Hong Kong Holiday

Hong Kong Holiday

Emily Hahn

The Manners of Marie

I NOTICED this morning that I was still being careful with the tooth powder, covering the brush gingerly. Now that I am in Hong Kong, within calling distance of at least three shops where I can buy any amount of tooth powder, this seems rather silly, but habits die hard and I have just spent a year in Chungking. Thinking it over, I realize that in many similar ways I show the effects of that year in Szechwan Province. I still get a feeling of surprised pleasure when I summon a cab and ride at ease to my destination, instead of toiling wearily on foot for hours along rocky mountain trails. I still jump up at night in a cold sweat whenever a boat or a train whistles; sometimes I find myself half dressed in the dark and planning to rush for the further, safer dugout before I remember that I am not in Chungking and that the whistle is not an alarm. That sort of thing is to be expected, I suppose, but other things happen to people in beleaguered cities which would surprise you. Take Marie’s lapse from virtue, for instance.

There were, in my time, from fifteen to twenty foreign women in Chungking. They were strange and interesting specimens, all of them, but Marie was especially noteworthy because she was so invincibly, unquenchably, unbelievably pretty. The standard of beauty in such a place is low, because most European women who go to Szechwan interest themselves perforce in other things than sexual allure, and Marie was always a shock to newcomers. They always said the same thing to her, and we grew to expect it and to giggle hysterically when they said it— You? Here? My God, why? This is no place for a white woman!

Actually Marie thrived in Chungking. Some women didn’t. What got most of them down was the air raids and the consequent mental anguish. But as they pined and grew thin and sallow and careless of cold cream and hair gloss, Marie waxed in health and beauty. She was young and vigorous; she would walk miles for a tennis game, a dance, or a permanent wave. She found a village with a barbershop that had a permanent-wave machine; it was, I think, the most tremendous feat anyone ever accomplished in Chungking. We others greeted her news without much enthusiasm; I, for one, could not face with equanimity the prospect of being tied up to one of those torture gadgets when the air-raid alarm hooted. But Marie was an awfully nice girl. I have never met a more charming girl. She has such pretty manners, I often said. One can forgive her being so young and pretty, her manners are so good.

Everyone agreed with me. There wasn’t a woman in the foreign colony at Chungking who had a word to say against Marie. This unusual state of affairs was due in part to the strain under which we lived, which left us no time for pettinesses and jealousy. During my year there I can remember no catty remarks, no crimes passionnels; we loved each other and were all ladies and gentlemen—until my last day there.

Now, it is exceedingly difficult for anyone who has not lived in Chungking to understand what life can be like when you just can’t buy things. It was uncomfortable to a degree; the lack of things amounted to an obsession with most of us. Other people, far more eloquent than I, have written of the horrors of life in a city where beer cost thirty-five Mex. dollars a bottle and whisky was two hundred. Others have written feelingly of the gravel in the rice and the rotten meat. Some have even dwelt on the horrors of the air raids. But nobody, so far as I know, has thought of mentioning the shortage of women’s clothes.

Many of us arrived in Chungking from Hong Kong by plane, and we were allowed to bring thirty kilograms of luggage, no more. Thirty kilograms is not much. It is about sixty-six pounds. After a few months we grew adept at begging or tricking newcomers into bringing things for us, but it wasn’t easy. When our clothes wore out and our shoes fell to pieces, we bought grass linen and made dresses and we wore Chinese sandals. We also inherited the clothes of the women who went away. That was an unwritten law throughout the colony. A woman going away was surrounded and swamped by shrieking maenads who tried on her shoes and her dresses and gave hysterical thanks for every scrap that came their way.

Well, the day was in sight when I was to leave Chungking. It was the end of August and the weather was hotter than any we had had before. The bright-blue sky had given the Japanese inspiration, and for two days running, incendiary bombs had rained down on the scarred, pale ruins. From the hill across the river we watched the resultant fires and when, after twenty-four hours, the last glare died down we were looking at a strange and desert land.

I could hardly believe I was really going away. The idea of living anywhere else dazed me. I felt as if all I knew in the world was that hilltop among other hills, overlooking a skeleton city. But it was true; my permission to leave had been acquired from the garrison commander, I had been vaccinated and inoculated, my passport had its visa for Hong Kong. A kindly Briton named Hanbury had allotted the attic room of his house to female refugees, and it was there that I dragged out my suitcase and began to pack.

It didn’t take long. My nightgown and underwear I set aside to give away, according to custom. My hairbrush I kept. My powder would be given away—I added it to the nightgown and other things—as well as a tiny phial of perfume which some Croesus had brought me from Hanoi. How delighted I had been with that perfume! But I could buy more in Hong Kong, and the girls would be delighted in their turn.

