IX
The clock on the train platform showed 9:15 PM when Paul reached Central Station. He had changed trains in Kowloon Tong and Mong Kok and would be able to get the 9:30 PM ferry to Lamma without hurrying. Though he had been longing for nothing more than his home and the peace of the island for more than twenty-four hours, he hesitated now. Too many impressions, thoughts, and ideas were whizzing through his head. Where were they to go? He wished he could pack them in cartons, put them on the shelves, take them out one by one, and think them through, examine them until they dissolved into nothing. Or that he could share them with somebody. Talk about them until they no longer raced around in his head, until they ebbed away, like a wave that lost its momentum on the beach and seeped into the sand forever. He felt that he had completely exhausted himself. As though his mind and his senses had taken on another rhythm in the past three years on Lamma, a rhythm that was no longer equal to the pace of the city: its sounds, its people, its hustle and bustle. Should he take a later ferry and have a drink in the bar at the Mandarin?
He called Christine. Her voice would do him good.
She was still in the office working on last month’s accounts. No, she had no objection to having a drink at the Mandarin Oriental.
———
Paul felt the effect of the alcohol immediately. He felt it first in his legs and sensed it creeping through his body in waves, reaching his head, and he was overcome by a feeling of ease that he had forgotten existed.
Christine glanced at him, amused. “Is everything all right?”
“Yes,” he replied, and had to laugh.
“When was the last time you had a drink?”
“I can’t remember. It must be years ago. But it feels good.”
“Why have you asked me here? What have you been doing since we had lunch?”
He had thought about whether it would be better to say that he’d had a long conversation with the Owens, run some errands or gone swimming, and had an appointment in the Foreign Correspondents’ Club, but then it seemed ridiculous to him to say nothing about his visit to Michael Owen’s apartment and the few hours he had spent on the other side of the border. So he told her about his investigations into the murder. She looked at him as though he had told her that he never wanted to see her again. For a moment he was afraid that she was going to start crying or screaming at him. Or that she would stand up without saying a word and leave.
“You don’t take me seriously.”
“Why do you say that?” Paul said.
“You promised me that you wouldn’t get involved. You said you would stay out of it.”
“I only did my friend a favor.”
“You smuggled evidence over the border.”
Paul did not respond. He wanted to take her hand, but she shook her head in rejection.
“You’re treating me like a hysterical woman.”
“Not at all. Why are you saying that?”
“You think I’m seeing ghosts, don’t you?”
“No.”
“You think I hate the Communist Chinese because they killed my father.”
“No, Christine. No.”
“You think I hate them because my husband had an affair with one of them. Admit it.” Her voice was now so loud that the other guests in the bar turned to look at them.
He looked at her. Her lips were trembling a little. The skin above her neckline mottled red with rage or fear or agitation. He got up and knelt down next to her and stroked her on the head, and in that moment he felt something that he had thought had completely and utterly withered away, died, been extinguished forever. He felt a faint longing, a desire for her, for her body, for her breath on his skin, for her hands to hold him as tight as they could. He put one hand on her lap and stroked her tenderly on the cheek with the other.
“Can you stay here with me?” he asked quietly.
“Now? But I am here.”
“Tonight.”
She looked at him in disbelief, searching his eyes, his face, for a sign. Did he even know what he had just said? Was he serious?
“Shall we stay the night here, in the hotel?” he asked, and then stood up. He saw in her eyes that she would not say no.
They were so keyed up that they were completely silent as they stood next to each other in the elevator, holding hands tightly.
The room was much too cold. He turned the air-conditioning off and opened the door to the small balcony. Warm, humid tropical air streamed in immediately. Christine disappeared into the bathroom. He stood around in the room undecidedly, not knowing what to do with himself, with his fear and his lust, not knowing whether to take off his clothes, not knowing what was driving him, whether he was aroused, needy, or full of desire. His whole body was trembling. He closed his eyes. He wanted to feel her, do nothing more than feel, without words, without gestures, without a tomorrow, to forget everything else for this one moment, this one, never-ending, long and terribly short night.
He heard her opening the bathroom door and coming toward him. She stood in front of him, undid his shirt slowly, button by button, then his belt. She helped him out of his trousers like he was a blind man; her hands stroked his chest and her lips caressed him. He could not open his eyes. One look would have spoiled everything. She took hold of his hands and made them push her bathrobe aside, baring her breasts, and he let her lead, let her do what she wanted, as she pulled him onto the bed, as she undressed him fully, stroked him and kissed him in places that no one had touched for years. He began to stir and at some point he did not need her to lead any longer, trusting himself, awakened, to move his hands of his own accord, caressing her breasts, her thighs, touching the opening of her vulva, so carefully, so tenderly and so gently, as if it were the first time, as if it were the last time, her body were the most precious of all gifts. As though he could barely believe his luck. He felt her breathing growing louder and heavier, her writhing under his hands as she grew more and more aroused.
