Mao's Last Dancer

by Li Cunxin

  They then proceeded to have lengthy, almost philosophical conversations about individual rights versus group rights. Charles later said he’d almost enjoyed it, except for the fact that he was concerned about my safety. He was working on the assumption that they would hold me through the night and then take me to the airport and fly me out of America the following morning.

  But Ben and my friends would not leave the consulate without me. They refused to leave. So the consulate officials turned the lights out. The free tea, soft drinks and crackers were withdrawn. Only the use of the bathrooms was allowed.

  About twenty minutes later the officials came back into the room. Kind and polite persuasion changed to cold, threatening words.

  Ben and my friends continued to resist.

  By now, rumors about my detention at the consulate had started to spread to Louisa’s party. By 10.30 p.m. they suspected something terrible had happened. Two people in particular wanted to find out the truth: Anne Holmes and Carl Cunning-ham were dance critics for the Houston Chronicle and the Houston Post. They’d planned to interview me that night, but as time dragged on and I was still missing they eventually enlisted the help of some Houston Ballet board members and discovered that I was being held at the consulate against my will.

  Hours had passed. People were beginning to gather at the side entrance to the consulate. Charles was asked by Consul Zhang to go and deal with them. That was ironic, he thought: the small crowd included a few newspaper reporters, and the Chinese officials seemed to be putting an unusual amount of faith in him, asking him to talk with the press.

  Anne and Carl, the two dance critics, were among the small crowd gathering outside. Charles could only say to them that there was a discussion going on inside and they were about to resolve the situation. He believed that if he told them the truth it would make the situation even more inflammatory.

  He went back inside. “Look, there are members of the press out there, and they are not going to go away,” he told the Chinese officials. “They are going to make this into a big story.” But to Charles’s surprise the Chinese officials kept on insisting that, as a lawyer, he should know how to control the press. Charles laughed. This was America, he explained several times. In America even lawyers could not control the press.

  At one o’clock in the morning, after many hours of interrogation, I was collapsing with hunger and exhaustion. My head was throbbing. I couldn’t think anymore. I hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast the previous morning. I asked one of the consulars for something to eat. I didn’t care if they put something terrible in my food like sleeping pills or poison. I just needed food.

  They found me some leftover fried rice and a Tsingtao beer, a bittersweet offering—it reminded me of my parents back home. At least I would taste something from my hometown before I left this world, I thought.

  After my fried rice and beer they wanted to resume the interrogation. I told them that my brain couldn’t take any more. Please, just leave me alone, and if they wanted to kill me they should do it now. I had made up my mind. I wasn’t going back to China.

  To my surprise they agreed to stop their interrogation, and they assigned one of the guards to sleep in the room and keep an eye on me. I thought I’d just feign sleep, so I pretended to snore. But the guard simply told me to stop it, and we both twisted and turned all night.

  About the same time, Charles had his final discussion with Anne and Carl outside the consulate. They wanted to know all the details. They knew this was a front-page story. Charles asked them to withhold writing anything until the matter was resolved. They said they appreciated that, but they had a greater duty to the public and they had deadlines to meet. Charles went back inside and asked to use the telephone. First he rang Federal Judge Woodrow Seals, a feisty old guy who had been appointed by President John F. Kennedy.

  “Charles, this better be good,” he said. It was about two in the morning by now.

  Charles briefly explained the emergency, and Judge Seals told him that he would meet him at the federal courthouse at 6 a.m. along with the chief justice of the Southern District of Texas, John Singleton. Charles then called his legal assistant to help draw up the documents.

  Then, unknown to the consulate officials, Charles made another crucial call. He rang the U.S. State Department. He asked to speak to the duty officer for China. He said this was a critical matter. The U.S. government should act. Charles related the story of Simas Kudirka, a Lithuanian seaman who had been on board a Soviet trawler that was suspected of spying in U.S. waters in the early 1970s. Kudirka had jumped from the deck of the Soviet vessel onto the deck of a U.S. Coast Guard vessel. Soviet sailors forcibly removed him, and a long investigation followed. Everyone in the Coast Guard chain of command who had allowed Kudirka’s removal faced the possibility of court-martial.

