She straightened up, massaging her forearms and flexing her lingers, and looked around with wonder at the room she had entered through the window. The floor was covered with soft, thick Oriental rugs and the walls were hung with tapestries, there to hide cracks and peeling paint as much as to provide decoration. Everything was red and purple and gold, from the upholstery on the chairs to the canopy above the bed, which dominated the small room. She walked around the bed, marveling at the size of it, and saw with surprise that there was a mirror fastened just below the canopy. She heard footsteps approaching outside and quickly looked around for a place to hide. Briefly, she considered diving down underneath the bed, but then she realized that the bed would be the first place they would come to and instead she chose to duck behind the curtains on the other side of the painted wooden screen standing in a corner.
The door opened and a couple entered. The man was middle-aged, dressed in a dark frock coat, an elegant waistcoat with a gold watch chain and a howler hat. The girl was young. Chinese, no older than Jasmine, wearing a form- fitting, bright red dress slashed deeply up the side with green and gold dragons embroidered on it. The man had a red face and a huge handlebar moustache and sidewhiskers and the girl had long black hair hanging straight down to her waist. Jasmine watched wide-eyed from her hiding place as the man closed the door behind them and then swept the girl up in his arms, crushing his lips to hers. The girl lifted her bare leg and rubbed it against the outside of the man's leg, hooking it around him.
It was nothing like what Jasmine had imagined from the novels she had read. Instead of whispered words of endearment and loving, affectionate caresses, it was an impatient, clumsy pawing and clutching, a hurried, awkward shrugging out of clothes and a playful, adolescent wrestling. Instead of emotion- laden sighs and languorous moans, there was panting and giggling and squealing. Instead of a transcendent, blissful floating in one another's arms, it was a grunting, bouncing, spring-creaking thrusting and groaning and when it was over, the man lay spent for several moments, then immediately got up and started to dress while the girl came behind the screen and. while Jasmine held her breath behind the drapes, she quickly cleaned herself using the washstand that the screen concealed, slipped into her dress, straightened it, brushed the stray strands of hair away from her face with a completely indifferent air and then went out to escort the gentleman back downstairs. Jasmine was at the same time both fascinated and incredibly disillusioned. Was that all there was to it?
Somehow, she had imagined something much more spiritual and romantic. The sight of the man's unclothed body had repelled her. He had looked so much better in his clothes! Without them, his stomach had hung down like a buddha's and his chest had sagged. He had been covered with unattractive, thick, coarse, curling hair and his legs looked spindly, grotesquely out of proportion with the rest of him. Naked, he had looked ugly, comical, ungainly, and as for his manhood, it was all Jasmine could do to refrain from giggling at the sight of it. She could not believe that Dr. Morro would look so silly and pathetic with his clothes off, but at the same time, a telling blow had been delivered to her romantic fantasies. She was not embarrassed by what she had witnessed. She was merely surprised and disappointed.
She slipped out from behind the drapes and moved quickly to the door. She opened it a crack andpeeked out into the hallway. She could hear sounds coming from behind several of the closed doors, but for the moment, the hallway was clear.
However, she had no idea which way to go. She stepped out into the hall uncertainly and, at that moment, a door opened right in front of her and an old woman carrying a pile of bedclothing stepped out. Startled, Jasmine gasped.
The old woman smiled toothlessly. "I haven't seen you before," she said, speaking in Chinese. "You must be new."
"Yes, I… I am not sure which way to go," said Jasmine, forcing a smile.
The old woman looked at her questioningly. "Is there a gentleman wailing for you?"
"Yes, he has only just arrived,” said Jasmine. and she described Moreau.
"Ah, the important visitor who came with Master Tao," the old woman said, nodding. "Yes. he is to stay with us for a time. He is in the room at the far end of the corridor, but I was told he is not to be disturbed.
"I was sent to see if there is anything he wants," Jasmine said. "I am to bring him whatever he asks for."
"Ah well that is different," the old woman said. "It is good that there will be someone else to look after his needs. I have more than enough to do. There is no end to work around here. You are one of the new servant girls, then?"
Jasmine nodded.
The old woman shook her head. "You will find it harder work than pleasing gentlemen," she said. "You will see. You may soon prefer working on your back to scrubbing on your knees. There is time enough for that. You should not waste your youth. I was young and pretty once, like you. Now I wash floors and empty chamberpots." The old woman cackled and waddled off down the corridor, carrying her pile of bedclothes.
Quickly, before she ran into anybody else, Jasmine made her way down to the door at the far end of the hall. She hesitated when she reached it. Now that the moment had arrived, she was suddenly afraid of declaring herself. What would he say? Would he be angry? What if he rejected her? There was no turning back now. She bit her lower lip and knocked on the door.
"Yes? Who is it'?" she heard him say.
She shut her eyes, took a deep breath, opened the door and stepped inside.
"Jasmine!" Moreau said, astonished. "Dear God! What on earth are you doing here? How did you get here?"
"Do not be angry, Dr. Morro," she said. "I had to come! "It all came spilling out of her in a torrent of impassioned words, words that tumbled over one another in her rush to get them out, afraid that if she paused for breath, her fear would paralyze her or, worse yet, that he would stop her.
Moreau stood there in astonishment, unable to get a word in edgewise. She finally ran out of steam and stood before him, looking down at the floor, stripped hare in all but the literal sense, her face flushed, her lower lip trembling, her eyes ready to flood with tears.
Moreau started to say a dozen different things and realized that each one of them would have been wrong. What was he to tell her'? That he was old enough to be her father? It was a cliche and he was not her father and, in any case, the only time age made any real difference to a woman was if a man was too immature for her, a factor that was more often than not measured emotionally and not chronologically. And Jasmine was a woman, naive, perhaps, certainly inexperienced, but a woman none the less. And just as one did not treat a girl as if she were a woman, one did not treat a woman as if she were a girl. Was he to tell her that he did not love her? What purpose would that serve? Besides, she had not asked him if he loved her. She had opened up her heart to him, imposing no conditions, asking nothing, offering everything. A gift like that was not rejected out of hand. It was accepted in the same spirit in which it was offered. Whether or not it was reciprocated was another, much more complicated matter.
"Are you going to send me away?" she said, drawing herself up proudly, prepared to accept rejection with dignity.
"No," he said. "Please, sit down. It seems that we have much to talk about."
Andre was having a hard time keeping track of all the bodies. It was difficult enough, shadowing the indefatigable Conan Doyle, now she also had Bram Stoker to worry about and the man that they were following and the people who were following them.