The Russian Concubine Part 41

Lydia didn't wait for more. Suitcases stood by the front door, coats and umbrella draped across them.

She raced up the stairs. Silent, she must be silent. In her room, her smart new room, she tore off her dress and underclothes and threw them into the bottom of the wardrobe. Using an old sweater she scrubbed her hair and skin till it tingled. Quick brush. Old dress. Cardigan. Downstairs.

She walked into the drawing room with a ready-made smile. 'h.e.l.lo, Mama, I didn't expect to see you still here.'

'Lydia,' Alfred exclaimed. 'Thank the Lord you're home. Your mother has been worried sick. Where have you been?'

'Out.'

'Out? That's no answer, my girl. Apologise to your mother at once.'

Valentina was standing staring at Lydia, her limbs very rigid, her back to the fire, a half-smoked cigarette in her hand. There were two high spots of colour on her cheeks, as though the heat of the fire were affecting her. But Lydia knew her mother. Knew those telltale spots. They meant fear.

Why? Her mother knew she often roamed the streets of the settlement, had done so for years. Why the sudden fear?

'Lydia,' Valentina said slowly, 'what's wrong?'

'Nothing.'

Valentina took a long draw on her cigarette and exhaled with a little grunt, as if she'd been prodded in the chest. She was still wearing the chiffon dress but had replaced the bolero with a warm suede jacket, and there were dark smudges under her eyes.

'I'm sorry, Mama. I didn't mean to delay you. I thought you'd have gone ages ago. With all those guests to wave you good-bye, I didn't think you'd even notice that I . . .'

'Don't be silly, Lydia,' Alfred said. She could see he was trying hard to hang on to his temper and be polite. 'Of course we wanted to say good-bye, both of us. Now take this.' He held out a brown envelope. 'It contains some money in case the need should arise before we're back, but of course Wai, he's the cook, will provide your meals, so you shouldn't need much. A trip to the cinema perhaps?'

Lydia had never been to the cinema in her life. At any other time she'd have jumped at it.

'Thank you.'

'You'll be all right here on your own?'

'Yes.'

'Anthea Mason said she'd look in now and again to see that you're okay.'

'No, I'll be fine. Is there another train tonight? I'm sorry I made you miss yours but there must be another one you can catch if you hurry.' She looked over at her mother. 'I'd hate you to miss out on your honeymoon because of me.'

'Well, actually . . .' Alfred began.

'Yes,' Valentina said with an annoyed lift of one eyebrow. 'We can change trains at Tientsin. Alfred, be an angel and fetch me a gla.s.s of water from the kitchen, would you? I'm finding it hot in here.' She ran a wrist across her forehead. 'Probably all the tension of . . .' She let her voice trail away.

'Certainly, my dear.' He glanced at Lydia. 'Put your mother's mind at ease, so she can go off feeling rea.s.sured.' He left the room.

Immediately Valentina tossed her cigarette into the fire and came to stand right in front of Lydia. 'Tell me, quickly. What happened?'

Lydia felt weak with relief. Yes, of course, she could tell her everything, she'd know what to do, where to buy medicines, a doctor, she could . . .

Valentina seized her arm. 'Tell me what that dirty great wolf wanted.'

'What?'

'Popkov.'

'What?'

Valentina shook her. 'Liev Popkov. You went off with him. What did he say?'

'Nothing.'

'You're lying.'

'No. He was just drunk.'

Valentina looked closely at her daughter, then gently wrapped her arms around her and pulled her close. Lydia breathed in her musky perfume and held tight, but as she did so she felt her own body start to shake uncontrollably.

'Lydochka, sweetheart, don't.' Valentina's hand stroked her damp hair. 'I'll only be gone a week. I know we've never been apart before but don't be upset. I'll be back soon.' She kissed Lydia's cheek and drew back a step. 'What, tears? From my I-never-cry dochenka dochenka. Don't, sweetheart.'

Valentina reached for the silver tray of drinks on the sideboard. With a quick glance to check that the door was still closed, she poured a gla.s.s of vodka, drank it straight down, shuddered, and poured another which she carried to her daughter.

'Here. It will help.'

Lydia shook her head. No words. No breath.

Valentina shrugged, drank it herself, and replaced the gla.s.s. The red spots on her cheeks were fading.

'My sweet darling.' She held Lydia's face between her hands. 'This marriage is a new future for us. You will grow to like him, I promise. Be happy.' She smiled, but there was something not quite right about it. 'Please. You and me. Let's learn to be happy.'