  Kudirka eventually ended up in America. Charles had hosted him in Houston. He knew the U.S. State Department had internal regulations about the forcible repatriation of foreign nationals, particularly when it came to communist countries. He knew he’d said enough.

  The Chinese officials at this point became suspicious and told Charles that he could no longer use their phones. In any event, he knew he had to leave the consulate to help draft the legal documents. There were only a few hours left until morning, and he wanted to speed things along.

  After Charles left the consulate, the Chinese officials had had enough. They demanded all the Westerners follow Charles and leave the consulate at once. But everyone was determined. They refused to leave until they saw me safe and sound. This irritated the Chinese hosts even more. They cut the phone off and turned off the lights once more.

  When Charles left the consulate the morning papers were already out on the streets. Charles was shocked to see the headlines. “Chinese Consulate Holding Eight Americans Hostage.” He returned to his office, then went to the federal courthouse with the finished legal documents, ready for signature.

  Federal Judge Woodrow Seals and Chief Justice John Singleton were there as arranged. “Charles,” said Singleton bluntly, “I hope you know what you are doing.”

  “Well,” Charles replied, “there’s not much time, so we just have to try our best.”

  Once the documents were signed, Charles rang Chase Untermeyer, executive assistant to the then Vice President George Bush. Charles cited the Kudirka story again and said this was a critical matter. “Chase,” he said, “Vice President Bush’s wife, Barbara, is a trustee of the Houston Ballet. The vice president should know the Chinese consulate is holding a Houston Ballet dancer, Li Cunxin, against his will.” Charles knew the vice president would take appropriate action.

  Chase in turn immediately contacted Vice President Bush, who had Chase call James Lilly, who was then the Asia specialist on the National Security Council and was later to become the U.S. ambassador to China.

  Charles then returned to the consulate with a federal marshal to serve both orders, one ordering the consul general to produce me and the other enjoining the consul general from removing me from the country. The handful of people waiting outside had grown, and they were mostly press. One man, looking very much like Clark Kent with pad and pencil in hand, walked up to Charles and whispered in his ear. He was FBI. “The consulate is surrounded,” he said. “We have the floor plans. There is no way they can take Li out.”

  Charles knocked on the door of the consulate, with the U.S. marshal, trying to serve the court orders. “Go away,” said an official, “there is no one here.”

  For the rest of the day Charles went to and from the consulate, but he was not allowed back in. He received many phone calls both from the federal court and from Washington. FBI numbers outside the consulate began to grow.

  Charles then received another call. It was from James Lilly in the White House. President Reagan was inquiring about the status of the case. Then the State Department called and asked Charles to go back to the consulate and tell them to reconnect their phones. The Chinese emba
ssy was trying to contact them to give them instructions.

  Charles returned to the consulate around 4 p.m., and by 5 o’clock he was again in a room by himself talking to Consul Zhang. Consul Zhang was almost in tears. He asked Charles again, did he have to release me? “Yes. The problem won’t go away. If you don’t release Li, it will only get worse.”

  The crowd outside now numbered around two hundred. All the major networks were there, television cameras in the back of flatbed trucks, cameras over the heads of the crowd, and the parking lot of Walgreen’s drugstore next door had been turned into a mini-TV studio. In my room at the top of the consulate, I was, of course, completely unaware of these developments.

  Soon after 5 p.m. Consul Zhang returned to my room. “Cunxin, for your own good, and for the last time, I’m going to ask you: will you go back to China?”

  Here is the turning point of my life, I thought. I was prepared for the worst. “No, I won’t go back. Do whatever you like with me.”

