The Frenchman's Revenge (82 page)
Read The Frenchman's Revenge Online
Authors: Taylor Lee
After days and nights lying sandwiched between bodies that were dead, or near dead, she gave up trying to decide why Ming’s body smelled sweeter, even dead, and Ang Lan’s wasted body made her gag days before Ang died. You’d think that dead bodies would smell the same.
But they didn’t.
They were always fetid, always sour. But, each body had its own unique odor, clinging to some useless sliver of individuality, not understanding it didn’t matter – anymore in death than it had in life.
The insects also played a role. They lent their particular imprimatur, especially the maggots.
The men came every three or four days to cart away the bodies. They tied handkerchiefs over their faces to protect them from the stink of the hold.
The stench was so strong many times the men carrying the bodies would drop them and vomit into the slop buckets or on the dead girls.
She heard the sailors say they had to weight the canvas sacks they stuffed the bodies in to make them sink. The girls were so slight, so small, they were almost weightless.
When they reached land, the smells changed. The brothel had distinctive, suffocating odors all its own. The stink of the filthy mildewed mattresses they huddled on was a comforting smell. It was a smell they clung to while waiting for the men to come and get them. The thought of the men, looming over them, their fat, hairy bodies thick with the rancid stink of sweat, whiskey breath and dried semen made her gut roil. Like the madam’s heavy sweet perfume, the acrid reek of the lye soap they used to scrub their tender flesh between men sickened her.
But in five long years she never figured out why the smell of the burning brothel was what woke her. It wrenched her screaming in terror from the horrifying fog of her nightmare, her body sticky with sweat, her face streaming with tears, her chest racked with sobs.
It didn’t make sense.
The fire was what freed them, what saved them.
The men who burned the brothel to the ground with the bad men inside were their saviors, their avengers.
She lurched to her feet clutching the bedpost to keep from swooning. When the stars flashing behind her eyelids stopped and her legs steadied she moved as quickly as she could.
Sometimes she made it to the bathroom, not tonight.
Crouching on her hands and knees on the cold floor, she retched and heaved, emptying herself until no more poisonous smells swamped her.
She stumbled to the sink and splashed cool water on her sweaty flesh, her face, neck, arms, chest, and then between her legs. When she could stand without hanging on to the walls or furniture, she bundled up the damp sheets and heaped them outside the door. Much as she hated for the maids to know her nightmares were back, she couldn’t bear the rank smell of her fear saturating the bedclothes. She wiped up the floor and washed herself once more.
Lying naked on the clean sheets she waited for the vision.
In five years it never failed to appear. When she heard the crash of the cymbals and saw the blast of fireworks her chest loosened, she began to breathe again.
They were all there at the celebration. The Frenchman, his beautiful red-haired bride, the strong white man with the carved cheekbones, and his elegant Chinese wife.
Sitting beside them, their faces rapt with joy were the other girls.
Like her, they no longer reeked of excrement or rotten food or depraved men. The girls were clean, their hair was shiny. It smelled like lavender and honeysuckle
They all laughed and cheered when he burst on the stage. The boy-man, scant years older than she was.
The man of her dreams. The man who leapt and twisted in a ferocious dance of artistic strength.
His sinewy arms flexed as he tossed the blazing weapons, the dangerous swords, the flying staff.
The muscles on his back and chest gleaming in the firelight rippled with the effort of his strenuous moves. His powerful thighs pulsated as he leapt through the air. She gloried in his golden skin, his swirling black hair, and his flashing blue eyes.
Breathing deep she settled back against the cool sheets. As always, fierce resolution flooded her. The first time she saw him at the wedding celebration, and in every vision thereafter, she vowed that some day she would be like him.
She would be strong, unafraid.
A warrior, a defender, an avenger. Never again a victim.
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