A Girl Divided

by Ellen Lindseth

  “Understand that I’m not officially recommending this,” the consul said at last. “But go to the Calcutta police and tell them your wallet was stolen, along with all your papers. I’ll have Jack prepare an official letter vouching for your identities and intentions. They’ll likely balk, but if you’re insistent enough, they’ll reissue you the visas you need. If they prove wholly recalcitrant, have them call my assistant.”

  She stiffened, aghast at the suggestion. “But that would be a lie.”

  Nathan’s fingers dug into her arm, silencing her. “And where will we pick up Miss Baker’s passport?”

  “I’ll arrange to have it at our consular office in Bombay, so you can pick it up on the way to the dock. I’ll certainly try to expedite things on my end. However, if plans go awry, my counterpart in Bombay may have an idea of what to do.” The consul stood. “Be sure to see my assistant on your way out so he can get all the necessary information as well as your ticket.”

  Nathan rose as well and shook hands with the man. “We will, and thank you.”

  The consul’s gaze rested on her again. “By the way, in case you didn’t hear in China, India has become a bit unsettled. There’s been a push in recent months for Indian independence, which has resulted in a few civic disturbances around the country. At the moment, the situation is peaceful enough, but tension is growing. So be careful. Should you be caught up in a demonstration, the locals might not necessarily know or care that you’re not British.”

  “Are you saying we’re in danger?” Anxiety threaded through her. “Because we have a friend who’s—”

  “Thanks for the warning.” Nathan seized her elbow again, his fingers biting in hard enough to make her eyes tear up. “But we’ve traveled extensively through rural China for almost a decade, so being regarded as ‘foreign devils’ is hardly new. We’ll be fine.”

  The consul smiled slightly. “Then I wish you safe travel to Bombay.”

  On the way back to the clerk’s desk, Genie’s thoughts whirled. She had never considered the possibility that they were all just trading one dangerous situation for another. Poor Sister Lavinia! Nor could she see how one ticket was going to help, unless Nathan intended to send her on alone. Only, he wouldn’t. Would he? He’d made a promise to her father.

  “Nathan—” she began on the way out of the consulate, after all the documents had been filled out and photographs taken.

  “Whatever your questions, they will have to wait. I’m not discussing anything until I’ve talked to Brother Marcus.” He all but bolted down the steps, the hastily sketched map to the police station in his hands.

  She was forced to hurry after him. The consul’s precious letter confirming her identity—the only thing standing between her and a Calcutta prison—was in Nathan’s coat pocket. “What does Brother Marcus have to do with—”

  Nathan grabbed her arm and hauled her around to face him. “Eugenia, your father put me in charge of this trip. Not you. So when I say we’ll discuss this later, that’s exactly what’s going to happen. Understand? And not another word about Sister Lavinia.”

  Her arm ached from the layer of bruises forming under his grip. Tears of frustration burned in her throat at the sheer depth of her powerlessness. A hundred passersby eyed her, yet she knew none would help should she try to protest. It wasn’t fair.

  It wasn’t right.

  “Do you understand?” Nathan repeated.

  “Yes,” she managed finally. Then her anger boiled over and she yanked her arm free. “But I don’t agree.”

  Chapter 15

  By the time Nathan and Genie returned to the hotel, it was nearly five in the evening. She trailed him into the relative cool of the lobby, exhausted, hungry, and thoroughly disgusted not only with Nathan but with herself. Despite her abhorrence of lies, her precarious situation had forced her to remain silent while Nathan lied to the police and then to the British consulate. Nor had she been able to withstand Nathan’s wintry demeanor following her outburst. Her need for his assistance ended up trumping her determination to ask if another American girl had been by, and she felt awful about it. Not one of her finer days.

  Still, the truth was, as much as she longed to be free of Nathan and his petty tyranny, traveling halfway around the world by herself would require more worldly experience than she currently possessed. And being trapped in India with a revolution brewing within while an enemy threatened from without? The possibility made her blood run cold.

