“An old man passed by, hit my leg with his cane, and yelled at me. ‘Get off the streets,’ he said.
“‘I don’t know where to go,’ I said between sobs. ‘I need to find the herbalist, Master Lee.’
“‘Lee’s place is just up the street,’ he replied. ‘I will walk with you.’ It was a small courtesy, but made a big difference to me. The inside of the store was just as I remembered. But something was different. It was too quiet, the incense pots were cool, and several statues were gone. I rushed to the back and found all the bunks empty. The wall of food and herbs was also gone. Master Lee and Shuang had left the city with their baby. There was no one there to protect me. I felt that this was it. I was at the end of my rope. I sat at the table and wept. That was when I heard the door slam.”
“Was it the Communist?” Loni asked.
Sofia shook her head. “A man with an old rifle appeared before me. ‘I come from General Ho,’ he said. ‘Master Lee promised to send him some tea. I have come to collect it.’
“I struggled to understand what he had said. It suddenly hit me. General Ho was the alcoholic warlord. A plan for survival quickly formulated in my head. I had something the general wanted. But, I needed some tea to make an entrance. I was once again in survival mode.
“‘Sit and wait,’ I ordered. ‘Or your general will not get his tea.’ The threat worked. He slowly dropped into one of the chairs.
“‘We must hurry,’ he said. ‘The Communists are close.’
“I knew that Master Lee gave all his patients small bags of the recipe to use when they left the clinic. I wondered if any had left their bags in the bunks in their haste to leave. I tore into each bunk and found the small bags in almost every bunk. Some had three and four bags. In the end, I have over twenty bags, enough for several months of tea.
“‘I am going to deliver this batch in person,’ I told the man. He shrugged, hefted his gun and we were off.
“We ran down the street. My heart was thumping in my chest. The time spent without food and rest had taken its toll. I could not go on and stopped to rest.
“‘We must go,’ he warned. I was just about to give him the tea, when I noticed something in the window of the closed store.
“‘Break that window,’ I told the man.
“‘Why?’ he asked.
“‘Break that window and take the outfit right in front. Do you want me to appear before General Ho dressed like a peasant?’ I yelled at him.
“He used the butt of his gun to break the glass. He reached in and pulled out the clothes. We then set off running again. This time, I had confidence by my side. We reached a car on the west side of town. The man and I piled in.
“‘How long before we reach the general?’ I demanded.
“‘His home is about two hours drive by car. Why do you ask?’
“‘I will need to change into my nursing outfit before we get there,’ I answered.”
Chapter Sixty-Three
Sofia stood and refilled Loni’s teacup and hers. Banyon waved away her offer. He stood and looked out the sliding doors at the sea. He glanced at his watch again and pointed his finger at the dial for Loni to see. She nodded her head in understanding. Sofia watched the interaction. Then she went on with her tale.
“I made the men stop by a lake which was surrounded by mountains. I had grabbed a small piece of soap from the well in the back of the herb store before we left. I told them to stay and took the tea and the outfit down to the lake with me. I went into the water, clothes and all, and began washing my hair. I flung the round peasant hat back on shore. I then proceed to undress in the water. When there was no soap left, I simply walked out of the water to the shore. I’m sure I put on quite a show for my guardians.
“I used leaves from a broadleaf tree to brush off the water and stepped into my nursing dress. I had no underwear and didn’t care. I shook out my hair, but did not put the hat back on my head yet. When I walked back to the car, I was a European woman again. My blonde hair was blowing in the breeze. I had a goal and a plan. I was confident that I could do what needed to be done. It was clear that the driver and the other man had never seen a white woman before. I expected that General Ho had not had the pleasure, either.
“‘Now, let’s go see the general,’ I said. I placed the hat on my head and stuffed my blonde hair inside.”
“You were incredibly brave,” Loni said. “I don’t know if I could have put together a plan with everything that was going on.”
“It was war,” Banyon scolded her. “Survival was all that mattered.”
“You are so right,” Sofia said to Banyon. “It was war.”
“So what happened next?” Loni asked as she bounced on the couch. To her this was like reading a good book.
“The compound where the general lived was on top of a mountain. There was a solid brick wall all around it. We entered through a wooden gate. Just inside the wall were a large open area and a three-story building with many outbuildings. We walked up broad marble stairs and through glass-paned wooden doors into a courtyard. The house was built around the courtyard, with balconies on all three floors. The sandy courtyard was about forty feet square. The general sat in the middle of the courtyard at a round table. A bottle of rice wine was near his elbow. It was half-empty.
“The general was a small, slim, man. He wore a tailored uniform of light brown. A black, pencil-thin mustache adorned his upper lip. He stopped talking to his advisors, who were all around him, when I entered. I walked into the courtyard like I owned it and stripped off my hat, shaking out my blonde hair. I carried the bag of tea in front of me as I rolled my hips on the way to the table. No one noticed the tea. The general suddenly lit a cigar, leaned back in his chair, and surveyed my body like it was an ordnance map.
“‘Who are you, my dear?’ he asked in a cultured voice.
“‘You requested tea from Master Lee,’ I replied.
