by Janie Chang
Perhaps Master Yang conceded to his daughter out of guilt for letting her remain unmarried. Dajuin pasted signs on the wall that boasted FABRICS DIRECT FROM THE FACTORY, NO NEED TO GO IN TO SHANGHAI. Anjuin and Third Wife took turns working in the shop, at first under Grandmother Yang’s sharp eyes, then on their own as Grandmother Yang realized Anjuin could more than manage.
When I wasn’t at school or doing my chores for Grandmother Yang, I helped Anjuin and Third Wife at the store. Not that there was much to do, but it meant we could be on our own, a rare luxury. Without First Wife or Grandmother Yang around, we were less guarded, more easily moved to laughter by Third Wife’s stories about her family.
“So in front of all the guests my father said to my eldest brother, ‘Your son is a complete moron.’” Then Third Wife looked around the empty shop and lowered her voice. “And my brother replied, ‘I’m sorry about my son, Papa. But it skips a generation, you know!’”
Anjuin looked shocked for a moment. Then we all dissolved into giggles, Anjuin laughing so hard she had to grasp my hand to hold herself upright.
A YEAR AFTER her first child was born, Yun Na had a second baby, this time a boy. As mother to a son, she lost no time asserting herself over Anjuin. She even snubbed Third Wife, whom she should’ve respected as a mother-in-law. Always difficult, now she was intolerable.
By July I had saved enough money to place some ads.
Anjuin and I took a handbarrow to Shanghai. We had let Grandmother Yang think we were just going to look at the shops along Nanking Road, and at first she had been reluctant to give permission.
“Ever since our government banned the opium trade, the streets are filled with gangsters,” she said. “I’ve heard that warlords fund their armies by forcing their farmers to grow poppies, and the gangs are fighting for control of the Shanghai opium trade.”
It had been Dajuin who calmed her. “I go to Shanghai every day to call on customers, Grandmother. It’s safe. The Green Gang and the Red Gang don’t care about schoolgirls. Only each other.”
Anjuin and I shared a handbarrow with other passengers as far as the racecourse, then we walked the rest of the way to Xinwen Bao newspaper’s office at the corner of Hankow and Nanking Roads. All the way there, I was conscious of the searching looks people gave me. I hung my head and held tight to Anjuin’s hand.
The newspaper office was a scene of such chaos I wondered how they managed to print a newspaper at all. There was a great deal of shouting from a half-dozen men gathered around a desk at the far end of the room, all of them talking at once.
“Sun Yat-sen may be back from Japan, but the situation is too far gone. He can’t stop General Zhang Zuolin from putting Puyi back on the Dragon Throne.”
“I disagree. Zhang Zuolin may be the strongest of the warlords but he’s insane if he thinks he can restore the old Manchu regime. The Qing Dynasty will never regain power!”
“He’s got another agenda, just wait and see. That old fox has something to gain from all this.”
I caught a glimpse of the man whose desk they surrounded. He ignored the uproar and continued writing, pausing only to glance at some notes before returning to his work, a quiet figure in pale gray. His very stillness gave him an air of authority.
Anjuin and I found signs that directed us up the staircase to the next floor, where a row of clerks sat behind a row of desks. PAYMENTS. DELIVERY INSTRUCTIONS. SUBSCRIPTIONS. ADVERTISEMENTS.
Anjuin prodded me over to the Advertisements desk. A middle-aged clerk with pockmarked cheeks looked up from his magazine and studied me. He turned and spat.
Anjuin took over. “How much for a classified advertisement?”
“Seventy-five cents per line. Ten words in a line,” he said, his voice a grumble.
We knew this, but wanted to be sure. I pulled out the note from my tunic pocket and we quickly counted the words again.
Information wanted. The whereabouts of a woman named Zhu, who lived at the Fong residence on Dragon Springs Road, the External Roads area, around 1908.
“Twenty-five words,” I said.
“Give it here.” The clerk scanned my carefully penned sentences. “Three lines. And lucky for you, even after adding the reply box number, it’s still three lines.”
