James clavell

He grinned, glad they were happy together. "That's right. So maybe I deserved the lecture. I'm guilty as charged. Now, about that kiss you promised me...." But he did not move. He was feeling his way, probing. Everything's changed now, he thought. Sure I wanted to—what did she call it? To pillow. Sure. Still do, more than before. But now we're changed. Now we're in a different game. I don't know if I want in. The rules've changed. Before it was simple. Now maybe it's more simple. "You're pretty. Did I mention you were pretty?" he said, avoiding the issue that she wanted out in the open.

"I was going to talk about that kiss. You see, Linc, the truth is I just wasn't prepared for the way, to be honest, the way I, I was swamped, I guess that's the word." He let the word linger. "Is that good or bad?"

"Both." Her eyes crinkled with her smile. "Yes, swamped with my own desire. You're something else, Mr. Bartlett, and that's also very bad, or very good. I, I enjoyed your kiss."

"So did I." Again he grinned at her. "You can call me Linc." After a pause she said, "I've never felt so wanting and swamped, and because of that very frightened."

"No need to be frightened," he said. But he was wondering what to do. His instincts said leave. His instincts said stay. Wisdom told him to say nothing and wait. He could hear his heart beating and the rain hammering the windows. Better to go, he thought. "Orlanda, guess it's ab—"

"Do you have time to talk? Just a little?" she asked, sensing his indecision.

"Sure. Sure, of course."

Her fingers brushed her hair from her face. "I wanted to tell you about me. Quillan was my father's boss in Shanghai and I seem to have known him all my life. He helped pay for my education, particularly in the States and he was always very kind to me and my family—I've four sisters and a brother and I'm the oldest and they're all in Portugal now. When I came back to Shanghai from San Francisco after I'd graduated, I was seventeen, almost eighteen and... Well he's an attractive man, to me he is, though very cruel sometimes. Very."

"How?"

"He believes in personal vengeance, that vengeance is a man's right, if he's a man. Quillan's very much a man. He was always good to me, still is." She studied him. "Quillan still gives me an allowance, still pays for this apartment."

"I know. But I'd like to—if you want to listen. Then you can decide."

He studied her. "All right."

"You see, part of it's because I'm Eurasian. Most Europeans despise us, openly or secretly, particularly the British here—Linc, just hear me out. Most Europeans despise Eurasians. All Chinese do. So we're always on the defensive, almost always suspect, almost always presumed to be illegitimate, and certainly an easy lay. God how I loathe that Americanism! How rotten and vulgar and cheap it really is. And revealing about the American male—though, strangely, it was in the States that I gained my self-respect and got over my Eurasian guilt. Quillan taught me lots and formed me in lots of ways. I'm beholden to him. But I don't love him. That's what I wanted to say. Would you like more coffee?"

"Sure, thanks."

"I'll make some fresh." She got up, her walk unconsciously sensuous and again he cursed his luck.

"Why'd you bust up with him?"

Gravely she told him about Macao. "I allowed myself to be persuaded into the fellow's bed and I slept there though nothing happened, nothing—the poor man was drunk and useless. The next day I pretended that he'd been fine." Her voice was outwardly calm and matter-of-fact but he could feel the anguish. "Nothing happened but someone told Quillan. Rightly, he was furious. I have no defence. It was... Quillan had been away. I know that's no excuse but I'd learned to enjoy pillowing and..." A shadow went over her. She shrugged. "Joss. Karma." In the same small voice she told him about Quillan's revenge. "That's his way, Linc. But he was right to be furious with me, I was wrong." The steam hissed and the coifee began to drip. Her hands were finding clean cups and fresh home-baked cookies and new starched linen as she talked but their minds were concentrating on the man-woman triangle.

"I still see him once in a while. Just to talk. We're just friends now and he's good to me and I do what I want, see who I want." She turned the steam off and looked up at him. "We... we had a child four years ago. I wanted it, he didn't. He said I could have the child but I should have it in England. She's in Portugal now with my parents—my father's retired and she lives with them." A tear rolled down her cheek.

