re twenty-one, and not like the others, you’re untainted and you’ll be here for a few years.” He smiled, spinning the web tighter, telling only part of the truth, molding it: “Truly you’re the first person I’ve met who,
alors
, even though you’re English and actually an enemy of France, you’re the only one who somehow seems to merit the knowledge I’ve acquired.” An embarrassed smile. “Difficult to explain. Perhaps because I’ve always wanted to be a teacher, perhaps because I’ve never had a son, never married, perhaps because soon I have to move back to Shanghai, perhaps because we’ve enemies enough and perhaps … perhaps you could be a firm friend.”

“I would be honored to be your friend,” Tyrer said at once, enmeshed and under his spell, “and I really do think, I really have always thought we should be allies, France and Britain, not enemies and—” The shoji slid back. Raiko, on her knees, beckoned Tyrer. His heart surged.

André Poncin smiled. “Just follow her, and remember what I told you.”

As in a dream Phillip Tyrer got up unsteadily and padded after her, down a corridor, into a room, across it and along a veranda, into another empty room where she motioned him in, closed the shoji, and left him.

A shaded oil lamp. Charcoal brazier for warmth. Shadows and darkness and patches of light. Futons—small square mattresses—laid out as a bed on the floor, a bed for two. Downy coverlets. Two
yukatas
, wide-sleeved, patterned cotton gowns for sleeping in. Through a small door a bathhouse, candle-lit, tall wooden tub filled with steaming water. Sweet-smelling soap. Low, three-legged stool. Diminutive towels. Everything as André had foretold.

His heart was beating very fast now and he pushed his mind to remember André’s instructions through the saké haze.

Methodically, he began to undress. Coat, waistcoat, cravat, shirt, woolen vest, each article meticulously folded and nervously placed in a pile. Awkwardly sitting, then pulling off his socks, reluctantly his trousers and standing up once more. Only his woolen long johns remained.

Weaving a little, then an embarrassed shrug and he took them off and folded them, even more carefully. His skin prickled into goose bumps and he walked into the bathhouse.

There he scooped water from the barrel as he had been told and spilled it over his shoulders, the warmth pleasant. Another and then the sound of the shoji opening and he glanced around. “Christ Almighty,” he muttered.

The woman was beefy with huge forearms, her yukata brief, nothing under except a loincloth and she strode purposefully towards him with a flat smile, motioned him to squat on the stool. In absolute embarrassment he obeyed. At once she noticed the healing scar on his arm and sucked in her breath, said something that he could not understand.

He forced a smile. “Tokaidō.”

“Wakarimasu.”
I understand. Then, before he could stop her she poured water over his head—unexpectedly and not part of his forewarning—and began soaping and washing his long hair, then his body, her fingers hard, expert and insistent, but taking care not to hurt his arm. Arms legs back front, then offering him the cloth and pointing between his legs. Still in shock he cleansed those parts, meekly handed the cloth back. “Thank you,” he muttered. “Oh, sorry,
domo.”

More water took away the last of the soap and she pointed to the tub.
“Dozo!”
Please.

André had explained: “Phillip, just remember that, unlike with us, you have to be washed and clean
before
you get into the bath, so others can use the same water—which is very sensible, don’t forget wood is very expensive and it takes a long time to heat enough—so don’t piss in it either, and don’t think of her as a woman when you’re in the bathhouse, just a helper. She cleans you outside, then inside, no?”

Tyrer eased himself into the tub. It was hot but not too hot and he closed his eyes, not wanting to watch the woman making the bath tidy. Christ, he thought in misery, I’ll never be able to perform with her. André’s made a vast mistake.