Bound for Vietnam Read Online Free PDF Page A

that had the number of your table written on it. And you did not get your nose inside a feed bag unless you had paid in full, up front. In one corner of the dining room, a man seated behind a wooden bench sold large bottles of warm beer. Qingdoa beer, the best in China, was seven yuan – about eighty cents. I don’t mind room temperature beer when the weather is as cold as it was up there, off the coast of Manchuria.
    When I had finished eating, my two escorts took me back to my cabin and invited me to dance in the restaurant at seven. I put on my dancing shoes. The restaurant turned out to be the grotty dining room thinly disguised. The main lights had been dimmed, a ring of coloured lights surrounded a cleared central area and a karioke had been set up in one corner. (Where some absolutely dreadful singing went on.) Creepy was seated at the door flanked by two muscled henchman, who were punching back would-be boarders like the heroes in a swashbuckling pirate film. A ticket was obviously needed for admission. I did not have one, but this omission was overlooked. No drinks were served, but your ticket entitled you to a carton of soy milk.
    A young couple sat down next to me and started a conversation. Creepy asked me to dance and as I was brought up never to refuse to dance with a gentleman unless he was dead drunk, I submitted. We did a sedate sort of fox trot around the floor. Then one of the girls asked me. It was a first for me to waltz with a woman. I am not too keen to repeat it either. There was no rock and roll on this coastal ship, as there had been on the Hai Sing , but there was a bit of disco. These frenetic Saturday-night revels ended early and abruptly. At twenty-five past eight the lights were thrown on and a general fast exodus erupted.
    I went to bed with a book, luxuriating in the best bed I had encountered on these travels. Encased in my wooden surrounds, I felt cocooned and warm. During the night I was awakened by the sound of something slamming rhythmically. I felt the ship rolling and knew that we had left the shelter of the bay and entered the open sea.
    By daylight the roll had increased, and I got out of bed to a steady lift and swell. The sun came up on a dark blue empty sea that had a few white-caps on it, but nothing else in sight. I had a wonderful bath in brown (I hope it was only rust from the pipes) water. Sitting in liquid up to my chin that tipped and dipped and sloshed with the movement of the ship, I had waves without even moving.
    I was left to spend a peaceful morning alone until eleven o’clock when I was again collected and escorted to a meal. My new friends from last night joined me. He was a doctor of medicine, she was a biologist, and they were part of a group on their way to Shanghai for a conference. I think Cupid had struck. This pleased me, as they made a happy couple.
    After lunch, the sun came out. It lay on my book as I wrote at the desk and patterned the carpet at my feet with the shape of the windows. All day we headed steadily south through a moderate swell. The weather became warmer and the sky cleared to a bright blue. That evening I walked around the deck. It was still warm and now it was so calm that the breeze hardly ruffled my hair. The sea remained wide and empty. We had passed only an occasional freighter going the other way. As dusk closed the day, dark gunmetal storm clouds, tinged pink at their edges, gathered. A passing container ship showed a light on the blackening expanse of the ocean and the clouds became screens for furnaces of fire.
    That evening I was escorted to the feeding station and helped to dine again, but fast! It was hard not to bolt your food when people stood three deep at your elbow waiting for your seat.
    I was woken at two the next morning by the decreasing of the ship’s roll and on looking out of the porthole I saw the lights of the Shanghai River in the distance. Shortly after three, we entered the channel of the river. Far away on