In the early part of this century there lived in the young city of Vancouver in British Columbia a large family by the name of Hastings. The head of this family was old Mrs. Hastings who was a widow, a saint and a mystic. With her lived her younger, elderly sister Miss Edgeworth, some sons and daughters, and two grandchildren. They lived in a big square red wooden house which broke smartly into decoration at the corners. The family had but recently arrived from England, and they had at once planted a garden which quickly flourished in the soil and moisture of the British Columbia climate which encourages weed and flower, tree and vegetable with almost tropical energy. At the end of this garden were low wooden buildings. The building on the left included living quarters of the Chinese cook and a trunk-room full of the trunks which accompany a large English family in migration and also the good English bicycle of Miss Edgeworth who though elderly was daring and would try anything once. She was therefore well fitted to be a pioneer. She had bought this English bicycle before she had learned to ride, and she had never been able to learn to ride it. However, since she felt it to be a shame not to use so fine a vehicle (the bicycle was too heavy, sexless in spite of its sex, conspicuous for its bulky accessories of bright metal) she used to walk it about the town in the daytime. Thus the bicycle became well known in Vancouver for its handsomeness, for its cussedness, and because it was always walked, not ridden. A result, on the side, was that the bicycle was never taken out at night because Miss Edgeworth never wished to walk it at night when it could not be seen. It became available, then, to unauthorized people who might wish to ride it at night, and, at last, an unauthorized person did.
Yow, who inhabited the little room opening off the box-room, was the Chinese cook of this family. He was a formidable Chinaman, tall, pock-marked, and with a droop of one eyelid which added cynicism to his already disillusioned face. Even in the house, when wearing his Chinese slippers, he walked with a proud and swaggering gait. His look was derisive. He admitted that, in China, he had killed two men, one slowly, one quickly. He also said that he had been beaten to within an inch of his life. All this may have been true. He could juggle the affairs of this family of nine people and have an extensive private life of his own on the side very easily, although the pressure made him bad-tempered. He kept the children in their place by means of the simple threat “I killem you!” He was insolent, a good cook, a clean and devilish servant, rude to the younger ladies of the house, hostile to the men, and he worshipped the venerable Mrs. Hastings, arrayed in her age, simple goodness and heavenly piety. He had indeed three passions. One was for old Mrs. Hastings who actually believed him to be a very good man which perhaps he was; one was for gambling; and one was for Lilly Waller, a white girl with taffy-coloured hair who worked in Chinatown, whom, in his dark mind, he called “my lady-friend.” Lilly seemed indifferent to him, or perhaps she was cagey.
Washing up the evening dishes as with one swift movement, Yow used to walk to his outside room and transform himself. His real life now began, and the innocent Hastings family were left to their silly and mysterious occupations. When Yow went to his room he wore a white coat and apron and his hair was plaited in a queue which was wound round his head. When he came out of his room a few minutes later he wore a good black high-necked jacket with trousers to match of expensive material with a faintly brocaded pattern. His queue, lengthened by a plait of green silk, was looped up under his right arm. He wore Chinese shoes turned up a little in front and he wore a round black hat. He walked, swaggering out of his room, through the box-room where stood all the trunks and also the English bicycle, out of the gate and down the lane in the direction of Chinatown, headed for Lung Duck’s place. Anyone coming down the lane would instinctively falter at the sight of Yow advancing like Lucifer.
When Yow arrived at Lung Duck’s place which was in Shanghai Alley off Pender Street, he went through a narrow door and through several stale and dark passages. The Chinese noise grew greater as he got near the gambling room which was full of very potent cigarette smoke and other smells which announced a different world, a Chinese world. The room was crowded with grouped Chinamen. One could see them through the smoke, clustered around tables, squatted upon the floor, all talking loudly in Chinese shorthand. The police did not in those days interfere very much with their pleasures. Shanghai Alley was riddled darkly with gambling dens, one much like the last, all smelling vilely of some kind of smoke, all resounding with voices clacking like typewriters (much argument), no place in which to spend the night. But that is what Yow did for choice. He spent the night, or most of it, playing fan-tan amid the smoke and jabber, losing a little or winning a little from his cronies (no big stuff), and arriving back at his bedroom in the early morning, elated or black as thunder. This is how he spent his nights while the white family he served were sleeping blamelessly in silent rooms with the windows open and photographs on the walls. No wonder he was bad-tempered. He did not drink.