  Pausing to let her eyes adjust to the interior dimness, she listened to the lobby buzzing with activity as usual. Nathan waved at someone, and then she spotted Brother Marcus sitting not far away. A slender dark-haired girl was perched on the couch beside him. Genie’s spirits lifted immediately.

  “Brother Marcus, Lavinia,” Nathan said, heading toward them. “You’re back.”

  “Brother Nathan. Miss Baker. I hope your day was successful?” The young red-haired missionary stood, a wide smile untangling itself from his beard.

  “It was.” Nathan clasped the man’s hand. “And it appears yours was as well.”

  “Indeed. Lavinia . . .” Marcus turned to the silent girl next to him, and his smile faded a bit. “These are our new friends I was telling you about.”

  Sister Lavinia glanced up, and Genie’s breath caught at the savage anger blazing in her intensely blue eyes. Then the girl blinked, and the emotion disappeared as if it had never existed. “Forgive me if I fail to say I’m pleased to meet you, because I’m not.”

  “Lavinia,” Marcus said sharply.

  “Oh.” Her eyelids fluttered briefly. “Am I to lie now? Pretend that they weren’t among any number of passengers who could have stopped my abduction? Stopped you from dragging me away from the body of the person I loved best, leaving it unburied for the dogs to devour?”

  Genie inhaled sharply. Desecration of a corpse was bad enough in any culture, but Zhenzhu would say there was no worse fate than to lie forgotten and unhonored after death. It was why Wu Fang had cut across the Nationalist line to retrieve his beloved wife’s burial marker, losing his arm in the process.

  “Desist, Lavinia.” Marcus’s voice was low, hard. “You know there was no time. Nor were you the only one who suffered.”

  “Yet I was the only one dragged onto the plane,” Lavinia shot back.

  Brother Marcus’s face flushed dangerously. “Have you forgotten John’s letter?”

  Lavinia paled and dropped her gaze to the carpet. Seeming to shrink in on herself, she went utterly still.

  The transformation was unsettling. Such forced obedience also touched some hidden nerve inside Genie.

  Nathan cleared his throat. “We were able to secure one more ticket for the ship to New York.”

  “So we are up to three.” Marcus exhaled and massaged the back of his neck. “’Tis not ideal, but perhaps we will think of something over dinner. At the least, we need to discuss our travel plans to Bombay.”

  “Of course. Let me check for messages, and then we can depart.” Nathan placed his hand on the small of Genie’s back, making her start. “Will you watch Eugenia for me? I’ve dragged her all over town today, and she’s likely tired.”

  She stared at him. Now he was worried about her? Not when she had told him all afternoon she would like to sit or at least get a bite to eat? He gave her a small smile and left for the front desk. Calling on her last reserves, she schooled her face into a polite, vacant expression. Maybe it was her mood, but the opulence surrounding her, the richly polished wood, the marble- and gold-accented pillars, seemed a slap in the face to the poverty she had seen in the streets today.

  With her irritation only increasing, she let her mind return to the problem of the three tickets. The inescapable fact was either she or Nathan was going to end up left behind, stranded in India without friend, or family, or money. It likely wouldn’t be her, since Nathan had promised her father she would get to the States. And likely not Lavinia, if Marcus’s behavior in Lashio was any indicatio
n.

  So that left Nathan behind and gave Genie a new escort, which might not be all bad as long as she willingly got on the boat. But what if Lavinia refuses, and Marcus resorts to sedation again? Will you once again idly stand by and let him? Genie’s conscience squirmed uncomfortably. Though in her defense, she hadn’t known the particulars of Lavinia’s reluctance.

  Nathan touched her elbow. “Eugenia, we’re leaving now.”

  Genie hesitated, the thought of Lavinia being physically forced to do something against her will not sitting right with her. Hadn’t her father raised her to be a champion for the downtrodden?

  “Wait,” she said, coming to a decision. Her heart thumped unsteadily as three pairs of eyes turned to her, but she stayed the course. “Lavinia and I need to return to our room first.”

  Lavinia’s eyebrows lifted fractionally.

  Nathan openly stared. “Why?”

