by Janie Chang
The army promised to feed and clothe him. To Private Fung this seemed a better future than life on a barren farm. He didn’t want to leave his daughter behind with relatives who could barely feed themselves. They had no incentive to look after a girl who wasn’t even their own and if he sent them his army pay, they would probably spend it on food and clothing for their own children. After losing so many family members to hunger and disease, he preferred taking his chances with the army.
Fung kept Duckling out of sight the best he could. His captain chose to ignore the little girl. “She’s her father’s problem,” he said in curt reply to Lian’s timid question. “If he wants to bring her along, so be it. But they get no special treatment.”
Fung joked with his comrades, all of them raw recruits. They were in high spirits, lively as though gathering for a festival instead of fighting a war.
“They think it’s an adventure,” Lian said. “But then, at the start of our journey, we also believed we were on an adventure.”
“We weren’t actively marching into danger, though,” Meirong said. Across the deck, Duckling, finally tired out, was being passed from lap to lap. “Doesn’t he realize what it will be like on the front lines?”
“Oh, Meirong,” Ying-Ying said. “Don’t you think I tried to tell him? I said we could take her with us and look after her. That he could come to the Chengtu campus after the war and find her.”
But Fung had never seen war. He’d never been away from his family’s impoverished farm. All he knew was that he’d been given a new uniform of smooth khaki, the finest garments he’d ever worn, and that for the first time in her young life, his daughter was getting enough to eat. He was pleased the students had all fallen in love with Duckling and laughingly ignored their entreaties to let them take her.
“Waah, waah, she’s all I have,” he said. “She’s my family. We stay together. Did you hear her just now? She’s learned all the words to your song.”
Four nights later, they reached the wharf in Wuhan. A courier paced beside his horse, waiting to greet the boats. He ran aboard as soon as they tied up, waving a cylindrical message holder. The army captain opened the leather holder, read the order, and flung down both in disgust. He shouted at the soldiers, who began moving equipment off the decks. Then he strode on board the barge and spoke to Professor Kang before storming off again.
“The captain asks us to stay out of the way and let the soldiers disembark first,” the professor told the students. “They must march quickly for Henan.”
“But Henan is north,” Meirong said. “Even farther north than where we got on the boat. Why didn’t they just leave for Henan in the first place?”
The professor looked sad. “My guess is that Henan has suddenly become very important and in need of soldiers.”
They hugged and cosseted Duckling the entire time Fung and the other soldiers unloaded equipment from the barge. The girls stuffed as much food into Private Fung’s knapsack as it could hold. When it was Lian’s turn to hand over Duckling to the next student, she did so reluctantly. Her arms felt empty without the little girl. Duckling’s laughter, so delightful a day ago, now broke her heart.
Within an hour, the barges were unloaded, and the detachment of soldiers formed up. At the very back of the column, Private Fung stood at attention, one hand stiffly at his side, the other holding Duckling’s hand. When the column began to move, he swung her onto his shoulders.
The students called out her name and Duckling turned to beam at them, waving and laughing. Private Fung also turned to wave, a jaunty flourish that matched the wide grin on his face. The last they saw of Duckling was a small figure riding on her father’s shoulders, red ribbons bobbing.
Many of the girls wept as the soldiers vanished around the bend. Even in that final moment, Lian hoped Fung would come to his senses and leave Duckling with them. They are both just children, she thought, wiping away hot tears. Father and daughter, marching to their deaths.
Chapter 20
A half-empty boarding school in Wuhan had been assigned to Minghua 123 for their stay there. The cramped dormitory rooms, their narrow beds meant for middle schoolers, seemed palatial. The boarding school’s two dozen remaining pupils were teenage boys who had been cut off from their hometowns when war broke out. Their teachers were in the midst of planning their evacuation to Hunan Province in the south. Some of the boys had shyly asked the Minghua students about their experiences on the road.
