House of Trembling Leaves, The (37 page)

‘‘Maybe they need a new chef, aahh!''

‘‘That'll be the day.'' Lu See smirked and turned towards Dungeonboy. ‘‘Have you done the washroom yet?''

‘‘
Tung yet jun!
Soon-soon, lah. Finish dog hair sweeping first, lah.''

‘‘
Hum gaa chaan!
'' Fishlips slammed the phone down.

Uncle Big Jowl eyed the invitation. ‘‘Friday 13th. Bad joss, bad joss, aahh.'' He cocked his head. ‘‘Never sit at table when thirteen people are seated. Never so long as there is still teeth in my mouth.'' He knocked three times on his wooden chair. ‘‘Are you going to go?''

‘‘To the Italian Embassy?'' She shook her head. ‘‘Not my cup of congee.''

Mother's ears perked up. ‘‘I'm not surprised, just look at your appearance – moth-hole in dress, no eye shadow. You think she was
hut-yee
. Sometimes I think you steal clothes from the dustman.''

‘‘You know, Mother, I've been thinking. When you're old and senile I'm going to send you out to work at the chicken farm in Pagoh and force you to pluck feathers for ten hours with all the other old, mad, stinky people.''

‘‘
Cha!
No respect. You see how my own daughter speaks to me?'' she said to her imaginary audience.

‘‘And at the end of every day I'm going to bring my dresses with holes in them for you to mend.''

Mother started to grin. ‘‘Terrible things she says, meh?''

‘‘And if you refuse to comply I'll jab you with a stick. Mother, stop laughing!''

Mother covered her mouth but continued to giggle. Lu See turned to Dungeonboy, who had taken up his mop. ‘‘Scrub the footprints off the toilet seat while you're at it.''

When he'd gone Lu See at last found a moment to herself. She remained at the cashier's desk and played with a pen cap, deep in thought. Eventually, she began to write.

When will I get to see you again, Mabel? I find it horrible imagining you in the jungle surrounded by leeches and spiders. Are you in constant danger? Is there anything to eat? Are you hurt? You wanted to be a nurse at school. What happened? Why did you go and do this? Was it to punish me? To reject me for not telling you sooner about Sum Sum?

When, just after the war, Hesha came with that letter saying she was safe and well I wanted to tell you there and then but you were so young. I suppose I was selfish – I was frightened of disappointing you, losing you. I depend on you for love.

I worry so much I cannot sleep at night. I wait and watch from the window. What did you think of me, of your family, when you went off to fight for the Communists? The house is so quiet without you. The dogs miss you. I imagine you think you know what you are doing, know what you are fighting for, that you are proud that you have a cause, but remember those you have left behind. I am your mother, not your birth mother it's true, but your mother all the same. Like it or not, I am. I raised you. I kept you safe for so many years

Lu See stopped writing in mid-sentence. She realized her lips were moving, muttering Mabel's name under her breath; she crumpled the paper in her hands and threw it angrily to one side.

I kept you safe for so many years.
Lu See closed her eyes and clung tightly to the words.

She took a breath and recalled the day Mabel's eyes found hers and blazed with such shock and distress Lu See had been reluctant to meet them.

Mabel had just returned from nursing school and she was frantic. ‘‘The administration department is questioning if I am Chinese?''

‘‘What? Why?''

‘‘They have initiated race-based quotas. Malays get first choice of courses available, followed next by the Chinese and finally the Indians. They say from the colour of my skin I might be an Indian. They want clarification.''

‘‘Your complexion isn't dark.''

‘‘No, but it isn't as fair as most Chinese. And I'm too pale to be Indian.''

‘‘It's simply that milky-chocolate shade because you used to spend hours in the sun when you were a child.''

‘‘Please don't lie. I know when you're lying. I'm nineteen years old. I've had to live without a father all my life. Tell me, was my father really Adrian Woo? Or was he an Indian?''

‘‘Mabel, really, you mustn't – ''

‘‘It was something I never wanted to ask. I never even suspected anything until a few years ago, when I realised that I didn't look like the other Chinese girls at school. But I never dared ask. Well, I want to know the truth now.''

Lu See absorbed her daughter's words and shut her eyes briefly.

