‘Would you be Daiyu, in the film?’ said Will.
‘No, of course not, I’m too old,’ said Noli. ‘I’d quite like to play his first wife, because he’s told me a bit about her, and she sounds like a – well, she was no Lady Rowena, put it that way.’
‘D’you think it’s strange,’ said Will, still dicing onions, ‘that Papa J married twice and nobody in the church is supposed to marry?’
‘What?’ said Noli. Her knife slipped off the onion she was mangling.
‘Will!’
One of the older women had spoken, her tone a definite warning. The kitchen workers around the onion choppers seemed to have come back to life: there was a resumption of the usual clanging and clattering as they moved away.
‘Of course it’s not strange,’ said Noli. ‘His first marriage was before he even – anyway, it’s a Higher-Level Truth, isn’t it?’
‘What is?’ said Will, still looking at the onion he was chopping.
‘Papa J and Mama Mazu, you can’t – it’s not the same. They’re, like, our parents – all of our parents.’
‘Materialist possession,’ muttered Will again.
‘Oh, come—’
‘Have you read the Bhagavad Gita?’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Noli, clearly lying.
‘Lord Krishna talks about people of demonic nature. “Self-conceited, stubborn, intoxicated by pride in wealth, they perform sacrifice in name only, with ostentation.”’
‘Ohmigod, there are so many people in acting like that,’ said Noli. ‘The last show I did—’
But her voice was drowned out by another. Somebody outside the kitchen was screaming.
72
Nine in the third place…
The woman carries a child but does not bring it forth.
Misfortune.
The I Ching or Book of Changes
The kitchen door banged open to reveal Penny, whose once-green hair was now straggly and brown, and the front of whose sweatshirt was stained with what looked like blood.
‘It’s Lin,’ she wailed. ‘In the women’s bathroom. She’s – oh my God—’
Robin and Will were the first to move. Robin followed the younger man at a sprint, her apron slightly impeding the motion of her knees, and behind her she could hear some of the older women also running. They dashed down the pathway into the courtyard, but at the dormitory door, Will checked. Men weren’t supposed to enter the women’s dormitory. Robin pushed him aside, ran through the empty dormitory and through the bathroom door.
‘Oh Jesus,’ she said aloud.
There was a puddle of blood seeping from under one of the toilet cubicle doors. She could see Lin’s bloodstained legs, which weren’t moving.
‘Lin,’ Robin yelled, pounding on the locked door, but there was no answer. Robin dashed into the neighbouring cubicle, jumped up onto the toilet seat, seized hold of the top of the partition and pulled herself over it.
‘Shit,’ said Robin, landing and slipping in the blood surrounding the teenager, who sat slumped against the toilet.
She’d expected suicide, but saw at once that the blood, of which there seemed a terrifying amount, seemed to be issuing from Lin’s vagina. Her tracksuit bottoms were sodden and she was wheezing, while her neck, face and hands were covered in an angry red rash.
‘Lin,’ said Robin, ‘what’s happened?’
‘Leave m-m-me,’ whispered Lin. ‘J-j-just leave m-m-me.’
Robin heard footsteps outside the cubicle and hastily unlocked the door to reveal the worried faces of Penny and assorted female kitchen workers.
‘I’ll get Dr Zhou,’ said Sita, who disappeared.
‘N-no,’ gasped Lin. ‘N-n-not Zhou, n-not Zhou…’
‘You need a doctor, Lin,’ said Robin. ‘You’ve got to see a doctor.’
‘N-n-not him… I d-d-don’t want him… I’m fine… it’s fine…’
Robin reached for Lin’s hand, which was hot, and held it.
‘It’s going to be OK,’ she said.
‘N-n-no it won’t,’ said Lin faintly, now gasping for breath. ‘N-n-not if she g-g-gets Zhou… p-p-please…’
Robin could hear men talking outside the dormitory and a few minutes later, loudest of all, she heard Dr Zhou.
‘Get out of the way!’ he shouted as he entered the bathroom, and the women surrounding the cubicle scattered. Robin remained exactly where she was, and felt Lin’s fingers tighten on hers as Zhou appeared in the open doorway.
‘What the bloody hell have you done to yourself?’ he shouted, looking down at Lin, and Robin read panic in his face.
‘Nothing… nothing…’ wheezed Lin.
‘I think,’ said Robin, feeling terribly guilty about betraying Lin, but afraid of the consequences if she didn’t speak, ‘she might have eaten some plants.’
‘What plants?’ shouted Zhou, his voice echoing off the tiled walls.
‘Lin, tell him,’ said Robin, ‘please tell him. Think of Qing,’ she whispered.
‘M-m-mug… wort,’ said Lin, now gasping for breath.
‘Get up,’ snarled Zhou.
‘Are you mad?’ said Robin, looking up at him. ‘She can’t stand!’
‘Get two of the men in here!’ Zhou bellowed at the women who’d retreated back into the dormitory.
‘What are you going to do?’ Robin demanded.
‘You, move!’ Zhou barked at Robin, who remained exactly where she was, still gripping Lin’s hand.
Now Will and Taio appeared at the cubicle door. Taio looked disgusted, Will, simply horrified.
‘Wrap a towel around her,’ said Zhou, ‘we don’t want mess everywhere. Then carry her to the farmhouse.’
‘N-n-no,’ said Lin, starting feebly to resist as Taio began to roughly bundle a bath towel around her.
‘I’ll do it,’ said Robin, batting Taio’s hand away.
Lin was hoisted to her feet, the towel wrapped around her, then carried away by Will and Taio.
‘Clean that mess up,’ were Zhou’s parting words to Robin, and as he left the bathroom, she heard him bark at somebody else, ‘You, go and help her.’
Robin’s tracksuit bottoms were soaked in the warm red liquid. She got slowly to her feet, her nostrils full of the ferrous smell of Lin’s blood, as Penny came creeping back into the bathroom, her eyes wide.
‘What happened to her?’ she whispered.
‘I think she tried to give herself a miscarriage,’ said Robin, who felt nauseated.
‘Oh,’ said Penny. ‘I didn’t know what to do. I just saw the blood under the door…’
The ramifications of what had just happened were hitting Robin. She wondered whether Lin was going to die, whether Zhou was competent to deal with the emergency. She also knew she’d reacted to the crisis as Robin Ellacott, not as Rowena Ellis, shouting at Zhou and ignoring his orders, pushing Taio away, siding with the girl who’d tried to abort her baby. Then there was her admission she knew Lin had eaten plants…
‘Dr Zhou told me to help you clean up,’ said Penny timidly.
‘It’s fine,’ said Robin, who very much wanted to be left alone. ‘I can do it.’
‘No,’ said Penny, who looked queasy but determined, ‘he told me to… you really yelled at him,’ she added nervously.
‘I was just shocked,’ said Robin.