Jade Woman

29

« ^ »

IS there ever truth in rumor?” Dr. Chao asked the television interviewer. I turned up the volume because of the traffic noise through the balcony window. I’d shot back to Steerforth’s place when Sim the swine sent word Dr. Chao would be on after the news.

“Reports say you paid seven figures for a rare painting—”

“Impossible,” Dr. Chao interrupted blandly. “Who pays millions for a work by an unknown artist?”

“Unknown? To Hong Kong and the Western art markets, yes. But reports suggest that the painter is Chinese—”

“Reports! Rumors!” Dr. Chao spread his hands.

“So there is no truth in reports that an old painting has arrived, changed hands for a fortune? That China offers a substantial sum for its return?”

Dr. Chao was astonished. “Why do you ask me these things? Secret shipments of valuable antiques, the payments in gold, these are impossibilities. You should ask Sotheby’s, not a simple doctor.”

“Thank you,” said the interviewer.

The taipan smiled with serenity. A cartoon came on.

Pretty good. There were enough clues to tell Hong Kong that Dr. Chao was fibbing.

Nothing fails to convince like a denial. Mind you, it was never in doubt, seeing that the Triad owned the interviewer, and the station itself for all I knew. Pawn to king four.

Game on.

Freedom too is absolute. I felt king of Hong Kong, now being allowed to roam. There was the odd blip from my two dark-suited watchers, Leung and Ong, but I only had to mention that my wanderings were authorized and they faded like snow off a duck. “The artistic impulse must flourish untrammeled,” Ling Ling said in melodious judgment, so I could go anywhere, anytime—in bounds, of course. The phone was barred; no letters, telegrams.

There are tales of folk becoming “island-happy,” meaning slightly deranged from claustrophobia brought on by Hong Kong’s smallness. I don’t understand it because the place really is all things to all men. Hong Kong never disappoints. Every feature is larger than life. Turn a corner and you happen on a dancing dragon, its giant head grinning in multicolored celebration and noisily stopping traffic. Another few paces and an entire shop front is covered in artificial flowers and glittering draperies, with musicians and incense calling on the gods for lucky trade. And I learned what truly defined Hong Kong for me: the clack-clack-clack of thick wooden sandals, the clicks of the abacus, mah-jongg counters rattling, the tock of gambling chips. Every side street sounds full of pendulum clocks from the combined sounds of movement, money, gambling, more movement for still more risky money.

And I started painting.

Marilyn—I’d given her Chinese name up—sat for me. I used any old oil paper for the sketches. She was nervous but got used to me blundering about, spinning her round, peering at her face hours at a time. I’ve never had a model of my own, so I was learning too. Art fires you up. And, me being me, I naturally rabbited on all the time about past scams, the Impressionists, my past mistakes, the world of fakery we all inhabit, how antiques constitute the only true faith…

Calling to see how old Surton was managing, I casually introduced my problem.

“How marvelous to have a place like this,” I said enviously. “To work. I’d love to have somewhere to try out some of Song Ping’s painting techniques.”

His mezzanine room was done out as a study, with a long bench to lay out work. He was showing me a proof of Song Ping’s first catalog, printed on authentic Chinese paper and in typefaces of Canton in the Victorian era. Dt. Chao’s laborers were worthy of their hire.

“I do sympathize, Lovejoy. Couldn’t your firm help?” The pillock’s logic irritated me.

“No.” I was so sad. “Living rents are, er, not tax-deductible. Accountants.”

“Hey!” His specs gleamed. “We have a roof room, quite unused!”

“Please.” I restrained him. “Phyllis would—”

“—be delighted, Lovejoy! You’re practically one of the family!” Forced, I conceded gracefully, working it out. I’d have to smuggle canvas, paints, brushes to the house.

Those cardboard cylinders, for carrying paper scrolls, might do. The Triad’s ubiquitous goons would assume they contained manuscripts for Surton. Nervously I arranged to use the roof room for a couple of hours most afternoons. There I would make a second version of my masterwork, in solitude. A fake of a fake. Labor of love.

The next public announcement was made simultaneously in all the media. I thought the newspapers went over the top, the headlines too splashy, but Marilyn translated the Chinese and said they were just right. The television gave a bald announcement that a major Impressionist masterwork had now been confirmed, and was in the possession of a respected local doctor, aha. Television caught Chao on the hoof outside one of his hotels at Sa Tin Heights. He smilingly deprecated his good fortune, admitting that, yes, he now did have personal knowledge of such a masterwork. It was under close guard at a secret place.

He would try to arrange a public exhibition very soon. Such fortune should be shared, ne?

Hai, I said in agreement. All well so far. Only three more moves and Fatty would get his comeuppance.