Where, by the way, were the girls? It was time they gathered about me and began snatching. No doubt they would arrive soon. I kept on with my sorting out and packing. Four dresses, two of them almost down to the last thread. A yellow sports shirt. A pair of broken shoes. A ribbon from a Chinese shop. These things, as I shook them out, emitted a curious white dust, remains of the plaster-wall hotel from the ruins out of which they had been fished. All of them I wrapped up, feeling a strange pang as I did so; they were old and mildewed and worn, but we had been through a lot together and I hated to give them up.

A roar from across the river called me from my sentimental musing, and I hurried to the window. Yes, there it was—the first signal of a coming air raid, a red lantern on a pike. That, then, was why the women had not gathered about me. Down the burnt-out cliff across the river came blue-clad Chinese in a rushing mob, and the ferryboats were filling fast. Hundreds of refugees would crowd into the protected area on our side of the river, hoping that the raiders would remember their promise to respect foreign houses. I went downstairs to the veranda and greeted the others as they came in, receiving with what grace I could muster their jokes about one last sendoff. I brought with me the bundle of castoff clothing.

I’m sending it down to Vi at the Club, I explained to Hanbury. She’s small and plump, and she can use it all when it’s cut down, and she’s lost almost all her stuff in one bombing or another.

I’ll let the coolie take it, said Hanbury. There’s plenty of time before the next alarm.

Thus philosophically we whiled away the time until the planes came over. I remember that raid quite clearly, since it was my last. I remember how we walked all around the long veranda, waiting and wondering from which direction they would come this time. The first flight arrived. They flew across the short width of the city, dropping their bombs on the crest of the hill which formed the backbone of Chungking, and in the quivering air the columns of dust and black smoke rose slowly out of the quiet ruins. Another flight came over as we watched and flew closer and closer to the piece of sky above our hill.

Look out! someone shouted. I dived for the floor, as did everyone else, and in the river beneath us, a hundred yards away, two or three bombs sent up fountains of muddy water.

It was over again. We lifted our heads cautiously from the floor and stared at each other. Then we laughed. Then we got up, and called for drinks, and felt our knees quake. The all-clear went at three o’clock. Hanbury told me there was to be a farewell party for me that night.

I was pleased, of course, and even flattered, though I knew it was not so much a compliment to me as an excuse for celebration. The locally made vodka went a long way in cocktails and we enjoyed parties tremendously, though the personnel and the conversation were always the same. The chief problem this time was the usual one: some of our guests would have to come several miles, and at the end of the party it would be awkward to retrace those miles, over the hills or the river. All the spare beds in the houses in our neighborhood were requisitioned on such an occasion. In our house we knew that nobody else could be put up; we were crammed to the doors already. The host made that clear. Anyone who asked if he could spend the night was to be told so. Say that they’re welcome to a corner of the floor, advised Hanbury. That’s all the room there is.

We were sitting around discussing it over our tea when Vi burst in. No, we said in chorus as she appeared. No, you can’t stay tonight. Try the boats. For it was a new expedient to go and live on whatever river boat happened to be docked when you had been bombed out of your house.

It isn’t that. I’ve got a place to stay, she said. I came here about something else. She paused for a moment, out of breath. Look here, she went on, and I realized then, as she turned to me, that her breathlessness was not due merely to having climbed the hill. You sent me a package of clothes, didn’t you?

I admitted I had.

What was in it? demanded Vi.

As far as I could remember those few poor rags, I gave the list. Vi nodded at each item. Well, she said, it’s gone.

At that we all sat up. Gone? I said.

Gone. Stolen from the Club, said Vi dramatically. I’d gone across river to get some films. I stayed over until the signal was down. When I came back and found your note, I was tickled, naturally, and then I asked where the bundle was and the bar boy said, ‘One missy have take away.’

"One missy? I said incredulously. Which one?"

He said a big one, said Vi.

Some mistake, muttered Hanbury. It’ll be cleared up in time.

And I mentioned it to Emma, went on Vi, and she said, ‘Oh, that’ll be Marie. Marie just thought she’d take a look at what was in it, probably. That’s just like Marie.’ And do you know, I think she’s right.

It was a remarkable accusation to make. Hanbury protested. No, hang it all, Vi. You mean Marie would just walk in and take it–––

Just to look at, said Vi crisply, and to see what was in it that she wanted. Why, she’s always doing things like that. She borrowed Marge’s slacks once to go riding in— and ruined them—without asking. And you know yourself, she said, turning to me again, how she walked off with your shoes. And the way she uses anybody’s house —I mean to get dressed in or to take baths—and that time …

It came flooding out, a damning list of misdemeanors. Never had there been such a speech in Chungking since the beginning of the bombing. I realized that we had all been moving and working in a dream and untold iniquities lay beneath the peaceful surface of our social pool.

