This Scorching Earth. Donald Richie

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СКАЧАТЬ to the rest of Tokyo it was SPOOF. It was to rival the Tokyo chapter of the SPCA, of which the British ambassadress was patron.

      Dottie continued: "Well, you know, a couple of weeks ago she saw some trained dogs in Asakusa or some such place, and she decided they were being cruelly treated—they juggled or sat up or something. Of course, she cares about animals just about as much as I do. But she just can't stand seeing that English woman in the newspapers all the time. And so she confiscated the whole troupe, dismissed the owner out of hand—the Australians are like that, you know—and decided to play Lady Bountiful to all the animals. She thought they'd be good entertainment at her parties, juggling and all. But they wouldn't do a thing—just moped. They were nasty too; got into some of Randolph's—that's Lord Briton—old ambassadorial papers or something and chewed them all up. Well, last night was the payoff. They'd been just darling little nuisances before, but last night one of them bit Mrs. Colonel Butternut on the thigh when she was down on the floor being the the head of John the Baptist during charades." She smiled. "Isn't that a scream!"

      "What happened to the dogs?"

      "Well, this was one time, believe you me, when our dumb friends got short shrift. She probably had them drowned."

      "All of them?"

      Dottie shrugged her shoulders—this wasn't the point of the story. "And Mrs. Colonel Butternut is in St. Luke's under watch—she might have rabies. Can't you just imagine her frothing at the mouth? She's done it all her life, but until now no one thought anything of it. Oh, it's a panic!" She stood up.

      Together they walked past the girl who took tickets, and the headwaiter at the door bowed to them.

      "Why don't their clothes ever fit, I wonder?" asked Dottie, looking vaguely at the small man in the dress suit too large for him.

      "Their Japanese clothes do," said Gloria.

      "Oh, those!..."

      They were silent as they walked through the revolving door into the already dusty sunlight.

      "Well, that was a nice breakfast," said Dottie, "but tomorrow's won't be."

      "What I like best about spending the night with the Japanese," said Gloria, who had at least spent nights with Americans in Japanese on-limits hotels, "is that no one says good-morning to me until I'm presentable. They have a tacit agreement that you're not even visible until you get your face on and are ready to meet the world." She'd read this in a book somewhere.

      "Yes, I know," said Dottie. "They do act that way, don't they?" She was anxious lest it seem she didn't know as much about the Japanese as Gloria, and was at the added disadvantage of not having read a book through since finishing high school.

      Directly at the billet entrance was an Army sedan, the young Japanese driver leaning against its shining fender. He stood away from the car as they came out and made a tentative motion toward the handle of the rear door, his black hair shining in the sun.

      Gloria wondered whom the sedan was for. You never saw them waiting in front of the billet except very late, when the field-grade officers were saying good-night to their girls. The hotel was for lower-rated civilian girls, who never got to use anything better than a jeep. Only the upper grades rated sedans. She found herself wondering about Dottie, who could get a sedan on the strength of her husband's high civilian rank. So, then, whose transportation could this be but Dottie's? But she'd said she'd come in her own car. Then Gloria remembered that the Ainsleys didn't own a car.

      Gloria glanced at Dottie, who was squinting in the early-morning sun. Such a poor liar. This was certainly her transportation, ready and waiting, yet she couldn't take it because she'd already told Gloria about the car. And she needn't have lied either. Lots of wives used sedans to go to the Commissary.

      While Dottie hesitated on the hotel steps, Gloria swiftly reconstructed the events of the night before. Dorothy had probably left her husband rather late, pleading relatives or something. Then the adulterous meeting, perhaps at his billet. She'd probably sneaked out in the cold, dark morning when it was too early to go home. Perhaps she'd tried to hail a passing jeep. Then the sudden determination to have breakfast. It was probably a combination of hunger and the perverse desire to expose her own position. Now the finale—home in the sedan which she had probably called just before going in to breakfast. But Gloria's presence had spoiled this last touch.

      "Well," said Dottie briskly, "I parked the car around the corner—past the station as a matter of fact. Thought I'd just walk to the Commissary. Exercise, you know," she concluded brightly.

      "Yes, it's only halfway across town."

      "What? Oh, yes. Well, one can't get too much exercise." Then, anxious not to seem to be avoiding the obvious, she said: "These poor drivers!"

      "Why poor?"

      "Oh, I don't know. It's in their eyes—that lovely melted-chocolate color, you know. And then, Japanese men are always sad looking anyway, like dogs left in the rain. Breaks your heart." Dottie was not without her sensitive side.

      "The women look comparatively dry," said Gloria.

      "Oh, them! Isn't it strange—the men look just like dogs, and the women look just like cats. You know—cute little triangle faces, button noses, and those lovely slanting eyes. It's really the animal kingdom."

      "Maybe that's why Lady Briton likes it so much over here."

      "Yes," giggled Dorothy, "someone should start a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Japanese."

      Someone really ought, thought Gloria. It wasn't that the glorious Occupiers were cruel. They were merely thoughtless. There was something about having plenty in the midst of famine that made people thoughtlessly cruel. When she was good and drunk Gloria always felt like apologizing to beggars. So far she had restrained herself. She didn't like Dottie's saying what had so often occurred to her; so she asked if Dottie was going to the opera.

      "Well, if you call it an opera, yes. It's good business, you know."

      "You don't like Madame Butterfly?" asked Gloria.

      "Oh, adore it! Simply adore it! But that soprano! Know the girl. A nice voice, though a shade overly cultivated—that is, when you realize that she had nothing to cultivate in the first place. Can't hear her except in the first three rows. Bad breathing, that's what Mme. Schmidt says. You know her, dear? My old sensei—that means teacher, you know. From Vienna and just the sweetest old lady ever. Poor thing—half-starving now. Whenever I take my lesson I go to the PX and just load up—crackers, cheese, sardines, that sort of thing, you know. I suppose they have a banquet after I go. Awfully odd position she's in—white, natch, and yet can't use the PX or, well, any of the Army things. Can't even ride Army busses, or the Allied cars on the railroad. Doesn't go out much—no shoes! Of course, she was here all during the war, and I suppose that's why. And the CIC is always investigating her—as though she cared about Hitler or Mussolini or anything but music. She'll be at the opera tonight probably—I'll bet she's off borrowing a pair of shoes right now. That soprano is another pupil of hers."

      "I guess I'll be going," said Gloria. "Some major or other from the office asked me."

      Dorothy looked at her intently for just a second, the look of a person who is trying to decide whether or not to tell a woman that her lipstick is smeared, that an eyelash has fallen to her cheek, that her nose needs blowing. Finally she said: "Oh, really? What's his name?"

      "Calloway. Why?"

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