by Bo Caldwell
The chest’s brass fittings and polished wood gleamed in the lanterns’ soft light. Katherine knelt next on the ground and ran her hands over the intricate carving, transfixed by it. When she looked up at me, I saw that she was as overcome as I was. “Thank him,” she said in English. “Tell them how generous this is, how kind he is.”
I nodded; I wanted to do just that, but had no idea how. “Magistrate,” I said to him, “the city owes us nothing, and we are humbled by your exquisite gift.” Then I turned to the crowd and looked out at scores of people I’d known for decades. I had seen their children grow up, and I knew their joys and their sorrows. I said to them, “Since coming to Kuang P’ing Ch’eng we have received far more than we have given. We came to serve you and to teach you of our faith, but it is we who have been cared for and taught. We came to devote our lives to the work here, and you have given us lives we never imagined. We know of no place on earth more blessed than this city. And we are blessed that it is our home.”
We stayed at the celebration until late in the evening. Again and again I found myself looking up and down the long line of tables at the faces of people I loved. Remember this well, I thought; this night is the gift.
When I was a child in Oklahoma, neighbors brought food with death and flowers with sickness and other things in between. In China we received noodles on the occasion of our daughter’s birth and chrysanthemums at her death; lotus seeds for health and ginseng for longevity; and, at the New Year, tangerines for good fortune, fish for abundance, dumplings for wealth. The siege and occupation of Kuang P’ing Ch’eng and the year following it brought gifts as well. Neighbors gave us chickens and eggs, noodles and cakes, winter wheat and fruit and half a butchered hog, and at the feast we were given, in addition to the magistrate’s chest, four hundred dollars from the city’s merchants to refurbish and expand the clinic and dispensary.
There was another gift, less tangible but just as real—the gift of trust. Feelings of apprehension that we had never truly overcome in nineteen years seemed to give way after the war. Attendance at services grew to twice or even three times what it had been, and the number of believers increased by the month. It was as though a wall came down; sometimes during a worship service I felt we had a bond we had not shared before, like people who had been rescued from a sinking vessel and were now grateful for the simple blessing of standing on solid ground.
But those gifts came at a price, and although I was a grateful man after the siege of Kuang P’ing Ch’eng, I was also a haunted one. The image of Katherine, standing alone in the compound yard with thirty rifles trained on her stayed with me for many months, and each time I recalled how close I had come to losing her, a rush of fear and panic nearly brought me to my knees.
Beautiful Country
1932–1946
In the spring of 1932, I began experiencing a strange kind of unrest inside. At first I thought it came from neglecting some responsibility, and I looked for a task I was avoiding or a leading of the Spirit I had ignored. When I couldn’t find anything that I had or hadn’t done that would cause this disquiet, I worked harder at what was in front of me. I preached in the marketplace from morning till evening, I traveled to the outlying villages with a zealot’s fervor, I wrote letters to churches all over the United States telling of our work, I attended to every maintenance chore I could think of at our compound. But nothing helped.
Then one night I woke suddenly with the strange sense that Katherine and I would soon leave China. The thought sparked instant dread in me; I had come to imagine us growing old in Kuang P’ing Ch’eng and living out our days there. These hopes seemed reasonable; missionaries who returned to the United States usually did so to be near their families, but Katherine and I had neither children nor grandchildren, our parents had long since passed on, and our years in China had made only distant relationships possible with our siblings, except for Naomi. Who was there to welcome us in America? What was there to return to? My middle-of-the-night thoughts of leaving seemed foolish and wrong, and I dismissed them.
But as time went on, my unrest continued and I began to feel a distance from God. I told myself this was natural, a phase of my spiritual life that would pass. I did not spend more time in prayer; I considered my spiritual distress an embarrassing weakness I should be well past or at least able to fix on my own, an attitude similar to a sick man thinking he should heal himself.
When these thin rationalizations gave way, I attributed my anxiety to the general precariousness of our lives and the country’s political situation, which was, once again, unstable. The reunification of 1928 had been short-lived; the country was soon in turmoil again as the new government, headquartered in the south, tried unsuccessfully to control the northern provinces. The Communists, once supporters of the Kuomintang but now its enemies, regained strength and essentially established their own government and military in Kiangsi province in the south. In September of 1931 the new government faced a new and even greater threat: Japan took Manchuria and began to move south in an attempt to occupy China.
The Kuomintang already rejected all things foreign, and Japan’s invasion increased feelings of nationalism and anti-foreign sentiments. Attacks against foreigners became more frequent, and in early 1932 we received news that shattered us: Ruth Ehren, the deaconess who had come over to China with us in 1906 and had accompanied us to Shanghai when we were married, was kidnapped and held for ransom by a band of soldiers said to be Communists. The mission in Shin Sheng Chou received a ransom note from the kidnappers along with a bloody finger wrapped in a dirty scrap of blue cotton. The mission staff tried frantically to negotiate with the kidnappers, but two weeks later word came that Ruth had been killed. She had been tortured each day and was said to have lost her mind.