And when the time came, when the air in the room was as warm and as humid as it was in the street outside, when the bed, the sheets, the walls, the carpet, and every corner of the room smelled of them, when nothing more stood between them, when she asked him to come inside her at last to release her from her desire and her lust, his strength ran out. He collapsed into himself and drooped. Unable to fight it, he fell aside and lay still.
He pulled the thin blanket over his head. He wanted to hide away, to disappear, to dissolve. “I can’t,” he whispered. “I’m sorry.”
———
They had breakfast in the room, sitting on the bed in fluffy toweling robes with their feet tucked under them as they drank freshly pressed orange juice, spread marmalade on each other’s still-warm bread rolls, and were careful with their words and gestures. Two people who know how delicate every happiness is.
At some point he got up, put the breakfast things away, and kissed her on her forehead, her neck, and her lips until they fell slowly onto the bed. They lay face-to-face, nose-to-nose. He saw his face reflected in her eyes.
“You mean a great deal to me.” It did not sound as tender as he had wanted it to. But it was what he meant, and it was a lot.
“You mean a great deal to me too. I worry about you.”
“You mustn’t.”
“Promise me something?”
“What?”
“Promise me first.”
“Promise first? Without knowing what? Who ever heard of that?”
They giggled.
“Trust in me,” she said, putting on a mysterious voice that reminded him of someone. Trust in me. Kaa, the snake from The Jungle Book, spoke like that. He held his breath. What made her say that? Why use exactly those words in that tone? He did not want her to say any more. He did not want to be reminded of The Jungle Book. It had been Justin’s favorite film; they had watched the
DVD together so often, sitting on the couch in the living room or in bed, that Justin knew the dialogue practically by heart. The Jungle Book would destroy everything now. Everything in this world, he thought, hung by a thin thread that could break any moment. Any moment. You didn’t even have to touch it. He put his index finger on her lips and said very quietly: “I promise.”
“You promise me that you’ll no longer travel to Shenzhen for this thing?”
Paul nodded.
“You have to keep to what you promise, right?” she asked, making sure.
“You have to keep to what you promise,” he repeated.
———
Paul took Christine to her office. With her help, he was even able to cope with the overcrowded metro this morning. They stood with their bodies pressed together. He had never seen her looking so radiant before. The sight of her was enough to help him bear with equanimity the crush in the train, which normally made him anxious.
They arranged to meet for lunch. He found it difficult to say good-bye to her, even for only a few hours.
He wondered if he should get in touch with Elizabeth Owen. He felt a sense of responsibility for her that he could not explain, certainly since he had left her sleeping in her son’s flat. What right had he to keep from her the fact that there was a dead body in Shenzhen who was, in all likelihood, her son? Was it not his duty to tell her about this? Whoever she received the news from, the impact would be the same. Whether from a Hong Kong policeman, from an official at the American consulate, or from him, Paul Leibovitz, who knew from personal experience what the death of a child meant to a parent. The longer he thought about it, the stronger grew his conviction that he could not shirk this responsibility, that they shared the same fate, that it should not matter whether he liked the family or not, but that what he had suffered and lost meant that he simply had no choice. He rang her number.
Her voice sounded more agitated than worried or frightened.
“Mr. Leibovitz, I was just about to call you. Did you go to my son’s apartment again yesterday or this morning?”
“What do you mean? What should I be doing there? I don’t even have a key.”
“My husband thought perhaps the concierge had one and had let you in. But I told him straightaway that that was nonsense. What reason would there be for you to go to the apartment without us?”
“Why are you asking?”
“Because we’re in the apartment now and it’s all in a mess. Someone must have been here searching for something. I’m sure it was Michael but then why didn’t he get in touch with us? He has our number and he knows how he can reach us. But the more important thing is: Where is he now?”
“Mrs. Owen, wait there for me. I’ll be with you in fifteen minutes.”
———
The apartment had not been totally trashed. There were no broken bits lying around and neither the couch cushions nor the mattress had been slit open, but someone had been here, and had looked in every corner, making no effort to conceal the search. In the bedroom, there were piles of underwear, socks, sports gear, and shirts on the bed; the chest of drawers was empty and the wardrobe had been emptied. In the study, the floor was covered with countless files. Many lay open and some had had documents torn out of them. The contents of the desk drawers lay strewn all around: pens, paper clips, flight schedules, dollar and yuan notes, coins, rubber stamps, and photos.
Richard Owen sat down on his son’s desk chair and looked out of the window in silence, as though he was far away in his thoughts.
“Do you know if anything’s missing?” Paul asked.
