The Library of Legends

by Janie Chang

  They walked back along the path, the scent of leaf mold rising up as their footsteps disturbed the ground. Lian peered through the shrubs for a view of the fishing village and to her relief the village’s one main road looked peaceful, the houses intact. There was no sign that enemy aircraft had done anything more than fly over. Zhongmiao’s small fleet of fishing boats was sailing back to shore. A strong wind had come up and gusts rippled the lake’s green surface.

  Impulsively, Lian grasped Sparrow’s hand. “Thank you so much for coming with me to the caves. I’m glad we got to know each other better.”

  Sparrow squeezed her hand in return. “I’m glad too,” she said. “I’d like to think of us as friends.”

  LIAN FELL ASLEEP almost immediately that night. When she dreamed, it was of stone-paved streets in a strange city, rain streaming from roof gutters, storefronts shuttered against the storm. Windbeaten branches tapped against whitewashed walls and there were no streetlights anywhere. Two women with cloaks thrown over their heads were hurrying through the rain. Their gowns were in an ancient style. She followed them as they ran along streets and over bridges until, finally, they reached a neighborhood of high walls and imposing gates. The two women stopped at the entrance to a grand mansion, a set of double doors lit by a large red lantern that hung from the roof of a shallow portico. As if she sensed Lian’s presence, one of the women paused and turned around.

  And even though what Lian saw were the figures of two women standing in the rain, she knew one of them was actually the Prince. And that the Prince was Shao. The other woman, the one who had turned around, shone like a sliver of crescent moon. It was Sparrow Chen.

  “I’d like to think of us as friends,” she said, looking straight at Lian. Then the two women vanished through the doors.

  Chapter 15

  Food was something the students talked about constantly, especially while eating their meager, unimaginative meals. Some mixed large spoonsful of chili sauce in their rice and noodles just to have something tasty. Cook Tam had been hired just before Minghua 123 left Nanking and many of the students doubted his credentials. Others, more forgiving, pointed out the kitchen didn’t have much to work with. They complained, but knew they were lucky to have anything to eat at all. They were especially lucky that Zhongmiao was a fishing village, so Cook Tam was able to serve fresh fish every week. But they still couldn’t help reminiscing about their favorite dishes.

  “Roast pork with crispy skin,” Shorty Ho said, looking down glumly at the salty boiled peanuts sprinkled over his rice. They ate lunch standing around the dining tables since all their chairs and benches furnished the library. “River shrimp fried with scallions. My mother’s sticky-sweet Eight Treasure Rice Pudding.”

  “Chicken cooked with chestnuts in a honey-soy sauce,” said another. “Salt-and-pepper eel. Or just a fried egg.”

  Shao longed for many foods now, but more than anything else he craved fresh fruit. Oranges especially, the sweet juicy segments and fragrant peel. At New Year’s, his grandmother would give out oranges to all the children. But they weren’t allowed to eat them until she had taken out her ivory-handled knife and sliced each one into eight segments. When she handed Shao his cut orange she would say, “Here, have a duck, have a duck!” Then the old lady and the boy would giggle together in delight at this private joke because he had once confided to her he thought oranges more delicious than roast duck.

  The other thing Shao missed was the news. He had never done without a daily newspaper. But Zhongmiao was just a small fishing village, a place where few could read. News arrived by word of mouth, more rumor than news by the time they heard. For Minghua 123 this was unacceptable, so Old Fan, one of their laborers, made the four-hour walk to Hefei every other day. He left in the morning and returned late in the afternoon with a bundle of newspapers. Sometimes Cook Tam went along to replenish their supplies. On such occasions they would take a handbarrow, Old Fan pushing, Cook Tam riding in comfort. Sometimes the cook sent his assistant, a scrawny young man nicknamed “Bantien,” which meant “Half the Day,” because the cook complained it took half the day for the assistant to achieve anything.

  Shao could always tell by the number of students loitering in the yard whether it was time for Old Fan to return from Hefei. When he appeared at the factory gates, the large man was always besieged by students eager to snatch a look at the headlines, entreaties to let them see the front page before he delivered the papers.