A few months later a messenger from the yamen came to the compound with word that the magistrate desired my presence. I was replacing the last loose tiles on the roof of the clinic, an annual chore, and when I finished the task I walked into the city alone. When I reached the yamen, I was escorted through the first, second, and third courtyards to the magistrate’s living quarters, where I found him in an agitated state. He motioned for me to be seated and asked his servant to leave us, and once we were alone he paced the length of the room for a few minutes, not speaking, his tall form bent over as if beneath a burden. Finally he sat down across from me, and I saw how much he had aged since the war.
“Mu shih,” he said, “my country is changing.”
I almost laughed; he seemed to be stating the obvious. “It has been so for many years, Magistrate. Certainly, since I have been here, change has been the one constant.”
He shook his head. “That has been change on the surface. The change I sense is far deeper, a transformation of our most basic beliefs. China will be a different place before long; our very core is being altered.”
“Surely, Magistrate—” I started, but he shook his head, and when he continued, it was as if he were speaking to someone sitting next to me, for he did not meet my gaze.
“In the past, you have been a refuge for those who came to your compound in times of danger or want. We have been grateful for your protection, but that, too, is changing. I fear that in the future the reverse will be true: your presence will put those near you in peril.” He paused for a moment; then, his voice low, he said, “My friend, if the Communists gain power, they will try to kill every missionary in the country; they have said as much. Mission stations will become the most dangerous places to be, rather than the safest.” Finally he met my eyes. “I believe the time is coming when you will need to leave us to protect us.”
His words stunned me. But I knew what he said was true, and at that moment I saw that the feeling I had had in the middle of the night a few months earlier had been correct. The magistrate was voicing what I had known but had not wanted to acknowledge: Katherine and I would soon leave China. “Do you believe that time has come?”
He shook his head. “Not yet. But I sense i
t on the horizon and it saddens me, which is why I felt the need to speak with you.” He paused and seemed to weigh his words. “When the time comes for you to leave—and it will come, of this I am certain—you must know that your leaving will bring our city great sadness, and that it is not our wish.”
I nodded; the truth of what he said sank in me like a stone. My throat tight, I said, “I understand.”
The magistrate gestured to a servant standing at the door. The servant left and returned with tea, which he served to us. The magistrate motioned for me to drink and seemed relieved to have the conversation over with. He changed the subject, and we spoke for a while about his youth in the country to the northeast. But our exchange was strained—I could see he felt grieved—and I soon left him.
I told no one about our conversation, not even Katherine. Broaching the subject of leaving seemed premature, so I waited and watched for a sign. I thought the decision might be made for us, and I half expected to hear that the Consulate or the Mission Board was once again urging evacuation and that Katherine and I would be forced to leave. At night as I lay in bed staring at the worn beams of our ceiling, I tried to envision our departure, and I prayed that when the time came I would be able to freely let go of this great gift from my Lord—this place that had become my home, and the people who were my family.
Six months later, on a fall day in 1932, the magistrate’s servant once again came to our compound. When he found me, he was frantic: the magistrate was in grave trouble, he said; I must come at once. I did not hesitate, and together we hurried to the city, where I followed him through streets that, as we neared the yamen, became strangely empty. It was mid-morning, a time when the city was usually busy.
When we entered the yamen gates the servant ran through the courtyards as I followed. Normally the yamen was busy with the city’s merchants conducting their business, but that day it was eerily still. We were about to enter the fourth courtyard when two strangers came out of the magistrate’s living quarters. The servant and I stopped. Each of the men carried a large sword, and as the servant and I watched, they casually wiped blood from their swords on their trousers. They seemed very much at home; they were relaxed and calm, even jovial. When they saw me, they seemed surprised to see me. I could not recall ever meeting them, but they smiled and greeted me by name.
“Mu shih,” said the taller of the two, “how do you come to be here at such an early hour? Is there not enough to occupy you with your church?” He glanced at his companion and the two of them laughed easily.
“The magistrate requested my presence,” I said.
The shorter man smiled. “Kung P’ei Te, you are mistaken. The magistrate is well, but he is unable to welcome you. Let your heart down and come away from this place. My friend and I were here to speak with some spies we found hidden in the yamen. Return to your compound in peace.” Then the two men took hold of the magistrate’s servant and me and began to lead us roughly out of the courtyard. At the yamen’s huge outermost gate, they nearly threw us into the street before closing the gate and locking it.
I saw no choice but to return to the compound. I urged the servant to come with me, but he wanted only to be away from the yamen—and perhaps me—and he ran off through the city, his footsteps echoing behind him.
October 23, 1932
Yesterday when Will came from the yamen he looked drained and nearly sick. He said he was just tired and went upstairs, and it was Chung Hao who told me what had happened—that the magistrate and his wife had been murdered in their rooms. Who killed them and why is not known; the murderers could be bandits or “the others”—a name for Communists—or warlord soldiers or even Kuomintang. They could be anyone, really.
