Naked Earth (34 page)

“I stood waiting for hours outside his office, trying to waylay his car. But he has several and all their cars have those blue cloth curtains down. The sentry at the gate must think I’m out of my mind. Maybe I am.”

Pink rings had appeared around her eyes, which were quickly filling with tears. And almost immediately her upper lip turned blotchy red and swollen as if she had been crying for hours.

Thinking how plain she looked for a girl that someone as important as Shen seemed to have taken considerable trouble over, Ko Shan turned away a little to rearrange idly the towels and stockings draped over the foot of the bed. It must have been a double blow to her—to be kicked out by Shen as well as discovering he had fooled her about Liu. She was probably all ready to settle down as Shen’s mistress. With those girls possession is nine-tenths of the law. These half baked new
kan-pu
were actually no different from housewives. You might truly say of them that the shortest way to a woman’s heart was through the vagina.

“Comrade Ko, you’ve got to help me reach him. I’m not going to make a scene or anything. All I want is to ask him to carry out his promise. Please. You’ve got to help me.”

Was Su Nan implying that she was obliged to help because it was she who introduced Shen to her? When Ko Shan spoke she weighed her words, frowning deeply. “Really, I don’t know what to say. I would have minded my own business last time you came to me, only you just wouldn’t take no for an answer, you remember. But this time I’m really at the end of my wits. There’s just nothing I can do.”

“Isn’t there any way to get in touch with him at all?”

“There must be, but I’m not the person to do it. You see, we’re in trouble right now—I guess you’ve heard. Over in our office. I don’t expect you realize the seriousness of the situation.”

“Yes, I know.” After a pause she said, “I know it’s a lot to ask.”

“It just can’t be done. And even if I do manage to get in touch with Shen, I won’t know what to say to him. No matter how tactfully I put it, it would amount to the same thing. It’s a serious business, you know, to charge a
shou chang
with a thing like that. Especially with the Three Antis on.”

Su Nan said nothing.

“I’m not doubting your words,” Ko Shan added soothingly. “I can see you’ve been through a lot and your nerves are all shot to pieces. But since you’ve already made one mistake, it’s best to be careful over your next step, don’t you think? Rashness might get you into serious trouble.”

It took Su Nan a minute to grasp her meaning. “Yes, Shen won’t like it, I know—the way I try so hard to get hold of him. People will talk.”

Ko Shan nodded. “Shen’s always been very careful with his reputation,” she said daintily, enunciating every word with care. “That’s why I just can’t understand how such a thing could happen.”

“He shouldn’t have let me out alive then,” Su Nan said violently. “Well, he could still have me murdered. Easily. I really don’t care what happens to me. The only thing is—Liu’s still inside there.” When Ko Shan did not answer she asked, suddenly nervous, “You don’t think anything has happened to him, do you?”

“I really don’t know what to think. As I said, the whole thing’s fantastic. But from what you said, it seems that Shen’s not serious. Then I don’t suppose he’ll do anything about Liu one way or the other.”

It would sound so silly if she were to argue that Shen had been serious about her. He had told her about his wife, a survivor of the Long March and at present one of the vice presidents of the National Women’s Association in Peking, a very active and influential woman. The Central Committee of the Party would never give permission for him to divorce her. Su Nan would have to remain under cover. But he wanted her to know it was for always. Only he had to be sure she would have nothing to do with Liu from now on, never see him again or write him.

He had said such a lot of unnecessary things, for one in his position. All lies, it seemed, in the light of his subsequent behavior. Maybe he had thought it would please her, not knowing that it only made her feel worse to know that she was tied to him for life. Though it also could be that he really meant it at the time and just changed his mind afterwards.

She did not want to tell Ko Shan any of this. It would only make her appear a bigger fool than she was. Perhaps she could have managed things better if she had not felt so completely overwhelmed by the giving away of herself, though it had seemed to her then that she could not have acted otherwise.

She turned toward the window. Sensing that she was crying, Ko Shan came and stood beside her, leaning against the sill. The alley was quiet in the afternoon sun with most of the people away at work. In the old brick house opposite, the window kept banging in a deserted room. Brown-framed, tall and narrow, it was swinging slowly outward with determined abandon, grimly pulling itself short and swinging back again, painfully, for the inevitable jarring bang. It banged many times before either of them spoke.

