The Private Papers of Eastern Jewel (9 page)

For the first time since I had heard Kanjurjab's name I allowed myself to wonder what he might be like. He had sent me a garishly coloured portrait of himself. It showed him posed on a high-backed chair, dressed formally in dark-blue silk with a spiked fur hat on his big head. On a desk beside him sat a clock painted to forever read the mysterious hours of noon or midnight. The backdrop of the painting displayed sprays of gore-red anemones which appeared to be growing from his shoulders. I was not optimistic about our union. If his nature echoed his appearance it would make life too peaceful for my liking. I wondered what he expected of me, duty, beauty and humility, I supposed.

Sorry told me she had once met a Mongolian outside the walls of the Forbidden City. He had smelled of mare's milk and horse urine. His skin was weathered to leather, his teeth were as grey as oysters and, although she stepped aside for him, he did not smile once. She added optimistically that he was probably not a prince, so I could hope for better.

That morning, my last in the western wing, I enjoyed a breakfast of cuttlefish and garlic with a thimbleful of five-grain wine that Sorry said would protect me against the north wind. She was unsettled that I was to fly in a plane on my journey, and sad that the time had come for us to part, but I noticed something of relief in her bearing. I knew she loved me, but perhaps I had become too much for her, and she was looking forward to a quieter life. I asked her to hug me as though I were a girl again and then to let me go. I told her to remember me only if it didn't make her sad.

'After all,' I said, 'memory is given for survival, Sorry, so remember only those things you need to.'

'I will, little mistress,' she said. 'I always do as you say.'

Although I had cried at the loss of my blood mother it would have been inappropriate to cry at leaving Sorry. I was ready to let her go. Everything has its time and life lived without change is bound ultimately to be unsatisfying. I had learnt from Sorry that if you set your mind to it, it is possible to love a bad person as she had loved me. In any case I could not believe that I would never see her again. I was not superstitious as Natsuko was, but something inside me knew that I would see Sorry again.

The years I had lived amongst the Kawashimas had taught me things that I would never forget. From Kawashima I learnt that power is useless if you do not use it and that one should always have something to barter with. From Teshima I learnt that selfishness has many rewards and from Natsuko that virtue guarantees none. From Shimako I came to know that it is possible to be two people at one and the same time, also that an inner and secret life has more influence on us than the one we choose to show the world.

Although the weather had turned for the better, Natsuko caught an infection and took to her bed. She frequently suffered bouts of beriberi for which Dr Mura gave her vitamin injections, but this time she said it was influenza. It may have been a ploy to keep her from having to attend my wedding, although she did lie pale on the pillow.

When the time came for me to go she took her leave of me with her customary formality.

'I would wish you fortune in your marriage, Yoshiko,' she said, 'but that would be foolishly optimistic for someone born in the Year of the Tiger. Tigers are never satisfied, nor do they ever give up hunting.'

I couldn't resist the urge to fence with her one last time. 'Natsuko,' I said, 'your husband's geisha was born in the Year of the Tiger. If rumour is to be believed her life has been excessively fortunate.'

She smiled pityingly at me. 'In Osaka,' she said, 'the unlucky year is that of the ram.'

My rooms in the western wing looked lifeless without my belongings to decorate them. While living my life there I hadn't noticed that the walls were crumbling and in need of painting, or that the mirror I gazed into every day was leaden with age. Yet, somewhere steeped in the plaster and in the still air of the rooms there remained a trace of the excitement, the misery and the sexual encounters they had hosted. Yamaga was there too and that was a memory that could never be pure, it would always come with pain attached to it. I took up the cup he had last sipped sake from and let it fall to the floor; it broke into three shards, I stamped on them, powdering them to dust. I would take no memento of him to distract me from living. I knew, though, that his image and my pain would return unbidden no matter what I left behind me.