"Was that his idea, to keep the child there?"

"Yes. But he is right. Once a year I go there. My parents... my mother wanted the child, begged to have it. Quillan's generous to them too." The tears were rolling down her face now but there was no sound to her crying. "So now you know it all, Linc. I've never told anyone but you and now you know I'm, I wasn't a faithful mistress and I'm, I'm not a good mother and and..."

He went to her and held her very close and he felt her melt against him, trying to hold back the sobs, holding on, taking his warmth and his strength. He gentled her, holding her, the length of her against him, warm, tender, everything fitting.

When she was whole again she reached up on tiptoe and kissed him lightly but with great tenderness and looked at him.

He returned the kiss equally.

They looked at each other searchingly, then kissed again. Their passion grew and it seemed forever but it was not and both heard the key in the lock at the same time. They broke away, trying to catch their breath, listening to their hearts and hearing the coarse voice of the amah from the hall. "Weyyyyy?"

Weakly Orlanda brushed her hair straighter, half-shrugged to him in apology. "I'm in the kitchen," she called out in Shang-hainese. "Please go to your room until I call you."

"Oh? Oh the foreign devil's still here is he? What about my shopping? I did some shopping!"

"Leave it by the door!"

"Oh, oh very well, Young Mistress," the amah called back and went off grumbling. The door banged loudly behind her.

"They always slam doors?" Linc asked, his heart still thumping.

"Yes, yes it seems so." Her hand went back to his shoulder, the nails caressing his neck. "Sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry about. How about dinner?"

She hesitated. "If you bring Casey."

"No. Just you."

"Linc, I think it's best no," she told him. "We're not in danger now. Let's just say good-bye now."

"Dinner. Eight. I'll call for you. You pick the restaurant. Shanghai food."

She shook her head. "No. It's too heady already. Sorry."

"I'll call for you at eight." Bartlett kissed her lightly, then went to the door. She took down his raincoat and held it out for him. "Thanks," he said gently. "No danger, Orlanda. Everything's going to come up roses. See you at eight. Okay?"

"It's best not."

"Maybe." He smiled down at her strangely. "That'd be joss—karma. We must remember the gods, huh?" She did not answer. "I'll be here at eight."

She closed the door behind him, went slowly to the chair and sat, deep in thought, wondering if she had scared him off, petrified that she had. Wondering if he really would be back at eight and if he did, how to keep him off, how to puppet him until he was mad with desire, mad enough to marry her.

Her stomach twisted uneasily. I have to be fast, she thought. Casey holds him in thrall, she's wrapped her coils around him and my only way is good cooking and home and loving, loving loving loving and everything that Casey is not. But no pillow. That's the way Casey's trapped him. I have to do the same.

Then he'll be mine.

Orlanda felt weak. Everything had gone perfectly, she decided. Then again she remembered what Gornt had said. "It's the law of the ages that every man has to be trapped into marriage, trapped by his own lust or possessiveness or avarice or money or fear or laziness or whatever but trapped. And no man ever willingly marries his mistress."

Yes. Quillan's right again, she thought. But he's wrong about me. I'm not going to settle for half the prize. I'm going to try for all of it. I'm going to have not only the Jag and this apartment and all it contains but a house in California and, most of all, American wealth, away from Asia, where I'll no longer be Eurasian but a woman like any other, beautiful, carefree and loving.

Oh I'll make him the best wife a man could ever have. I'll minister to his every need, whatever he wants I'll do for him. I felt his strength and I'll be good for him, wonderful for him.

"He's gone?" Ah Fat wandered noiselessly into the room, automatically tidying as she talked the Shanghai dialect. "Good, very good. Shall I make some tea? You must be tired. Some tea, heya?"

"No. Yes, yes make some, Ah Fat."

"Make some tea! Work work work!" The old woman shuffled to the kitchen. She wore black baggy pants and white smock and her hair was in a single long braid that hung down her back. She had looked after Orlanda ever since she was born. "I took a good look at him downstairs, when you and he arrived. For an uncivilised person he's quite presentable," she said speculatively.