  “It’s your professors who pay for these newspapers, Young Masters,” he would say, swatting them away. “You can read the news when the professors are finished.”

  But on this afternoon, when Old Fan and Bantien walked through the yard, both were untypically silent. Old Fan gave a copy of Xinwen Bao to Chen Ping, the first student who stopped him. Chen Ping unfolded the newspaper and cried out in dismay.

  “Shanghai has fallen!”

  The shout brought students running. The battle for Shanghai had dominated front pages since August. The Battle of Jiangyin to prevent Japanese warships from moving up the Yangtze River. The Battle of Luodian, a suburb of strategic importance. The heroic, doomed defense of Sihang warehouse, which the government had hoped would spur support from Western allies.

  And now the November 8 issue of Xinwen Bao reported that the army’s central command had given the order for a general retreat from Shanghai. Chen Ping read the front page out loud to a circle of grim faces. When Chen Ping handed out pages of the newspaper, Shao took the middle section, searching the columns until he found the editor in chief’s essay, his father’s words.

  Outside the International Settlement, streets are cratered and buildings leveled. Japanese sentries patrol empty neighborhoods, their soldiers looting among the ruins. Inside the Settlement, an estimated 500,000 displaced persons have taken refuge, filling camps and hospitals. There are also refugees who have not been counted, the ones being housed and fed by relatives. It’s common for twenty people to squeeze into rooms meant for a family of six.

  Foreigners who once belittled the Chinese family system as feudal and nepotistic are now thankful our tradition of duty to family has prevented worst-case scenarios. We hope they now understand our resilience as a people and a nation. China is worth supporting. China is worth more than words of sympathy. China needs her allies to take action.

  A muted atmosphere settled over the factory campus in the wake of losing Shanghai. Shao leaned against the back wall of a bunkhouse. In the yard, students drifted together in small, subdued groups to huddle over the newspapers. Some of the female students were weeping.

  “I knew Shanghai might fall, I just didn’t believe it actually would.” Jenmei came to stand beside Shao. She leaned her head on his shoulder. Shao hoped everyone was too preoccupied to notice. “Your family should be safe, though; they live inside the International Settlement.”

  “Yes, we do,” he said. “But my father goes in and out of the Settlement on business quite often to see the situation for himself. It’s a constant worry to my mother.”

  Jenmei patted his arm, her eyes sympathetic, her full lips curved in a soft smile. Then she slipped her hand into his. Just as gently he pulled his hand away from hers.

  “Jenmei,” he said, keeping his voice low, casual. “I’ve been thinking.”

  “You’ve been avoiding me for days, Shao,” she said. Her smile twisted, became slightly mocking. “Don’t feel embarrassed about what happened between us. I don’t hold myself to bourgeois notions of romance and neither should you. It was just an expression of physical desire. We shared a kiss or two, nothing more.”

  But there had been more. The smooth curve of her body from neck to back, the hollows at the base of her throat. The insistent pressure of her arms. Yet even as he listened to her murmured endearments, he’d felt detached. He’d sat up, moved away. And she had taken his refusal as a gesture of chivalry, that her virtue mattered to him. That she mattered to him.

  There were only twenty girls in Mingh
ua 123, a ratio so lopsided hardly any of them lacked admirers. But the romances were innocent, the girls treated with utmost deference. They were fellow scholars, young women from good families. Shorty Ho, who had developed a huge crush on Ying-Ying, would never think to lay a finger on her, never do anything to harm her reputation. Instead, he sent her poetry. All of it his own, all of it terrible.

  “Alas, I can’t help my bourgeois notions,” Shao said, trying to keep his tone light. “You’re a classmate and deserve my respect. I apologize. I won’t let it happen again.”

  “Well, don’t let this keep you from attending meetings,” Jenmei said. Her smile grew brighter even as her eyes narrowed. “It gives the younger ones confidence to see a senior student there.”

  “I’m sorry, Jenmei,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s not what I’m looking for.”

  “What are you looking for then?” Her smile was too wide. “Have you found it with your little maid? A servant who doesn’t deserve respect? Or that timid little Hu Lian, always hiding away from others?”