Lian soon realized almost everyone in Wuhan was a newcomer. Thousands of troops poured into the city, adding to tens of thousands of refugees. Journalists from all the major papers waited in tea shops and outside government offices, exchanging rumors while scribbling out stories. It was, she had to admit, exciting to be in a big city again.
In Wuhan, food was still plentiful and street vendors offered cheap fare far tastier than Cook Tam’s unimaginative meals. When Lian and her classmates strolled through Wuhan, they always bumped into other students. Sometimes her classmates even ran into friends and relatives, traveling with their universities. They eagerly exchanged news and stories, shared meals.
“No radios, telegrams, or telephones,” one of them said over spicy noodles, the first really good noodles Lian had tasted since leaving Nanking. “One village where we stayed told us we were the first refugees they’d ever met. They didn’t even know we were at war.”
There were so many students in Wuhan, from both universities and middle schools, the government organized special events for them. The rally they were attending was sponsored by the Ministry of Education and attendance was mandatory.
“Would anyone even notice if we didn’t attend this rally?” Meirong complained as they pushed their way to Wuhan University. “I’ve heard about them and they sound like a boring waste of time.”
Wuhan University’s own students had evacuated weeks ago. Their splendid campus now housed government offices. Students were already gathered on the huge playing field, some of them shivering after standing outside in the cold for so long. Lian felt the wind pierce through her coat. She wrapped her scarf more tightly around her collar and pushed her hands deeper into her pockets.
“There must be more than two thousand students here,” Ying-Ying said, looking around.
They saw some of their classmates huddled at the edge of the field and elbowed through the crowd to join them. Shorty shouted and waved his arms at Ying-Ying when he saw her.
“Must you bellow like a street vendor?” Ying-Ying said. She tossed her hair at Shorty. “You’re an embarrassment to our school.”
“But it’s my specialty,” Shorty said, sounding hurt. Ying-Ying aimed a mock slap at his head, then allowed him to take her hand. They jostled for a better view of the stage, forming a tight cluster. Lian felt someone tug her hair and looked up to see Shao. He winked at her.
The speakers crackled with static and the opening bars of the national anthem blared out. Then a troupe of musicians came onstage to perform some patriotic songs and dances. Next a small orchestra made up of students played a Western piece, something classical. Finally came the real reason for the rally. A uniformed officer came to the microphone and began his speech.
“The Japanese bomb civilian targets to intimidate and demoralize.” The speaker’s words thundered through the open area, amplified to reach the far end of the field. “But this does not weaken our resolve.”
Lian thought of what they’d already seen, the tired and the homeless, the sick and the hopeless. Refugee centers short on food, shelter, and medicine. Old men and women sitting listlessly on straw mats. The woman who had given birth on the muddy banks of the Yangtze. When they saw her, the current was coaxing her unresisting body into its waters. None of those people had gone to war but it had devoured them just the same. So many deaths, rendered anonymous by the sheer number of victims.
“China is a vast land and our military takes advantage of this. Our government and armies move inland strategically. Not to retreat, but to
force the Japanese to stretch their resources across greater and greater distances.”
Shao took her hand. “Your mother will be all right,” he whispered, giving it a squeeze.
She gave him a quick, uncertain smile but did not pull away. She felt her hand grow warm in his.
WHEN THE RALLY ended, most of the students milled about on the playing field, introducing themselves, mingling and exchanging stories.
“I want to stay for a while,” Meirong said to Lian. “Make some new friends from other schools and hear about their travels. It’s all good material for Minghua 123 News. Unless you want me to walk back with you?”
“No, no. You stay,” Lian said, glad to see her friend’s extroverted nature surfacing. “I’m a bit tired and I need to mend my blouse.” Lian didn’t want to make any more new friends. Nor did she want to remember how warm and protecting Shao’s hand had felt over hers. Because she was certain it meant more to her than it did to him.