In quiet hours I drew up additional extracts of the mythical Song Ping’s life, snatches of his diaries, bits of hearsay. I became quite fascinated by his quirks and foibles, even though I was inventing them. I wrote out chunks of garble, letting him ramble on about Monet, Sisley, Renoir, not so much Pissarro, made him in awe of the staid Manet. For authenticity I included a place-name, mentioned the café the young Impressionists frequented, even gave details of a vaguely improbable row between Monet and poor Frederic de Pazille, who died in the Franco-Prussian War. Because so many of my materials came from East Anglia, I included a few taped readings—my voice, disguised over the phone. My best was a fragment of a crudely translated letter supposedly written by Song Ping from London in the 1870s. I made him speak disparagingly of Renoir’s “rainbow” palate.

After I’d finished I tried it all on Marilyn in celebration. She listened, perched on her studio stool. I acted out the bits, ran the tapes, mimicked Monet’s quarrelsomeness, showed her how the withdrawn Sisley’s taciturnity must have irritated, the lot.

“Well?” I said, exhausted. “Convincing?”

She was silent a moment. “These are people you knew?”

Women. “No, love. How many times have I to tell you? They were in France, over a century ago. It’s my plan, see?”

She nodded. “Very good.”

So that day I took all my made-up notes and concocted tapes to the university. The old man was delighted. I explained, sadly, that these were the very last fragments of everything I had been able to get from my firm about Song Ping, RIP.

“Some of it is disjointed. Most is in English or French, I’m afraid. Our firm’s phoned in a few fragments on these tapes. Other bits might turn up. We might get a Canton address where he first exhibited.”

“Excellent!” He handled my sheaf of scraps with so much care my heart went out to him. A real honest pro. We’re a dying breed. “No chronology, I see, Lovejoy?”

“No. There’s, er, a special chronology fee for putting them in what you think’s the right order.” I’d have to see that Sim authorized the fees directly from a London bank. Life’s all go.

He hugged himself. “Imagine it all in Chinese calligraphy of the period, authentic paper, proper typology! It shall be a truly realistic exhibition!” He rubbed his hands, cackling a merry don’s laugh. “Lovejoy,” he said, eyes misting. “Thank you for this task!”

“But it’s a mammoth—”

“Genuine learning, challenged by time’s decay, emerging triumphantly in mankind’s pursuit of—” He spouted this rapturous crap for some minutes.

“Great, Stephen.” I was moved in spite of myself.

Leaving the steep garden, I met Phyllis Surton just disembarking from the number 3

bus in Bonham Road. Her grayness seemed to blot all color from the surroundings as we enacted a dithery reunion. The racket from St. Paul’s school opposite made conversation difficult, so I turned back with her.

“I’m just taking some materials to Stephen, Lovejoy.” She carried folders and a box.

“Old inks, brushes.” She was like a sparrow, nervy and dithery. We uttered commonplaces: can I carry your stuff; aren’t the flowers nice. She made to sit on a stone seat. The least I could do was sit beside her.

“Do you notice the plants?” she asked.

“Plants?” We were in a garden, for God’s sake. “Aye. Great.”

“No. There.” She pointed.

“Grass?” It was low-lying frondy stuff.

“Look.” She smiled, touched a finger to a frond by the path. Instantly the greenery collapsed. Its falling movement touched others, and the whole green carpet cowered down.

I found myself standing in alarm. “It’s alive!”

“Not really that way, Lovejoy.” She was smiling. “Mimosa pudica, the sensitive plant.

Touch it and it, well, crumples.” She held my gaze as I returned uneasily. “It’s me, isn’t it?” Slowly the greenery was straightening, warily recovering. “I pretend to be like everyone else. But afraid of touch, encounter.”

“Me too.” I kept my feet off the ground. For all I knew this bloody grass had teeth.

“I know,” she said unexpectedly. “I sense it. I look, but can’t dare myself to…”

“Bloody cheek,” I said, stung. “I’m not scared of anything.”

She smiled at that. “Should I tell you something, Lovejoy? I know you won’t tell—

Stephen wouldn’t understand anyway if you did. It’s… about the bar. Where you get picked up—”

“Listen,” I began, but she shushed me.

“… Meet ladies, however you put it.” She stared away. “I’ve saved up, scrimped. For months I’ve had enough to… to, you know, hire somebody. And… and I desperately wanted to. There!”

My gasp sounded really authentic. “Phyllis!”

“I knew you’d be shocked. I actually tried once, even went as far as writing out a note.

I picked out a man and everything.” She watched a group of students climbing the garden path. “I’m so hopeless. Pathetic.”

“Which was he?” I already recognized a few of the other gigolos, the idiot musician Rich, Dennis the blond with a good line in patter, Sidney the pretend aristocrat forever dropping names, Juanito—

“You, Lovejoy.” Still not a glance. Her face was red. “To me you felt the same timid creature riven by unrequited desire.”

“Nark it, Phyllis.” Though it proved she was a woman of taste. “I’m only doing it because I have to.”

“You’re not offended, Lovejoy?” She looked askance.

“I understand.” I gave her my most soulful gaze, really profound sincerity. Saying you understand makes women think you agree. She smiled hesitantly, reached out and touched my hand. I didn’t collapse.

“Thank you, Lovejoy. You’re sweet.” She paused, until the students were out of sight.

“There’s one thing, Lovejoy.”