“The Shun Bao newspaper offices are just around the corner,” Anjuin said. “They may be cheaper.”
“The cost is based on circulation,” the clerk said. “The bigger the circulation, the more people see your advertisement. At Xinwen Bao we have a circulation of more than 90,000 every day. Shun Bao has more, so you’ll pay more there. You can go to one of the smaller papers, but then you won’t get the readership. We’re a good middle ground.”
“It’s just that I need to place this advertisement every week for several months, or until I get a reply. Or give up.” I couldn’t decide.
“Well, if you promise to advertise at least five times I can give you a discount. Ten percent.” He squinted at me and I nodded.
He began writing out my receipt then squinted at me again. “Can you afford more?”
“Why?” I asked.
“The woman you seek may not live in Shanghai anymore. You should probably advertise in other cities.”
Dejected, I looked at Anjuin. I hadn’t thought of that, but the clerk was right. What if my mother was living elsewhere in China?
“You can do it through this paper,” he said. “We have reciprocal arrangements with all the big newspapers in other cities. Costs a little more and you get your ad in three other city newspapers. Can’t hurt to try.”
I counted over more coins from my cloth pouch, but it gave me new hope to think that if my mother was now in Hangchow or Soochow, she might see my little ad. Even if she couldn’t afford to travel, surely she could afford a stamp to reply.
“Just do your best,” said the clerk, encouragingly. “Advertise when you can.”
After he finished writing up the order, Anjuin spoke up. “Is there always such a big commotion downstairs?”
He snorted. “The Royalist warlord Zhang Xun marched his army to Peking this morning and took over the Forbidden City. They put that child Puyi back on the throne. The Qing Dynasty is back in power and President Li is hiding at the French embassy.”
In the end, the Manchu Restoration lasted only twelve days. The Republican government’s forces defeated the Royalist army. Afterward, warlords recruited deserters from both sides. The warlord Zhang Zuolin did best. He now commanded the largest private army in China.
CHAPTER 13
January 1918, Year of the Horse
I worked away steadily in Miss Morris’s office, adding to the stack of finished copies. Every so often, the old fountain pen she had given me would need a wipe and for this I used crumpled sheets of notepaper from her wastebasket. The letters were very dull, reports to the mission, never anything personal. One day the word Eurasian caught my eye, so I smoothed out the page.
Gentlemen,
In 1865, the Anglican Church closed its Diocesan Female Training School after only three years. The Church found that upon leaving school with some proficiency in English, almost all the Eurasian girls became mistresses to European men.
Today, the situation is not appreciably different.
I stress it is not lack of schooling that drives these girls into concubinage or brothels. It is lack of opportunity. never Very rarely do our Eurasian girls find acceptance, let alone employment. They are bright and hardworking, but at best their mixed blood dooms them to menial work; at worst, they end up following their mothers’ professions. The Mission must provide do more to help some employment for our Eurasian graduates.
You may argue there are Eurasians who do well. Indeed there are entire communities of wealthy and middle-class Eurasians in Shanghai, Hong Kong, and other port cities. However, the girls in our care have no family and no such connections. There is no possibility of their being taken in by respectable Eurasian society. Therefore, I beg you to . . .
Concubinage and brothels. Factories. There had to be another way.
I wondered where Fox was traveling. I wished I could wander as she did, undetected, unafraid, sometimes an animal, sometimes a human.
EACH MONTH I made the trip into Shanghai and the Xinwen Bao offices to see whether anyone had replied to my advertisement. Anjuin came with me sometimes, but mostly I walked there and back on my own, to save money. Each month, the clerk persuaded me to pay for another month of ads. But after nine months, I felt ready to give up. I had finished my work for Miss Morris, and my savings were nearly gone, all of it spent on finding my mother. I’d been foolish to hope that anyone would notice my little classified ads.
At the Xinwen Bao office I went up the now-familiar staircase. The clerk, now also familiar, urged me to try for one more month of advertising. His smile was sympathetic, and I felt so grateful for his kind manner that I agreed.