  “Ah . . . feminine reasons.” She had trouble holding his gaze. “And I don’t want to go alone. There are too many men in the hotel. I—I don’t like the way they look at me.”

  “Fine. I’ll escort—”

  “No! I mean . . .” She paused as she racked her brain for a rational objection. “Lavinia might have something I, ah . . . need.”

  Her cheeks heated with the lie, her second one in as many minutes. She held her breath, sure he would see through the fabrication.

  Instead, it was he who looked away. “All right. But be quick about it.”

  She turned to Lavinia, but the girl was already on her feet. Together they silently crossed the lobby, Genie debating the best way to start what was likely to be a delicate conversation. Once they were out of sight of the men, she slowed her steps. She glanced down the hallway and saw they were alone. Good.

  “Mrs. Schmidt,” she began in a hushed voice.

  The young widow gave a slight shudder. “Call me Lavinia, please.”

  Genie hesitated, a little surprised. “All right. I gather from your disappearance this morning that you don’t want to go to the United States.”

  “You have gathered correctly, though you can see how well my wishes have been honored thus far.” Anger and something else—pain?—flashed in the girl’s blue eyes.

  “I’m sorry for what happened in Lashio,” Genie said quietly, guilt pricking her. “I thought you were afraid of flying.”

  “And now?” Lavinia snapped. “Now that you know the truth, do you hold my brother blameless?”

  “No. And again, I’m sorry.” Genie held the girl’s cold stare, trying to convey her emotions silently. We are the same. We are women, trapped between the walls of men and war.

  Lavinia looked away, her eyes suspiciously bright.

  “You heard we’ve only three tickets,” Genie said, pressing ahead. “That means one of us gets left behind. If you want it to be you, I’ll do what I can to make sure that happens. That no one forces you to leave against your will again.”

  Lavinia glanced toward the lobby. “Perhaps we should continue to the room.”

  Once they were safely inside, Lavinia plopped down onto the mattress. She turned an assessing gaze on Genie. “I’m assuming you really don’t need any supplies?”

  “No. I wanted a chance to talk privately. Nathan would kill me if he thought I was condoning feminine rebellion.”

  “As would Marcus.” Lavinia studied her for another second. “We can talk, but first—why are you trying to help me?”

  The question confused her. “Why wouldn’t I? It’s clear you are unhappy; should I not try to help?”

  “So it’s not because you’re trying to be rid of me because of my curse?” Lavinia asked flatly.

  “Curse?”

  “I thought perhaps my brother had mentioned it. Perhaps told your fiancé.”

  “Oh, Nathan isn’t my fiancé.”

  “Husband, then?”

  Genie gave a strangled laugh. “Heaven forbid. I would no more marry Nathan than I would your brother.”

  Lavinia tilted her head and studied Genie. “My brother isn’t a bad person. Some even say he’s passably handsome.”

  “He drugged you to get you out of Burma!”

  Lavinia shrugged slightly. “You didn’t seem to care before; what’s it to you now?”

  “Look, do you want to stay in India or not?” Genie asked, a little exasperated with the widow’s seeming inability to stay on topic even though they were pressed for time.

  Lavinia’s gaze slid out the window. “No. Have you seen the women on the street? Starving and forgotten, holding children half-rotted with leprosy . . .”

  “Perhaps if you returned to Burma?”

  “With what money?” Lavinia said bitterly. “I checked the ticket prices at the harbor and at the rail station. Or at least I tried, since many of the ticket sellers wouldn’t even talk to me because I’m a woman. And to whom would I return? To the rest of our group, who think the Good Lord abandoned them because of me?”

  Genie hesitated. The curse again. Her father would tell her such notions were foolish, and yet Zhenzhu wholly believed in them, often tucking protective talismans in nooks around the house to ward them off, but never where Genie’s father would find them.

  Stay away from the girl, she could almost hear Zhenzhu whisper in her ear. Lest you become infected by misfortune as well . . .

  Li Ming would likely agree, having been raised on the same fairy tales as Genie, tales rife with demons and enchantments.

  But her father would tell her that charity trumped all, and she was, if nothing else, her father’s daughter.

