The Empire Trilogy (174 page)

Mr Webb would not have approved of such a match as Walter was now contemplating. But no matter, Walter thought with a grim chuckle, old Webb was dead and from the grave a man's influence on the board of directors is much reduced. Nor would his wife approve … but tomorrow Sylvia would be on her way to Australia. As for Monty, trained to detest Langfields the way a police-dog is trained to leap for the throats of burglars, he might not like it but then his opinion was of no account. For a moment Walter's eye rested sadly on his only son. Why could he not have turned out like one of Harvey Firestone's boys? As if aware of his father's disappointment Monty looked up at that moment. ‘What's biting the old man?' he wondered. ‘Perhaps there's something he wants me to do?' But the next moment his thoughts had returned to browse on his own problems which, like his father's, were manifold. How was he to get out of this hole, Singapore, with his skin in one piece? And, a more immediate problem, how was he to get through another dreary evening when he had seen almost every film in town? The only one poor Monty had not seen was Myrna Loy in
Third Finger, Left Hand
. Could you beat it! That was certain to be the sort of romantic rubbish to which he would normally have given a wide berth. But if that's all there was then there was nothing else he could do. He would have to put up with it. ‘
Third Finger, Left Hand
indeed!' he thought grimly as he tackled his pudding. ‘Why am I being punished like this?'

‘A businessman must move with the times!' Two hours had passed and calm had descended on the Blacketts' household once more, but Walter's train of thought had not made much progress. Now he and Solomon Langfield and the doctor sat on the unlit verandah smoking cigars; upstairs, after an abortive attempt to be allowed to stay up late on this their last night in Singapore, Kate and Melanie were lying almost naked on their beds complaining of the heat and calling each other ‘darling' in affected tones: Melanie was still hoping to be rescued from this early banishment by an air-raid and planned to cause a sensation, if the Japanese obliged, by appearing in the Blacketts' improvised shelter wearing no more clothes than she was at present. Kate was less unhappy than she had expected to be at the prospect of leaving, partly because her father had agreed after a great deal of persuasion that her beloved cat, Ming Toy, might accompany her to Australia. Mrs Langfield and Mrs Blackett had both retired early. Matthew, after murmuring his goodbyes to the ladies (only Kate had shed a tear at parting from the Human Bean), had made himself scarce. Joan and Nigel had wandered into the garden and were sitting by the swimming pool watching the moon sliding gently this way and that on its dark skin.

Walter was pondering the question of palm-oil as he had done time and again in recent weeks. Palm-oil was plainly a business for the future. It was also, all too plainly, one in which he had allowed Blackett and Webb to get left behind. Other matters had obtruded, preventing him from taking the decisive action that was needed: old Webb's illness, the war, worries about young Webb's holdings in the company … and before all that there had been the Depression and its aftermath, the struggle for a Restriction Scheme and heaven knew what else. But while he had been hesitating what had happened? Guthries had been going from strength to strength with their new oil bulking company. Even the French had been at it, with Socfin (La Société Financière des Caoutchoucs) building a bulk shipment plant at Port Swettenham. Why, he had heard that Guthries now had twenty thousand acres under oil palms! To make the matter more galling, it seemed that Malayan palm-oil was considered superior to West African. One day, for all Walter knew, it might beacome as important as rubber … or more so, if synthetic rubber developed. Then where would Blackett and Webb be?

Walter had been aware of all this for years, of course. It was useless to pretend otherwise. Younger, he might have taken the plunge, built a modern oil mill and bulk shipment plant, negotiated for estates. It was absurd to think you could compete by shipping the stuff in wooden barrels in this day and age; it would take a considerable investment. It was the sort of venture that might be undertaken, perhaps, by a firm as large as Blackett's and Langfield's combined. Walter was profoundly depressed by the thought that a good fifteen years had gone by since Guthries had gone heavily into palm-oil. In that time he had done nothing! There was one consolation, at least as far as Socfin were concerned: Port Swettenham must be in Japanese hands by now.

Dr Brownley stood up to take his leave, murmuring that one of these days Walter must…

‘Yes, yes,' muttered Walter impatiently, anxious for the Doctor to leave without delay. There was a matter he wanted to discuss with Solomon Langfield. Discountenanced by the briskness of Walter's goodbyes, the Doctor retreated. Walter was left alone in the semi-darkness of the verandah with his old rival of many years.