Back at the boarding school, she stood for a few minutes beside the radiator in the dormitory’s entrance lobby to warm up. Sunset angled its way in the windows, casting long striped shadows through the staircase banister. Lian reluctantly moved away from the radiator and trudged up the stairs to the room she shared with three others. As soon as she entered she saw the envelope on her bed.
Come to my office at six o’clock this evening.
It was from Mr. Lee. Her hands felt numb with cold again. What more did Lee want from her? And he wanted to see her at a time when everyone else would be in the dining hall.
Lee’s office was on the second floor of the school’s small administrative building. Lian pushed open the front door at the appointed time. Electricity to the campus was shut off at night to enforce the blackout. The entrance lobby was dark, but light from an open door sliced down the staircase. The wooden staircase creaked with her every step. She knocked at the door.
“Come in, come in,” the director of student services called out.
Mr. Lee’s desk faced the door, the window behind him taped over with newspaper. Other than a desk and chair, the office was bare. A door to the right of the desk, slightly ajar, connected his office with the one adjoining. A kerosene lamp cast the only light in the room. It was cheap, a clear glass chimney on a red-painted metal base, the sort that foreign oil companies gave away for free.
She took a deep breath, willing herself to meet his eyes.
“This is really the first chance we’ve had to chat since Zhongmiao Village,” he said. “What do you know about Wang Jenmei’s death?”
She gasped. It was the last question she had expected. “Nothing. I don’t know anything. I thought you . . . would know what happened.”
“And why would I know anything, Miss Hu? Do you think I’m a murderer?” He smiled as though joking, and his eyes flicked for a moment to the adjoining door. “Did you see anyone unfamiliar following our little convoy?”
“There were unfamiliar people every day,” she said, keeping her voice steady. “People who walked with us on the road. The ones who camped at the factory campus.”
“Very true.” Mr. Lee regarded her over his glasses. “But there might’ve been someone you spoke to while you were on the road. Someone you might run into again. If you remember or notice anything, you’ll let me know. Shut the door when you leave.”
Lian wanted to bolt out the door, but restrained herself. She wouldn’t betray her fear to Mr. Lee. By the time she reached the ground floor she was shaking so much she sank to the ground, back pressed against the corridor wall. She had to calm down, behave normally.
But how could Mr. Lee even think she knew something about Wang Jenmei’s death? More confusingly, didn’t he know?
Floorboards creaked and the door opened. Mr. Lee was coming out. She stood up and edged along the wall, deeper into the darkness of the corridor, away from the stairwell. Her fingers touched a doorframe. She didn’t dare push the door open in case its hinges were rusty. She pressed herself against the door, hoping the shallow niche of the doorframe and its shadows were enough to hide her.
The staircase creaked with footsteps. Then she heard Mr. Lee speak and her heart lurched. He knew she was still there. But almost immediately another voice replied. A man’s voice. Lee wasn’t talking to her. There was someone else. There were two men coming down the staircase.
“I don’t believe she knows anything about the murder.” Mr. Lee sounded slightly anxious.
“Perhaps it was someone sent by the Juntong,” the second man said. “Will the girl continue to cooperate?”
Juntong. The Nationalist Party’s military intelligence agency. Lian shuddered.
“Anyone suspected of conspiring with the enemy would be torn apart,” Lee said. “She doesn’t want people to know her father was a Japanese spy. If we need her, she’ll do as I say.”
“Well, we can’t ask for much. She’s not trained.” Lian thought the second man’s voice sounded familiar.
“I know, sir”—Lee’s voice was apologetic—“but she was the best I could do on short notice after Shen was killed. But do you really think the Juntong planted an assassin in our midst?”
Lee had called the other man “sir.” Someone more important. And Shen had been the previous student informant.
“If they did, then Wang Jenmei was more of a threat than we realized,” the unknown man said. “Someone murdered that student and didn’t bother informing us. Someone took action because we didn’t. Wang’s death was a warning, to us as well as to the students. We must be even more vigilant.”