Lydia hugged her mother close. 'Go to Datong, Mama. Go and be happy.'

'That's right, ladies, kiss and make up. Don't want to see anyone looking sad, not today of all days.' Alfred beamed at them both, handed his wife the water and patted Lydia on the back. 'I've telephoned for the car and it should be here any minute. Excited?' he asked his wife.

'Ecstatic.'

'Good.'

Then there was a fuss with coats and cases and last-minute hugs, but as Alfred and Valentina were walking out the front door, Lydia said, 'Is it all right if I buy a padlock for Sun Yat-sen's shed?'

'Of course,' Alfred replied airily. 'But why do you want to padlock your rabbit in?'

'To keep him safe.'

She washed him. Softly. Barely touching the damaged skin with a cloth soaked in warm water and disinfectant. His rags were crawling with lice and she threw them outside into the rain.

His body was a sickening sight. So thin she could count the bones. And it was branded. Burn marks, each one in the shape of an S. Like snakes. Six of them, scorched into his chest. The burns were black and rotting but even they were nothing compared to his hands. As she unwound the foul strips of cloth that were twisted tight around his fingers, she almost gagged on the smell, and however careful she was, chunks of blackened skin and flesh came away with the bandages.

Left behind were the maggots. White squirming creatures devouring Chang An Lo. Dozens of them. Lydia recoiled in horror.

Liev Popkov raised his head from his chest at her cry. He was on the floor, slumped against the wall next to Sun Yat-sen's paG.o.da cage, the vodka bottle she had brought from the house still in his hand.

'Ah otlichno! otlichno! Maggots,' he rumbled. 'They are good. Eat away the bad and clean the wound. Leave them.' Maggots,' he rumbled. 'They are good. Eat away the bad and clean the wound. Leave them.'

His head slid forward onto his chest once more and he uttered a deep shuddering snore that Lydia found oddly comforting in the cold shed. She drew the oil lantern nearer to Chang's hands and studied them. It was brutal. The little finger was missing on each hand. They had been hacked off. The wounds had festered until the hands had swollen into rotting melons that had burst open, filled with pus and maggots.

With painstaking care she lifted out each maggot. She kept telling herself they were no worse than c.o.c.kroaches or worms. Only once was she actually sick and that was when she pulled out one particularly fat white slug and it popped between her fingers. When they were all removed, she sluiced clean water and disinfectant through the wounds and, after a moment's uncertainty, replaced two of the maggots in each hand. Liev Popkov should know. He'd been through bad times, probably seen any number of bullet holes and sabre cuts during the revolution, so he should know. But what if the maggots ate their way up to Chang's brain?

She forced that thought out of her head.

Quickly she dabbed something on the gaping wounds. OPODELDOC & LAUDANUM. She'd found it in the first-aid kit in the bathroom along with some bandages, and it seemed better than nothing. Slivers of bone glimmered white through the raw flesh, and she swathed them in gauze and clean bandages. Chang An Lo made no sound. Sometimes his eyelids flickered. That was the only way she knew he was alive.

Lydia had never looked at a naked man before. She spooned warm water with honey over his lips and eased a dribble of it into his mouth but she was frightened he might choke, so she kept it to only a drop or two every half hour. And all the time she was aware that he was naked.

The sight surprised her. She had no idea his private parts would be so . . . so soft or so loose or so embedded in thick hair, yet oddly, with Chang she felt no embarra.s.sment. When she removed the rags from Chang's loins, Liev Popkov had growled his disapproval from his spot against the wall, but he was too busy combing through the fibres of his overcoat and snapping up stray lice between his thumbnails to care too much. It was obvious he thought the Chinese was dying. And what did it matter to him? Liev was eating a hunk of cheese from the kitchen and swigging from the vodka bottle. No interest in words.

After she had tended Chang's hands as best she could and spread the liniment over his chest as well, she covered his top half with a blanket to keep him warm and set to work on his lower half. She bathed his hips and stomach and it was like bathing a skeleton. Empty bones. When had he last eaten? Days? Weeks? She had thought she knew what hunger was, but not this. Not like this. She squeezed out the wet cloth again and started to wash the mat of black hair at the base of his stomach, but it was deeply encrusted with . . . what? Blood. Faeces. Urine. More lice. A wave of crippling pain for him swept up from her own stomach, and it was with gentle, nervous fingers that she lifted his p.e.n.i.s.