‘‘Is there something you want to tell me?''

‘‘Mabel,'' said Lu See. ‘‘Please take a seat.''

She sat down at the kitchen table. Lu See sat next to her and took her hand. ‘‘A long time ago I promised myself you would learn the truth about your life, that I would confess everything … I promised I'd tell you one day.''

‘‘The truth about my life?'' repeated Mabel. ‘‘What are you talking about?''

Lu See stroked her daughter's hair. ‘‘Please, just listen.'' Searching for a tissue in her pocket, she began in a wavering voice. ‘‘There is a woman in Tibet, a woman called Sum Sum, who is a great friend of mine, almost a sister, perhaps even more than a sister … A long time ago she accompanied me to Cambridge, to England, to the place where you were born.'' She paused, frustrated that her words weren't coming out right. ‘‘What I'm about to tell you has no bearing on how I feel about you. I love you, Mabel. None of this was ever meant to hurt you. Sometimes we keep secrets to protect the ones we love. You are my daughter.'' Her eyes began to fill up. The fingers on both her hands knitted together in prayer. ‘‘You will always be my little girl.''

Mabel rose and took a small backward step, putting both hands to her mouth. ‘‘What are you talking about?''

‘‘The thing is, Mabel, my darling, Sum Sum left you to me when you were only a few weeks old. Not long after Adrian died.'' Her voice trembled. ‘‘Not long after my husband died, I miscarried. I was in a terrible state, broken apart. I'd lost my husband and my baby. I was broken apart. Only Sum Sum understood how to heal me. She realized you would heal me.''

When she lost her child in the weeks following Adrian's death, Lu See's anguish had known no limits. In her darkest moments she feared her psyche had fractured. She often wondered what would have happened if she hadn't been forced to look after Mabel. If she'd been left with only grief to fill her soul. Would she have done something drastic? Would she have lost her mind? Might she have taken her own life? The answer more often than not was yes. And Sum Sum had known it.

 

Lu See had hidden the secret for so long, shielded it, the way a beautiful girl would protect an ugly scar on her arm with long sleeves. Now, seated in front of Mabel, shoulders slumped, she felt as if she was about to be sent to the gallows. She looked into Mabel's eyes and wished there was something she could say to comfort her.

‘‘You're saying that everything's a lie. Everything about me is made up.''

‘‘No, of course not.''

‘‘First I had to grow up without a father and now this! Do you have any idea what it was like not having a papa when I was at school? All the girls used to ask what does your papa do, what does your papa do? You know what I told them? I said he was a ship's captain, sailing the seven seas, that's why he was never at home. And now you tell me this!'' Stricken, she looked at her hands intently, inspecting her skin tone, her short fingers, as if seeing herself for the very first time. ‘‘So my mother, my biological mother, is living in Tibet?''

Lu See blinked a quiet yes.

Mabel's expression grew serrated, like the edges of a bread knife. ‘‘Why?'' The anger filled her up. ‘‘Why did she abandon me? How could she – I was her child.'' She was pacing backwards and forwards in her beaded
Nyonya
slippers. ‘‘And why didn't you tell me before – and don't say you were meaning to, you wanted to, but it was better I didn't know!''

‘‘Do you think I haven't thought about telling you? I've thought about it every day for the last nineteen years.''

Mabel's arm whipped through the air. ‘‘Who else knows about this?''

‘‘Only Uncle Big Jowl and your grandmother.''

Mabel took out a fork and carefully stabbed the back of her hand.

‘‘What are you doing? You'll hurt yourself!''

‘‘I'm making sure I'm not in some horrible dream.'' She dropped the fork.

‘‘I was there the second you were born. I fed you, cradled you, bathed you, put you through school. Made sure you wanted for nothing. Who do you think put coins under your pillow when you lost your first tooth? Who taught you to ride a bicycle, to tie your shoelaces, to count to one hundred? I taught you what's right and wrong. I left Cambridge, never sat my entrance examination, so that I could return with you in my arms. I've taken care of you since–''

‘‘This isn't about you.'' Mabel interrupted. ‘‘It's my life that's been turned upside down.''