Somewhere in the city a cock was crowing, so far away it was a mere high-pitched creak, almost inaudible. To Su Nan the sleepy, plodding normality of the afternoon was unbearable. It discredited her story as much as Ko Shan’s attitude did. On such an afternoon in an alley like this the world of the
shou chang
seemed hardly possible.—Not that there was anything extraordinary on the surface. The steam-heated rooms were quietly furnished and there was none of the cluttered profusion of a rich man’s house. Things and people were produced instantaneously or whisked away out of sight at wish as by some efficient genii.

All that had happened to her there rose up uncontrollably inside her, goaded by the disbelief. The present just floated past her in pale misty puffs, vaguely annoying, like Ko Shan’s cigarette smoke in the sunlight. Only the glass of hot tea against her palm felt real. And the tea was already cooling, the heat fading away to become as impalpable as the thin warmth of the sun upon her.

There was another thing she had to speak of before she went. By now she knew it was useless asking Ko Shan anything. But since she had told her so much already, she might as well say it. And it was easier somehow with Ko Shan standing so close.

“I’ve got to have an abortion.”

Ko Shan made a face of pained half-laughter. “You’re certainly in a mess.”

“Please help me to find a doctor willing to do it. Please. You know more people than I do, Comrade Ko. Won’t you try and find a doctor for me?”

“But that’s against the law.”

“I know, but lots of woman comrades do that, don’t they? When the situation makes it necessary.”

“That was before,” Ko Shan said a little indignantly, “when everybody had to be on the move all the time. In the army or the underground. Now it’s different. The People’s Government doesn’t allow it.”

“Yes, but actually—at least here in Shanghai, where lots of irregular things are still going on—” Su Nan said hesitantly.

“Not this. Now you’d better drop the idea,” Ko Shan said firmly in her best Big Old Sister manner. “I should think the best thing to do under the circumstances is to ask for sick leave, go somewhere quiet and have the baby. Do you think you can confide in your family?”

“I’ve already written home saying I have to have an operation,” Su Nan said stubbornly, looking away. “They’ll raise the money somehow.”

“It’s not a question of money. I doubt you can get anybody to do it for you.”

“I have to have it. Soon. Please! Please help me! I haven’t told anybody else about this.”

It was on the tip of Ko Shan’s tongue to ask her what made her think that she, Ko Shan, was the person to go to in a case like this. She wondered again how much Liu had told her. No, maybe she didn’t need to be told. The furor at the Three-Anti Confessional Meeting must be all over town.

Anyhow, all other considerations apart, she did not see why she should introduce Su Nan to an abortionist and prove beyond a doubt that she was well-acquainted with such practices. “I certainly feel honored because you trust me more than anybody else,” she said smiling. “That’s why I have no choice but to advise you to the best of my knowledge. Really—why don’t you go into the country somewhere and stay there for several months until it’s all over? That ought to be easily arranged, especially if you’re going to receive money from your family.”

“I can’t do that.”

She’s thinking of the possibility of Liu coming out of prison, Ko Shan thought with relish. The best part about this business was that much of it had happened by itself. She had not gone out of her way to arrange it. It proved once again to Ko Shan’s own satisfaction that it was not in her to be jealous. She wouldn’t have bothered if Su Nan hadn’t pestered her so. Then she did have some vague idea of killing two birds with one stone—introducing the girl to Shen and getting Liu out. It’s true that the girl had bungled her part of the job. At worst it might even cost Liu his life. But if anything could reconcile Ko Shan to his death it would be the thought that his girl had killed him through her stupidity.