It was the custom in Chungking to carry your party clothes to a party and to change there. The women’s dormitory, therefore, was crowded with girls that evening in every stage of deshabille. Baths were run in the bathroom, there was a heavy smell of perfume and a continuous buzz of chatter. Most of the chatter was about that bundle of clothes; Vi had spread the story of iniquity far and wide. In the middle of it the door opened and Vi walked in, looking very grim and carrying in her arms the bundle.

We all fell silent as she stalked across the room and put her burden down on the floor. Found it in the Club, she announced. She’s brought it back, just like that. Now we’ll look, and if there is anything missing …

We crowded around her as she untied the string and laid the paper out flat. Each poor old garment was taken up, shaken out, examined, commented upon, and laid aside. The inquiry did not take long, and when it was finished everyone looked at me expectantly.

I don’t know, I said doubtfully. I thought I knew it all by heart, but–––

Underwear? asked Vi. Dresses? You know that blue georgette—was that there?

Yes, by God, so it was! I said suddenly. Isn’t it now?

Seven heads bobbed over the heap. No. No, it’s gone.

And the sports shirt? That yellow shirt—where is that?

Gone.

Is that all? asked Vi in a terrible voice.

I think that’s all, I said.

We heard steps on the stair and then a high, sweet voice upraised in girlish humming. The door swung open; Marie stood on the threshold, the picture of lovely youth. She looked at us gathered around the little heap of clothes on the floor, and we looked at her.

The most extraordinary thing happened. After all, we were grown women. Some of us were over forty and most of us had said good-by to twenty-five. Yet the atmosphere in that room carried me back to my school days. There was an air of implacability, of cold, concerted condemnation which you’d expect to find only in savage tribes and in groups of children. If I had been Marie, I would have turned and fled. She didn’t. She walked into the room and put down her bag. Going to sleep here tonight, said Marie gaily. Hello, everybody.

The group around the heap of clothes broke up. You can’t stay here tonight, Marie, I said sharply. There isn’t any room.

Hanny said I could, she retorted. He said I could sleep on the floor.

Vi marched into the bathroom. There was a very heavy silence.

Oh, said Marie, pretending she had just seen the open bundle.

I turned to the mirror and began to brush my hair. The others went on with their dressing. From the bathroom you could hear the water running, and then it stopped.

Vi! called Marie. Vi! Those clothes of yours—I took one of the snoods. There were two. Do you mind?

We all stopped what we were doing. I remember Claribelle had a stocking just slipped on over her toes and she stayed doubled up on the bed. Vi answered from behind the bathroom door, clearly, Oh no. That’s perfectly all right, Marie. She turned on the water again. Claribelle resumed pulling up her stocking. I stuck a hairpin in over my ear. Nobody said anything for a minute while Marie pulled clothes out of her bag.

Damn! she said. I’ll have to iron this. Anybody want anything else ironed? Vi, would you like me to iron your dress or anything?

It was just the sort of offer which usually impressed me with Marie’s good manners. Now the silence in the room became chillier, if possible, than ever. None of us addressed another word to Marie. For myself, I finished getting ready as soon as I could and escaped downstairs to the party. The men, in their blundering, honest, unsubtle way, were mixing drinks and sampling them. When a few minutes later the girls began to drift downstairs, all powdered and brushed and ready for the party, you would never have supposed that anything untoward had been going on upstairs. They were chattering among themselves and with Marie in perfect amity.

It was a nice party—until it came to an end and the girls went upstairs again. As I had foreseen, there was some question about where to put Marie. Of course Hanbury could not really allow her to sleep on the floor and of course she knew it. In the end it was Hanbury who slept on the floor, and his bed was brought up and set up outside our door for Marie. The minute we got inside our room the same chilly manners were resumed. In a dead silence Marie made her little preparations for bed and went to it.

We had almost fallen asleep when Claribelle said with a sort of drowsy viciousness, Anyway, she’ll never dare wear those things as long as she’s in Chungking. I’ll see to that. I’ve warned everybody.

And in spite of the air raids, the war, the smashed city, and my imminent departure upon fresh adventures, it still seemed to me the most important thing in the world that Marie should not enjoy her ill-gotten gains.

Marie, en route to America, has just dropped into my hotel room to say hello and good-by. It was charming of her, considering that she had only a day in town.

There was just one tense moment when, sleekly brushed and dressed in new clothes, she turned to look at herself in the mirror and caught sight of my wardrobe closet. Oh, do you mind? she begged prettily.

I did not mind, and she opened it.

With a practiced eye, she looked over the dresses. Unerringly, she seized upon the prize of my collection, an evening dress, and brought it out to the light. The intervening healing days were forgotten for a moment. Forgotten, too, was the fact that we were now in the heart of Hong Kong’s shopping district, many miles away from the arid ruins of Chungking. Our eyes met; something seemed to snap and sparkle.

Then I recollected myself. Got it across the street, I said nonchalantly. It didn’t cost very much, really.