Just round the corner from Shanghai Alley was a restaurant – no, a joint – with Chinese characters on its dark face. Restaurants in Chinatown were not in those days called Mandarin Gardens or Pekin Chop Suey and so forth for the benefit of foreigners. There were Chinese customers, and there were Chinese characters, or none, on the windows or doors. The food was good. Sometimes there were dried fish or octopuses in the windows. They stayed there a long time and collected dust, as they were a symbol, not to eat, although probably no one would have minded eating them.
In Lam Sing’s place, which was the place that Yow went to for a snack of real food, not white stuff, there were two white waitresses. One was the pale girl named Lilly Waller. She had a room down on Cordova Street, but on the night shift she worked at Lam Sing’s. Yow watched this pale Lilly moving quickly and well. She had taffy-coloured hair, brown eyes and a pale mouth. Up went the straight line of her back, up the straight line of her neck, with the head set well. Her demeanour was not friendly. Yow watched her nightly taking her orders, balancing her tray, moving well and quickly and with indifference from kitchen to tables. He was mad over Lilly. He was mad over old Mrs. Hastings too. Two different loves. He loved Mrs. Hastings steadily, purely, and disliked all other white people on principle. His love for Lilly was a desire that consumed him, and in her indifferent way Lilly played with him. She was not fastidious. She was not vicious. She was no particular good and she had an inordinate desire for things. She was all that Yow wanted.
“You likee go vode-vil show? I takem you,” said Yow one night.
“Say, who do you think I am? I don’t go out with Chinks,” said Lilly, fondling her hair and looking straight downwards.
Yow’s eyes went obsidian. “You callem me Chink, I killem you,” he said, making a threatening gyrating movement with his fist, as though he were going to do it with a corkscrew.
“Twenny-three skidoo,” said Lilly indifferently.
“What for you tellem me skidoo,” said Yow fiercely. “You not tellem me skidoo! I rich man. I plenty money. You look see!” And Yow took from his pocket all his wages, paid that day, and two dollars and sixty-five cents besides. He was lucky. The night before he could not have shown Lilly sixty-five cents. He was clever, too. He had waited till payday to speak to Lilly. Lilly did not answer, but looked at the money and then looked at Yow obliquely and walked away to another table.
Not long before Yow first spoke to Lilly, young Mr. John Hastings had brought his bride to the big house for a few weeks until he moved to Montreal where he had an unusually good opening. His bride was a beautiful young American girl from St. Louis, and in point of riches she was far out of the Hastings family’s class. Her trousseau was of great size and beauty. It was impossible to find room for all her trunks in the house, and one trunk had to be taken out again and put into the box-room. Yow helped to do this. He had a ferocious neatness and shifted all the trunks about until the box-room looked orderly again. He had to move the English bicycle as well. This was the day after Yow had first spoken to Lilly.
When Yow had arranged the trunks to his satisfaction, he turned and surveyed the box-room. Out of the bride’s big trunk hung a bit of lace. Things had been crammed in and the lid squashed down. Yow opened the lid of the trunk in order to put the piece of lace in, and there he saw piles of silk stockings, layers of lawn and silk nightdresses tied together with silk ribbon, layers of petticoats tied together. He saw camisoles threaded through with pink and blue ribbons; he saw knickers with embroidered frills at the knee. He fingered these things a little and he began to think. He took two pairs of silk stockings with clocks on, and then he closed the trunk. He turned round. The box-room light twinkled on the bevelled glass and the steel of the English bicycle.
Because of the extra work in the box-room Yow had been later than usual with dinner, which had annoyed him very much because he would be late at Lung Duck’s. The night was already dark. In the small light of the box-room his eye and a half fell upon the shine of the bicycle. How simple the idea that burst full-blown. The bicycle was never sought and taken out after dinner, which was the one time when it would be useful to Yow, and at that time its owner, Miss Edgeworth, spent her evenings conversing vivaciously in the house. He yanked it out, wheeled it forth, led it into the lane, down the lane to the sidewalk, and mounted, or tried to. It was not very hard for a man of strength, for once get it under control and the bicycle was as solid as a tricycle. He established himself on the seat and began to pedal a little, with a fierce sense of triumph. To begin with, he wobbled a good deal, but the bicycle soon carried him sweetly and steadily, with fewer and fewer stops, weaving a little along Robson Street in the dark, down Granville Street, along Pender Street to Shanghai Alley. He took a sharp turn neatly at Shanghai Alley, drew up at Lung Duck’s, swung his leg across in the lordly way of one who owns a bicycle, propped it easily at Lung Duck’s place and regarded it arrogantly with his hands on his hips.
