Elephant Song

Cheng consulted his wristwatch.  It was nine o'clock.  He rose to his feet and bowed.  Thank you for your assistance, he said formally.  I am honoured that my humble efforts have pleased you.  I wish you a sword of steel and many happy hours in the velvet scabbard.  There was no question of payment.  The snake-doctor would make a deduction from Cheng's commission on the supply of African snakes and wild birds.

Cheng walked back quickly to the apartment building in Tunhua Road.

He sat in the black leather driving seat of the Porsche and for a few minutes enjoyed the tight full sensation of his erection before he started the engine and drove out of the garage.

It took him forty minutes to reach the sea pavilion.  The grounds were surrounded by a high wall topped with a ridge of ceramic tiles, except on the open sea side.  Coloured paper lanterns hung from the traditionally-shaped pediment of the gate.  It looked like the entrance to a pleasure garden or fairground.

Cheng knew that the lanterns had been lit especially to welcome him.

The guards had been warned to expect him and they made no effort to detain him.  Cheng drove through and parked above the rocky headland.

He locked the Porsche and stood for a moment inhaling the kelp odour of the sea.  There was a fast motor launch moored at the private jetty.

It would be needed later.  Cheng knew that in less than two hours the speed boat could be over the thousand yard sounding, over the oceanic depths of the East China Sea.  A weighted object, such as a human body, dropped overboard from there would fall into the primeval ooze of the sea-bed, never to be recovered.  He smiled.  His erection had abated only slightly.

He went up to the pavilion It was also of traditional architecture.

It reminded Cheng of the house in the willow-tree pattern on the blue porcelain plates.  A servant met him at the door, led him into an i

it was exactly ten o'clock when she entered the room from behind the bead curtain.

She was slim as a boy in her tight brocaded tunic and silk pantaloons. He had never been able to guess her age for she wore a mask of make-up like a player in a Peking opera.  Her almond eyes were starkly outlined in jet black, while her lids and cheeks were hectically rouged to the carmine colour that the Chinese find so attractive.  Her forehead and the bridge of her nose were ash white and her lips a deep startling scarlet.

Welcome to my house, Green Mountain Man, she lisped, and Cheng bowed.

I am honoured, Myrtle Blossom Lady.  She sat on the sofa beside Cheng and they exchanged formal and polite conversation, until Cheng indicated the cheap imitation leather briefcase he had placed on the table in front of him.

She appeared to notice it for the first time, but did not deign to touch it herself.  She inclined her head and her assistant glided into the room on slippered feet.  She must have been watching them from behind the beaded curtain.  She left again as silently as she had entered, taking the briefcase with her.

It took her a few minutes to count the money in the back room and to put it in a safe place.  Then she returned and knelt beside her mistress.

They exchanged a glance.  The money was all there.

You say that there is a choice of two?  Cheng asked.  Yes, she agreed.

But would you like to make sure the room is to your taste, and that the equipment is in order?  She led Cheng through to the special room at the back of the pavilion.

The central piece of furniture was a gynaecologist's couch, complete with stirrups.  It was fitted with a plastic cover that could be removed and destroyed after use, and there was also a plastic sheet laid over the floor.  The walls and ceiling were tiled and washable.

Like an operating theatre, it could be scrubbed down to its present sterile condition.

Cheng moved to the table on which the instruments were laid out.

There was a selection of silk cords of various lengths and thicknesses arranged in neat coils on the tray.  He picked up one of these and ran it through his fingers.  His erection, which had softened, revived strongly.

Then he turned his attention to the other items on the table, a full set of stainless steel gynaccological instruments.

Very good, he told her.

Come, she said, and took his hand.  You may choose now.

She led him to a small window in the near wall.  They stood hand-in-hand in front of it and looked through the one-way glass into the room beyond.

After a few moments the female assistant led two children into the room.

They were both dressed in white.  In the Chinese tradition, white was the colour of death.  Both the little girls had long dark hair and pretty little nut-brown pug faces.

Cambodian or Vietnamese, Cheng guessed.

Who are they?  he asked.  Boat people, she said.  Their boat was captured by pirates in the South China Sea.  All the adults were killed.

They are orphans, nameless and stateless.  Nobody knows they exist; nobody will miss them.  The female assistant began to undress the two little girls.  She did it skilfully, titillating the hidden audience like a strip-tease artiste.

One girl was at least fourteen.  Once she was naked Cheng saw that she had full breasts and a dark tussock of pubic hair, but the other girl was barely pubescent.  Her breasts were flower buds, and the fine haze of pubic down did not conceal the plump cleft of her pudenda.

The young one!  Cheng whispered hoarsely.  I want the young one. Yes, she said.  I thought that would be your choice.  She will be brought to you in a few minutes.  You may take as long as you wish. There is no hurry.  She left the room, and suddenly the music swelled from hidden speakers, loud Chinese music with gongs and drums that would cover any other sound, such as a little girl's screams.

The colonials of Victorian times had sited Ubotno's Government House with care on high ground above the lake, with a view out across the waters, and they had surrounded it with lawns and exotic trees brought out from Europe to remind them of home.  in the evenings the breeze came down from the Mountains of the Moon in the west, with the memory of glaciers and eternal snows, to take the edge off the heat.

Government House was still as it had been in the colonial era, no more pretentious than a comfortable redbrick ranch house with high ceilings, enclosed on all sides by a wide flyscreened verandah.  Victor Omeru had kept it that way.  He would not spend money on grand public buildings while his people were in want.  The aid that he received from Ameria and Europe had all gone into agriculture, health and education, not personal aggrandisement.

Tonight the verandahs and lawns were crowded as Daniel Armstrong and Bo

She had teased her hair out into a great tawny red mane and she wore a green mini-skirt tight around her buttocks and high on her thighs.

For such a big girl she had shapely legs.  Give me a hand.  Damned skirts!

The Landrover stood high and her skirt rode up as she slid down.  She showed a flash of lace pantie that rocked the Hita corporal on to his heels.

There were floodlights in the jacaranda trees and an army band belted out popular jazz with a distinctive African beat that lifted Daniel's spirits and put a spring in his step.