No sooner had I read it than a timid rap came at the door. ‘Come in!’ I said, expecting a waiter. Instead, the face of my lady friend from the Côte d’Azur peered in. I was surprised, irritated and resigned. ‘Come in,’ I said, coldly.
We went shopping at Harrods and purchased ski-ing outfits, then on to a jeweller’s in Bond Street to buy a bracelet, with which she was highly pleased. A day or so later we arrived in St Moritz, where seeing Douglas brightened my horizon. Although Doug was in the same dilemma as I was about his career, neither of us spoke about it. He was alone – I believe Mary and he had separated. However, meeting in the mountains of Switzerland dissipated our melancholy. We ski-ed together – at least we learnt to ski together.
The German ex-Crown Prince, son of the Kaiser, was in the hotel, but I never met him, although when I happened to find myself with him in the same elevator I smiled primly, thinking of my comedy Shoulder Arms, in which the Crown Prince was a comedy character.
While in St Moritz I invited my brother Sydney to join us. As there was no vital hurry to get back to Beverly Hills, I decided to return to California via the Orient, and Sydney agreed to accompany me as far as Japan.
We left for Naples, where I said good-bye to my lady friend. But this time she was in a gay mood. There were no tears. I think she was resigned and somewhat relieved, for since our sojourn in Switzerland our alchemy of attraction had become somewhat diluted, and we both knew it. So we parted good friends. As the boat pulled out, she was imitating my tramp walk along the quay. That was the last I saw of her.
twenty-three
MANY excellent travel books have already been written about the Orient, so I will not encroach on the reader’s patience. I have an excuse, however, to write about Japan because of the weird circumstances in which I became involved there. I had read a book about Japan by Lafcadio Hearn, and what he wrote about Japanese culture and their theatre aroused my desire to go there.
We sailed on a Japanese boat, leaving the icy winds of January to enter the sunny climate of the Suez Canal. At Alexandria we took on new passengers, Arabs and Hindus – in fact we took on a new world! At sunset the Arabs would place their mats on deck and face Mecca and chant prayers.
The next morning we were in the Red Sea, so we peeled off our ‘Nordics’ and wore white shorts and light silk shirts. We had taken on tropical fruits and coconuts at Alexandria, so for breakfast we had mangoes and at dinner iced coconut milk. One night we went Japanese and had dinner on the floor of the deck. I learnt from a ship’s officer that pouring a little tea over my rice complemented its flavour. As the boat drew nearer to the next southern port, the thrill increased. The Japanese captain calmly announced we were arriving at Colombo in the morning. Although Ceylon was an exotic experience, our one desire was to get to Bali and Japan.
Our next port was Singapore, where we entered the atmosphere of a Chinese willow-pattern plate – banyan trees growing out of the ocean. My outstanding memory of Singapore is of the Chinese actors who performed at the New World Amusement Park, children who were extraordinarily gifted and well read, for their plays consisted of many Chinese classics by the great Chinese poets. The actors performed on a pagoda in the traditional fashion. The play I saw lasted three nights. The principal actor of the cast, a girl of fifteen, played the prince, and sang in a high, rasping voice. The third night was the final climax. Sometimes it is better not to understand the language, for nothing could have affected me more poignantly than the last act, the ironic tones of the music, the whining strings, the thundering clash of gongs and the piercing, husky voice of the banished young prince crying out in the anguish of a lost soul in lonely spheres as he made his final exit.
It was Sydney who had recommended visiting the island of Bali, saying how untouched it was by civilization and describing its beautiful women with their exposed bosoms. These aroused my interest. Our first glimpse of the island was in the morning – white puff clouds encircled green mountains leaving their peaks looking like floating islands. In those days there was no port or airfield; one landed at an old wooden dock by row-boat.
We passed through compounds with beautifully built walls and imposing entrances where ten or twenty families lived. The farther we travelled the more beautiful the country became; silvery mirrored steps of green rice-fields led down to a winding stream. Suddenly Sudney nudged me. Along the roadside was a line of stately young women, dressed only in batiks wrapped around their waists, their breasts bare, carrying baskets on their heads laden with fruit. From then on we were continually nudging. Some were quite pretty. Our guide, an American Turk who sat in front with the chauffeur, was most annoying, for he would turn with lecherous interest to see our reactions – as though he had put on the show for us.
The hotel in Denpasar had only recently been built. Each sitting-room was open like a veranda, partitioned off, with sleeping quarters at the back which were clean and comfortable.
Hirschfeld, the American water-colour artist, and his wife had been living in Bali for two months and invited us to his house, where Miguel Covarrubias, the Mexican artist, had stayed before them. They had rented it from a Balinese nobleman, and lived there like