  “Sparrow is a friend, a member of my household,” he said, both angry and astonished that she would bring a servant into the discussion. “And Lian is a friend. I don’t understand you.”

  “No, apparently not,” and she sauntered away, tossing her hair so that it fanned out in the wind before settling again on her shoulders.

  AFTER THE FALL of Shanghai, the school newspaper received a flood of submissions ranging from fiery, patriotic opinion pieces to wistful memoirs of favorite spots in the city. Even Shorty Ho dropped off two pages of heartfelt prose. Meirong spent long hours sifting through the pile and handing out stories for volunteers to copy.

  “You’re spending too much time on this newspaper,” Lian said. “You do too much.”

  “Oh, Lian, you can say it,” Meirong said. She squinted over a submission. “You think I follow Jenmei blindly. But there’s lots of debate at our meetings, we all ask questions.”

  “Communism is officially forbidden by the government,” Lian said. “What if Minghua decides to actually enforce the rules?”

  “Our professors are very tolerant,” Meirong said. “Anyway, the worst thing they could do is expel us. Or send us to a camp for reeducation.”

  Lian sat beside Meirong and Ying-Ying for a few minutes. When more students entered the newspaper office, she got up quietly to make her way next door to the courtyard house. She couldn’t be part of it anymore, the cheerful teasing, the sharing of confidences. Not when she worried that Mr. Lee might expand her spying activities. Not when just a glimpse of Shao or Jenmei brought a hot flush to her cheeks.

  Outside the factory’s front gate, campfires burned against the brick wall. When travelers saw the handmade sign for Minghua University, many came in to beg for shelter. Even after some of the students reported cash and small items being stolen, Professor Kang still allowed travelers to camp inside the walls, but with added precautions. Two of the laborers stood guard on Scholars’ Lane while two more watched the gate.

  Lian walked past bands of travelers cooking their meals on charcoal braziers. The flickering glow cast cruel shadows on gaunt faces. She felt suddenly and irrationally fearful. She turned her eyes away as she hurried past and breathed a quiet sigh of relief when she reached the double doors of the courtyard house. The old gatekeeper who used to work for the factory owner bobbed his head at her and returned to his pipe.

  The sound of conversation from the courtyard made her pause. She’d hoped for a bit of solitude. There were people in the courtyard garden, screened from her view by shrubs of rhododendron and tall bamboos. Lian moved quietly along the brick walkway that bordered the courtyard, then stopped when she recognized the speaker’s confident tones.

  “The meetings aren’t just for students, you know,” Jenmei said. “If anything, it’s working-class folks like you who need to learn about the rights you’d have in a socialist country.”

  She sounded harsh, almost accusing. It wasn’t the persuasive, playful voice Jenmei normally used when coaxing people. Lian stayed out of sight, backing into the corner of the courtyard, a dark shadowed space between two houses. She peered out from behind the wall but still couldn’t see past the bamboo.

  “Thank you, Miss Wang, but it’s not for me.” A second voice, clear and lilting. Sparrow.

  “Your young master attends these meetings,” Jenmei said. “I thought you followed him everywhere. You followed him from Shanghai to Nanking. And now on this trek across China.”

  “I’ve no interest in politics, Miss Wang,” Sparrow said. “Please excuse me, I have duties.”

  “Wait, Sparrow, wait,” Jenmei said. “You know him better than anyone. How can I win him to our cause?” The plaintiveness of her voice, so different from a moment ago, made Lian think Jenmei didn’t really mean the Communist cause.

  There followed a long pause. “He’s searching for something you can’t give him, Miss Wang,” Sparrow said.

  “And what is that something?” Jenmei said, her voice bitter. “Do you give it to him? Besides washing and mending his clothes, what else do you do for him?”

  The sound of a slap. And then a gasp, a shocked intake of breath.

  Lian shrank deeper into the shadows, heart pounding. Jenmei ran from the garden, wiping a sleeve across her eyes. At the brick path, she paused to straighten up, then strode into the forecourt, self-assurance in the swing of her hips. She called out to the gatekeeper, a cheerful greeting. No one could have imagined she’d been in tears a moment ago.