Chinese moved ceaselessly up and down Shanghai Alley, which was ill-lit. One of the few street lights stood near Lung Duck’s door. The drifting stream of Chinese halted, gathered, made towards and surveyed Yow’s unusual English bicycle which had not been seen in Chinatown before.
“That your wheel?” in the Cantonese dialect.
“Sure.”
“What kind wheel? Not all same nudder kind wheel.”
“He American wheel,” said Yow, who did not know what kind of a bicycle this was.
“He look all same lady wheel.”
“American man wheel American lady wheel all same,” said Yow loftily.
The bicycle stood there alien and shining, surveyed and talked about by twenty or thirty Chinamen all at once at the top of their voices. Small Chinese boys crouched down and fingered the pedals and the corset-like laced cover of the chain.
“Skidoo,” said Yow to them, and they skidooed.
“How much money?”
“Two hundred dollar,” hazarded Yow.
The crowd grew. Everyone wanted to touch the bicycle. Yow saw that it was not safe outside so he wheeled it inside down the long passage and into the smoky gambling room. Gambling stopped in a desultory way and all the gamblers came to look at the bicycle. Yow was the only Chinaman in Chinatown to own a bicycle at that time and he didn’t own one. Well, perhaps he did, for here it was.
At about half-past two Yow arose from where he squatted at his game, strode arrogantly to the bicycle and, with it, departed. He wheeled it along to Lam Sing’s place, pushed open the door and wheeled it in. He had an instant success.
“That your wheel?”
“Sure.”
“What kind wheel? Not all same nudder kind wheel.”
“He American wheel.”
“How much money?”
“Three hundred dollar.”
Yow sat down near the bicycle. Lilly drifted over. Yow looked up at her pale face, her soft pink lips and her taffy-coloured hair.
“That your …”
“Say, I got something for you.”
Yow pulled out the two pairs of silk stockings with clocks on, and put them on the table. Lilly bent her head and her eyes grew wide. She had heard of silk stockings but she had never seen any before. She sat down at Yow’s table. The lure was working. She fingered the stockings. Only the very very rich, she thought, Society people perhaps, or some real swell fancy women had silk stockings like these.
She looked up at Yow. “Where’d you get them?” she asked, her eyes large and brown as she for the first time looked full at him.
“I buyem,” said Yow, blowing smoke through his wide nostrils. “You likee go vode-vil show?”
“Sure,” said Lilly.
“You puttem on,” ordered Yow.
Lilly sat down at the table and pulled up her skirt and petticoat. She bent over so that Yow saw only the top of her pompadour. Then he saw her leg. Lilly took off her shoe, pulled off her garter, rolled off her black woollen stocking, pulled on the long silk stocking, gartered it, stretched out her leg – shapely now – gazed long upon it and then looked up at Yow. She smiled a smile of pure happiness.
“You puttem nudder one,” Yow ordered.
This time slowly, luxuriously, Lilly put on the other silk stocking. She curled her toes up and down, up and down.
“They sure look swell,” she murmured.
“You allasame my lady-friend,” said Yow rapturously and pulled Lilly down upon his knee.
“Say, you’re sure you did buy them?” said Lilly. “I don’t want no trouble with the police.” Lilly had once had trouble with the police, and this trouble, rather than her rectitude, had made her a careful girl and nervous.
“Sure, I buyem my friend bringem New York City,” said Yow.
New York City. The stockings acquired more lustre. The passion (which ruled Lilly then) for things mounted in her and her slight repugnance towards Yow melted and flowed into a liking for a giver of things and a potential giver of more things. Lilly was favourably disposed also towards the owner of a bicycle. Perhaps, she thought, passing her finger along the pattern of Yow’s coat, he’ll let me ride it.
