Empire of the Sun - J. G. Ballard [45]
‘Thanks, Basie!’
From then on Jim regularly helped Mrs Blackburn. Every morning he was up at dawn to rake the ash from the stove, chop firewood and lay the briquettes. Long before the water in the congs began to boil Jim had already earmarked sweet potatoes for Basie and himself, selecting those with the least blight and fungus. He saw to it that Mrs Blackburn served them the thicker rice, into which, at Basie’s suggestion, he had been careful to stir the minimum of water. After their meal, when the other prisoners rinsed their tins at the latrine tap, Basie always sent Jim to fill their mess-tins with the tepid water in the potato cong. Basie insisted that he and Jim drank only this grey, pithy liquid.
Although, like everyone else, Basie was never keen for Jim to come too close to him, he clearly approved of Jim’s efforts. At the end of his second week at the detention centre Basie allowed him to move his sleeping mat beside his own. Lying at Basie’s feet, Jim could intercept Mrs Blackburn on her way to the kiosk.
‘Always look light on your toes, Jim.’ Basie lay back as Jim fanned him. ‘Whatever happens, keep moving around the court. Your dad would agree with me.’
‘Actually, he would agree with you. After the war you can play tennis together. He’s really good.’
‘Well…What I meant, Jim, is that I’m trying to keep up your education. Your dad would appreciate that.’
‘I think he’ll give you a reward, Basie.’ Jim assumed that the notion of a reward would spur Basie in his search for his father. ‘Once he gave five dollars to a taxi-driver who brought me home from Hongkew.’
‘Did he, Jim?’ At times Basie seemed unsure whether Jim was having him on. ‘Tell me, did you see any planes today?’
‘A Nakajima Shoki and a Zero-Sen.’
‘And American planes?’
‘I haven’t seen those again. Not since you came, Basie. I saw them for three days and then they went away.’
‘I thought they had. They must have been a special kind of reconnaissance flight.’
‘To see how we all are? Where did they come from, Basie? Wake Island?’
‘A long way, Jim. It must have been just about the end of their range.’ Basie took the fan from Jim’s hand. An elderly Australian had arrived to talk to Basie about the war. ‘Go and help Mrs Blackburn. And remember to bow to Sergeant Uchida.’
‘I always bow, Basie.’
Jim hovered around the conversation, hoping to catch the latest news, but the two men waved him away. Basie was surprisingly well informed about the progress of the war, the fall of Hong Kong, Manila and the Dutch East Indies, the surrender of Singapore and the unbroken advance of Japan across the Pacific. The only good news in all this were the flights of American planes that Jim had seen over Shanghai, but for some reason Basie never mentioned them. He liked to talk out of the side of his mouth, telling the old Britishers about the other inmates at Shanghai Central Prison, who had died and who had been handed over to the Swiss Red Cross. Basie even sold information for small scraps of food. Mr Partridge gave him his potato for news of his brother-in-law in Nanking. Inspired by this, Jim tried to tell Mrs Blackburn about the American aircraft, but she merely sent him back to the briquettes.
Now that he felt stronger, Jim realized how important it was to be obsessed by food. Shared equally among the prisoners, their daily rations were not enough to keep them alive. Many of the prisoners had died, and anyone who sacrificed himself for the others soon died too. The only way to leave the detention centre was to stay alive. As long as he ran errands for Basie, worked hard for Mrs Blackburn and bowed to Sergeant Uchida all would be well.
Nonetheless, some of Basie’s ruses unsettled Jim. On the morning Mrs Partridge died Basie learned some encouraging news about the brother-in-law in Nanking, and soon after was able to sell the old woman’s hair-brushes to Mrs Blackburn. Whenever anyone died