I wanted to live my life as it happened, not lost in nostalgia or anticipation. I didn't expect to be happy. It seemed to me that happiness was only found in those moments when time is occupied with something that takes you out of yourself. I determined to live day by day in my life, and avoid the long-term pursuit of happiness. I would let the pleasure principle guide me through my allotted time, so that when death sought me out it would find me still living life to the full.

Bone Stew and Mare's Milk

Kawashima and Nobu accompanied me on the journey to Port Arthur where I was to be married before travelling to Mongolia. Hideo was to remain at home as temporary patriarch as his grandfather was now too old for such duties.

My trunks, filled with clothes and wedding gifts, had gone before me, but in my precious writing case I carried on board the half-eaten box of lychees now shrivelled with age, my bee in amber and my mother's coral earrings.

We flew from Tokyo across Korea to the beautiful peninsula of Port Arthur in a military plane as the guests of Admiral Ube Sadamu. The Admiral, an influential and aristocratic cohort of Kawashima's, had helped to arrange my marriage to Kanjurjab as part of Japan's effort to make as many footholds in Mongolia as possible. It is a pity that power rarely comes with beauty, for the Admiral was as ugly as he was powerful.

We had news that China's weak Emperor Pu Yi had fled the Forbidden City under the protection of the Japanese. With Peking in turmoil his Imperial Majesty's safety was at risk. On a grey February morning in 1925 he had been secreted out of the city in the company of his tutor Reginald Johnston to set up home in Tientsin, the birthplace of his wife Wan Jung. Admiral Ube had a hand in the matter, and I could tell by the way that Kawashima deferred to him that he was a powerful man. Nobu told me that the Admiral was at the centre of Japanese affairs and was a personal friend of Crown Prince Hirohito.

The journey was thrilling, especially the take-off, which was doubly exciting for me because of Nobu's obvious fear of flying. I told him I was determined to fly a plane myself one day and he laughed, not only to annoy me but because he was genuinely amused. Nobu enjoyed making me angry to compensate himself for the many humiliations he had suffered in his youth at my hands.

'You will be a wife, Yoshiko,' he jeered. 'Wives do not fly planes, they lie on their backs and breed.'

Nobu had grown into a handsome man whose strong looks belied his weak nature. He told lies to ease his path through life and always took the line of least resistance, relying on his charm to get him what he wanted. I liked him well enough, though, he had a good sense of humour and I once saw him delicately release a panic-stricken butterfly from a spider's web. His true ambition was to be a poet, but he didn't have the courage to speak of it to Kawashima. I doubt he had the talent either. Despite his prodding, I think that he admired me, even though I had, over the years, frequently exposed the frailties of his nature. I did not blame him now for taking a little pleasure in my situation.

Although he did not know it then, Nobu was to marry the daughter of our host Admiral Ube. The girl was high-born and the marriage pleased Kawashima, but she was sickly and suffered many stillbirths. She delivered Nobu only one living child, a girl who, having no brothers to compete with, grew to be not only decorative, but also scholarly.

We had taken off in what the pilot had described as excellent flying weather; the air was perfectly still with a clear bleached sky and good visibility. As we descended in an inky light, one or two stars appeared in the sky and the faint outline of the moon looked red. Kawashima took a silver flask from his pocket and offered us a shot of malt whisky. It was my first taste of any spirit other than sake or Chinese wine. The strange flavour brought to mind temples and tobacco and left my throat hot. I thought the taste interesting and admired the silver flask. But Nobu, who strove to appear unimpressed with everything, said that sake was better and Kawashima and Sadamu nodded in agreement.

I was informed by Kawashima that Port Arthur had been captured from China by Japan and was now Japanese territory. It was therefore a most suitable place for the marriage to take place, particularly so as Kanjurjab had no wish to cross a sea to meet his bride. Kawashima said that when I reached Mongolia I would be expected to promote my country in all things. As a daughter of Japan I must never forget the debt lowed to my adopted land. I could not believe that the country I so loved could truly wish me to give my life to the cold plains of Mongolia. Surely Japan had higher things in mind for me?