I suppose, said Marie, that I ought to wait until I get home before I start buying things …

The rest of our conversation was completely civilized, and I saw Marie go with regret. She had such pretty manners.

The Extraordinary Pelvis

THEY’RE BEING VERY KIND to let us have the use of the room, the Dean told me, and so you must be on time for class. The minute the hour is up, the whole lot of you must be out and leave space for their students. Don’t forget. It’s not as it was in Shanghai.

I assented rather gloomily. It was not a bit like Shanghai in the old, leisurely days when our college had its own house. But then we have been refugees for a long time, from the edge of Soochow Creek to Shanghai’s Frenchtown, from Frenchtown to Limbo and back again into the world, and materialized as one more superfluous college on the hospitable campus of Hong Kong University. I took a bus into town, reflecting on how quickly life can change. A few uniformed Japanese had marched into our schoolrooms and taken over all the remaining equipment—broken blackboards, torn textbooks, and such remnants—and now we are all guests of the British Government. From one point of view, it is an improvement. I like Hong Kong, the students like Hong Kong, my gibbons, flourishing on the veranda in my apartment, like Hong Kong very much. But the Japanese haven’t left us such amenities as textbooks, pencils, paper, and the other things used in schoolrooms, and we can’t very well buy them until we get some money somewhere. Of course, there aren’t many students any more.

It’s a long way from the university to my apartment on the Peak, and I had forgotten all these problems before I got home. The Dean had said, "At three o’clock sharp tomorrow I’ll be there to introduce you to the new class. Remember now. Be on time."

I had the best intentions in the world; I always do. It’s a long way, however, from my house to the university, and as I went down the hill next day, I stopped off for lunch with friends at their hotel. It was a fairly typical luncheon for Hong Kong. Both British and Americans act as if the war were around the corner these days and each party likely to be the last. We live high, and I was very late for class. I arrived in a taxi, ran up a lot of steps until I was breathless, found myself lost, and spent five minutes rearranging my mood so that I would be properly professorial when I met my students. The Dean was just going out of the classroom when I found him. Panting and merry and probably smelling of whisky, I could not have been his ideal of a teacher. Rather coldly he introduced me to the students and left.

I don’t remember exactly how that lecture went off. We had only half an hour left of our precious time. I remember my impression that I was talking to three rows of spectacled faces which registered nothing at all, not even a natural surprise that their teacher should arrive drunk and disorderly.

It’s a horrid job, said I to myself on the way home, my luncheon glow fading. It’s a thankless life. Nobody profits from these classes. I must recapture their respect somehow or we shall all be wasting our time. What makes teaching bearable, anyway? Some spark, some reaction, if it’s only from one student. There’s not a bit of spice in any one of these. A triple row of milk puddings, that’s what they were. The luxuriant green trees around Government House hurtled past the bus. My head ached a little; the sun was too glaring. Dregs, that’s what they are, I fumed. They should be at the front. And I ought to have given a better lecture. We shot out onto the road by the bay, placidly blue in the sunlight. I should have gone up the Peak by the tram; instead, I took a taxi. When I got home I looked at the gibbons on the veranda before I lay down. Mr. Mills, the big beige one, was scratching his right hip. Gibbons don’t scratch as much as monkeys do, and my gibbons have no fleas. I wondered a little before sleep overcame me.

That evening young Taylor came to see the gibbons. Taylor is something in government, but so far as Mr. Mills is concerned, he is a gibbon, and they are good friends.

He’s scratching—have you noticed? Taylor said to me. What is it?

I examined the irritated spot while Mr. Mills lay stretched on the chair arm, completely relaxed and proud of the attention.

It’s—why, it’s awful! I said in alarm. Look, it’s all inflamed. It’s like a big blister or something. We’ll have to swab it. What do you suppose it is? Mills rolled his eyes but lay quiet.

It’s not hurting him, at any rate, said Taylor, looking anxious. I say, I’d better let the doctor have a look at him. You know, the doctor’s a friend of mine and he’s been wanting to examine this gibbon. I’ll take him to hospital tomorrow afternoon. Want to come along?

I’ll be at school, I said. I’ll meet you here afterward.

I was in the middle of a fairly credible English lecture next afternoon, if I do say it myself. Remorse had done its work and the three rows of pudding faces had resolved themselves into the usual group of Chinese students, earnest and attentive and just a little inhuman at the beginning of term. Spectacled or spotty, tall or short, all students look alike for about three weeks, and then I begin to know them. By the end of a few months the picture has become more detailed. There is the shy, clever one, the brazen, stupid one, the one who thinks he is not getting his money’s worth, the one who writes in and asks for a photograph just before the final examination. Some of them cheat. A lot of them are still under the impression that they are in a Chinese-style school where unpopular professors are tossed out on their ears and there is a mad faculty rush for popularity