Empire of the Sun - J. G. Ballard [49]
Jim waited until Basie looked up, but the cabin steward seemed hardly to recognize him. His attention had turned to the two boys, and he had moved deftly into the vacuum in their lives. From the page of a Chinese newspaper he folded a series of paper animals, chuckling when the boys gave a weak laugh. Like a depraved conjuror, he slid his hands into the pockets of their school trousers and cardigans, searching for anything of use.
Jim watched him without resentment. He and Basie had collaborated at the detention centre in order to stay alive, but Basie, rightly, had dispensed with Jim as soon as he could leave for the camps.
The truck struck a deep gully in the cobbles, slewed across the road and came to a halt by the grass bank. They had left the northern outskirts of Shanghai and were entering an area of untilled fields and rice-paddies. Beyond a line of burial mounds two hundred yards away a canal ran towards a deserted village. The Japanese driver jumped from his cabin and bent over the front wheels of the truck. He began to talk to the steaming engine, now and then including Jim in his mutterings. He was only twenty years old, but had clearly suffered a lifetime of exasperation. Jim kept his head down, but the driver stepped on to the running board, levelled a finger at him and delivered a long harangue that sounded like a declaration of war.
The driver returned to his cabin, grumbling over his map, and Basie commented: ‘Add that up any way you like and we’re still lost.’ Already his attention had moved from the boys to whatever advantage could be gained from their situation. ‘Jim, do you know where you’re taking us?’
‘Woosung. I’ve been to the country club there, Basic’
Basie played with his paper animals. ‘We’re going to the country club,’ he told the boys. ‘If Jim can find it for us.’
‘As long as we reach the river, Basie. Then it’s either east or west.’
‘That’s a big help. East or west…’
The sandy-haired Briton beside the missionary woman rose from his knees. There was a large, leaking bruise on his forehead and left cheekbone, as if he had recently been struck in the face by a rifle stock. In some pain, he settled himself on the bench. Long freckled legs emerged from his khaki shorts and ended in a pair of thonged sandals. In his late twenties, he carried no luggage or possessions, but he had the self-assured manner of the Royal Navy officers who cut such a dash at the Shanghai garden parties, thrilling the mothers of Jim’s friends. He ignored the Japanese guard, talking across him as if he were a mess-boy who would soon be dismissed to his quarters. Jim assumed that he was one of those tiresome Englishmen who refused to grasp that they had been defeated.
The man touched the bruise on his face and turned to Jim, whose ragged figure he appraised without comment. ‘The Japanese have captured so much ground they’ve run out of maps,’ he remarked amiably. ‘Jim, does that mean they’re lost?’
Jim thought about this. ‘Not really. They just haven’t captured any maps.’
‘Good – never confuse the map with the territory. You’ll get us to Woosung.’
‘Can’t we go back to the detention centre, Dr Ransome?’ one of the missionaries asked. ‘We’re very tired.’
The physician stared at the abandoned paddy fields, and at the prostrate old woman at his feet. ‘It might be for the best. This poor soul can’t take much more.’
The truck moved forward again, trundling at a halfhearted pace down the empty road. Jim returned to his post by the driving cabin, and scanned the fields for anything that might remotely resemble Woosung. The doctor’s words unsettled him. Even if they were lost, how could he want to return to the detention centre?
Jim knew that the fury of Sergeant Uchida made it unlikely that the driver would dare to turn back. But he kept a careful watch on Dr Ransome, trying to guess whether he spoke enough Japanese