by Janie Chang
Should she have begged Cook Tam to intervene? Should they have run away from Shangtan sooner? Why hadn’t she sent Meirong a letter before they left, to give her hope, to say they were going to get Shao’s father to help?
Shao led her into the elevator, then to the door of the flat. She felt his steadying hand on her arm. Inside, she dropped her cloth bag on the floor and went to the kitchen.
“Do you want tea?” she asked. “I can boil water.” She said this automatically, out of habit.
She didn’t know whether she made the tea or whether it was Shao who did it. She was mired in regrets. She hadn’t saved Meirong. No, that wasn’t true. She had saved Meirong, could have saved her. But her stubborn, willful friend had been too impatient. Surely Meirong must’ve known what would happen if she tried to escape. Had she escaped out of defiance? Or because she had been beaten and tortured during her “reeducation”?
Whenever Shao left, Lian didn’t notice. Nor did she remember eating anything for dinner.
In the morning, she pulled open the soft velvet drapes and looked down at the street. It was still early but Shanghai had been awake for hours. There were cars and rickshaws jostling along the road, handbarrows loaded with goods pushing their way between the lanes. A gleaming black sedan stopped and two young men got out, neckties loosened about their collars, laughing as they staggered into the apartment building opposite. A woman paused to smooth down her hair before hurrying into the florist shop, late for work.
It was all so busy and lively, so normal. Meirong would’ve made up a story to tell about the young men, about the florist shop assistant. But there was no Meirong, and now the only person Lian wanted was her mother. Not Shao, not Sparrow. Her mother. Her mother would’ve told her that the hard knot of pain in her chest wasn’t just because of Meirong. That it was all the tears she had been holding back since leaving Nanking, tears she had not allowed herself to cry over all the tragedies she had witnessed.
But if she started crying, she never would’ve stopped. Not for days.
Below, traffic moved and pedestrians filled sidewalks, the hundred small dramas of life on the street continued. Lian stood at the window until she was cold then moved stiffly into the kitchen, where she ran water into the kettle. She wasn’t hungry but she wanted to warm her hands around a bowl of hot water.
When the doorbell rang she considered not answering. It was probably Shao, checking on her. But she was living in property his family owned, so she couldn’t refuse. She opened the door to Sparrow, glowing in the dim light of the hallway.
“I heard about Meirong. How terrible,” Sparrow said. “I’m so sorry. Are you all right?” There was something in her voice that frightened Lian.
She came inside and gently led Lian to the couch. “I have news, Lian. It’s good news, but you must be strong.” Her hands pressed tightly around Lian’s. “I found your mother.”
Lian gave a little cry. “Where? Where is she?”
“She’s at West Gate Hospital on Siccawei Road,” Sparrow said. “Lian, she thought you were dead. She tried to kill herself.”
Chapter 35
Shao rushed to West Gate Hospital after reading the note Sparrow left him. She had found Lian’s mother at the Southern Baptist Mission’s refugee camp. Or rather, she learned that Lian’s mother had been working in their administrative office but was now in the hospital. She was taking Lian to see her mother.
He found Sparrow waiting in the corridor outside the ward.
“How is her mother?” he said, instinctively lowering his voice to a whisper. “What happened?”
“A letter of condolence from Minghua,” Sparrow said. Shao groaned.
Before anyone realized her intentions, Lian’s mother had run up to the second floor of the Mission’s offices, the highest building on the property, then thrown herself out a window. From such a height, she had broken her leg and briefly lost consciousness. And now she was in the hospital, lying in one of seven beds crammed into a room meant to sleep four patients.
“What can I do?” he said. “Does the hospital need payment?”
“No, this hospital is jointly run by several foreign missions,” Sparrow said. “But the problem is that they’ve lost one of their surgeons and the one who’s here is already working far too many hours. Lian’s mother is on a very long list.”
“Have you seen her mother? What’s she like?”
“I didn’t want to intrude on their reunion,” Sparrow said, “so I haven’t actually met her. I just took Lian to the room and looked in. There’s a strong resemblance. A small chin, eyes like smoky brown topaz. Beautiful.”