“Sir, just one more thing,” Lee said.
The building door opened and slammed shut. Footsteps on the concrete outside. Lian pushed open the door she had been leaning against and tiptoed into the room. Across from the door, sheets of newsprint defined the rectangle of a window. Feeling her way to the window, she peeled aside one edge of the newspaper and peeked out. Lee was walking away, in the direction of the dining hall. The other man paused to light a cigarette. He took a long drag and strolled away. His burly figure, still wearing a white apron, was familiar.
Cook Tam was the man Mr. Lee had called “sir.”
Chapter 21
It seemed as though they would never get to Chengtu. There were so many schools on the move, so many students. Housing, funds, food, and transportation were all difficult to organize. The government was building classrooms and dormitories in Chengtu, but at least three other universities were already on their way there.
“It’s all taking longer than planned,” Mr. Lee announced. “We’ll meet the other Minghua groups in Changsha and stay a couple of months. We can celebrate the New Year there.”
The students in the dining hall erupted in wild cheers at the prospect of reuniting with the rest of their classmates.
“There’s more, there’s more,” he called over the noise. “We’re going by train to Changsha. Courtesy of the military. Boxcars for ourselves and our belongings.”
They cheered even more, quieting down when Mr. Lee waved his hands for silence.
“One more thing. A family on the train has very generously offered to let our female students and older staff members ride in their private car.” He cleared his throat. “Let me assure our young ladies it’s perfectly safe. You’ll ride in compartments with the women of the family.”
Meirong gave Lian a nudge. “At this point, I’m willing to compromise my virtue if it means sitting on soft benches for the next hundred miles.”
The bustling atmosphere in Wuhan had been good for Meirong. She’d made new friends from other universities and spent so many hours chatting with journalists that her classmates now teased her about changing her major to journalism.
“I just might,” Meirong said, looking superior. “Once our school is all together again, I just may transfer to Professor Mah’s Journalism Department.”
Lian took comfort in Meirong’s improved mood. And in the memory of Shao’s warm hand over hers. But would she ever shed he
r guilt over Jenmei? Or the fear that clenched her heart every time she saw Mr. Lee, and now, Cook Tam? Or her dread of an assassin so mysterious even the two men she feared didn’t know where that danger lay?
THE WUHAN RAILWAY station was mobbed. Lian and the other girls were able to get on board their train only because an army officer took them through the cordon of soldiers. When they finally climbed aboard the private railcar, a young woman their own age greeted them, her smile one of genuine delight. She wore a stylish wool suit, long hair twisted up in a knot. Her face was bare of makeup but her brows were carefully shaped, her nails buffed to a shine.
“My name is Wei Fanling. Please make yourselves comfortable,” she said. “We’re all family and we already know everything about one another. We’ve been dying for new companions.”
Lian, Meirong, and Ying-Ying shared a compartment with Fanling and three other girls, all cousins. They were fresh and neatly dressed, making the Minghua students self-conscious of their shabby clothing and blunt-cut hair, the straw sandals tied over their shoes.
“Don’t apologize,” one of the Wei girls said. “You’re so much braver than we are, enduring so much to continue your education while we ride in comfort.”
The cousins bombarded them with questions. Their sincere, unaffected interest made conversation easy. The Wei family had traveled all the way from Anhui Province. Their grandfather had decided it was time to evacuate Anhui. After Changsha, the train was going to Chengtu, where the Wei cousins were going to attend West China University.
“But why didn’t you head directly to Changsha from Anhui?” Meirong asked. “It’s so much farther to come up to Wuhan and then go west.”
“The direct route by rail was too dangerous,” one said, “and this was the only way we could all travel together.”
Fanling interrupted. “It’s because General Wei is our uncle.”
The general had arranged all their travel, giving his family priority on civilian transportation when possible, troop transportation if nothing else was available. This circuitous route was the result.