Эльвира Барякина - White Ghosts

The Church of the Holy Epiphany, the only Russian place of worship in Shanghai, has become a temporary refugee camp, where people live in makeshift tents and huts made out of plywood. The stench, noise, and dirt hangs like a pall over the enclosure around the church. Father Seraphim ladles soup from a large cauldron; a queue to his mobile kitchen stretches across the churchyard and disappears up the street. The refugees use a chemist’s scale to weigh tiny bars of laundry soap, one minuscule piece per person. There are queues for everything: queues to use the bucket to fetch water and queues to dry laundry on the washing line.

A local neatly-dressed business owner, keen to cut back on his labor costs, appears at the gates. “I need ten men at the slaughter-house to help load discarded guts. Anyone interested?”

The crowd rushes to their benefactor. “Me! Me! I am!”

The refugees have to go to Chinese public bathhouses where the second floor is for the rich, the first floor for the poor. The hot water from the second floor pours downstairs through a wide stone-lined gutter, and the poor wash themselves with it, picking up all sort of skin diseases in the process.

Everybody is desperately trying to make ends meet. Women who set themselves up as fortune-tellers were the first to start earning. Their services are in huge demand among their fellow countrymen. Divination and clairvoyance are prohibited on the territory of the International Settlement, but the colonial authorities can’t do anything about the Russians because they are stateless and come under Chinese jurisdiction, and according to Chinese law and custom, fortune-telling is an honorable occupation.

Starting from scratch is the most difficult thing for the exile. No one cares that you used to be a successful journalist, or a general, or a well-known politician. Life hurls you back down to the first rung of the ladder, back with the inexperienced and the young, who, incidentally, are much more adept at picking up the local language and customs. But you are no longer eighteen; at your age, you should have at least a few accomplishments to boast of. If you really have nothing to justify your years in this world, your value depreciates, as does your esteem, not only in other people’s eyes but in your own.

All of us Russians, including myself, hate Shanghai with an impotent rage. Deep down inside, each of us believed that we had some God-given right to a certain status in China, at least as a sign of respect for our race and the fact that our country had once been one of the Great Powers. But in reality, we are now the lowest of the low in China’s social hierarchy. Like all fallen gods, the Russian refugees are not even granted mortal status and certainly no forgiveness. Our place is to dwell out of sight in hell.

In search of a miracle, I visited all the English-speaking editorial offices in the city, but the doormen didn’t even let me in. The Russian accent is a curse. Before I can even get a sentence out, the door is slammed in my face: “No Bolsheviks in here!” How am I meant to convince them that I’m not a Bolshevik? It requires time and effort to find out who is White and who is Red, and it’s really much simpler to sling every single one of these Russian tramps out on their ear, just in case.

I was lucky enough to find a temporary job and spent several days working for a furniture workshop. This involved sawing hard teak wood using an enormous eight-foot, two-man saw until your muscles are screaming for respite. As soon as one man begins to lag, the owner kicks him out and replaces him with a fresh Slav(e). Nobody bothers with sawmills here when the manual labor is so cheap.

However, I’m slowly learning to survive in Shanghai, too. If I’m lucky enough to earn a silver coin, I have learned not to spend it immediately but exchange it for a larger number of copper coins. That way, after scampering around the city for hours, I can usually find a money changer that offers good rates and end up making about ten cents for my pains. For me, this is the difference between dinner and hunger. Ten cents can buy you a princely feast of noodles or sugar-roasted nuts. But you always have to keep your eyes open: those scumbag street hawkers sometimes add sand to the food to make it heavier.

If it’s been a particularly bad day, I can get by on a couple of pickles for seven coppers or go to the French Catholic nuns who give out carrot soup if you can put up with their interminable sermons.

This is how all the unemployed live in Shanghai. The only way to earn more than a dollar a day is through crime. Some burgle apartments, others work as racketeers providing “protection” to the local small traders.

The stuffy dressing room was filled with taxi-girls preparing for the night ahead: getting changed, applying their make-up, and curling their hair. Any outsider might have been forgiven for thinking that they were speaking some sort of secret language, but Ada had already started to grasp their slang.