Lian came out, her face pale and her expression strained, but she managed a smile. Sparrow was right. Lian was beautiful.
“How’s your mother?” Shao said. He held his hand out to her but she didn’t take it, just leaned her back on the wall beside him. Her blunt-cut hair was growing out and hung over her face, like curtains closing her off to him.
“She’s happy I’m not dead,” Lian said, “and I had so much explaining to do. But she’s in pain. A broken leg, you don’t even need X-rays to see that. The nurse says it should be set quickly, but how long a wait, she can’t tell. And there’s some chance of infection.”
Shao looked around. The hospital was cleaner than the one in Changsha, but that wasn’t saying much. Patients sat on benches and corridor floors waiting for care, some with open, weeping sores. There were children with eye infections, adults with large, visible tumors. Too many were wounded.
“There’s so many urgent cases ahead of her,” Lian said. “I understand that. I just want her to come home.” The catch in her voice pinched his heart, a sharp twinge.
“Have you eaten at all today?” Sparrow said. “Can your mother eat? I’ll get something and bring it back.”
“I’d be so grateful,” Lian said. She straightened up. “I’m going to sit with my mother and watch her in case she starts running a fever. Apparently, that’s the first sign of infection.” Lian returned to her mother’s room.
“She looks so fragile and so . . . young,” Shao said. “She makes me feel protective. As though she needs my help.”
“Lian isn’t fragile,” Sparrow said. “Think of what she’s had to deal with on top of the hardships we all faced with Minghua 123.”
Shao mused on all Lian had been through. That business with Mr. Lee. Then being threatened by Wendian. Not knowing where her mother was the entire time they were on the road. That moment in the air-raid shelter when he’d caught a glimpse of the steel in her. With or without him, she would’ve come to Shanghai for her mother, for Meirong.
“No, she doesn’t need protection, but she makes me feel worthwhile.” He leaned against the corridor wall. “As though I’m someone who can make a difference.”
“Don’t I make you feel worthwhile, Young Master?” Sparrow asked. He couldn’t tell whether she was teasing.
“You take care of me, Sparrow. You’re so competent it makes me feel useless,” he said. “Everyone just thinks of me as the youngest son. They see my family’s money and think I won’t ever amount to much.”
“You’ve done well at Minghua,” Sparrow said. “Good grades, a tutorial leader.”
“But now I’m back in Shanghai, doing what my father wants,” he said. “He’s enrolled me at Jiao Tong University. I’m not like my brothers. They’ve always been decisive. All I’ve ever done is follow along. I have no initiative of my own.”
“You thought of getting your father to help Meirong,” Sparrow said. “You helped Lian escape to Shanghai.”
“I got sick,” he said. “It would’ve been a lot faster if you hadn’t had to look after me most of the way.”
“It’s not your fault for getting sick,” Sparrow said. “And all you really needed was some rest, good food, and Dr. Mao.”
WHILE ON THE road, trudging behind a cart, Shao had tried not to think too much about his hometown. Now he could admit how much he had missed its noisy
sophistication, brightly lit streets where music blared out from nightclubs and delicious smells escaped through restaurant doors. He’d missed the gleam of polished automobiles and the gaudy flashes of neon signs. It was easy to take a route that avoided the edges of the Settlement, so that he wouldn’t have to look at the ugly barbed-wire barricades. He enjoyed walking its streets, pretending that war had never touched the city.
But today he took a rickshaw, promising the puller a silver coin if he ran fast. Shao checked the address on the business card one more time as the rickshaw rushed through traffic, cutting off other vehicles and taking shortcuts through alleys too narrow for cars. Shao got off on Nanho Road, a street of modest shops and apartments. He took the stairs two at a time to the building’s third floor hoping he wasn’t too late, that Dr. Mao’s office hours were not yet over. When he reached the landing, it was immediately obvious which flat contained the doctor’s office. A handwritten sign pasted on the door read DR. MAO BA. PHYSICIAN AND SURGEON.
Shao rapped on the door. When there was no reply, he pushed it open. An empty desk and chair, a tall filing cabinet, the pale green walls bare except for a pair of calligraphy scrolls. A folding screen of green fabric divided the room in half. The murmur of conversation came from behind the screen.