“‘Why has he not come himself?’ the diminutive general asked.
“‘He has fled,’ I responded.
“‘Yes, I have heard that the Communists are in the city. Why did you not leave with him?’ He puffed on his cigar as he awaited an answer.
“‘I just arrived from Shanghai, by train, this morning. When I found the shop, he was already gone. Your man found me in the shop, so I decided to bring you the tea.’
“‘The train has not been running lately.’
“‘It ran today and was ambushed, but you already knew that.’
“‘Yes, I suppose that I did,’ he replied. ‘This is the tea mixture?’
“‘Yes, my general.’
“‘And what is to become of you?’ he asked playfully.
“‘I am your new nurse,’ I replied, remembering my sister’s bold statement to the German, Gerut.
“‘What if I don’t need a nurse?’
“‘I am also your new virgin.’ He stopped talking when I said that.
Chapter Sixty-Four
“I tried to look as virginal as possible as I stood before him. Dark smoke billowed around his head as he sucked on his cigar. He spent a long time studying me and thinking. His advisors stood frozen in their spots. No one knew what to do. You could hear birds singing from somewhere in the big, dark house. After some time, he appeared to reach a decision.
“‘I have need of both of your gifts,’ he suddenly said, standing. ‘Follow me.’
Loni drew her breath in sharply and balled her little fists. Sofia ignored her and continued. “I found myself at peace. I had been through many horrific situations and compared to some of those, losing my virginity to this small man was manageable,” she said. “I wasn’t sure that he had stood up because he was very short—almost a midget. We walked toward the house. I made sure that I was two steps behind him, even though he had to take two steps to my one. A servant opened the door and bowed as we entered. We proceeded down several halls and he made a right turn into a library-like room. It was clearly his office. I quickly scanned
the room in search of a place for our ceremony. A large leather couch dominated the middle of the room. He plopped himself on it. His legs didn’t reach the ground. I stood before him and reached around my back to unbutton the nursing outfit.
“‘Sit,’ he ordered.
“‘Yes, my general,’ I sweetly replied as I moved to the other end of the couch and sat down.
“‘Your virginity is safe with me,’ he announced. ‘I prefer young boys.’ The shock was visible on my face. He went on to explain that he told people that he would only bed virgins to keep his men from knowing the truth.
“‘There are few virgins in China during this war,’ he added with a sardonic smile. I confirmed this later: He had no female concubines. It was his ruse. He further explained that it was not him, but his lover who was an alcoholic and needed the recipe. The general had visited Master Lee to get a sample of the recipe. It had worked well on his lover. The alcohol had taken its toll on the man and he could not get an erection, but the recipe had changed that.
“‘I tell everyone that he is my son, but he is really my lover. I think you can help me with two problems,’ the general said to me.
“‘Two problems,’ I repeated.
“‘Yes,’ he replied seriously. ‘I cannot use boys to nurse him as he is very frisky, if you know what I mean.’ He raised his eyebrows.
“‘Oh,’ I said.
“‘We had to get rid of two boys he corrupted and two females he impregnated. He is rather indiscriminate. I have threatened to cut off his member, but it would be my loss.’”
This time, it was Banyon who gasped. Sofia ignored the interruption. She seemed intent on telling the story.
“‘Are you really a virgin?’ General Ho asked me.
“‘Yes,’ I answered as seriously as I could. I now realized that the general was just a lovesick homosexual who was worried about the commitment of his lover.
“‘We will check you every week. If he beds you, we will know. If that happens, I will give you to my troops to play with.’
“‘No need for threats, my general. I am happy to keep my virginity. I am also an excellent nurse and have cured many people from the horrors of alcohol.’
“‘No one must know of this. If you tell anyone, you will be my guest in a place reserved for my enemies.’
“‘My lips are sealed,’ I replied.
“‘Make it your legs are well,’ he said.
“Once he knew that he could trust me, I became the general’s close confident. He asked me for advice on everything, including sex.”
“I thought that warlords were all consumed with fighting and conquering and had no time for love,” Loni said.
“General Ho was no different. He was a demon on the battlefield. He had a true Napoleon complex. He was brutal and determined, but when he came home to the compound, he was a pussycat.”
“What was the lover like?” Loni asked.
“Ting. His name was Ting. He was tall and thin. He had almost no muscles, except for one,” Sofia replied. “Actually, they were quite a pair. Everything about General Ho was small, but strong and disciplined. Ting had no ambition but carried a big stick. Ho loved the stick. They came to see me as one of them. They could be themselves around me. The people around the compound thought that both of them were abusing me terribly behind the closed doors of the library.”
“And no one suspected the truth?” Loni asked.
“Never. I suppose that whenever anyone suspected, they disappeared,” Sofia said. Then she added. “Sometimes General Ho would slap me or rip my dress to make it appear that I’d had a rough time during a session. He enjoyed being rough, but it was a small price to pay. In public, he always treated me like a slave. Once, when he had a meeting of his military leaders, he grabbed me by my hair and forced me to kneel under the table. No one dared look to see if I was really earning my keep. We lived in luxury and were completely debauched.”
“But, did the recipe worked on Ting?” Loni asked.
