The Silent Death

By Hypatia Artemisia

A deaf Japanese chauffeur encounters a Chinese girl with the same affliction moments before the Nanjing Massacre.

The clouds formed a woolen blanket over Nanjing, a blanket stained by soot and smoke and jet streams, a blanket through which the white sun shot a gaping, burning bullet hole. 

In a sleek black Sedan parked three miles outside the city, a man slept soundly with his arms draped over the steering wheel. Had you sat beside him at the shotgun of that old Sedan, you wouldn’t have have payed much mind to his faded blue shirt or his oversized trousers, his gangly build or his slight overbite. 

Had you been a Cantonese cabbage farmer, he might have been your son. Had you been a seamstress’s daughter from Shanghai, he might have been your lover. 

Had you sat by him under the shade of that dead cedar, you wouldn’t have seen the blood red star on the olive green cap that had fallen onto his lap.

Isamu Takahashi was an unremarkable man who happened to be utterly deaf. 

His first name, Isamu, meant courage. Takahashi hated this name, courage was not something he particularly cared for and the hiss of the “s” and the drawn out “u” only seemed to spell out his father’s contempt.

What an honor your affliction has deprived you of, his father had sighed, the honor of dying for the motherland.

Takahashi himself was glad he had lost this honor. He couldn’t imagine dying for anything. Takahashi would rather pass away quietly, watching the last petals fall from his favorite cherry blossom tree, than meet his end in the russet-gold blaze of battle. 

The silent death was what he had in mind when he took up a job as a chauffeur—an easy job, a comfortable job, a job a deaf man could do. Takahashi wasn’t a bad driver, but it baffled him when his disability became something of a selling point. By the time he was promoted to drive for Admiral Okada of the Imperial Army, Takahashi reasoned that his success was all due to the simple fact that the only thing worse than a talkative chauffeur was an eavesdropping one. He was neither.

Takahashi was rudely awakened from a lovely dream about discovering the edibility of cherry blossoms by a loud banging on the side of the car. He donned his thick glasses, squinted out the window, and found himself face to face with the butt of a rifle.

It was those idiots, Kenji and Hiro. Or was it Enji and Jiro?

The tall one tugged at the door handle. Takahashi shook his head vigorously. He was to wait here for the Admiral until half past one.

In a quick motion, the one with a large wart flipped the rifle around and pressed the barrel to Takahashi’s temple, “Open the door you son of a bitch!”

Takahashi opened the door.

Takahashi’s stomach churned with anxiety as the buildings came into view. He revved up the engine, hoping to finish this little joyride as soon as possible so he could go back to pick up Okada, so he could keep his nice job.

Takahashi decided he didn’t like Nanjing. The rows of shops, hotels and homes that lined the road were mainly empty, with dark windows like eye sockets that continued to stare even after the eyes had been gouged out. In the backseat, Tall and Wart were having their own conversation about the cityscape.

“That man’s back is so bent he’s nearly folded in half,” said Tall, preparing to fire, “It’d be a mercy.”

“And the sow-” Wart squealed, “No, it’s a woman.”

Takahashi didn’t hear the shots, he didn’t hear the sharp screams or the dull thuds of bodies hitting the ground. Takahashi kept his eyes on the road, he clenched his jaw and pretended to see nothing. 

---

Ai shuffled her mother’s jade pendant from cheek to cheek like an indecisive chipmunk, running the red string along her tongue. The watery porridge for breakfast barely satisfied the beast of hunger that now gnawed at her insides, demanding more. She contemplated swallowing the pendant, letting the smooth stone slide down her the moist canals of her oesophagus, letting it plop gently into the shallow well of her stomach. No, Ai was almost seven, she would not think of such foolish things anymore.

A plate of steamed buns sat tantalizingly on the counter. Had mother forgotten to take them to the market?

Ai watched the clock and played with her dolls and tongued the pendant some more and looked at the clock again, but she couldn’t push the plate of steamed buns out of her mind. Ai snuck towards the counter. She kept her eyes on the clock, as if she had no idea her right hand was creeping towards the largest bun.