He called a greeting and a voice from behind the screen, cheerful and familiar, called back. “Please sit and wait. Two minutes.”
While he waited, Shao took a closer look at the scrolls. Two lines of poetry by the Tang Dynasty poet Zhang Jiuling. The calligraphy was exceptional, the brushstrokes expressive yet still within the bounds of classical style. If this was Dr. Mao’s own calligraphy, no wonder Judge Liu had been impressed. The doctor possessed the gentlemanly accomplishments of a scholar as well as a medical degree.
“You’re better off spending your money on nutritious fresh fruits and vegetables.” Dr. Mao came out from behind the screen with his patient, a pregnant woman. “Those herbal remedies are of questionable benefit.”
The doctor closed the door after the woman, then turned to shake Shao’s hand. “Mr. Liu, are you unwell again? Or are you here because of your mother?”
“I’m fine,” Shao said, “and my mother is as well as can be expected. No, I’m here on behalf of my friend Lian. Her mother needs someone to set her broken leg.”
WEST GATE HOSPITAL for Women and Children was staffed entirely by women, its charter drawn up during a time when Chinese women, especially those of good family, were forbidden to be seen by men who were not relatives, let alone foreign men. But these were extraordinary times and the hospital was desperate. Shao could only hope they were desperate enough to agree to his idea.
He accompanied Dr. Mao to meet the head of surgery, an American woman. She was polite but wary, obviously skeptical. Shao moved out of earshot, watched the woman’s gestures grow animated, her body shifting closer to Dr. Mao. Then she shook Dr. Mao’s hand, holding it in both of hers as though his presence was a miracle.
In exchange for the use of an operating theater and assistants, Dr. Mao agreed to perform two other surgeries. Furthermore, he would fill in as a visiting doctor two days a week.
“I’m sorry, Doctor,” Shao said. “I didn’t mean to add more to your workload.”
“Nonsense, I should thank you,” the doctor said. “It’s good for my practice to be affiliated with a hospital. There’s only so much I can do from an office. As for workload, I’ve hardly got any patients. I’m too new. I have no reputation yet in Shanghai.”
“But now you’re the Liu family doctor,” Sparrow said. “When word gets around, all of Shanghai society will be at your door.”
“Maybe, maybe,” he replied amiably and picked up his bag. “Now let’s go see my new patient.”
Shao followed the doctor, who strode along the corridor, absentmindedly tugging at the stethoscope around his neck. There was something incongruous about the shiny instrument dangling down the front of his long scholar’s gown.
Lian’s face transformed when Shao explained that Dr. Mao would operate on her mother. There was a small glimmer at first, like the flame from a matchstick. Then a smile that made her face glow like lamplight. She’d looked up at Shao as though he had performed a miracle. As though Shao were the one who would set her mother’s leg. For a moment, he thought she was going to fling her arms around him, and he braced himself in smiling anticipation. But instead she took a step back.
“You’re wonderful, Shao,” Lian said. “I can’t thank you enough.” Then she disappeared through the swinging doors back into the ward, leaving him alone with Sparrow.
Sparrow’s expression could only be described as appraising. “That was very kind of you, Young Master. And quick thinking.”
“Dr. Mao is the kind one,” he said. “He’s not going to charge Lian for the operation. He says his patients pay according to their means. No wonder he lives and works out of a tiny flat.”
“That will change when patients of means begin coming to him,” Sparrow said. “Why don’t you go home, Young Master? You should go see your mother. I’ll wait here in case Miss Hu or her mother needs anything.”
He nodded. “I’ll go home now. Let’s talk when you’re back home too. We haven’t spent much time together lately, have we?”
“If you have any spare time, you need to spend it with your mother, Young Master,” Sparrow said. “It matters to her and it matters to you. Once she’s gone, you’ll be sorry for every minute you weren’t by her side.”
“Sparrow, please don’t call me ‘Young Master’ anymore,” he said. “No one thinks of you as a servant. Once Second Aunt arranges a marriage for you, you’ll be mistress of your own household.”