‘Well, Solomon,' he began cautiously, ‘these are troubled times for Singapore and I have a feeling that things will never again be quite the way they used to be in the old days.' A grunt of assent came from the figure in the cane chair beside him. Encouraged, Walter went on: ‘Soon it will be time for another generation to take over from us the building of this Colony. But still, I think we've done our bit, people like you and me … and my sorely missed partner, Webb, of course.' He added as an afterthought: ‘… And poor old Bowser, too, we mustn't forget him.' Walter considered it generous of himself to include the incompetent, drunken Bowser and the crafty, even criminal Langfield among the founders of modern Singapore. All the same, he waited rather anxiously for Solomon's response which, when it came, was another grunt, somewhat non-committal this time. On the darkened verandah Walter could see little but the glow of his companion's cigar tip on the arm of his chair and a faint gleam of moonlight on the bald pate as it curved up to the long sagacious forehead where preposterous eyebrows rose like puffs of steam.

‘I must say that it reassures me when I think that our work here will be in good hands when our youngsters take over from us. Mind you, my boy, Monty, has never been as interested in the business as I would have hoped … not his line but, well, fair enough, we all have our rôle to play and he's more of … I suppose you'd say he was more of an academic turn of mind,' proceeded Walter, fumbling rather. ‘But my girl, Joan, now, she's as hard-headed as they come and one day she'll make a fine businesswoman. Why, she could buy and sell her old papa already!'

A faint snicker greeted this remark and Walter paused, disconcerted. Had he imagined a sarcastic note to it, as if one were to say: ‘Well,
that
wouldn't be difficult!'

‘Yes,' he continued, summing up, ‘I don't think we need worry about those who come after.' And he added, almost as an afterthought: ‘Young Nigel, he's a fine lad, too. I like the cut of his jib, I must say. Too bad there aren't more like him coming out East these days … Someone at the Club the other day, just forget who it was, said to me: “Look here, Blackett, why don't you and Langfield marry that young pair off? That'd give Guthries and Sime Darby something to think about! And by Jove, you know, he wasn't far wide of the mark either when you come to think about it.'

A faint, enigmatic chortle greeted this last observation, followed by silence.

‘Well, Solomon,' Walter ventured presently. ‘What would you think of such an arrangement if the interested parties liked the sound of it? There need be no great changes on the business side during our lifetime, of course. Frankly, I think we could both do a lot worse. What d'you think?'

Now at last, after being immobile for so long that it might have been taken merely for a piece of furniture, the passive silhouette beside Walter began to move, to struggle to its feet with a creaking and shrieking of bamboo, accompanied by a most peculiar gasping sound which it took him a little time to recognize as laughter. At length, however, the wheezing and gasping died away. By now Langfield was on his feet in front of Walter and bobbing up and down. Again it took Walter a few moments before he realized what the dimly perceived figure was doing. Then it was suddenly clear: the old codger was executing an insulting little caper in front of him.

‘So you're having trouble getting rid of her, are you, Blackett?' he crowed. ‘Well, no son of mine would look at her in a hundred years. Never! Not if you gave him half Singapore with her! Ah, that's a good one … That's the best I've heard for years … Ha! ha! … Your daughter and my son! He wouldn't look at her! Ha!' Solomon had paused in the half-open door which led back into the house and his old monkey's face, illuminated by a glow from within, was twisted with hideous glee. ‘Good night, Blackett. Why, that's the best I've heard for years! You've made my day.'

The door slammed. Walter was left alone on the verandah but he could still hear Langfield's footsteps departing down the corridor. Then, from somewhere deep inside the house, faintly, a querulous voice cried out: ‘He wouldn't touch the bitch! Never! Never!' A burst of frenzied laughter and all was quiet.

Not far away, in another and less elegant part of the city, Matthew was sitting on Vera's bed, apparently about to begin his second meal of the evening. For the past week Vera had issued repeated promises that she would one day cook him a meal, ignoring his protests that he was managing perfectly well for food already. Now here was the promised meal, balanced on his lap, and there seemed to be no option but to go ahead and eat it. He peered at what lay on the plate which was by no means easy to identify in the dim light of the oil-lamp. He proded it suspiciously. ‘What is it?'