Ai was just about to trade cold, hard pendant for the warm, soft bun when her mother stormed into the room. Ai dropped the bun in her pocket and looked down at her dolls to conceal the bulge in her cheeks. She noticed that Mei Mei was missing one eye, and had half her face chewed off by a rat. Ai frowned. 

Out of the corner of her eye, Ai saw mother wrapping the rest of the steamed buns in a cloth. She held her breath, hoping mother wouldn’t notice the missing one. Mother was so beautiful, thought Ai, even with her hollow cheeks and wrinkles, even with her stony face and strict rules. Ai hoped she would look like mother when she grew up.

Mother tugged Ai towards the bedroom and put a large bag on the floor. She rolled up Ai’s flower-patterned blanket and tucked it into the bag, then gestured at the closet. Were they going on a trip?

Ai changed into her favorite shirt, one mother had sewn herself, and folded her remaining two shirts and spare trousers carefully. She looked at mother, seeking an ounce of approval from that stony face of hers. Mother smiled thinly and rubbed her pendant, a nervous habit. 

Except the pendant wasn’t there. 

Mother’s face turned dark. She grabbed Ai’s cheeks and mouthed sternly, Sp-it i-t ou-t. Ai felt the tears begin to prick at her eyes. How foolish she had been. Now mother would be angry and not proud. She let the pendant slip out onto mother’s bony palm; it was iridescent with the late morning light sprinkled upon a film of saliva. 

When Ai looked back up at mother’s face, she found fear and not anger. Mother looked out the doorway. Had someone knocked?

Mother motioned for Ai go into the closet. She pushed on the bottom left of the closet, revealing a trapdoor. Mother held onto the sides of Ai’s head, a gesture that meant she had to pay close attention now. Mother began to count. One. Two. Three.

Ai counted with her. Four. Five. Six.

One th-ou-san-d, mouthed mother, fin-d Un-cle Wu if I d-on’t l-et you out. She closed the door, sealing Ai in a lightless, soundless world.

Ai didn’t like the bitter taste of the numbers. She contemplated eating the steamed bun, but decided to save it for later. Mother was already angry at her for one thing, if she found out about the stealing, she would never forgive Ai and she would never let her out of the damp, suffocating closet.

Ninety-five. Ninety-six. 

Ai focused on the numbers. Ai didn’t hear the banging on the door, or wood splintering, or the plates being smashed into a million pieces. She didn’t hear her mother’s frail body being thrown onto the empty counter. Didn’t hear the screams.

---

Takahashi watched the cigarette smoke twist itself into various whimsical forms. An elephant. A Kabuki dancer. He imagined himself as a smoke particle, floating around freely in the wintry air. As a smoke particle, he wouldn’t have to glance at his pocket watch every two or three breaths, worrying about when those two were coming back so he could hop back onto that dammed car and pick up that dammed Okada and continue his lifelong pursuit of the silent death.

Takahashi sighed, checked his watch, and took another puff. A cherry blossom tree.

Ai’s eyes were as swollen as two overripe sour plums when she turned around the block, so she didn’t see the man smoking by the wall at first. Ai had counted to one thousand, but mother had not let her out. After a good five minutes of crying, she crawled out of the trapdoor and went to find Uncle Wu. Uncle Wu was a kind man who would give Ai watermelon rinds and apple skin when she wandered around his fruit store. 

When Ai knocked on his door, no one answered. Ai knocked louder and began to cry again. No one wanted her. Not mother, not Uncle Wu. 

After another five minutes, Ai decided she would find someone else to take care of her instead of crying like a baby. She was almost seven after all.

There was a girl at the edge of the building, a real girl, not a smoke one. Takahashi squinted through his lenses. She was wearing a red shirt, slightly discolored around the navel by what appeared to be a water spill. Her coal black hair was pulled back in two uneven pigtails that curled towards her ears. As the girl stumbled towards him, Takahashi flinched, then chastised himself. You can’t be that much of a coward, he thought, it’s just a girl. 