  He looked at me long and hard. Finally he said sadly, “I’m sorry you have chosen this road. I still believe you will regret it later. I’m sad we have lost you to America. You’re now a man without a country and a people. But I want to warn you, there are many reporters outside. What you say to them now or in the future will have a direct effect on you and your family back in China. You should consider seriously anything you say or do. We will be watching you.”

  I could hardly believe what I had heard. I was going to be free.

  All of sudden, I felt only compassion toward Consul Zhang. I understood that he only represented the government’s desires, what was best for China and the Communist Party. But, unlike me, he had to go back and he would probably never manage to get out again. He had been kind to me the whole time I was in Houston. “I’m sorry, Consul Zhang,” I said sincerely.

  He looked at me with a barely detectable hint of empathy and led me downstairs to Elizabeth and Charles.

  23

  MY NEW LIFE

  I kissed and hugged Elizabeth and told her that I loved her. I hugged and thanked Charles for saving my life. He was a man of great integrity. I couldn’t have found a better human being—he had risked his reputation to save me.

  I didn’t want to say anything to the reporters, but Charles knew they wouldn’t leave me alone until I did. So at 5.30 p.m. in front of a sea of microphones, flashing lights and cameras, with Elizabeth by my side, I managed a few simple words: “I am very happy to be able to stay with my wife and in America. I would like to do nice things for China and American art in the future.”

  All I could see was a mass of people and endless flashing lights. I could hear the clicking sounds of cameras, and reporters shouted questions at me from every direction. I held Elizabeth’s hand tight. I could not think anymore. I wanted to get away.

  At first some of the reporters’ cars followed us, trying for an exclusive. But Dilworth drove his BMW very fast and managed to lose all the cars except one. That car followed us through every red light. Finally Dilworth had had enough. He pulled over and took a gun from the glove compartment. I was weary of drama by that stage. I imagined another headline in the newspapers: Chinese defector in shooting incident.

  But then two men got out of the other car and approached us. They flashed their FBI badges. “Mr. Cooksin, the FBI would like to take you and your wife to a safe house for your protection. You are in a dangerous situation. The U.S. government has an obligation to make sure you are safe. The Chinese government may well choose to retaliate. Do you understand?”

  I shook my head. “What’s safe house?” I asked.

  The FBI man smiled. “It’s a comfortable house in a secret location guarded by the FBI. There will be someone to serve you twenty-four hours a day. It’s as safe as the White House. You’ll like it.”

  “Thank you, but I don’t want go to safe house. I have my freedom now. Please, leave me alone,” I replied.

  “You’re taking a big chance,” the FBI man warned.

  “I know, but I cannot live my life in fear.”

  The FBI man handed me a telephone number to call if I found myself in any kind of danger. “Just a precautionary measure,” he said. “The FBI will have trailers on you until we feel it is safe enough.”

  “No, I don’t want you follow me,” I said.

  He smiled again. “Don’t worry, you won’t even notice.”

  And, true to his word, if they did have someone trail me in those next few months, not once did I notice.

  After my release from the consulate my story was flashed all over the TV networks, the newspapers and the radio stations. I received a flood of requests—Hollywood movie offers, books, TV, radio and newspaper interviews, magazine story offers and job offers from ballet companies all over the world. There were even offers in the Chinese newspapers that promised me lavish overseas holidays to my choice of destination. Yes, well, I thought—any destination as long as it’s in China.

  The only offer I accepted was an interview on Good Morning America. I wanted to explain my situation once and for all, to correct any false stories. I didn’t want my reputation as a defector to overshadow my reputation as a dancer.

  Elizabeth’s mother had flown to Houston from Florida as soon as she’d heard that her daughter and new son-in-law were locked up at the Chinese consulate. Now it was all over, Elizabeth and her mother and I were planning to drive to Florida to start our new lives together there. We didn’t really know what we were going to do. We were simply shell-shocked.

  On the morning we were to leave, Ben called. “Li, I’ve spoken to the Chinese consulate. They’re not objecting to you working with the Houston Ballet, and the dancers’ union has also given their permission. So I would still like to offer you that soloist contract.”