  “Curse or no,” she said, suppressing a twinge of unease, “if you’re saying you want to travel to the States, I will support you. If you don’t, I will do my best to see that you stay. But I should think you’d want to go, since your brother said he was taking you home to your parents. Isn’t that worth leaving the war behind for a bit?”

  “Not if your father swore he’d kill you the next time he saw you.”

  Genie blinked, sure she hadn’t heard that right. “Pardon?”

  Lavinia’s gaze fell to her hands, and she drew a deep breath. “I appreciate your concern, but I’m starting to think he’s right. My death would solve so much . . .”

  “Lavinia! Don’t even joke about such a thing,” Genie said, truly aghast.

  Lavinia glanced up, her blue eyes wells of pain. “Who’s joking? I no longer have anything left to live for . . .”

  “It only seems that way now because you’re grieving the loss of your husband and your friends,” Genie said firmly, remembering the tales of how distraught her father had been when her mother died. “You mustn’t give up.”

  “I am not grieving John’s—” Lavinia’s expression became shuttered, all emotion vanishing from her eyes as she stood. “We should rejoin the men. And to answer your question, what I want is immaterial. Marcus is set on my return, and only an act of God would change that.”

  Lavinia’s words turned out to be prescient as Nathan argued for more than two hours over dinner that Marcus should sell him one of his tickets. Brother Marcus didn’t agree, adamant that his sister return and equally assertive that he should accompany her. Nathan, not to be outdone, had brought up his promise to Genie’s father. His personal guarantee of her safe arrival at her aunt’s house in California. The only shared ground between them was that both women would be aboard the ship no matter what.

  Lavinia stopped pushing the curried lamb around her plate long enough to shoot Genie an I-told-you-so look.

  The spiced tea Genie had been savoring became like sand on her tongue. There was no way to avoid a showdown between the brother and sister now. If Ted had still been in town, she would have been sorely tempted to run away herself. Having stood up for her once, he wouldn’t have turned her away this time. Or Lavinia, either. Because of course she would bring the widow with her.

  As the four of them finished dinner in taut silence, memories of the night before haunted her. It was impossible to
imagine two more different evenings. Ted and the CNAC pilots had actively engaged her in conversation. Had asked her opinion. Had made her feel included, even when the topic was something she knew nothing about.

  She had even laughed, something she couldn’t imagine doing tonight.

  “Be sure to lock your door,” Marcus advised once they were back at the hotel. “We found men sleeping in your hallway this morning.”

  “Perhaps they were tired,” Lavinia said breezily as she hooked her arm through Genie’s, momentarily startling her. In her experience, only family members or people of long acquaintance ever casually touched one another.

  Marcus pointedly turned to Genie. “The train leaves very early in the morning. Either I or Brother Nathan will come for you around five a.m. Can you please be dressed and ready to go?”

  Genie hesitated. “Are all four of us going?”

  “Yes, of course. When I was out looking for Lavinia this morning, I purchased enough tickets for us all. Though things look worrisome now, I still have hope that, once we reach Bombay, the Good Lord will see fit to provide one more berth for Brother Nathan. So don’t worry, Sister Eugenia. Have faith.”

  When he smiled, his eyes crinkled at the corners, and Genie realized Lavinia had been right: that if she had met him under different circumstances, she might have considered him attractive, kind even.

  The realization gave her pause. How difficult it was to know someone’s true nature on appearance alone.

  Lavinia tugged on Genie’s arm, propelling her toward the hall. “Five will be fine.”

  Marcus scowled at his sister. “No more running away.”

  “How can I, when you hold my passport?” Lavinia asked bitterly.

  Once they were back in the room, the door safely locked, Lavinia’s spirits seemed to lift. While they got ready for bed, she asked about Genie’s travels, and about the flight from Lashio in particular.

  “Were there any open seats on the airplane?” Lavinia asked, taking a seat on her makeshift couch-bed. Genie had offered to share the bed this time, or even switch places with the girl. Lavinia had only laughed, saying she would probably end up on the floor anyway, since she was no longer used to soft mattresses.