"Oh? I didn't see you. Where were you?"

"Down by the stairs," Ah Fat cackled. "Eeeee, I took good care to hide but I wanted to look at him. Huh! You send your poor old slave out into the wet with my poor old bones when what does it matter if I'm here or not? Who's going to get you sweetmeats and tea or drinks in bed when you've finished your labours, heya?"

"Oh shut up! Shut up!"

"Don't shut up your poor old Mother! She knows how to look after you! Ah yes, Little Empress, but it was quite clear on both of you the yang and the yin were ready to join battle. You two looked as happy as cats in a barrel of fish! But there was no need for me to leave!"

"Foreign devils are different, Ah Fat. I wanted him here alone.

Foreign devils are shy. Now make the tea and keep quiet or I'll send you out again!"

"Is he going to be the new Master?" Ah Fat called out hopefully. "It's about time you had a Master, not good for a person not to have a Steaming Stalk at the Jade Gate. Your Gate'll shrivel up and become as dry as dust from the little use it gets! Oh, I forgot to tell you two pieces of news. The Werewolves are supposed to be Macao foreigners; they'll strike again before the new moon. That's what the rumour is. Everyone swears it's the truth. And the other's that, well, Old Cougher Tok at the fish stall says this foreign devil from the Golden Mountain's got more gold than Eunuch Tung!" Tung was a legendary eunuch at the Imperial Court in the Forbidden City of Peking whose lust for gold was so immense that all China could not satisfy it; he was hated so much that the next emperor heaped his ill-gotten gains on him until the weight of the gold crushed him to death. "You're not getting younger, Little Mother! We should be serious. Is he going to be the one?"

"I hope so," Orlanda said slowly.

Oh yes, she thought fervently, faint with anxiety, knowing that Linc Bartlett was the single most important opportunity of her life. Abruptly she was petrified again that she had overplayed her game and that he would not come back. She burst into tears.

Eight floors below, Bartlett crossed the small foyer and went outside to join the half a dozen people waiting impatiently for a taxi. The torrent was steady now and it gushed off the concrete overhang to join the flood that swirled in a small river down Kotewall Road, overflowing the gutters, the storm drains long since choked, carrying with it stones and mud and vegetation that came off the high banks and slopes above. Cars and trucks grinding cautiously up or down the steep road splashed through the whirlpools and eddies, windscreen wipers clicking, windows fogged.

Across the road the land rose steeply and Bartlett saw the multitude of rivulets cascading down the high concrete embankments that held the earth in. Weeds grew out of cracks. Part of a sodden clump fell away to join more debris and stones and mud. One side of the embankment was a walled garage and, up the slope, a half-hidden ornate Chinese mansion with a green tiled roof and dragons on its gables. Beside it was scaffolding of a building site and excavations for a high rise. Beside that was another apartment block that vanished into the overcast.

So much building, Bartlett told himself critically. Maybe we should get into construction here. Too many people chasing too little land means profit, huge profit. And amortised over three years—Jesusl A taxi swirled up, careless of the puddles. Passengers got out and others, grumbling, got in. A Chinese couple came out of the entrance, shoved past him and the others to the head of the line—a loud chattering matron with a huge umbrella, an expensive raincoat over her chong-sam, her husband meek and mild alongside her. Screw you, baby, Bartlett thought, you're not going to take my turn. He moved into a better position. His watch read 10:35.

What next, he asked himself. Don't let Orlanda distract you!

Struan's or Gornt?

Today's skirmish day, tomorrow—Friday—tomorrow's the ball-breaker, the weekend's for regrouping, Monday's the final assault and by 3:00 P.M. we should have a victor.

Whom do I want to win? Dunross or Gornt?

That Gornt's a lucky man—was a lucky man, he thought, bemused. Jesus, Orlanda's something else. Would I have quit her if I'd been him? Sure. Sure I would. Well maybe not—nothing happened. But I'd've married her the moment I could and not sent our child packing to Portugal—that Gornt's a no-good son of a bitch. Or goddamn clever. Which?

