The Orchid Tree (8 page)

‘And I’ll miss you too.’

He moves closer to her, lifts his hand, and strokes her cheek. He can’t help himself; it’s so warm and lovely. Then he leans in and kisses her gently on the mouth. She pulls back, clearly surprised.

‘Sorry,’ he murmurs, appalled at himself.

‘It was nice.’

‘Nice?’

‘I mean, wonderful.’

He takes her hand. ‘Shall we do it again?’

‘Please.’

He inclines his head towards hers and meets her lips. So soft and sweet. A rustling sound, and Ruth skips towards them. ‘There you are,’ he says with false enthusiasm. ‘We couldn’t find you earlier.’

It’s a week after Charles kissed me, and I’m sitting on a rock next to the path leading around the headland. I’ve only seen him briefly at roll-call or in the supper queue since, and we’ve exchanged shy smiles but haven’t managed to be alone together. Stanley is over-crowded; even married couples have few private moments. I wish we could be together more; I’m torn between wanting to shout my feelings to the world and the need to find out if Charles feels the same.

Dejection washes through me. The Japanese have just broken the promise they made a few weeks ago when they said they’d repatriate all the women, children, old people and those who are ill as an act of goodwill. Instead, they only repatriated the Canadians, and those lucky people left yesterday. Papa explained repatriation meant you had to have an exchange of prisoners. The only Japanese available to be exchanged with the British are some pearl fishermen caught in Australia, and the Aussies have turned their noses up at a bunch of half-starved, malaria-ridden people from Hong Kong. Someone said it was because the fishermen are familiar with the Australian coastline and they don’t want them reporting back to Japan. Hopefully, that’s the real reason. And I bet the internment camp in Australia is nicer than Stanley . . .

I hug my knees and stroke the cool stone of my jade bangle. Nearly a week ago, the American bombers returned and now they come back every day to bombard the harbour. I was filled with hope, thinking the war was bound to end and I’d be able to go home. Yet the days have worn on and now I feel even lower than before.

I’ve tried to keep cheerful. The adults hold regular concerts and perform plays, but the good times are few and far between. Sometimes, I take a pin and push it into the back of my leg to keep the guilt for Mama’s death at bay. If I’d realised how ill she was, I wouldn’t have resented having to do all the washing and cleaning. I would have been nicer to her and not have answered back all the time.

Shutting my eyes, I think about that terrible night when I held Mama’s hand and said goodbye to her. The pain of the loss is as strong as if it happened yesterday. I can’t bear to remember Mama’s face, so still and white. I can’t bear to visit her grave. I can’t bear to think of my mother’s body rotting in the earth.

Getting up from the rock, I dust down my shorts then traipse towards the Indian Quarters. There’s Charles, standing in the middle of the village green, surrounded by a group of children, Ruth’s friends, playing cowboys and Indians. I wave at him. ‘Shall we go for a walk?’

Charles spreads his arms out wide. ‘Sorry. Later maybe. Why don’t you give me a hand?’

I glance at the kids. Generally, they run around playing games and I don’t have much to do with them except when they dive-bomb me and shout, ‘Ratatata!’ Charles has become a sort of stand-in uncle and seems to enjoy supervising them, but I prefer to stay detached. I have no experience with young children.

Once, I spied Ruth doing her business behind a bush. It was revolting: worms wiggled among the turds. ‘Make sure she washes her hands before eating,’ I said to Charles. Then I told myself off for sounding like a prig.

I smile at him now; it would be rude to refuse. And, anyway, I’d do anything for him. ‘All right.’

‘We’ve captured Charles and we’re about to scalp him,’ Ruth shouts; she turns to her brother. ‘Surrender, paleface!’

Charles gives me a helpless glance. ‘Rescue me, please!’

I march towards him, children hanging onto me. By the time I reach him, I’ve started to laugh. I’ve been wading through a sea of infants and he looks so out of place stranded in the middle, his hands tied behind his back, his face anxious.

Collapsing on the ground, I clutch my belly as the giggles escape. ‘I have you in my power. Yield!’

‘All right, I give up.’ Charles grins and shakes his head.

I want to push back the hair flopping across his forehead, and kiss him right here in front of everyone.
I untie him and our eyes meet. But the children pile on top of us in a scrum and spoil the moment. ‘Come on! We can go for that walk now.’

On the path leading up from the Indian Quarters, I wrap my arms around his waist and breathe in his musky citrus smell. I lift my head and his mouth covers mine. I kiss him until the numbness goes. I drink him in, love for him flooding through me.

A new sensation takes hold. His hand moves slowly down my body. My heart hammers, but I don’t stop him. I want his touch.