Marriages and jobs. Gifts of money for the birth of a child and for funeral arrangements. The family servants could count on the Lius to take care of these things. But Sparrow didn’t respond. The silence between them grew.
“It seems so feudal, doesn’t it?” Shao said. Now he wished he hadn’t brought up the subject. “But Second Aunt will find a few suitable candidates. And you’ll get a good dowry.”
“I’m grateful to your father and Second Aunt,” Sparrow said. Her words were pleasant, yet unaccountably he felt reprimanded. “You should go home now.”
Chapter 36
Lian had spoken to Shao just once since West Gate Hospital. The day after her mother came home, there was a quiet knock on the apartment door, Shao and Sparrow. Lian put a finger to her lips. Her mother was sleeping.
“We came to drop off your mother’s belongings,” Sparrow said. She held a small wicker suitcase. “I went to the Southern Baptist Mission refugee camp. The ladies said to tell your mother they’re praying for a quick recovery.”
“We’ll go now,” Shao said. “We won’t bother you.”
“No, no,” Lian said quickly. “Let’s have some tea. Tell me about your mother, Shao.”
“I’ll make the tea,” Sparrow said. “And Old Zhao sent some pastries.”
Shao opened the French doors, letting in light and noise. He was casually and beautifully dressed, a cardigan of fine wool that matched the blue pinstripe of his Oxford shirt. He’d had a haircut and there was no longer any evidence of the windburn that had roughened his face. Lian resisted the impulse to touch his cheek.
“How is your mother—” she began.
But he interrupted her, speaking quickly, almost as if reciting. His father had sent for Dr. Mao, who diagnosed his mother’s various ailments as symptoms of cancer. The doctor had given them the news with kindness and tact. Then his father had called their longtime physician, Dr. Wu, to the house and asked whether his wife’s symptoms could be those of cancer. After another examination Dr. Wu admitted the possibility, then tried to blame his negligence on Mrs. Liu’s long history of nervous complaints.
Dr. Mao was now their family doctor, but Shao still held his father responsible for taking so long to consult a different doctor.
“He’s always been dismissive of my mother
’s health,” Shao said. He leaned against the wrought-iron railing and lit a cigarette. Lian didn’t remember him smoking before. “My father thought she was going through one of her moods and said as much to Dr. Wu, who was happy to do as little as possible. So neither of them took her seriously.”
Lian almost reached over to take his hand. She wanted to take his hand but knew she should keep her distance. She gripped the balcony railing instead. “So what does Dr. Mao prescribe?” she said.
“According to him, it’s too late,” Shao said. He savagely stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette and threw it over the balcony. “He says it would’ve been too late even six months ago. My mother won’t see the end of summer. His work now is to keep her comfortable.”
“I’m so sorry,” Lian said. She’d spent months worrying about her own mother but even in her most overwrought moments there had only been uncertainty, and therefore, hope. Shao had none.
“It’s all right in a way,” Shao said, “at least according to Mother. She says it’s a relief not having to wonder anymore if she’s been going mad with imagined ailments.”
Sparrow brought out a tray with tea and pastries and set it down.
“There’s some happier news,” Shao said. “My father is giving Sparrow a dowry and Second Aunt is doing the matchmaking. She lives for this sort of thing, my second aunt.”
Sparrow poured the tea, seemingly unperturbed and oblivious to Lian’s gaping open mouth. After they left, Lian went to the bedroom to check on her mother. But for the first time in days, it wasn’t her mother’s health that preoccupied her.
Sparrow, married.
LIAN COULD TELL her mother was still afraid. How long would it take for all those years of mistrust to let go? Even in the flat, with just the two of them, her mother still clung to old habits. She looked out of windows from behind the drapes and paused the conversation if she heard voices coming up the staircase. If only her mother could enjoy their reunion, which for Lian was like a dream after so many months of worry. A dream where she and her mother lived in a beautiful flat. Where they spent hours each night talking until her mother laughingly and reluctantly told her it was time for bed, as though she were a little girl again. Where they slept in the same room, Lian on a layer of quilts on the floor, her mother on the bed with a pillow propped under her plaster-casted leg.