  I was overjoyed. I thought Ben would hate me forever! I thought I’d never work with him again.

  “What about you and China?” I asked. I still felt immense guilt.

  “I don’t know, the consulate is very cold toward me. You were the last person they ever suspected of defecting. There’s nothing more that I can do to convince them that I wasn’t involved.”

  “Will you ever forgive me?” I asked.

  “Yes, yes, I can. I wouldn’t offer you a contract if I couldn’t forgive you,” he replied.

  So Elizabeth and I abandoned our Florida plan for the time being, and I immediately joined the rehearsals for Ben’s new creation of Peer Gynt. I was so happy. Everyone welcomed me back with open arms.

  But even so, I didn’t know another soul in America outside Houston. My English was still very poor, and now I was cut off from my own family. Elizabeth and I had only her one-bedroom apartment until the lease expired a few months later.

  We eventually rented a two-bedroom fourplex, close to the ballet studios, as our first real home together. It was a run-down place with a noisy, inefficient air-conditioner and no mosquito screens on the windows. But we were happy.

  Lori and Dilworth continued to love and care for Elizabeth and me. They often cooked for us: Dilworth even attempted a Chinese stir-fry once. He used a lot of oyster sauce. After that I cooked some of my niang’s dishes for them, and Dilworth didn’t try to cook Chinese for me again. Instead he stuck to American culture, taking me to cowboy bars and nightclubs and generally treating me like a little brother. We had such good times together.

  It took awhile for Ben to feel comfortable with me again after the consulate incident. But now that I was a permanent member of the company, he started to give me more soloist and principal roles. My dancing continued to improve. A few months after my defection, Ben cast me in the technically challenging Don Quixote pas de deux for a national tour.

  So it wasn’t until Christmas that Elizabeth and I finally drove to Florida for our first holiday since our marriage. We stayed with her mother in West Palm Beach, and I met her father and his second wife.

  I was sad to discover that Elizabeth’s parents were divorced. Elizabeth had grown up
in a comfortable, middle-class family. Her father had a small printing business, and her mother was a receptionist at the West Palm Beach Ballet School. It was worlds apart from the kind of life I had known.

  But although I had Elizabeth’s love, my job with the Houston Ballet and my precious freedom, I couldn’t shake off a nagging dark shadow across my heart. I began to have nightmares. My family and I were being shot against a wall, just like the people from my commune back home. I would shout violently and wake up sweating and find Elizabeth leaning over me saying, “It’s all right. It’s all right.”

  I feared for my family and friends back in China. I feared the worst. I hated myself for putting my loved ones in danger. The pain to even imagine that I would never see them again! Everywhere I was reminded of my family. The good food that I ate every day in America would remind me of my family’s struggle for survival. Seeing Elizabeth’s mother reminded me of my niang. Tears would flood my eyes. Seeing children playing in the parks would remind me of my own childhood and all the games I used to play with my friends and brothers. And when the rain came, I thought of my family and wondered if they still rushed around to collect the flakes of dried yams from the rooftops before they got wet. I was homesick and guilt stricken and, without me realizing it, Elizabeth became the victim of my emotional suffering. My only escape was to dance.

  Throughout this time I made enormous progress with my dancing, and Elizabeth worked hard as a scholarship student. But Ben never considered her a top prospect, and she gradually became disillusioned. She was convinced Ben didn’t like her because she had married me. She was torn between her own dance career and mine.

  I felt so very sorry. Elizabeth was such a courageous girl. She was strong-minded and gregarious. We saw ourselves as Romeo and Juliet, but we were convinced our story would have a happy ending. Yet no matter how hard we tried, life’s intricacies always seemed to make our relationship worse. We avoided talking about the problem. We were afraid of hurting each other. I was still struggling to understand American culture, selfishly immersed in my own dancing world, arguing over unimportant things like unpaid bills and unwashed dishes.