As Lilly walked along to the vaudeville with Yow, she thought of the silk stockings and the bicycle, but chiefly about the bicycle, which Yow had left at Lam Sing’s for safety. She swung her hips as she walked, just to show that she did not care at all about being seen with this man. But chiefly she thought about the bicycle.
At four o’clock in the morning Yow rode home on his bicycle. He stood it in its accustomed place. Then he went to the bride’s trunk, opened it and began to choose. A nightdress, a petticoat, a camisole and a pair of knickers. He took a newspaper and made a smallish tight parcel. That night, when it was dark, he rode to Chinatown. Lilly now changed to the day shift, and at night she learned to ride the bicycle. Night after night, Yow took her a present. Lilly was ravished by the trousseau which became hers bit by bit, but most of all she loved the bicycle. She began to covet the bicycle.
Soon Yow, who had been unlucky at fan-tan, had nothing more to give to Lilly. The trousseau had stopped halfway down the trunk, where books took its place. Yow’s pockets were empty. His infatuated pose of rich man was ended. He had nothing left to give but his bicycle. It was inevitable.
The evening was cold. The stars were bright winter stars. Lilly was now able to ride the bicycle, and she and Yow and the bicycle went together up the town, in the bright darkness and along Robson Street; sometimes Lilly rode, sometimes they walked the bicycle. Slowly, persistently, an intimation lighter than smoke invaded Yow in his infatuation. While Yow’s passion was for Lilly, Lilly’s passion was for the bicycle, or so it almost seemed. Yow was becoming only the agent of the bicycle. The tall Chinaman, the pale girl and the bicycle were noticed by a few people, but not by two policemen who, walking with acquired majesty upon another street, paced together towards Barclay Street on their way to answer an excited call from young Mr. John Hastings. There had been a robbery; much of his wife’s trousseau was missing and so was a valuable bicycle belonging to his aunt. Family opinion had already convicted Yow, who had lately been excitable and unstable. In the privacy of her bedroom, Yow’s Mrs. Hastings knelt beside her bed and with tears prayed for Yow and besought the Lord that this might not be so. “He is, dear Lord,” she murmured with her accustomed reverential intimacy and passion, “fundamentally a good man. But this Thou knowest, O Lord!” Her petition did not avail, for the past cannot be undone and it was Yow who had indeed stolen the trousseau, and it was Yow who was now sauntering towards his room with Lilly Waller while two policemen waited for him inside the box-room door.
“You stay my place tonight,” said Yow, in the dark, cajoling. “I likee you stay my place tonight.”
Lilly did not answer.
“What for you not come my place? I go your place, you tellem me you no like me go your place. You come, Lilly. You go home oily [early] before alla people get up.”
“Maybe the folks’ll see me,” objected Lilly.
“They not see,” urged Yow. “I go now look see. Nobody come nighttime my place. I takem wheel puttem box-room. I look see. You wait … I come tellem you. You come.”
Lilly said stubbornly, “I’m scared of the folks.”
“Lilly,” Yow begged with a frightening tenderness, “you come! I givem you my wheel. You come, Lilly.”
“You’ll give me your wheel to keep?” asked Lilly warily.
Yow had a feeling of disquiet. “Sure,” he said, “I givem you my wheel. You keepem. Your wheel.”
“W-e-ell,” said Lilly, “I guess I’ll come.”
By now the nearness of the house which they approached oppressed Lilly. Yow pushed forward but Lilly hung back. The immense respectability of the house breathed from its walls. Its rectitude spread over the dark garden and spilled into the shadowy lane.
“You wait here,” said Yow protectively. “I takem bicycle. I puttem shed. I look see.”
So then Lilly loitered in the lane beside dark laurels and Yow trundled the bicycle towards the shed. There was a sudden light, hoarse shouting, Chinese shouting, and the scuffling of men, a furious cry. Oh, it is the police! the police! They have him! Lilly crouched, turned, and ran.
Proud skilful dangerous Yow, poor fellow, what has he done? He has lost liberty, and the English bicycle, and old Mrs. Hastings, and he has lost Lilly, the pale slut who is running running through the dark lane, stopping, crouching in the shadows, listening, hardly daring to look behind her.