She laid it out nice and clean—just like Casey did but different though the result's the same. Now everything's complicated, or simple. Which?

Do I want to marry her? No.

Do I want to let her drop? No.

Do I want to bed her? Sure. So mount a campaign, manoeuvre her into bed without commitments. Don't play the game of life according to female rules, all's fair in war and war. What's love anyway? It's like Casey said, sex's only a part of it.

Casey. What about her? Not long to wait for Casey now. And then, is it bed or marriage bells or good-bye or what? Goddamned if I want to get married again. The one time turned out lousy. That's strange, I haven't thought about her in a long time.

When Bartlett had returned from the Pacific in '45 he had met her in San Diego and married within a week, full of love and ambition and had hurled himself into beginning a construction business in southern California. The time was ripe in California, all forms of building booming. The first child had arrived within ten months and the second a year later and a third ten months after that, and all the while working Saturdays and Sundays, enjoying the work and being young and strong and succeeding hugely, but drifting apart. Then the quarrelling began and the whining and the "you never spend any time with us anymore and screw the business I don't care about the business I want to go to France and Rome and why don't you come home early have you a girl friend I know you have a girl friend...."

But there was no girl friend, just work. Then one day the attorney's letter. Just through the mail.

Shit, Bartlett thought angrily, it still hurting. But then I'm only one of millions and it's happened before and it'll happen again. Even so your letter or your phone call hurts. It hurts and it costs you. It costs you plenty and the attorneys get most, get a good part and they cleverly fan the fire between you for their own goddamn gain. Sure. You're their meal ticket, we all are! From the cradle to the goddamn grave, attorneys kite trouble and feed off your blood. Shit. Attor-neys're the real plague of the good old U. S. of A. I've only met four good ones in all my life, but the rest? They parasite all of us. Not one of us's safe!

Yes. That bastard Stone! He made a killing out of me, turned her into a goddamn fiend, put her and the kids against me forever and nearly broke me and the business. I hope the bastard rots for all eternity!

With an effort Bartlett took his mind off that gaping sore and looked at the rain and remembered that it was only money and that he was free, free and that made him feel marvellous.

Jesus! I'm free and there's Casey and Orlanda.

Orlanda.

He had not been with a girl for a couple of months. The last time was in London, a casual meeting and casual dinner then into bed. She was staying at the same hotel, divorced and no trouble. What was it Orlanda said? A friendly tumble and a shy good-bye? Yes. That's it. But that one wasn't shy.

He stood in line happily, feeling greatly alive and watching the torrents, the smell of the rain on the earth grand, the road messed with stones and mud, the flood swirling over a long wide crack in the tarmac to dance into the air like rapids of a stream.

The rain's going to bring lots of trouble, he thought. And Orlanda's lots of trouble, old buddy. Sure. Even so, there must be a way to bed her. What is it about her that blows your mind? Part's her face, part's her figure, part's the look in her eye, part's... Jesus, face it, she's all woman and all trouble. Better forget Orlanda. Be wise, be wise, old buddy. As Casey said, that broad's dynamite!

Shantytowns of rickety hovels built of any scraps, cardboard, planks, corrugated iron, fencing, canvas, sidings, three-ply walls and roofs for the well-to-do, all leaning against one another, attached to one another, on top of one another, layer on layer, up and down the mountains—all with dirt floors and dark alleys that were now awash and mucked and puddled and potholed and dangerous. Rain pouring through roofs soaking bedding, clothes and the other remnants of a lifetime, people packed on people surrounded by people who stoically shrugged and waited for the rain to stop. Tiny alleys wandered higgledy-piggledy with no plan except to squeeze another space for another family of refugees and illegal aliens but not really aliens for this was China and, once past the border, any Chinese became legal settlers to stay as long as they wanted by ancient Hong Kong Government approval.