Things were going her way so smoothly, swimmingly, it was enough to frighten anybody who had had any experience in life.—How long ago was it when Liu had spoken to her about Su Nan, right in this room—spoken as if it was something beyond her understanding, the cozy little igloo of their love, made of ice but warm and homey within and frozen hard to the ground, as firm as part of the living rock. Where would they be now when he came out of prison, if he ever did? How she wished he would, if only for the inevitable confrontation. She could very well imagine it, even if she probably wouldn’t get to see it. But Liu was such a fool, she wouldn’t be surprised if he sat beside Su Nan holding her hand when she was big with another man’s child. It made such a funny picture that she had to lean outside the window, flicking ashes off her cigarette, to hide her smile. The smile passed, casting a shadow where she had felt pleasure just a moment before.

The girl was sobbing. Ko Shan put a hand on her shoulder without saying anything and distinctly felt her shudder. Instantly offended, she withdrew her hand, being more susceptible to this revulsion of the flesh than any insult.

But Su Nan was not really thinking of her. Any touch was repellent right now, even that of the filmy sunlight on her head and face, because she felt ill. There was impatience in the feverish dryness of her skin and hair. Another time was ticking inside her, faster than the clock. “I’ve got to be going,” she said.

“Do take care of yourself, and try not to worry too much,” Ko Shan said. “After all, to a
kan-pu
, personal affairs are always of secondary importance, compared to work. If you have difficulty getting your sick leave, let me know and I’ll see what I can do—I know some people in your office,” she volunteered, to soften her refusal to help in other respects. And she knew that would not be necessary. Su Nan’s superiors would be only too glad to let her go, seeing that she was in such a state and liable to cause trouble. If not for the restrictions on travelling due to the Three Antis and Five Antis, probably they would have transferred her already to some small town in the interior.

WHEN SHE
jumped it seemed somehow, at the last moment, that she had not yet made up her mind. The staircase crumpled under her, folding up like an accordion. The steps hit her again and again through the haze of her indecision. Bluntly projecting edges pushed out surprisingly to strike at her. And yet the blows were muffled by their unexpectedness and the lightning rapidity with which they followed one another. All except the last one, when the patch of floor at the bottom of the stairs sprang up at her, and the vicious slap echoed throughout her, numbly stinging like an electric shock.

“Ai-ya, what happened
?...
How did it happen
?...
Fell down the stair
s
...
Fell all the way!” Voices buzzed around her. People were used to emergencies nowadays with businessmen jumping out of windows almost every day. Tumbling down a flight of stairs was child’s play, comparatively. It was no great surprise either that it should happen to Su Nan, who was getting to be a real case, as everybody knew around the hostel—chasing around town all day, missing office, missing meals. The management, in tacit agreement with her superiors, had chosen to overlook her irregular conduct until some means could be devised to get her out of the way.

“Can you get up?” asked the woman who was the hostel manageress.

Su Nan moaned when hands got under her, trying to raise her to her feet. She ached at so many places, it was difficult to locate the place she wanted to feel pain—the more so because there was nothing there, not a twinge or a flutter. That thing growing inside her, fattening itself on her, had remained intact like one of those imperishable clocks, quietly ticking its own secret time.

“Somebody go and get Dr. Chao there in our alley,” said the manageress. “Ask him to come at once. An accident. If he’s not in, get the nurse, Mrs. Kuan, in No. 14.”

They carried her upstairs. The nurse came. The examination was very painful but in a way the pain was a fitting revenge on her body that had dumbly protected this thing she could not live with. And the nerve-racking pangs did not really reach her. They were just distant booms of guns that shook the floor and windows. She was still busy feeling out that part of her where she was still waiting for some stir, some sign.

She could not understand how that parasitic life had such a tenacious hold on her. It seemed determined not to die unless she died with it. Sitting squarely, solidly, clock-like, ticking away in the dark until its long night was over, when it could emerge as a personality, a thinking, waking, cold-eyed consciousness. And in growing up—always just old enough to have judgment but not understanding. Anyhow, she hated it.

It was easy to talk—go lose yourself in the country until it was born. The
hu k’ou tiao ch’a
, population investigation, was even stricter in the country than in the city. A stranger in a village where everybody knew everybody else would stick out for miles. No end of questions would be asked by the village
kan-pu
. And afterwards she supposed she was to give away the child since she did not want it. That might not be too difficult, if it was a boy. It was always easy to arrange matters if you had little concern for other lives. She just could not consider it.