Kawashima had arranged for us to wait for Kanjurjab's arrival in a large house built like its neighbours in the western style, with an overgrown garden at the back, full of oily laurel and bleeding snowberry. Designed to sit comfortably in an elegant semicircle, it was painted white and guarded at its entrance by iron gates wrought with dragons and peonies. The interior was decorated in the Chinese style and overfilled with dark furniture and uncomfortable seating. My rooms were on the first floor at the front of the house, and despite the many servants they were untidy and a little dusty. The air in the house was heavy and sweet, which brought to mind decay, and the sofas and cushions were a little damp.

The house overlooked a coastline shadowed by ragged cliffs that met a grey strip of sand and shingle at the water's edge. From the back of the house the prosperous city of Port Arthur fanned out in rows of similar homes sitting in green lagoons of gardens that were lush with bamboo and magnolia. The broad streets lined with acacia trees were well kept but lifeless. I much preferred the area we had driven through from the airfield, where the poor lived around the dockyards and under the dripping bridges. There the narrow dark lanes, hung with washing and littered with everything from food remains to dead cats, had a sense of danger about them as though at any moment you might collide with adventure on their mean streets.

From the ice-free port great steamers plied their way to Shanghai, and around the aged wooden piers sampans crowded together selling fish and vegetables. You could be tattooed or drink tea served to you by women who themselves were for sale. I have always thought it a pity that wealth and position remove us to the top of the hill, away from the real life of the teeming streets where boredom is rarely a problem.

My bridegroom wasn't due to arrive until the day of the ceremony, which gave me two days to settle into the house. I thought this lack of urgency displayed a reluctance on his part to commit to our union, a reluctance which I certainly shared with him. Kawashima said that the timing was quite proper and was intended so that I would not feel rushed and would have time to prepare myself.

On our first night in the house we were served a splendid banquet at which Kawashima, Nobu and myself were the only diners. Admiral Ube had travelled on to Manchuria for some supposedly secret meetings. There were fried dumplings in a spicy broth and shredded lamb with capers. Course succeeded course, until the memory of the earlier ones had left us, but I do recall some good pancakes stuffed with winter radish and an apricot pickle made from the hard fruits usually kept for making dye. I enjoyed everything and ate voraciously.

After the servants had retired to their kangs, the little raised platforms of bricks laid side by side in the yard at the back of the house, things quietened down. I could hear the sea lapping the cliffs and the occasional call from ships far out at sea.

Nobu prepared himself to visit the 'flower girls' in a local brothel that Admiral Ube had recommended to him. The Admiral had told him that the girls in this house were the best you would find anywhere. They were mostly Chinese and had so many ways of pleasing a man that they were uncountable; no desire would be left unfulfilled, no request denied. Ube had confided in Nobu that for himself, only girls of fourteen or younger would do. After that age, he said, the scent of youth left their skin and their expressions became sour. Nobu and I laughed at the thought of the fat little Admiral making love. He was as broad as he was short with lowhanging buttocks and a pompous little swagger. Only his eyes, which were deep set, bright and serious, saved him from looking ridiculous.

I asked Nobu what he would choose from the uncountable list.

'First, I will take a bound-foot girl with white teeth,' he said excitedly. 'Just so that I can see for myself what the Chinese make all the fuss about. I will put the whole of her tiny lotus foot into my mouth as though it were a little breast. I hear that the girls with the smallest feet are the most exciting, because they are used to pain and are humble. When you have finished with them, they bathe you and feed you honey from their fingers.' As he spoke Nobu became flushed with anticipation.

'After the bound-footed girl, who I hope will be a virgin,' he continued, 'I will try the Polish girl they have at this house. Ube says she is ugly but it will be something to remember that I once mounted a girl with gold hair, and I need not look at her face.'

I envied Nobu his freedom to take off into the night and do as he pleased. I approved of his choices and would have accompanied him happily, if only to watch. For a moment I thought of running away and starting a new life. But something in me told me to wait. It was not time yet. My escape would need to be well planned and I would know where I was running to.