“Yes?” More sordid secrets? I suppressed a yawn.

“Hong Kong’s dangerous. Please remember that. It fights dirty. So keep safe from risks.”

I chuckled, debonair. “I know all about risks, love.”

Her gray careworn face hung its sadness at me. “Promise. If there’s any way I can help, you’ll come to me. Even if you think I’ll be useless.”

“It’s a deal,” I said, doing my cheap gangster act, not getting a laugh.

I left then, waving to her as she went towards the Tang Chih Building and I trotted downhill to the curving road.

Happy now the scam was underway, I paused, attracted by a crowd near Centra]

Market watching crickets fight. One called Golden Double-Eight Super Dragon won hands down. It ate its vanquished opponent. The sight made me ill. The loser had seemed so sure of itself.

We were in the Lantern Market one evening, me and Marilyn, strolling after supper. It was a couple of days after I’d started work. The place is actually a car-park near the Macao Ferry but becomes a vendor’s paradise at dusk. Hundreds of folk arrive and simply set up business, each around a paraffin lantern. Instantly it could be a scene from the Middle Ages, the yellow glows on huddles of faces against a starry sky.

“Here, mate.” I paused, gave an old bloke a note. He seemed poor, having nothing to sell. He took it without acknowledgment, which narked me. Bloody cheek. He could have said a ta. I’d only given it him because I’d glimpsed my little stumpy leper Titch talking to him, before poling himself off on his rollers as we’d approached.

“Sin Sang.” He was calling after me. Marilyn had halted. The old bloke was effortlessly hunched down, smoking. I saw he had a blackish pet bird in a bamboo cage.

“Go, Lovejoy,” Marilyn said. “Your fortune.”

“Eh?” I didn’t want my fortune told. “It’s all rubbish.”

A number of Chinese paused with us, loudly speculating.

“You must, Lovejoy. You’ve paid.”

The old bloke spouted in Cantonese, pointing, flicked the hemp loop off the cage and presented a deck of cards. Beside him was a pile of small bamboo slivers in an old Coke tin. The bird came out, picked out a card rather snappishly, I thought. I gave it an inexpert trill whistle like I do in my garden back home, just being pally. It ignored this, picked out a bamboo sliver, cast it on the card, and slammed back into its cage. Do not disturb. I was conscious of the crowd’s excited interest. The fortune-teller was silent, looking.

“Two! The bird should have chosen card or stick,” Marilyn said.

“I distracted it whistling, I expect.” I shrugged.

The old man spoke, chopping the air enthusiastically. Guillotine? The chop from some hoodlums? The crowd went wild. I grinned modestly, it was nothing. I thanked the bloke and his bird and walked us on among the lanterns.

“Good news, eh? Maybe I’ll be lucky.”

“He said that the double luck had not come together since his first Hong Kong ancestor, Lovejoy.” She was distant, unsmiling. “You will survive much trouble—”

“Look, love.” I could see what she was thinking. “Don’t start all that superstition stuff.

I’ve got a job on, remember?”

We strolled until about ten, then parted. I saw her into a taxi. She never looked back.

No rule that she had to wave, was there? I watched the taxi out of sight. Under the Triad’s rules I could do as I wished about Steerforth’s, ah, lucrative escort agency, as long as I made regular reports that the painting was on course—though I bet Marilyn was updating them every couple of hours.

This evening I felt restless, really out of sorts. Partly it was being so long away from home, partly the emotion—fear of what the Triad would do, the effort of painting in the style of somebody who never existed, all that. Ten-thirty I decided what the hell.

By eleven I was at the Digga Dig, up to no good. Steerforth was relieved to see me. My client he got me was French, sophisticated, impatient, world touring for a film distributor. Or was I her client? Anyway, she got on my nerves, even though we were a riot and she paid up. Superstition’s for the birds.

The inevitable’s never quite unavoidable. I’ve always found that. The trouble is that women make you want not to avoid it, if you understand. To be blunt, Marilyn and I made smiles, after a desperate painting session in which I marouflaged canvases onto wood for future masterpieces and laid my first touches on the Song Ping. I used quite narrow hog’s-hair brushes like Monet, touching the sky spaces. I was shaking with elation. From now on I’d slog daily, building up the surface and always remembering the white which the French master in his old age called “poison white” and deplored having used so much. I mixed paints on old blotting paper, Monet’s trick to reduce the oil content.

“Is that all, Lovejoy?” Marilyn scanned the canvas.

“For now. I wouldn’t want my old friend Monet to be mad at me, would I?”

“No.”

Her face was so trusting, her eyes rounded in agreement, that I grabbed hold of her and waltzed clumsily round the floor. She laughed, showed me the proper steps, but I was hopeless. We’d made love almost before I realized what was going on. I came to, thinking that samples of pollen and fine dust should soon be arriving from Cap d’Antibes, France, as I’d asked, and was too preoccupied to say good-bye properly.

It was a pity, because Leung and Ong came at six o’clock, with a summons to the presence, and by then Marilyn had disappeared off the face of the earth.