When I learned the news I went upstairs and found Will in our bedroom. I thought he hadn’t told me because he didn’t want to upset me, and I was cross; I don’t like it when he tries to carry too much by himself. But when I entered the room, my anger left me. Will was sitting motionless on the edge of the bed, staring out the window, his expression anguished. I sat down next to him and he looked at me but did not seem to see me. I took his hand and said, “This was not your fault,” for I know how my husband thinks. “They were not killed because they knew us,” I said, not at all sure it was true. Will said nothing; he just continued to look at me. Then he began to weep, and as I held him in my arms, I too gave in to my tears. The magistrate and his wife had been our friends and advocates for many years, and their deaths were a loss I could not take in. Nor could I dwell on the horrible deaths they had faced.
But my tears came from fear as well as grief, for I knew the murderers could have just as easily killed my husband too before going on their way. I have lost count of the number of times I have nearly lost him. When we were younger, the dangers of our lives here were a given: bandits and disease, warlords and violence were realities I didn’t question. I rarely let myself think about the risks, and when I did I assumed we were invincible. When Lily died I saw it as a fluke—our one misfortune. But each year I have understood more clearly how vulnerable we are, and I find myself longing for something I’ve never cared about before: I want us to be safe.
I think of my father when I told him I wanted to come to China. I was twenty-one years old, and he said he feared it was not safe for a woman alone. I think I laughed when he said this, for the thought had never occurred to me; safety seems irrelevant when one is young. But now it’s what I want; I want to grow old with my husband, who becomes more precious to me each year. I would have thought younger love was the stronger force, but my feelings for Will have put down roots whose depth I’m only beginning to sense, and while I think of our marriage as still young—nearly twenty-four years does not seem possible—I see it’s not a sapling but a sturdy old oak.
When I catch sight of him striding across the compound yard, I stop what I’m doing to watch him. I see his familiar walk: the efficient steps, his long legs, the way one shoulder is a little lower than the other, the way he taps his fingers against his thighs as he walks when he is puzzling over something. At breakfast when I look across the table at him I see the great kindness in his expression as he listens to Chung Hao’s concerns about this young church, and I see his wisdom, which is well beyond his years. I see compassion in his blue eyes, and I see the fatigue from too many years of too little sleep and too much work in the way he stands, resting, when he thinks no one sees him. When he is asleep, I see the growing gray in his blond hair and the furrows in his brow as he worries in his dreams. The term “middle age” fits where we are, for I see in him both the young man I fell in love with and the old one he will be. I see my own dear husband and I am struck by how deeply I love him, by how many times I have nearly lost him—and by how lost I would be without him.
Then I ask where my faith is. I decide I’m being selfish and that fear rather than faith is leading me, and I scold myself for my lapse; I buck up and work harder and turn my back on this yearning for calm. But it will not be silenced, and once again I am asking God: Would You give me a desire You do not plan to fulfill? I don’t receive an answer, but the Silence that greets me is somehow gentle, and I stop battering myself for my lack of faith and accept my desires as a mystery, to be felt rather than solved.
A month after the deaths of the magistrate and his wife, I was upstairs in the study writing to American churches when I suddenly wanted some air. The room seemed to be closing in on me, so much so that I almost felt panicked. I stood and went out into the hallway, not understanding the feeling that had come over me, knowing only that I needed to get out of that room.
I went downstairs to the back door of our home. I was about to step outside onto the porch that wrapped around the first floor when I stopped. Katherine was in the enclosed yard behind the house, hanging clean wet laundry on the lines that stretched between the two elm trees we had planted for just that purpose. She could have had help with this, which, knowing how fatigued she became, I had often suggested. But she always refused, sa
ying that the task reminded her of growing up, and that she loved the smell of the clean wet clothes.
I was about to go help her when something stopped me and kept me frozen at the door, watching my wife, staring at a scene I had witnessed hundreds of times. But it was different that day; Katherine was different. She looked so exhausted that I almost didn’t recognize her. I had never seen despair in her, but that was what I saw that afternoon, that and brokenness. The sight of her made me ache inside, and I wanted to go and comfort her, to repair whatever was wrong and dispel the sadness and exhaustion I saw. But something prevented me from opening the door; I had the feeling that I was supposed to see Katherine like this, and I watched intently as she picked up sheets and skirts and trousers and shirts from the wicker basket at her feet, shook them out, and pinned them to the clothesline.
Several minutes had passed when I realized that Mo Yun was standing next to me. She said, “Are you seeing her, mu shih?”
“Yes.”
“Do you see the fatigue?”
I nodded.
“Kung Mei Li’s life here is very hard on her,” she said gently. “She cannot do all that she could even a few years ago. She tires easily and experiences a great deal of fatigue.” Mo Yun paused for a moment. Then she said, “I do not believe she can recuperate here; she will not rest. She must return to America, where she can live a quieter life.” Mo Yun took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I believe that by staying here, you cut short her life.”