Footsteps echo. ‘Hello, you two,’ Jessica Chambers says brightly. ‘That’s a shamefaced look if ever I saw one.’ Laughing, she makes her way towards the blocks of flats.

I give her back a withering look. ‘Let’s go to the cemetery, Charles. We can find a spot where no one will see us.’

Under the orchid tree, well away from Mama’s grave, he gathers me to him. Gently, his hands explore the hollows of my back. Our kisses become more urgent and our breathing deepens.

A sudden cry from below. ‘Kate, your father wants you to go home straight away,’ Jessica shrills. ‘He’s been coughing blood.’

‘Oh, my God!’ I leap up and run down the hill.

***

‘Have you been with that Eurasian boy?’ Papa asks.

I nod.

‘You’re spending far too much time with him. It can’t continue. People will talk.’

‘Never mind about that. I’ve been begging you to see a doctor about that cough, but you’ve been too stubborn to do anything about it.’

‘You know how much I hate quacks. Ever since my TB.’

‘I hope it hasn’t come back. What am I going to do with you?’

I wipe my sweaty hands on my shorts. There’re other cases of TB in the camp, and the patients are isolated in a makeshift sanatorium behind the hospital. What if the doctors put Papa in there? How will he survive?

Papa coughs and sponges his moustache with his thread-bare handkerchief, leaving a tell-tail trail of pink sputum. ‘It might not be TB.’

‘Well, you’ll have to see the doctors. I’ll take you to the hospital tomorrow.’

‘Getting back to that boy you’ve got involved with.’ Papa clears his throat. ‘I can’t have you making a spectacle of yourself. It won’t do your reputation any good, dear girl. You’re growing up and you’ll be seventeen soon.’

‘Charles is just a friend. There’s nothing going on between us.’

‘Are you sure?’

I cross my fingers behind my back. ‘Absolutely. Don’t worry!’

***

The doctors have put Papa in a side ward and keep him under observation. I’m free to spend as much time with Charles as our lack of privacy allows. Today, I’m sitting with him under the orchid tree, his arm around me. There’s movement down on the beach. The Camp Commandant’s Assistant is swinging a baseball bat, and shouting at a gang of European men unloading a consignment of supplies from a boat. I nudge Charles and point.

‘He goes around slapping people’s faces and laying into them with that paddle if they don’t toe the line,’ he says, taking my hand.

‘Did you hear about his theories on eating grass?’

‘He’s been telling people they should live on it like Japanese soldiers hundreds of years ago.’

‘Mr Chambers and Professor Morris have started making grass stews.’

‘That can’t be good for their stomachs. Human beings aren’t able to digest the stuff. We’re not cows,’ Charles groans. ‘The war has got to end one of these days, you know. And all this will just be a memory.’

‘A bad one, I’m afraid.’

‘All bad?’ He smiles.

‘Not you, of course. You make it bearable.’

I run my fingers through my tangled curls and push them back from my face. ‘The Japanese are losing the war, though, aren’t they?’

‘Of course they are, bit by bit. We have to be patient.’

‘But what if we all die of starvation before the Allies can get here?’

‘We won’t.’ Charles puts his arms around me again.

I relax and snuggle against him. ‘I love you.’ The words spill out of my mouth before I’ve even thought about them. I hold my breath and wait for his response.

‘I love you too. I want us to be together for always.’ His mouth comes down on mine and I melt into him.

A shout from lower down the hill. ‘Kate,’ Jessica calls out. ‘Time to queue for supper . . .’

I wish she would leave us alone.

***

‘Your father asked me to keep an eye on you,’ Jessica says. ‘He doesn’t approve of your friendship with that young man.’

‘Why? I don’t understand.’

‘Charles Pearce is neither one thing nor the other. He’s not Chinese and he’s not English.’

‘Well, I think he’s very lucky to have two cultures.’

‘That’s the problem, don’t you see? The Chinese and the expatriates don’t mix. We respect each other, of course, and we work together quite happily, but our backgrounds are too different. If the races inter-marry they become part of the Eurasian community, which isn’t accepted by either side.’

‘I don’t see why we have to take sides. I really love my amah and her son is like a brother to me.’

‘That’s because they lived in your house and there were barriers, only you were just too young to notice them.’

‘There aren’t any barriers here in Stanley.’

‘We won’t be here much longer.’

‘I hope not. Yet sometimes I think we will be, and we should live for now as we don’t know what the future will bring.’

Jessica stands back and studies me with stern eyes. ‘You have an old head on young shoulders, my dear. Just be careful!’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Have you started your periods yet?’

‘Of course. But they stopped a few months after we got here. Mama said it was due to lack of food.’

