The Harmony Silk Factory

THE WINE WAS TOO MUCH for me. It colluded with the heat and worked its insidious way into my blood. There it became infused with the poison that ran thickly throughout my body; my limbs became leaden, my head light as yarn on a weaver’s spindle. My vision dazzled with the colours of richly shot silk; above me the sky was a tentative white canopy. Every time I looked at Kunichika he was leaning over to Snow, hissing sweet nothings in her ear, looking at me with a slow, sly sideways leer. The execrable remnants of our meal lay on the table, filling the air with their fetid odour. The two halves of the hunk of bread I had baked (in my “Mongolian oven,” a small mud kiln Johnny had built) lay at the heart of this devastation. Its damp lumpen texture began to harden in the hot air, crusting scablike on the surface.

“That was delicious,” Snow said.

“No, it was truly awful,” I said quickly before Honey had a chance to do so. Humiliation is always more bearable if inflicted by oneself. “Tasted of vinegar and hyssop.”

“Not at all, it was a lovely surprise,” Kunichika said, a smile tearing his face slowly in two. I lowered my face and rubbed my aching temples with my fingers. Under my breath I could hear my incoherent, mumbling voice. What was I trying to say? There was nothing to do, I thought, but sing.

“Là ci darem la mano,

là mi dirai di sì.

Vedi, non è lontano;

partiam, ben mio, da qui.”

Yes, my dear, come with me, let’s leave this place. I looked up and saw Snow smiling intensely; her wine-glazed eyes were moist and reddened, her face flushed and damp with perspiration. Kunichika continued to speak to her, the low rumble of his voice playing sostenuto in my ears. I continued to sing: I fear I will be deceived.

“Why are you singing Zerlina’s part, Peter?” Kunichika said politely. “Why are you playing the woman’s role?”

“So that you can sing your part — your true part. Come on, sing, you know the words.”

Snow laughed. Kunichika spoke his words slowly in unaccented but articulate Italian. “Io cangierò tua sorte,” he said. “I will change your fate.”

I sang again, falsetto, my voice cracking and ugly. I can resist no longer.

He spoke again, entreating us all into his lair.

I stood up and walked away from the table, stumbling towards the ruin. Misera me, misera me.

I sat down on the broken stone steps and began to weep. I closed my eyes, a sea of silk shimmering before me. I stepped onto the water and began to sink into its voluptuousness. I was weak and there was nothing I could do.

WHEN I AWOKE it was dark and I could taste the bitter furriness of food and wine in my mouth. My shoulder was stiff and aching where I had fallen asleep; I could still feel the poison of the alcohol in my blood, and I sank to the ground again.

A voice said, “Feeling sick? So you should. That was a nasty little performance you gave just now.” It was Honey, sitting on the step above me, smoking a cigarette.

“Go away.”

“No, I rather like being out here,” he said. “You see all manner of things in the jungle at night.”

“Just bugger off.”

“Language,” he said, lighting a cigarette. “I’m only now discovering just how vicious you can be. You’re a right little vixen, aren’t you? How pathetic. An attention-seeking, misguided child, that’s what you are.”

I heaved myself into a sitting position. My head convulsed with pain.

“What do you think she thinks of you? Do you think she even notices you leering at her?”

“I haven’t a clue what you mean. Please leave me alone. I don’t feel well.”

“She loathes you. She finds you faintly amusing — a ridiculous freak in a travelling circus. She wants a man. A real man, not some confused schoolboy like you. She told me herself.”

“You’re a liar,” I said, louder than I expected. My throat felt hot and inflamed. “You make things up as you go along, just like the rest of your type.”

“My type?” he said, moving down to sit next to me. “My type is your type, I’m afraid to say. And that type is not her type. You poor, stupid fool. Can’t you see that these people loathe us? They’ll always keep to their own colour, even if it means lowering themselves for some peasant like Johnny. Do you think they want to get involved with an Englishman like you, only to produce half-caste babies who’ll be shunned by their friends? You haven’t a chance. Kunichika’s the one she wants. Even you must see that.”

I didn’t answer. I could feel the heat of his cigarette.

“And not just her. Her parents do too. That’s why they sent her on this bloody holiday.”

“No, she’s here because she never had a honeymoon with Johnny,” I said.