The strength of the Colony had always been its cheap, abundant and strife-free labour force. The Colony provided a permanent sanctuary and asked only peaceful labour in return at whatever the going rate of the day was. Hong Kong never sought immigrants but the people of China always came. They came by day and by night, by ship, by foot, by stretcher. They came across the border whenever famine or a convulsion racked China, families of men, women and children came to stay, to be absorbed, in time to go back home because China was always home, even after ten generations.

But refugees were not always welcomed. Last year the Colony was almost swamped by a human flood. For some still unknown reason and without warning, the PRC border guards relaxed the tight control of their side and within a week thousands were pouring across daily. Mostly they came by night, over and through the token, single six-strand fence that separated the New Territories from the Kwantung, the neighbouring province. The police were powerless to stem the tide. The army had to be called out. In one night in May almost six thousand of the illegal horde were arrested, fed and the next day sent back over the border—but more thousands had escaped the border net to become legal. The catastrophe went on night after night, day after day. Tens of thousands of newcomers. Soon mobs of angry sympathetic Chinese were at the border trying to disrupt the deportations. The deportations were necessary because the Colony was becoming buried in illegals and it was impossible to feed, house and absorb such a sudden, vast increase in new population. Already there were the four-plus million to worry about, all but a tiny percent illegals at one time.

Then, as suddenly as it had begun, the human gusher ceased and the border closed. Again for no apparent reason.

In the six-week period almost 70,000 had been arrested and returned. Between 100,000 and 200,000 escaped the net to stay, no one knew for certain how many. Spectacles Wu's grandparents and four uncles and their families were some of these, seventeen souls in all, and since they had arrived they had been living in a resettlement area high above Aberdeen. Spectacles Wu had arranged everything for them. This was more of the land that the Noble House Chen family had owned since the beginning that, until recently, had been without value. Now it had value. The Chens rented it, foot by foot, to any who wished to pay. Spectacles Wu had gratefully rented twenty feet by twelve feet at 1.00 HK per foot per month and, over the months, had helped the family scavenge the makings for two dwellings that, until this rain, were dry. There was one water tap per hundred families, no sewers, no electric light, but the city of these squatters thrived and was mostly well ordered. Already one uncle had a small plastic flower factory in a hovel he had rented at 1.50 HK per foot per month lower down the slopes, another had rented a stall in the market area selling tangy rice cakes and rice gruel in their Ning-tok village style. All seventeen were working—now eighteen mouths to feed with a newborn babe, born last week. Even the two-year-olds were given simple tasks, sorting plastic petals for the plastic flowers the young and old made that gave many of the hill dwellers money to buy food and money to gamble with.

Yes, Spectacles Wu thought fervently, all gods help me to get some of the reward money for the capture of the Werewolves in time for Saturday's races to put on Pilot Fish, the black stallion who, according to all the portents, is definitely going to win.

He stifled a yawn as he plodded on barefoot down one of the narrow twisting alleys in the resettlement area, his six-year-old niece beside him. She was barefoot too. The rain kept misting his thick glasses. Both picked their way cautiously, not wanting to step on any broken glass or rusting debris that was ever present. Sometimes the mud was ankle-deep. Both wore their trousers well rolled up and she had a vast straw coolie hat that dwarfed her. His hat was ordinary and secondhand like his clothes and not police regulation. These were the only clothes he possessed except for the shoes he carried in a plastic bag under his raincoat to protect them. Stepping over a foul pothole he almost lost his footing. "Fornicate all hazards," he cursed, glad that he did not live here and that the rented room he shared with his mother near the East Aberdeen police station was dry and not subject to quirks of the weather gods like those here. And thank all gods I don't have to make this journey every day. My clothes would be ruined and then my whole future would be in jeopardy because Special Intelligence admires neatness and punctuality. Oh gods let this be my great day!

Tiredness wafted over him. His head was hunched down and he felt the rain trickling down his neck. He had been on duty all night. When he was leaving the station early this morning he had been told that there was to be a raid on the old amah, Ah Tarn, the one connected with the Werewolves, whom he had found and tracked to her lair. So he had said that he would hurry with his visit to his grandfather who had been taken ill and was near death and hurry back in good time.