“After a few weeks, Ting was always ready to go.”
“So, did you have trouble with the help?” Banyon asked.
“Not really. In the compound, General Ho did not fire people; he made them disappear. We never had any serious problems with the help. I think they were happy to be exempt from the debauchery.”
“When did you leave the compound?” Banyon continued.
“I celebrated my eighteenth birthday shortly after I arrived at the compound and I had to leave before I turned nineteen. It was in the summer of 1944 that the situation once again became desperate.”
“What happened?” Banyon asked.
Chapter Sixty-Five
“The war started going badly for the general by 1944. The Japanese had started to withdraw back to Shanghai. The void was filled by the Communists, who were as ruthless as the Japanese were. General Ho, who had allegiance only to himself, was losing ground and men at an alarming rate. He came home from one battle and asked me to join him in the library. The normally fastidious general was covered in black dust and visibly shaken.
“He gave no preamble. ‘We are losing many battles,’ he slowly announced. ‘The Communists will be here soon. I may have to retreat to the mountains with my troops.’
“I had never before seen him without his arrogant confidence. It was unnerving, to say the least. Fear suddenly greeted me again. ‘What is it that you wish of me?’ I asked.
“He stood up and walked around to the side of his desk. ‘Watch,’ he said. He pressed two panels at one time and a board immediately came loose. He pulled out the board, revealing a small strongbox. Inside the box was a bag filled with diamonds.
“‘Tomorrow, I want you to watch for explosions along the East pass. If you see explosions, you will know that we have blocked the pass up to the compound. It will only stop the hordes for a couple of hours. You must take the diamonds and run. Take Ting with you and go to Shanghai.’
“‘How will we leave the compound if the pass is blocked?’ I asked.
“He again pressed a panel, this time on the wall, and a doorway appeared. ‘This leads to the dungeon,’ he said. ‘At the far end of the dungeon, there is another hidden doorway. Pull on the chains on the wall. The tunnel will lead into the valley. It is a difficult journey, but you must make it.’
“‘Then what?’ I asked.
“‘Go directly to Shanghai. There is a club there called La Boyzzes in the French Quarter. It is where I met Ting. Go there every Monday night at nine o’clock. One of my men will meet you out front. He will wear a green scarf and wait for you by the light pole outside. He will have instructions for you.’ The general then closed the panels and told me to leave.”
“So, General Ho had an exit plan,” Banyon noted.
Sofia nodded. “But his plan fell apart as soon as the fighting began the next day.”
“They usually do,” Banyon said.
“The next morning, the battle started at dawn. I stood up on the third floor with binoculars and watched it unfold. General Ho was probably killed in the first few minutes of fighting. I saw a runner come to the compound to talk to Ting. There was much commotion. Everyone wondered if Ting was now the leader,” Sofia said.
“And the pass was not blocked, right?” Banyon said with confidence.
“Hundreds of Communist soldiers streamed up the road to the compound. I dropped the binoculars and ran to find Ting. I found him in the courtyard. He had dressed in a uniform and had bandoliers of bullets draped across his narrow chest. He held a machine gun in each hand. He was going to fight. Before I could reach him, the doors were blown off the wall of the compound and Communists poured in. Ting stood alone and pounded them with machine gun fire. In the end, he was a hero and gave me the time to sprint to the library.”
“So, he was killed?” Loni asked.
“I never saw him go down, but he could not have lasted long. I was in survival mode again and grabbed the diamonds on my way to the dungeon. Considering everything th
at was going on, I was still unprepared for the dungeon.”
“I bet it was old and creepy,” Loni made a face as she said it.
“Worse, there were dead people down there shackled to the walls. There were several torture devices and a fire pit. It didn’t take much imagination to understand what went on down there. I now understood where the servants who disappeared had gone.” Sofia shuddered.
“The only chain that I could see at the end of the dungeon was another shackle. I ran to it. I pulled on it and prayed it was the right one. I didn’t have any time. I could hear shooting upstairs. They would find the dungeon door soon. But nothing happened when I pulled on the shackle. Panic filled me. I could guess what the Communists would do to me, especially since I had a bag of diamonds in my pocket. I was trapped like a rat. Shouts filled the dungeon. They had found me.”
“Oh, no,” Loni cried as her hands went to her face in fright.
“Luckily, I had dressed in a peasant outfit that morning, hat included. It was dark in the dungeon, but I could see two men making their way towards me. They were kicking the dead people to make sure they weren’t faking. I knew it was only a matter of minutes before I would have to face their justice. I looped a set of shackles around my hands and slowly slumped to the floor, bowing my head so that the hat would mask my face. It was my only hope.
“One of the men stopped right in front of me. I could see his legs and shoes. He kicked the bottom of my foot, but not very hard. It looked like he was about to kick me again, when one of the corpses moaned. Both men moved over to the woman. One man asked if she could talk. She mumbled something I could not hear. Then, I heard a tearing sound and muffled protests. They were raping her, I would be next, but I dared not move. I was in a stinking dungeon surrounded by dead people with two enemy soldiers raping a helpless woman not ten feet from where I slumped in shackles. I didn’t think it could get worse, but it did.
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