‘‘Who protected you from the Japanese soldiers during the war? When there was no food to eat, who pawned her rings and necklaces so you could have an orange or a packet of biscuits to eat?''

Mabel looked away. She gnawed her bottom lip.

‘‘I'm sorry,'' said Lu See, whispering, threadbare. ‘‘I should have told you about Sum Sum, but …''

‘‘But what?''

‘‘I was scared of losing you. When I left Malaya, when I eloped, I left duty and family obligation behind. But then you were born and I had to embrace them all over again.'' She clasped her hands together. ‘‘In so many ways, you were a blessing.''

‘‘Did she know me?'' challenged Mabel. ‘‘Did she … did she breastfeed me, coo over me? Did she put pink ribbons in my hair? Or was I always unwanted?''

‘‘You were never unwanted.''

‘‘Oh, really. I suppose she abandoned me because she loved me so much.''

‘‘No, because she loved
me
so much.''

Lu See rose from her chair and went across to the Florence stove. She filled the kettle with water and put it on the boil and spooned tea leaves into a pot. Reaching under the sink, she pulled out the bottle of Dewar's, unscrewed the cap and took two long swigs.

Mabel's eyes were red and moist. ‘‘I want to see her.''

‘‘You can't … Tibet is shut off from the world.'' Lu See's voice went dead on her as Mabel turned her back and stomped upstairs. Lu See heard the slam of a door, the sound of a bolt being dragged shut, followed by a wail like an angered bird-cry. Alone in the kitchen, Lu See listened to her daughter stamp about her room, hearing the darkness close in on her. ‘‘What have I done?'' she mouthed.

Eventually all went quiet and in the silence she felt something inside her strain and break in two, like a guitar string, strung too tight for nineteen years, finally snap.

‘‘More
teh tarik
!''

Lu See jolted free from her daydream. She found herself sat with pen cap in hand at the cashier's desk. She told Dungeonboy to see to Fishlips Foo and wondered if, at this very moment, Mabel was being shot at, or worse, floundering in a shallow ditch bleeding to death.
God's sake Mabel! Why are you doing this to me?
Why, when I always taught you not to venture outside after dark, not to visit the Tung Wah Association assembly hall on Klyne Street and certainly not to speak to the watermelon sellers who everyone suspected to be communist spies.
Maybe I pushed her away, into the arms of the bandits. If you tell a child never to smoke cigarettes, one day it'll lead to an exploratory puff behind the garden pagoda.
Lu See let out a protracted sigh.
Boiling water will both soften a carrot and harden an egg.

Mabel longed to be independent, to be forward-thinking, but the moment Lu See told her about Sum Sum, she grew rebellious and rash too –
didn't she realize how dangerous it was for her to have joined the Malay Communists
? She'd be tried as a traitor, and where did that put us, her family; will I, thought Lu See, be branded a sympathizer for raising a daughter this way?

A few years ago, before Mabel disappeared, Lu See would bump into Mrs Kuok in church or Mrs Viswanath at the Indian spice store and one of them would say, ‘‘I saw your Mabel with that MCP boy. You must be so ashamed.'' But Mabel had never caused her mother to feel shame; rather the women's words led to a kind of fear to rise in her, together with a swelling of sorrow in her chest.

Lu See rubbed her eyes with her palms and glanced at the crumpled sheet of paper on the floor. She picked it up and set fire to it with a match. Mabel had been gone for over a year and in that time Lu See had never been able to write a letter through to the end. What was the point, she asked herself. There was no place to send it in any case.

The giant snake had come across Mabel's dangling arm probably thinking it was a type of rodent. Having wrapped its coils around it, slowly numbing the flesh, the python began to feast. By the time Bong heard Mabel's screams, the python had realized its mistake and was desperately trying to disgorge its dinner. ‘‘Kill it!'' she shrieked. Without hesitating, Bong hacked into the snake's dense body, running a
parang
across its thick olive skin, severing its spine; already half of Mabel's arm had been expelled by its strong cheek muscles. When they pulled the snake free from her she found that her saliva-soaked fingertips had already started to wither and break down from the python's digestive juices. All along her arm and forearm, its long, backward-curved teeth had dug into the tissue, locking onto flesh as it swallowed. The shock put her to sleep for most of the day.