The softness of it surprised her. It lay still on the palm of one hand while she soaped it with the other, easing off the filth and scabs, delicately patting the skin dry with a towel. There was something so unbearably vulnerable about it. Even the tracery of blue veins left it looking bare and exposed, as if it needed another barrier between it and the world. Is that why men want women so much? As a barrier? A protection?

'I'll protect you, Chang An Lo, I swear,' she breathed. 'Like you protected me.'

She washed his legs, then his feet. She ran a finger over the scarred line that she had sewn with her own hands at Lizard Creek, and finally she took a pair of scissors, returned her attentions to his groin, and cut away the matted pubic hair and lice. It felt like cutting away his secrets.

During that first night at his side, she struggled with what was staring her in the face. It was almost dawn before she admitted it to herself. She couldn't take Chang to the Chinese hospital. She couldn't. Neither could she call a doctor.

It was obvious.

The Black Snakes had done this to him, and he had chosen to risk death in Tan Wah's hovel rather than expose himself to recapture by seeking help from any medical people. Or even from friends where he was known among the Communists. Clearly he knew the Snakes had eyes everywhere.

'You could have come to me,' she whispered more than once and traced a finger along the sheer edge of his cheekbone.

Now she had to think.

The facts were bad. No adult would permit her to keep Chang here; she knew what they would say. They'd make faces and insist it was not right for a young girl. Scandalous. Scandalous. He'd be whisked away to the Chinese hospital, which was exactly where the Black Snakes would be waiting with their knives and their branding irons. No. No well-meaning adults. She was on her own. Her head dropped into her hands and struggled to work out her next step. It was some time before she lifted her face and gazed across the small musty shed at the big bear slumped in a heap. She wasn't alone. He'd be whisked away to the Chinese hospital, which was exactly where the Black Snakes would be waiting with their knives and their branding irons. No. No well-meaning adults. She was on her own. Her head dropped into her hands and struggled to work out her next step. It was some time before she lifted her face and gazed across the small musty shed at the big bear slumped in a heap. She wasn't alone.

She walked over and thumped his shoulder.

'Liev Popkov,' she said urgently. 'Wake up.'

35.

Theo drove fast. He was angry. Angry enough to leave the black paste in the drawer this morning. His body ached and every pore of his skin sweated for the dream-filled smoke, but he needed his mind sharp. Sharp as a rat. It was still early and the morning mist drifted over the roofs, no wind to shift it, and the day seemed to be holding its breath. Theo parked the Morris Cowley outside the black oak gates and spat in the faces of the stone lions on the gateposts. Lions guard the hearth. Well, not this time.

The gatekeeper bowed submissively, almost sc.r.a.ping the ground with the earflaps of his quilted hat.

'My master Feng Tu Hong not expecting you today, n.o.ble professor.'

'It is not your honoured master I have come to see, Chen. It is his pus-head son, Po Chu.'

The gatekeeper didn't exactly smile, but his face, usually so immobile and correct, took on a sly hint of animation. 'I send worthless wife to tell Important Son you here and wish to . . .'

Theo did not wait but strode through the gate and up into the courtyards. Behind him the scurrying sound of a woman's bound feet made the hairs on the back of his neck rise.

'Po Chu, you pig-humping piece of devil's spit, if you ever lay a finger on my Li Mei again, I shall personally stick a blade through your eyes and straight down your gullet.'

'Wah! You talk like a tiger, Tiyo Willbee, but at night you crawl on your belly like a worm to eat the poppy. I hear from the sampans. You shiver and you shake the way a wh.o.r.e does on her back with her legs in the air. You talk big but you crawl small.'

'What I do out on the river is not your affair. But be glad that the remaining whispers of last night's dream smoke keep me from calling the great war G.o.d Kuan Ti down from the skies to ram his spear through your bloodless heart for what you did to her.'

'The wh.o.r.e needed it.'

'Take care, Po Chu. Li Mei is no wh.o.r.e. She is your honourable sister.'

'No sister of mine would bed a fanqui. fanqui. She needed to be told.' She needed to be told.'

'Needed your stinking fist in her face?'

'Yes, by all the G.o.ds, she needed it.'

'Because she came to make peace with your father?'

'No. Because she thought my venerable father would be fool enough to give her what she wanted without a bargain.'

'Bargain? What bargain?'

'Ai-ay! The headmaster does not know his wh.o.r.e as well as he thinks.' The headmaster does not know his wh.o.r.e as well as he thinks.'

'Enjoy this breath, Po Chu, because it will be your last if you call my beloved a wh.o.r.e again. Tell me what bargain?'