‘Don’t let him take advantage of you, Kate. You’re still very innocent and your mother isn’t here to warn you.’

‘I don’t understand.’

Jessica looks away. ‘Take care not to lose your heart completely, that’s all. We don’t want you getting hurt.’

‘I won’t.’ Charles would never hurt me. We talk about anything and everything, and, with him it’s as if I’ve found the other part of myself, the part I didn’t know existed. I can guess what Jessica was on about, but Charles is a gentleman and would never do anything I didn’t want him to do. Trouble is, whenever he touches me I don’t ever want him to stop . . .

Japanese voices jangle from just outside the door. I’m perched opposite Papa at the piled-up suitcases we use as a low table, sipping tepid water and nibbling from a bowl of cold rice. I’m wearing a cotton slip, but the summer air is so wet it drips down my skin and collects in the bends of my arms and behind my knees. I wipe my hands and get to my feet.
What’s going on?

Two officers are standing on the threshold, swords hanging from their waists. Three more men in white suits and Panama hats come up from behind them. My breath catches.
Kempeitai.

Papa raises himself slowly from his mattress and bows. He’s still weak; he was only discharged from the hospital yesterday. The blood he coughed up wasn’t TB in the end. Just a severe case of bronchitis.

‘You got radio?’ a short, tubby man asks.

‘No,’ Papa says firmly.

‘We do search.’

There isn’t enough room for Papa and me, let alone for the contingent of Japanese. The officer gives a cursory glance around then mutters something incomprehensible. The rest of the Japanese laugh and back out of the door, still laughing.

Papa sits down heavily and I go to the window. The Japanese are heading off towards the Police Block. It’s too late to warn Bob. I have to find Charles.

Within minutes I’m running up the stairs to his room. It’s empty except for Ruth, who is sitting on a camp-bed, scooping congee from the bottom of her breakfast bowl. ‘What’s the matter?’ she asks.

‘The Japanese are prowling around looking for radios.’

‘Well, they won’t find any here.’

Legs shaking, I collapse on the bed. ‘Are you sure?’

Ruth gives me a puzzled glance. ‘Why?’

‘No reason, kiddo.’

‘I think my parents and Charles have gone to the canteen. Let’s catch up with them.’

I link arms with Ruth and we walk up the main road. If only I could share my concern with her, but Charles told me Ruth doesn’t know about the radio. Up ahead, I spot Derek Higgins approaching from the opposite direction.

‘Guess what?’ he says. ‘They’ve arrested a top government chap, the number two in the police, and lots of other people.’

‘Don’t sound so pleased.’ I push Ruth behind me.

Derek smirks. ‘Isn’t it about time we had some excitement in this boring place?’

‘You’re heartless and horrible.’

The echo of screams comes from the Commandant’s house at the top of the hill, and I flinch.

Derek folds his arms. ‘Do you know about Japanese water torture?’

I want to back away from him, but my legs have frozen.

‘They tie the victims face-down on a board and pump liquid through their nose and mouth,’ he says.

‘H... h... how do they breathe?’

‘They open their mouths even more, but the Japs fill them up with more water.’

‘You’re fibbing!’

Derek licks his lips. ‘When the victims look like the swollen corpses of drowned people, the Japs jump on the poor buggers’ stomachs.’ He sniggers. ‘Jets of water shoot out of their mouths, noses and even eyes.’

‘You’re such a sadist. I bet it’s not true.’

‘’Tis so!’

Ruth comes out from behind me, and stamps her foot. ‘I hate you. Leave us alone!’

I put my arm around her. ‘Come on, kiddo! I’ll take you home. We can wait for your parents and brother there.’

Back in the Married Quarters, we find Charles and his father sitting on their camp-beds.

‘Ma’s furious,’ Charles whispers. ‘She found us with the radio and has gone to bury it.’

‘I was so worried about you.’ I grab his hand, ‘Thank God you’re all right. And what about your mother? I hope she won’t be caught.’

‘She won’t be. We smashed the radio into little pieces. Japs won’t suspect a woman. She’ll pretend to be planting something in our vegetable patch.’

I squeeze his fingers and kiss him right in front of his father and sister.

***

I hurry back to the Indian Quarters, but something’s wrong. The village green is empty except for four men. My heart almost beats out of my chest. There’s Bob, stumbling between two
Kempeitai
officers and a Chinese supervisor. They march him to the end of the blocks of flats. My whole body shakes. The officer makes him dig in the soft earth until he unearths a small grey box.

Tears gush down my face. Papa arrives and takes me by the arm. ‘Come inside this instant! It’s far too dangerous out here.’