I trudged down the staircase, counting the few small coins in my cloth purse. I looked down just long enough that I didn’t see the person running up the stairs until it was too late. I went sprawling down the steps.
“Are you hurt, miss?” A man’s hand reached down to pull me up.
“Yes, I mean, no, I’m fine,” I said, breathless. But I found it hard to stand. I winced and sat down on the bottom step, rubbing my ankle.
“I am so sorry,” he said, looking helpless. It was the man I’d seen on my first visit to the newspaper, the one who had been writing quietly at his desk while his colleagues milled around shouting.
“I’ll be fine in a minute, it’s all right.”
“Can you walk? Let’s go to my desk,” the man said. “Have some chrysanthemum tea. Give your ankle a bit more time to recover.”
He sat me in a chair facing his own, rummaged in a bottom drawer, and pulled out a cup. Carefully he poured in some cold tea and handed it to me.
I looked around, emboldened by his kindness. “It’s very quiet today. Almost no one here. Usually there’s so much talking and shouting.”
“It’s a rare day of quiet for news,” he said. “You commented ‘usually.’ Why do you usually come to this office?”
“I place a classified advertisement every month and come in to check for replies.”
“Why are you advertising?” he asked, holding a box out. I took a biscuit.
“I’m looking for my mother. She left nearly ten years ago, though, so it’s rather difficult. This will be my last advertisement.”
“I see,” he said, and his eyes studied my face closely for the first time. I waited for his expression to change to dislike, for him to realize I was zazhong.
“I should go now,” I said. “You must be busy. Thank you for the tea.”
“No, no. Stay. There’s nothing going on, I’m not busy at all. Tell me your story. What makes you believe your mother is still in Shanghai?” His expression remained friendly.
“That’s exactly what your clerk said. So he suggested advertising in other cities through your newspaper.”
“Really? Tell me more.” There was the slightest tightening in his voice.
“You have reciprocal relationships with other big newspapers. So I’ve paid your paper to advertise in other cities. Hangchow, Soochow, and Ningpo.”
“There’s no such thing as reciprocal relationships for advertising,” he said, pushing his chair away from the desk.
A small cry escaped me. The clerk had been so nice, so helpful, but he was like everyone else, always looking for a way to gain a bit more, even if it meant cheating a schoolgirl. A girl who was zazhong. I looked down at my hands and blinked tears from my eyes.
“Stay here,” the man said, his face grim as he got up.
I heard his voice echoing down the stairwell, angry and loud, but not loud enough that I could make out his words.
When he returned, he sat down again, fingers drumming the tabletop.
“I told him to return the money or he’ll be fired,” he said.
“Do I have to go back upstairs to get my money?” I said. I didn’t want to face the clerk again.
“No, I’ll give it to you now. It’s me he’ll have to pay back.” The man took a wallet out from his tunic pocket and counted out several bills. More than I had spent on ads. “Now tell me all about the search for your missing mother.”
He listened with intense attention, leaning back on his chair. At the end of my short recitation, he brought the legs of his chair thudding down on the floor.
“Miss Zhu Jialing, I propose hiring a private investigator to follow your mother’s trail after she left Dragon Springs Road. I’ll take care of the cost.”
“I don’t mean to be rude, sir,” I said cautiously, “but why do you want to help? You’ve given me back all my money. The newspaper doesn’t owe me anything.”
“Perhaps I’m hoping to earn a little merit with the gods.” He gave me a wry smile. “I knew a young woman like you, once. Hun xue. I always wish I’d been able to help her in time.”
In time for what? Something in his face kept me from asking more.
He stood up. “I’ll get in touch if something turns up, Miss Zhu. Write down your name and an address where I can send you mail. My name is Liu. Liu Sanmu.” He took a card from his desk and gave it to me.
On my way back I had so much to think about I barely noticed the long walk. I could hardly wait to share this turn of events with Anjuin. But when I got home, the household was in a state of turmoil.
First Wife had finally gone mad.
