Jade Woman

16

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THE Mologai. The sun shines less in the Mologai, but heat gathers there in the shade and smoke. Steep cramped dwellings, shops oldish. Oddly, smoke pervading the whole area. The streets cling to contours. You clamber up steps from one narrow alleyway to the next, among the stalls. It’s an antique hunter’s paradise—or rather purgatory, because the promise of heaven takes time to realize.

Sweating into dehydration, I stood in Upper Lascar Row and gaped about. God, the Cantonese can use space like the Georgians. In a hundred yards there were as many businesses. Some were no more than a few pots or carvings on trestles under green canvas canopies. Others were crammed into shop fronts. You have to struggle through the mayhem as best you can. A few tourists were battling bravely, and I even saw one couple buying bowls of steaming congee from grub stalls on the lower steps. Braver still. Rescued by a couple of tins of cola, I eeled up Cat Street, conscious of dark doorways, a prickling feeling of being watched in that relative quiet. A lot of people stood about. Eyes seemed stiller, harder.

Yet it was bliss. Delicate chimes of genuine antiques thrilled me here and there. I instantly befriended a luscious wooden scroll box complete with hinges, just less than a couple of centuries old but wonderfully preserved— the elderly stallholder gave me his broadest gold-toothed grin as he recognized my lust. And a brush pot, humble russet wood but sweetly chiming its genuineness. I asked the price of both, and got laughter and nods. I should have recognized this as the start of barter but was hot and edgy by the ominous sense of threat. On the way in, a couple of thin blokes eyed me and strolled after me.

Well, it was broad day. I could just afford the brush pot. Only seven inches high and slightly splayed, it was magic. Conscious that time was passing, I drew breath to say I’d have it, hand in my pocket for my wad, when I noticed a familiar figure within a few feet. The crowd made space around his stubby little frame. Titch, knee-high, staring up at me from his roller-skate trolley. He glanced pointedly at the brush pot, and shook his head.

“Hey,” I said, pleased, made to go and say hello, but he gave a quick shove with his short poles and vanished behind the next stall.

I looked at the brush pot. It was a genuine antique, luscious. And I could afford the price. So where was the problem? But the little leper had oh-so-deliberately told me no, don’t buy. I muttered something to the stallholder and thrust my way out, up steep ginnels to the main contour road, having difficulty fending off importuning girls and declining nudged offers of drugs. I knew enough of the little geezer’s disappearing tricks to know I’d never find him. How the hell did he manage to get up and down the stepped alleyways? The sun placed its weight full on me as I made the narrow road where cars ran.

A temple stood across the opposite side of the road. I entered simply to get away from that odd nervy feeling. As I entered, the two blokes following me leaned against the wall opposite and lit cigarettes. I couldn’t see in the temple’s gloom but was conscious of incense, the clack of sandals, a chant, a gong, people. So I stood to one side of the bright entrance letting my vision accommodate.

When it did, the altar was nothing new. Red and brassy gold were everywhere. I watched an old black-garbed lady enter to pray. It seemed the thing to buy some incense sticks, ignite them and place them upright in large brass sand scuttles before the altar. I copied her, bought my sticks, did the fire bit and bowed there a bit. It’s only fair to pay for shelter.

As I stood beside the door steeling myself for a return through the baking heat and that dour threatening area where malign blokes dogged your every move, I could see a skeletal old man sitting across the road, his back to a wall. He lolled somewhat, smoking at an enormously wide bamboo pipe the length at least of a walking stick.

“Opium, I’m afraid,” somebody said. “One of our evils.”

Mistake to have glanced out. My eyes were unable to pick out the speaker, who seemed to be sitting low among the folds of red curtains. “I’ve heard,” I said.

“Hasn’t everyone,” the voice said dryly. “In Hong Kong junkies are classed according to the daily cost of sustaining their addiction. So we have ten-dollar addicts, twenty-dollar addicts, hundred-dollar addicts. They total five percent of the population. We Chinese say, He who carries fire in bucket needs iron hands.”

“Ballocks,” I said. “You made that up.”

“Well spotted.”

I’d met minds like his before—slick as a fish, with morality an irrelevance that would spoil the game. “He looks a thousand-dollar addict.” My vision returned. Not seated but small, meaning low down. Friend.

“Addicts needing more than a hundred dollars a day have to be criminals,” the little leper said. His English was nigh-perfect after all, the sod. “To get the money. They can’t work, doped most of the day.”

“Here, mate,” I asked. “You tipped me against that brush pot. Why?”

He smiled. “You were about to pay the asking price. A stupidity. Haven’t you been told to haggle? Always bargain. It’s Hong Kong’s main entertainment.”

“Ta,” I said. “Which way’re you going? Want a lift?” After all, I had Johny’s taxi.

“No, thanks. I have my own transport, as you see. But be careful out there.” He indicated the bright world. I fell for it, daft as ever, giving the glare a glance and dazzling myself. I heard a soft trundle, then silence. I stepped back, looked round the curtain. Nothing. The gong sounded, the incense sticks glowed, smoke stung. “See you then,” I said lamely in the direction of the temple’s interior, and struck down into the Mologai.

On the way I didn’t bother to look out for glimpses of him. If he wanted to be seen, he’d show. If not, there was no chance.

Nobody followed me on the way out. I was glad. Less chance of being knifed, robbed, kept from any honest pursuits.