I sniff and wipe my nose. ‘What have you heard?’

‘It’s spreading around the camp like wildfire. Japs have discovered a fortune in banknotes hidden under the bandages of a chap sent to town for an x-ray. They’ve arrested the top man in the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank and some of his underlings, the fellow in charge of Medical Services, and quite a few locals. Accused them of collaborating with the BAAG and forming a resistance.’

‘Derek Higgins told me about the arrests.’

‘They nabbed two of the Cable and Wireless staff, as well as our friend Bob, and said they were operating secret radios.’

‘How did they find out they had radios?’

‘Japs have discovered some spare parts smuggled in with our supplies.’

‘Who told on them?’

‘Some people would sell their own grandmothers for favours or for food.’

***

I lie awake all night; I can’t stop thinking about Bob. In the morning I rush to the hot water queue to tell Charles. Where is he? I spin on my heel and dash to the Married Quarters.

Ruth and her mother are sitting next to each other, crying. Mr Pearce hovers over them, clutching at his hands. ‘It’s too terrible,’ he says. ‘They came for him last night. Said that, because he repaired their radio, he must have known about the others in the camp.’

My legs buckle and Charles’ father gently helps me to a seat.

‘We were kept up all night by the Japs,’ Mrs Pearce sobs. ‘They had a drunken party in the prison. We saw everything from our balcony.’

‘One so-and-so, probably sozzled on
saké
, let loose into the yard and began firing his revolver into the air,’ Mr Pearce says. ‘All the Japs dived for cover, then an officer came out and shot him in the shoulder. They hauled the man away, and in the end everything quietened down.’

‘What do you think will happen to Charles?’ Numbness fills me, the frozen sensation only he can melt.

‘I don’t know,’ Mr Pearce says. ‘No one will tell us anything.’

‘They’ll let him out soon, though, won’t they?’ I wait for Mr Pearce to reassure me, but he remains silent.

***

The weeks pass and Charles is still being held in the gaol, along with the others who were arrested. Early one afternoon at the end of October, I’m lingering on the hillside above the cemetery with Ruth. I spend as much time as I can with Charles’ sister. It started as a way of getting news of him; now I’ve become fond of her and enjoy our moments together.

I’m thinking about Charles. Hopefully, his arrest was a huge mistake and he’ll soon be released. The Japanese said that, as Charles was over sixteen, he came under their authority and not that of the camp tribunal. He’ll be tried and sentenced like everyone else. I hope it won’t come to that. Mr Pearce said not to worry, as there was no proof that Charles had a radio or that he’s been involved in anything untoward.

‘I was with my friends by the main road this morning,’ Ruth says, picking up a fallen pine cone. ‘A van drove out of the prison and a hand waved through the window. Someone called out, “Goodbye”.’

I look down at the shore. There’s a stretch of sand near the jetty. It’s usually deserted, but not today. Guards have appeared and someone has dug channels above the high-water mark.

Ruth points. ‘What are those trenches for?’

‘I don’t know, kiddo. We’d better set off for school or we’ll be late for our lessons.’ I stare at the beach again. Three trucks have driven up and the guards are opening the doors. ‘Wait!’

The guards line up about thirty men and one woman, roped together in groups of three with their hands tied behind their backs. They wave their rifles and push the people down to sit on the sand, then they put blindfolds on them. There’s Bob in the first trio! A guard leads him forward to kneel by a trench. Then a large man, his head close-shaven, unsheathes a sword and swings it in the air.

Down comes the blade, glinting in the sun. A streak of silver. Shining. Silent. Deadly. I yelp as Bob’s body topples. Leaping to my feet I grab Ruth’s hand, and we run. We run, our legs pounding the dry earth to get away from the scene of horror unfolding on the sand, our mouths open to let out our screams.

Ruth runs back to her family and I career full-tilt into Papa on the pathway leading down to the Indian Quarters.

‘Steady, dear girl. What on earth’s the matter?’

In gasping breaths I tell him.

He pulls me close and I sob against his chest. ‘What a callous act! There’s no excuse for it,’ he says.

‘They were laughing and j . . . j . . . joking. How can they be so cruel?’

Back in the Indian Quarters, Papa fetches a cloth and sponges vomit from my chin. I can’t remember having been sick. He holds me as I weep. I spend the afternoon sitting listlessly on my mattress and go to bed early. Then I wake up screaming from a nightmares of Charles’ instead of Bob’s disconnected head rolling along the ground, blood spurting from his severed neck.

Papa sits down on the mattress next to me and pats my shoulder. ‘There, there.’

I feel numb and empty of emotion; it’s as if I’ve died too.