The best clients—young, rich, daring men—were known as “dragons.” Ugly but well-heeled ones were called “gold mines,” and the ladies on their arms “gold miners.” Boring men, who didn’t know how to dance properly, were known as “toe crunchers,” and men without money were called “false alarms.” “Locksmiths” was the name given to guys who put pieces of metal in their pockets to make them jingle so you’d think they were loaded.

Dark-eyed Betty, the wild and beautiful queen of the Havana, burst impetuously into the dressing room.

“Martha has told the cloakroom assistant to lock up my coat,” she cried indignantly, “so I won’t go running off to town with any of my goldmines.”

Ada watched her in admiration, not daring to say a word in her presence. Betty’s dress was red, with a side slit that reached right up to her thigh. Her lipstick was crimson and utterly shameless.

The manager barged into the dressing room without knocking. The newer girls squealed, covering their naked bodies.

“Hey, you, the Russian girl!” he barked, indifferently. “The Madam wants to see you.”

Ada made her way upstairs to Martha’s little office. The walls in the room were covered with porcelain plates showing pictures of various cities: Paris, Vienna and Florence. Martha was collecting them.

“Sit down,” she said, motioning to a brocade armchair. “The Municipal Council wants me to give details of all the people working here. What’s your full name and address?”

Ada told her.

“Nationality?”

“I’m an American.”

Ada had been to the American Consulate three times, hoping to secure some documents, but an evil-looking Marine wouldn’t even let her past the door. “Do you have a passport?”

“No.”

“Then beat it, lady.”

“But my father is from Texas, and I have Auntie Clare—” Ada protested each time.

“I said, scram!”

Martha wrote “Russian” in the box designated for nationality.

“Are you married? We’d better say yes. Hadn’t we?”

“Klim and I are only renting a room together and—”

“That doesn’t matter,” Martha interrupted. “Now, down you go and get back to work.”

Ada plodded dejectedly downstairs.

She had no one in this city, apart from Klim, and she wanted to put their relationship on an even footing for herself and for everyone else they met. But in reality it was all a big mess. She was sharing a room with a man who was eighteen years her senior and who was neither her husband nor even a relative.

Klim would walk her to the Havana every evening and always be at the entrance to meet her in the early hours after her shift was over. He took care of her, made her laugh, and taught her simple magic tricks, a skill that had provided her some decent tips. But at the same time, he acted towards her as if they were no more than good friends.

One day he mentioned to her, “Ada, there’s an orphanage in Xujiahui, and they have taken in some Russian girls. Do you want to go there? At least, they’ll teach you embroidery. The drinking and the tobacco smoke in the Havana really isn’t good for a girl of your age.”

“Well, it was you who brought me there,” Ada said, frowning. She was upset at the idea that he might be trying to get rid of her.

The other taxi-girls taught her to value herself for her feminine qualities, and she copied the tricks they used to win over their customers. But despite her efforts, Klim had not been tempted by her charms.

Sometimes Ada would change out of her clothes in front of him, waiting to see if he would say or do anything. But he would just sigh and silently go out into the corridor, leaving her seething with anger.

Who did he think he was? Some fine gentleman, who didn’t believe that she was worthy of him?

Ada decided to take a different tack. Once, while he was asleep, she crawled into his bed beside him. Then, intoxicated by her daring and debauchery, she placed her hand lightly on his thigh. Klim woke up instantly, shoving Ada onto the floor.

“Are you crazy?” she yelled, rubbing her bruised elbow.

He sat up on his bed and crossed his arms over his chest. “Ada, stop it! You would come to hate me, if anything were to happen between us.”

“I already hate you!” Ada spat back and started to cry. “You don’t love me.”

“Ada, you have your whole life ahead of you to learn about these things. You’ll find the right person and get married in your own good time.”

“To hell with you! I’ve sent a letter to Auntie Claire. She’ll invite me to America and send me some money. And you’ll be stuck here to rot in the House of Hope forever.”

Klim got a job at a tannery, which consisted of a few sheds standing next to a mountain of garbage and slimy waste. The land all around had been burned by the chemicals they used; the pools, where the pig hides were soaked, gave off an evil smelling gas, and the stench was so bad, that it would make anyone who wasn’t used to it retch.