“What should be missing?” Elizabeth Owen asked in astonishment. “My son can’t steal from himself. Apart from that . . .”
“Be quiet, Betty,” her husband interrupted her sharply, without turning around.
“Richard thinks I’m crazy.”
“Stop it,” he commanded.
“But I’m sure that it was Michael,” she continued, not listening to her husband. “Apart from us, he’s the only one who has a key. And the door to the apartment hasn’t been broken into.”
“His cleaner has a key. How many times do I have to tell you that, dammit,” Richard Owen barked at his wife.
“He was looking for something. He was definitely in a great hurry; that’s why he didn’t have time to call us,” she said, as though she had not heard him. “He’ll be in touch in the next few hours. I’m sure about that.”
Later, Paul would often wonder if it was what Elizabeth Owen said then that made him finally tell her the truth. Her son would be in touch in the next few hours. She was sure about that. Knowing how absurd it was that she was convinced of this was intolerable to Paul. It made him an accessory, an accomplice to her degrading illusion. He had always told the doctors that he didn’t want them to lie to him, and he had been glad that they had, as far as he could tell, never tried to.
“I have to tell you something,” Paul said. He felt his heart racing so hard that it seemed fit to burst. His knees went weak and his voice cracked. He gasped for air as though a mighty hand was pushing him down under water. He was about to shatter these people’s happiness or, more precisely, about to tell them that it was shattered, but that distinction made no difference to them. Nothing would be the same as it had been for them after what he was going to say next.
“The police found a dead body in Shenzhen yesterday,” Paul said.
Elizabeth Owen’s mouth fell open but no sound came out.
Richard Owen jumped out of his seat.
“They still don’t know who it is. The man did not have any papers on him. But he’s from the West and he is the same age as your son.”
“That doesn’t mean anything!” Richard Owen shouted at him, raising his hands as though he wanted to protect himself or was about to push Paul away.
“The dead man had three scars on his left knee.”
Paul had hoped never to look into eyes like these again.
———
He would need a good forty-five minutes to get from Harbour View Court to Wan Chai on foot. Paul thought about taking a taxi, but he would not be able to stand being cooped up in a car stuck in a traffic jam. Not to be able to move forward or backward. To be locked in. He would be overcome with claustrophobia. He had to be out, under the open sky. He walked down Robinson Road, getting faster with every step; the movement was doing him good. He took deep breaths and exhaled with such loud sighing sounds that the few passersby turned to look at him. He walked through the Botanic Gardens, ran down Kennedy Road, and came to the aviary in Hong Kong Park. There, his strength failed him. Drenched with sweat, he sat down on a bench and gasped for air like a sprinter within sight of the finish line. He felt a pounding pain in his head, and heard his blood rushing through his ears. Perhaps Christine would come to see him in the park for half an hour.
———
She brought along two cheese sandwiches, a packet of stuffed rice dumplings, and two half-liter cups of iced tea.
“I don’t know anyone else who would be mad enough to sit in the park at lunchtime and have a picnic,” she said, spreading a paper napkin out on the bench and putting the sandwiches down on it.
“It wouldn’t be my first choice either,” he replied wearily, “but I can’t do anything else.”
“How are the Owens?”
“They wanted to stay on in their son’s apartment for a while. They’ll go over this afternoon to identify him. I’ve called Zhang. He’ll pick them up at the border.”
“Is there no doubt at all?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Will you go with them?”
He shook his head.
“Did they not ask you to?”
“Yes, but I said no.”
“Are they going on their own?”
“No. I advised them to contact the Ame
rican Consulate. One of the officials there will surely go with them. I won’t. A promise is a promise.”
“You said that yesterday too. A couple of hours later you were over in Shenzhen again.”
“That’s true. But it’s different now. I can’t go on. The whole thing touches on a raw nerve for me.” Realizing that what he was saying still did not reassure her, he added, after a pause, “And I don’t want you to worry about me.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t help it.”
He stroked her hair.
“You think I worry too much, don’t you?” Christine asked.
Paul thought for a moment. “After everything that has happened to your family, I can understand why you don’t trust the authorities in China. But that’s over thirty years ago. I don’t think that you still have to be frightened of them. It’s no longer the same country.”
“No? Is it no longer the People’s Republic of China? Have I missed something?” She had wanted to ask this question calmly, almost as a throwaway remark, sounding only a little surprised. But she sounded snappy and aggressive instead.
“I don’t know how I would feel if they had my father on their conscience,” he said to appease her.
“And your brother.”
“My brother?” Paul asked, surprised.
“Your brother,” she repeated.
“But you haven’t told me anything about that.”
“He was ten years older than me, and when he was still at school, he was sent off to work in the countryside during the Cultural Revolution.”