The Last Rose of Shanghai(27)

Writers, they were like babies. They needed long hours of creative slumber and whined and threw tantrums constantly, but they also needed to be held once in a while.

I dug out a handkerchief from my purse and handed it to her.

She raised her head. Her dark eyes were large and watery, her complexion ghastly pale, like Sinmay’s. They were both addicts. “What are you doing here, little girl?” She took the handkerchief, folded it over her nose, and blew into it like a trumpet.

That was how different we were: American women blew their noses like opera, while Shanghai girls like me were taught to play it down to an unnoticeable diminuendo. And being called little girl in that unflattering tone was rather humiliating. But I needed her help. “Is something wrong?” I asked.

“What do you care?”

The same old arrogant, whiny Emily, but I knew she could also be perceptive, from all her articles I’d read. I had to put up with her. “Well, if you have time, I’d like to tell you something newsworthy. I hired a pianist. A European pianist. He’s the newest sensation in Shanghai. You might want to interview him.”

She sniffled. “You come here to tell me that? After you got attacked by the foreigners?”

So she had heard. “They were drunk. They wouldn’t be that violent if they were sober.”

“Clearly you’re going to get yourself killed someday.”

I said, a bit nervously, “There’s no law prohibiting Chinese hiring foreigners. I’m a business owner; I know. He’s brilliant, and customers love him. Besides, I can see you and my brother are mixed very well.”

“You have no idea what I’m going through. Your brother ruined everything for me. Now Sassoon doesn’t take me to his parties; my friends refuse to answer my phone calls. I’m no longer invited to their salons. I’m ostracized because of your brother.”

“But Sinmay said you are still friends with Sassoon.”

“Do you see him anywhere? He says he’s too busy and won’t come down from his penthouse. That jealous goat. He gets his hands on everything, and I find closed doors everywhere I turn.”

“Come on, it can’t be that bad.”

She sniffled and sat up. On her wrist was an emerald jade bangle, a gift from Sinmay, which used to belong to my mother. “I have to go. I have an assignment.”

“What do you think about the article? And my pianist? It’s newsworthy, you know it. He’s changing the way Chinese listen to music.”

She wavered through the revolving door and disappeared.

I thought to follow her and talk her into it, but a woman like Emily made her own decisions. I picked up her notebook from the chesterfield. The pages were as clean as snow.



It was raining, an early August shower, damp and chilly, and the drenched roof tiles, neat like nails, lay smooth and shining. Inside my club, it was still hot summer—the heat hugged dancers’ naked faces and bare shoulders, and white light brushed at red lips and half-closed eyes. When the sound of the piano streamed out and the trumpets blared, a flood of beats whizzed through the dark hall, seizing the suited bodies, bare legs, and flying hems with a hot, possessive spell.

I was under a spell too. It was hard to focus on the ledger, calculate weekly business tax and hourly wages. Sometimes I did my best concentrating on my work, sometimes I paused to listen, and sometimes I went to the dance floor, watching Ernest. He had been playing the piano for about seven months now, and thanks to him, my club had been turned around, rising in value as it rose in popularity. I had started to talk to some of my well-connected relatives and see if they would be interested in being shareholders. I would like to cash out and invest in gold—the tax officer working for the Japanese was always a pest.

I wanted to invite Ernest to the glass dome on top of the building for a celebratory dinner. Perhaps I would ask him to dance the foxtrot with me, or perhaps a kiss, just a kiss. Nothing more.

Then I noticed. He had his bandages on, the bandages he had taken off months ago. Had he reinjured himself? The band ended the last note to take a break, and the customers went to their seats. Ernest stood up and popped something into his mouth.

I went to him. “What’s that? What’s wrong with your hand?”

“That’s nothing.” He smiled, but his hand was trembling.

“Let me see your hand.”

He hesitated, then unwound the bandage. The lights were dimmed during the break, but I could see his hand was swollen, and a trickle of blood was seeping through stitches I had assumed were long removed. It seemed with all these months of playing, his stab wound had never healed properly. Yet he had kept going.

“You’ll take tomorrow off,” I said and raised my hand to stop him from protesting. “No argument.”

“As you wish, Aiyi.”

But I wasn’t done with him. I pulled him near the curtain where we would stay out of the customers’ sight. “You should have told me. You’re a pianist. You need this hand. Now you have a stab wound and this—how did you get the star-shaped scar?”

“That’s a long story.”

“Well, you have plenty of time.” I was determined. I needed to know everything about him.

“It was a long time ago.” He looked at his hand. “I was leaving a cabaret with my sister Leah. Some Hitler Youths came out of nowhere. Five of them. They attacked me and had me under their boots and carved this on my hand. They reminded me who I was and warned me to never play the piano again.”