Ai sat down next to the smoking man. She coughed, causing the man to snuff out his cigarette. Ai peered up at the man, who looked away. He was younger than mother but older than the mail boy, with sparse hair but clear, youthful eyes behind his thick glasses. His large nose sat awkwardly on the gaunt frame of his face like a greedy creature that sucked all the fat away from his cheeks, his lips, and his chin. The man looked hungry. 

Ai reached into her pocket and pulled out the steamed bun, which was smushed and a bit dirty. She dug her thumbs into the centre, ripping it open. Ai studied the two halves carefully and held up the larger one to the man. The man refused at first, but Ai knew his antics. He was like mother, spooning her portion into Ai’s bowl, lying that she was full when hunger burned so incandescently in her eyes. 

Ai stuffed the half into the man’s hand and turned around so he couldn’t give it back.

Takahashi stared at the pale gibbous in his hand. It had gone cold, but the softness of it provided an illusory warmth. He hadn’t eaten his customary lunch of plain rice and miso soup yet, and he supposed a small bite wouldn’t hurt.

It was delicious. The bun, which felt even softer on the tongue than in the hand, seemed to melt like snow and the filling was perfectly salty, the way Takahashi imagined his tears would taste when they suddenly beaded at the corners of his eyes. He found himself snarfing it up in a couple of bites.

The duo sat in silence for awhile, relishing the aftertaste.

Takahashi was about to light another cigarette when the girl turned towards him and pointed to herself, then held up a small square of her shirt for him to see. There was a character sewn there in white thread—the Kanji character for love. For ai.

Ai smiled, and Takahashi felt something tugging at the corners of his own mouth.

---

Takahashi adjusted the rearview mirror as the reflections of Tall and Wart grew larger. He went over the plan again. He would drop off the soldiers, take Ai to the refugee zone, and hurry back in time to pick up Okada.

This time, Takahashi opened the door before Wart could damage the car any more. Takahashi started the car as soon as the soldiers had sat down, he drove faster than the usual pace and prayed that Ai would stay silent. 

Halfway to the base, Wart cleared his throat, “Genji, look in the trunk.”

“Look yourself, Chiro.” Grunted Tall.

“Quit tapping your foot, don’t you hear the rustling?”

Ai was back in the closet, a moving closet this time. She began to count again. One. Two. Three.

When at two hundred and seventeen a hand touched her head, Ai thought that the skinny man had finally come to let her out. But the hand entangled itself into her hair and pulled hard, so hard it pulled a yelp out of Ai’s sore throat. 

Ai squeezed her eyes shut, and opened them to two strangers looking down at her. They were wearing the green caps with the red stars. The Japanese Devils, mother had called them. Ai couldn’t stop her hands from trembling as she tried to swat the hand from her hair. 

“Must’ve snuck onto the car.”

“Hey, did you hear what Inada did with that Chinese soldier?” Wart snickered.

“What?”

Wart took out a cigarette lighter. “Tell Takahashi to stop the car, we can use gasoline.” 

Tall grinned. 

Drop off. Refugee zone. Pick up. Takahashi was running the phrases the nth time through his mind when a hand touched his shoulder. What was it this time? He peered into the rearview mirror and saw Wart holding a crying Ai by the hair.

Takahashi’s face went numb. Slowly, he began to lose his senses until he could no longer see Ai’s tear-stained cheeks, no longer feel the hand on his shoulder.

Until he could only hear.

It was his father’s voice, yelling at him. Takahashi couldn’t see his father’s face, couldn’t feel the pain, but he could hear the sound of his father’s hand striking his cheeks, his temples. His ears. He could hear the gurgling of the garden stream and the melancholy song of a bush warbler fading into silence. 

“Stop the car!” As his senses came back, Takahashi felt the cold kiss of a gun barrel against the back of his head.

Takahashi revved up the engine. 

Was there anything worth dying for? Isamu Takahashi didn’t know. He wasn’t thinking as he shot straight for the crumbling barbershop ahead, swift as the wind through a cherry blossom tree.

---

Nanjing wept, but her tears could not wash the blood off the streets. Her thunder could not drown out the cacophony of gunshots and screams. Nanjing wept, and her tears streamed down the abandoned buildings, down the dead trees, down the faces of a young man and a younger girl lying in her rubble.