‘Baked beans.'

‘I can see they're baked beans. But what are these two lumps of slippery stuff?'

‘Chicken blood … a Chinese delicacy. Taste. You'll like it very much, Matthew, I know.'

‘And these two other lumps covered in sauce?'

‘They are other Chinese delicacy … They are white mice, poached Chinese-style. Taste. They are very good.'

‘I'm not frightfully hungry, as a matter of fact. I've had one meal already this evening … But I'm really looking forward to tasting all this,' he added hastily as Vera looked hurt, ‘even if I don't quite manage to finish it all.' He captured a baked bean with his chopsticks and nibbled it cautiously.

‘Oh, Matthew, you don't think I am a good cook, do you?'

‘Of course I do,' protested Matthew, and in a fit of bravado lifted one of the white mice to his lips and began to gnaw at it, making appreciative sounds. He found that it did not taste too bad, but would have liked to have known which end of the mouse he was eating.

‘You think Miss Blackett is better cook than I,' Vera said accusingly. ‘I don't know how you can touch a European woman like Miss Blackett, they sweat so much. It is something horrible!'

‘But…'

‘Yes, you prefer making love-making to Miss Blackett even though she sweats something horrible.'

‘Don't be silly. You say that just because I'm not hungry when you cook me a meal! You know I only like to be with you. Come and sit beside me.' Putting the plate down, he murmured : ‘I'll finish the rest later.'

‘I know you think I am not a good cook but my mother could not teach me. Always she was used to servants here, servants there, because she was a princess. It is because my family has blue blood that I do not know how to cook.'

‘But Vera, I think …'

She had come to sit beside him and now put her hand over his mouth and said: ‘If we stay together I'll learn to be a good cook so that you can invite your friends and we will have a nice time.'

‘I don't have any friends, except Major Archer and Dupigny … and, of course, Jim Ehrendorf, but I don't know where he is.' He looked at his watch. ‘Soon I shall have to be going, Vera. I'm expected on duty tonight.'

‘Not just yet. Lie here with me a little while. “With so much quarrelling and so few kisses, how long do you think our love can last?” That is what it says in the Chinese song translated into English by Mr Waley. Shall I read you another verse? But first take off your clothes and lie down beside me.'

‘Mrs Blackett and Kate are leaving for Australia tomorrow … and I hear that lots of other women are leaving, too. Tomorrow we must try to arrange for you to leave, too. It isn't safe for you to stay in Singapore with the Japanese so close.'

All night I could not sleep
Because of the moonlight on my bed.
I kept hearing a voice calling;
Out of nowhere, Nothing answered ‘yes'.

Matthew lay there inert, listening to the faint sounds which came from the other cubicles in the tenement and from outside in the street, above all, like the very rhythm of poverty and despair, that weary, tubercular coughing which never ceased. ‘Tomorrow, d'you hear me?'

I will carry my coat and not put on my belt;
With unpainted eyebrows I will stand at the front window.
My tiresome petticoat keeps on flapping about;
If it opens a little, I shall blame the spring wind.

‘What will become of us?' Matthew wondered, thinking how vulnerable they both were, lying there in the stifling cubicle and breathing that strange smell that hung everywhere in Chinatown, that odour of drains and burnings rags. And how strange it was that someone should have made up these verses, which he found extraordinarily moving, hundreds of years ago and yet they sounded as new and fresh as if they had been composed by someone who had been here in this cubicle only a moment earlier. And that this person should have belonged to a quite different culture from his own made it seem even more moving. And slowly a peculiar feeling stole over Matthew, almost like a premonition of disaster. All the different matters, both in his own personal life and outside it, which had preoccupied him in the past few weeks and even years, his relationship with his father and the history of Blackett and Webb, the time he had spent in Oxford and in Geneva, his friendship with Ehrendorf and with Vera and with the Major, his arguments about the League and even the one about colonial policy which he had had earlier in the evening with Nigel, and yes even his saying goodbye to dear little Kate … all these things now seemed to cling together, to belong to each other and to have a direction and an impetus towards destruction which it was impossible to resist.