  In the courtyard garden, behind the shrubbery, light moved. Sparrow, holding a lamp. The glow vanished in the direction of the laundry room, and Lian’s heartbeat slowed to a normal pace. So much of what she’d overheard worried her. Jenmei had been angry at Sparrow, hostile and accusing.

  But of more immediate concern, Jenmei had said Shao was attending meetings. In a place as confined as the factory campus, how could Mr. Lee not know this already? Was he testing Lian, waiting to see how long it would take for her to report this?

  Unbidden, her mind conjured their figures in the bunkhouse again. Candlelight caressing bodies. Lips touching.

  MR. LEE HAD TAKEN to dropping by the newspaper office every day. Although the students working on the paper were pleased he was so interested in Minghua 123 News, Lian knew his visits were to check on her. One day, as soon as she moved away from the table to leave, so did he, nodding at the student he had been chatting with, giving another a friendly slap on the back. He followed her out the door, staying a few feet behind until they were near the center of the yard, no one close by.

  “I’m glad you took my suggestion of spending more time with the school newspaper,” Mr. Lee said. “That makes it easier for you to keep an eye on things. And are you? Keeping an eye on things?”

  “Yes, I am,” she said, still unsure of what to do. He turned toward the bunkhouses.

  “Mr. Lee, wait,” she said, and he stopped to let her catch up. “What happens to Shao if he gets involved with the Communist Students Club?”

  “Nothing. His family’s too important.” His voice was kind. “We would take Wang Jenmei out of school, that’s all. She’s the bad influence, not Liu Shaoming.”

  “Would she go to one of those reeducation camps?” she said.

  “Perhaps,” he said, his eyes intent. “Is there something you want to tell me?”

  “Liu Shaoming has been attending her meetings,” she said. Her words came out in a rush. “I wasn’t sure until last night. And I don’t know how often he’s been.”

  Not waiting to hear his response she hurried to the library warehouse, books clutched tightly to her chest. She’d done it, but there was nothing to worry about. Shao’s father ran one of Shanghai’s biggest newspapers, his family owned banks and ships. They were the confidants of top government ministers. Nothing would happen to Shao. But Jenmei might be expelled. The meetings would stop and there wouldn’t be any more spying to do.

  And there wouldn
’t be any more trysts by candlelight.

  “WE ALL KNOW what the Nationalists want for China,” Chen Ping said. “But maybe I should hear some other points of view directly. Not through a newspaper politically biased toward the government. How can I defend or denounce either position without knowing the facts?”

  Shao knew Ping’s interest in politics was purely academic, but he didn’t want his friends to have more to do with Jenmei than necessary. She’d intrigued him at first, her strong will, her confidence. She brimmed with purpose. Lacking any of his own, he’d envied her convictions.

  Her attentions had not gone unnoticed by his friends.

  “She’s been waiting a long time for you to get within striking distance,” Shorty said. “Lucky for you I’m not taller. I know she’d find me irresistible.”

  Jenmei had become more outspoken, recruiting students and even servants. Although she promised members anonymity outside the Communist Students Club, Jenmei was using the fact that Shao had attended a couple of meetings to induce others to join. He didn’t like that. When he’d distanced himself from her, Shao hadn’t thought she’d be the sort whose feelings were easily hurt. He should’ve seen through her façade. He should’ve listened to Sparrow’s warnings.

  “Don’t waste your time, Ping,” Shao said. “Not tonight at least. We need to get ready for the morning.” Their time at the factory campus had come to an end. They were leaving Zhongmiao Village the next day.

  Shao packed all but the few items he would need in the morning. He climbed into bed by the dim light of the one lamp that still burned inside the bunkhouse. Most of his dormmates were already under the covers, getting in as much rest as they could before the long walk. The students couldn’t wait to get to a larger city. They were desperate for mail from home, and not just because they needed to know their families were safe. Out of touch, unable to draw on bank accounts, they were running low on cash and Shao was no different. He had lent a great deal of money to his classmates, never expecting to be paid back. He’d heard that professors were emptying their own wallets, giving Cook Tam money to buy food for Minghua 123.