Geling Yan - The Flowers of War

‘Have you been to Shanghai recently?’

‘Several times.’

‘Who with? With a soldier? This July?’

‘The end of July. Just when it was at its hottest.’

‘You must have gone to the Air Fleet Club. I often go there myself.’

‘How would I remember?’ said Yumo, although her smile seemed to indicate that she remembered perfectly well; she just did not want to admit it because she guarded the discretion of all her clients.

A yell from Hongling interrupted their conversation.

‘But I can’t dance! we’re all country bumpkins! Yumo’s the only one who’s been to all the clubs in Shanghai. She dances really well.’

Sergeant Major Li had been asking Hongling to dance for him, and this was her response.

All the women agreed with Hongling.

‘Yumo can charm statues of the Bodhisattva into life when she dances!’ one chimed in.

‘Miss Zhao, your soldier brothers risk their lives constantly … if we ask you to dance for us, should you not do us the honour?’ said Major Dai.

‘Right!’ agreed Hongling. ‘Live for the day! The Japanese might be here tonight, then there’ll be no tomorrow for us!’

Sergeant Major Li seemed to feel his rank was too humble for him to address Yumo directly and muttered something to Hongling. Then he grinned broadly as Hongling cajoled her leader on his behalf.

‘Who’s not heard of the fairy-tale palace in Nanking where Zhao Yumo hides out? It’s always full of fine men feasting their eyes on her!’

‘Well, I suppose, when we get old and long in the tooth, we won’t be able to wriggle our hips any more!’ said Yumo, getting to her feet.

Yumo’s neat, rounded buttocks undulated in a rumba. She fixed her gaze on Major Dai, and a response appeared in his eyes. But he could not keep it up for long and, with a young man’s shyness, he dropped his eyes and conceded defeat. But Yumo, the seductress, kept enticing him back to her. She wore a purple velvet cheongsam, against which her face, untouched by the sun, gleamed palely. She had certainly earned her place at the top of her profession: she carried herself easily, like a cultured, elegant, society lady. It was only these flashing looks that gave men a taste of the coquette under the surface.

There was a strict hierarchy in the Nanking brothels, and each grade was awarded a different salary. The Qin Huai women wore insignia on their clothes when they were at work, indicating their status. That way the clients could weigh out the family silver in advance, and work out who they could afford to enjoy that day. The people of Nanking had never been overly concerned about the morality of prostitution; in fact, generations of literati had sung the praises of prostitutes—from the Eight Beauties of Qin Huai to Sai Jinhua who rose to become wife of a diplomat—and had given them positive roles in their writings.

Yumo, who at work wore a five-star insignia, was standing in front of Sergeant Major Li now. He was a simple sort of a fellow and found it agonising to have this woman right in front of him without being able to get his hands on her. All he could do was smile foolishly. Even Wang Pusheng, just a slip of a boy, was enthralled by Yumo’s dancing. Only Cardamom was still absorbed in her poker game.

‘Your go!’ Cardamom turned to look at the boy. His small face swathed in multicoloured bandages, he was staring goggle-eyed at Yumo’s torso and belly, and she gave him a slap.

The evening the gravedigger brought Sergeant Major Li and Wang Pusheng to the church, Cardamom had given up her bed to Wang Pusheng. She first cleaned and dressed the wound in his abdomen and found the gaping hole, an inch and a half wide, in the paper-thin skin. It pouted like a pair of lips drooling red saliva and something grey and soft poked out of it. Sergeant Major Li told the women that when he poked back the intestines, he had tried to get it all back in, but a bit got left on the outside. However, there was nothing to be done until Fabio Adornato or Father Engelmann could get a doctor from the Safety Zone to come. Cardamom promptly became Wang Pusheng’s nurse, doing everything for him, from giving him food and water to washing him.

Cardamom’s slap brought Wang Pusheng to his senses, and he smiled at her. Cardamom was smitten. They were about the same age and both separated from their families. She knew nothing about hers, not even her own surname. She had been kidnapped by an itinerant busker from north of the Huai River and sold into the brothel.

Cardamom was then an exquisitely pretty but lazy, peevish and unambitious seven-year-old who could not even be bothered with learning to do her hair properly. She complained she had been cheated if she lost at cards, and insisted on the winnings if she won. A year passed, and her clients were mainly foot-runners, cooks and common soldiers. After five years of beatings, she managed to learn how to play the pipa but she still dressed in the other girls’ hand-me-downs, all patched and ill-fitting. The brothel madam used to say to her: ‘Cardamom, all you can do is eat!’ Cardamom took the comment in good part, and agreed: ‘Yes, that’s right!’ The only thing she had going for her was that if a man took a liking to her, she would put heart and soul into attending on him.

With someone she was keen on, she would exclaim: ‘You’re a fellow countryman!’ so the world was full of Cardamom’s fellow countrymen. If she wanted to cadge a gift from a client or the other women, she would say: ‘Ai-ya! I’d completely forgotten, today’s my birthday!’

Now she asked Wang Pusheng: ‘Why d’you keep watching her?’

‘I don’t,’ said the boy.

‘When you’re better, I’ll take you to a really big dance hall,’ said Cardamom.

‘But I might die tomorrow,’ objected Wang Pusheng.

Cardamom clapped her hand over his mouth, spat, and scuffed the spit into the floor with her foot. ‘Less of that nonsense! If you die then I’m going with you!’

She was overheard by Hongling, who shouted over: ‘Amazing! Listen to those two lovebirds!’

Wang Pusheng flushed scarlet and his mouth opened so wide the corners disappeared into the enveloping bandages.

‘Leave him alone,’ said Cardamom. ‘He’s only a boy!’

The women laughed. They thought it very funny when Cardamom played ‘big sister’.

‘And how do you know he’s a boy, Cardamom?’ teased Sergeant Major Li.

Only Yumo, still carried away with her dancing, paid no attention; she was so wildly flushed that her cheeks looked as though they were painted. Although, to the others, it seemed that she thought only of the movements of her body, her mind was far away. She was remembering a man she met in a dance hall. A man who had filled her with hopes, which he then shattered.

His name was Zhang Shitiao. His family had been merchants for many generations, but when he was born, his grandfather decided to make this eldest grandson a scholar. The boy first studied abroad and then returned to become section head at the Ministry of Education in Nanking. This was just the sort of step up in the world the family wanted him to make and was the reason why they had invested so much money in his education. He made a good marriage and lived an upright life. And so it would have continued if he had not spent an evening visiting the Sina Dance Hall with his former classmates. It was his chance meeting with Zhao Yumo that night which led him into the dissolute life he began to lead. If it had been a woman like Hongling or Cardamom, he would not even have exchanged a word with her. But then, women like Hongling and Cardamom could not go to that kind of a dance hall. The Sina Dance Hall on Central Road was a small and exclusive establishment. The very best lady singers and dancers were performing in the show, Kabbalah , that night and tickets were one silver dollar each. Sometimes the most popular dancers would only agree to dance if they were paid three or four dollars. It was the kind of place frequented by young men and women from rich families, but only behind their parents’ backs.