CHAPTER 14
Some musicians came into Dragon Springs Road so we all went outside to listen,” Anjuin said. “The musicians had a little boy who walked around holding out a basket for money. Just a toddler, a darling child.”
First Wife ran over to the boy, crying out, “My son, my son!” She gathered him in her arms and began walking back to the house, the boy looking uncertainly over her shoulder at his mother.
The musicians had been amused until the boy’s mother realized it wasn’t a game. She dropped her flute and ran over. Master Yang took the boy away from First Wife. He gave the woman some money, which smoothed over the incident. But just as he guided her back to the front gate, First Wife saw another little boy in the crowd and tried to run to him, calling out that he was her son.
Master Yang and Dajuin dragged First Wife through the front gates. As soon as she was back inside the Central Residence, she became passive and docile. Grandmother Yang made a herbal infusion to calm First Wife’s nerves. Master Yang gave her some account books to copy, just to keep her busy. First Wife was now working away quietly in her room, quite calm.
Dajuin’s wife, however, wasn’t appeased. She hurried her children away and shut them in her rooms. Then after supper, she confronted Master Yang.
“Send her away!” Yun Na demanded. “Send her to a Buddhist convent or back to Ningpo. She’s mad. What if she steals away my boy?”
“She wouldn’t take him very far, probably just to her own rooms,” Grandmother Yang said, but her brow creased. There was no telling what a madwoman might do.
“We can’t send her away,” Master Yang said. “Her clan and ours are very close. It would insult them.”
“Then lock her away!” the young woman cried.
Everyone knew the look on Yun Na’s face. She was about to throw a tantrum.
Then Dajuin spoke up.
“Why not move her into the Western Residence? If we fix up a few of the rooms, she can live there on her own. We could hire a servant to care for her. I think we can afford that now.”
Oh no. What would Fox do when she came back and found First Wife there?
IN ALL THE excitement, I had forgotten about the Xinwen Bao editor’s offer to help find my mother. The next morning, after washing up the breakfast dishes, I showed Anjuin the business card.
“Liu Sanmu. Editor and board member,” she read. “Goodness, he sounds important. Let’s show Dajuin.”
Dajuin was extremely impressed. “He m
ust belong to the Liu family that owns Xinwen Bao. A very forward-thinking clan. They support the Nationalists.”
“I still don’t understand why he’d be willing to spend all that money to hire a detective for Jialing,” Anjuin said. “He doesn’t even know her.”
“He probably doesn’t think it’s very expensive,” Dajuin said. “The Liu family is one of the wealthiest south of the Yangtze River. For someone like Liu Sanmu, the cost of a detective is of no more consequence than the cost of a bowl of noodles is to us. We can’t imagine how such people live.”
“AN ENTIRE COURTYARD for me?” First Wife asked Master Yang. “Surely it’s too much.”
She turned and looked questioningly at Grandmother Yang. We stood inside the front courtyard of the Western Residence, the door between courtyards unlocked for the first time in years.
“It’s your right as First Wife to have your own courtyard,” the older woman said, giving her daughter-in-law’s shoulder an encouraging pat. “Come see your rooms. We’ll all go.”
Its houses were old, but the Western Residence was at its most beautiful in late spring. Beneath the bamboos, wild bleeding heart had taken root and stands of feathery leaves with sprays of flowers the color of garnets bobbed in the breeze, brushing against my ankles as we walked along the path. In the courtyard, the fruit trees were shedding their blossoms and every small gust of wind blew a drift of white petals across the stone paving. Purple wisteria, which hadn’t been pruned in years, draped the trellis and spanned the gap to climb onto the roof of the derelict erfang, spilling fragrant blooms across the roof tiles. It was still too early for daylilies, but their bright leaves sprang up like small green fountains against corners and walls.
Surrounding Fox’s hydrangea, Anna’s flowers grew in a wild, undisciplined mass. I had collected seeds from my little patch in the Central Residence and sown them here. Over the years they had multiplied with joyous abandon. I even knew their English names now. Miss Morris had told me. Violas, clove pinks, forget-me-nots.