Field could see her beneath him, her mouth tightly shut, her body frozen . . .
Or was her pleasure real?
Field turned to the wall and then back again, his mind grappling with dramatic, confusing images of duplicity and debasement. Was this the end? Was this what she had anticipated? Was he beating her now, a prelude to a far more violent death?
Field lit another cigarette and forced himself to smoke it.
The door opened and she came down the steps to the sidewalk, her head bent, so that he could not see her face.
He moved quickly, the blood pounding through his head. He took hold of her roughly, pulled her across the road.
“Get in,” he said.
She resisted.
“Get in. Foochow Road,” he told the man. “Hurry.”
“He will have seen,” she said as they pulled away.
Natasha was watching the rickshaw man’s back, her face impassive and cold. She did not speak until she had opened the door of her apartment. “Please go,” she said, once she had moved inside.
“What happened?”
“Please leave.”
“What happened?”
In an instant she crumpled and he caught her. He lifted her and carried her to a chair by the window. He gripped her tightly, with stretched fingers, so that her head was on his shoulder, her hair once again in his face. He closed his eyes.
And then, just as quickly, she was struggling to be free and pushing him away. She got to her feet again. “No,” she said. “No.”
“What happened?”
“He knows.”
Field stood. “Knows what?”
“He knows.” She shook violently. “Something was different.”
“What was different?”
“In his eyes. He was less . . . not so far away with the drugs and he made me stand there such a long time, just staring.”
“Did he say anything?”
“Normally, he is hardly looking at me. Just so drugged and—”
“How long?”
“An hour, I don’t know. And he did not say I could go. I could not stand it anymore and I went and picked up my clothes and left and—”
“He just looked at you?”
She did not answer.
“He didn’t talk? He didn’t say anything?”
Slowly, she raised her head. “He asked me if I liked to wear stockings. Why did I not wear them?”
“What did you say?”
“I said I would wear them the next time.”
“He didn’t touch you?”
Natasha stared at the floor.
“Did he touch you?”
“It is not your business.”
“Did he touch you?”
“In the dressing room there were two ledgers.” She looked up. “A chest was open. They were on top.”
“And you looked?”
“I was frightened.”
“But you looked?”
“There were many figures. All the writing was in Chinese.”
“But you could read it.”
“No, I—”
