Dreams of the Red Phoenix (16 page)

Kathryn peeled back the white kid gloves that she usually
saved for Sunday service or visiting Chinese matrons. She adjust
ed her little cloche hat, also usually reserved for special occasions.
Was Kathryn trying to impress her with her stylish appearance?
Shirley patted down her own hair and couldn't recall if she had
brushed it that day.

“You are something,” Kathryn said.

“Oh, it isn't me. I've never met such resilient, hardworking,
decent people. Caleb used to say as much, but I hardly listened
to him. The truth is, they deserve better than the lousy hands
they've been dealt in life. I just wish we could do more.”

“Who do you mean by ‘we'?” Kathryn asked.

“Captain Hsu and I and the others.”

Kathryn did not smile.

“You're welcome to join us anytime. I would love to be com
rades with you.”

Kathryn bristled at the suggestion.

“I didn't mean ‘comrades,'” Shirley said. “I just meant—”

“I think the good captain has been filling your head with pro
paganda,” Kathryn said.

Shirley could feel her face going hot.

“You know we're not supposed to be supporting the Reds. It
isn't policy. It's fine that you've been helping the injured, but I
think you should consider closing up shop here and joining Doc
Sturgis and the other Americans at the infirmary. I've been assist
ing over there, and he's really quite crackerjack at what he does.”

“That's wonderful, but I've been doing perfectly well over
here, too.”

“He's a doctor, Shirley. Have you forgotten that you're not?”

Shirley let out a shocked laugh, but Kathryn continued. “I
know he would love to have a real nurse at his side and not poor
imitations like me. The two of you would make an excellent
team.
That's
the team you should be crowing about.”

“I've trained a fine staff of Chinese to assist me.”

Kathryn gestured to the crowded rooms. “So I see. Chinese
everywhere you look.”

“Shouldn't there be Chinese everywhere? It is
their
country,
after all.”

“But this is
our
mission. This is neutral territory. We are not at
war with the Japanese. We are Americans, not Chinese. We need
to remain in charge.”

“I am in charge!” Shirley threw up her hands.

“Clearly,” Kathryn said, as she yanked back on her gloves,
“you have chosen to work with the Chinese precisely so you can
be in charge. Over at the infirmary, you'd have to give that up.
You'd have to play second fiddle.”

“I don't think that's the issue at all. I'm doing what Captain
Hsu has asked of me. I'm joining the cause like everyone else.”

“Well, hurrah for the revolution and all that!”

Shirley took a step back. “Kathryn, you're not making any
sense. First you accuse me of only doing this so that I can be at
the top of the heap. And then you seem to worry that I'm joining
in with the ranks of the masses. You can't have it both ways, my
dear.”

Kathryn bowed her head. Her shoulders rose and fell as she
gathered her breath. Then she reached out and took Shirley's
hands. “I'm just so worried about you. I don't know what you're
up to, and it makes me nervous.” She squeezed Shirley's fingers
for emphasis.

“Just before you arrived, I was thinking that I've never felt
more purposeful in my life. But of course, I miss you terribly. I
can't offer you tea in the parlor any longer.” She gave a weary
smile as she glanced at the changed room. “But you are always
welcome. I mean it.”

Kathryn slipped her hands from Shirley's and started to step
away.

“Give my best to Doc Sturgis,” Shirley added.

Kathryn flung open the screen door and marched down the
porch steps.

Shirley stood in the center of her front hallway and looked
about. Kathryn was right: Chinese surrounded her. She wished
she'd spoken up to her friend and said, “Why, yes, you're right,
hurrah for the revolution!” She wanted to shout it now.

Instead, she headed for the piano, which had stood untouched
for weeks. She pushed open the cover, sat heavily on the bench,
and, after a long pause, threw herself into playing. The dark, ro
mantic riffs soothed her and stirred her and reminded her of the
universality of life's tragedies. She played with as much vigor as
her sleep-deprived and hungry self could muster. She swayed and
shut her eyes and tried to block out everything else. When she
opened her eyes again, Dao-Ming was at her side, and for once,
the girl didn't startle Shirley. Instead, her thick, sweaty palm on
Shirley's forearm gave a sense that they were all in this together.
The music had brought the unfortunate Dao-Ming to her, and
Shirley could offer these chords as a gift in return.

Then the child pinched her with those dirty little fingernails,
and Shirley stopped playing. “Damn it, child,” she said in En
glish. “Don't do that!”

Shirley had not cursed in a long time. Caleb couldn't abide it,
and so she had changed her habits years ago, but it felt awfully
good now. Then she noticed Dao-Ming's eyes filling up. She pat
ted the girl's back and tried to soothe her.

“I'm so sorry, love,” she said. “I didn't mean to frighten you.
Was the music too much for you?”

Dao-Ming nodded.

“I hope I didn't bother the patient upstairs? How is she do
ing?”

Dao-Ming mouthed a word. They all knew that the girl un
derstood language but seemed unable to use it either for physical
or emotional reasons—Shirley had never bothered to consider
the cause. But now she leaned forward and put her ear to the
girl's lips. Sound began to issue forth surprisingly smoothly, per
haps coaxed out of her by the inspiring music. Shirley hoped that
was the case. She listened with great concentration, not wanting
to misunderstand the Chinese syllables. But Dao-Ming spoke
without trouble, and the word she said was “Dead.”

C
harles thrust the broom into the chimney pipe, and soot
bloomed everywhere. His khakis and button-down shirt
were streaked with ashes, his face and hands gone gray. He
pushed back the Chinese Army cap, and his hair became dusted
with it, too. He knew he had no business being up on the patched
and splintered bamboo roof. But he plunged the chimney one
more time, then made his way back down the ladder, whistling as
he went. That he'd brought his own ladder seemed to him a he
roic gesture, but the girl had hardly acknowledged it when he'd
come up the alley with it teetering on his shoulder. He hopped
from the bottom rung, and the billowing ash made him sneeze.
She finally looked up from where she sat on the stone bench and
giggled. Charles wiped his nose, which only seemed to amuse her
more.

“You're funny,” she said.

That wasn't his intention, but he tried to make the best of it.
At least her grandmother wasn't around to spoil things with her
sour tongue. The old woman's snores floated out from the shack,
offering a rather lousy soundtrack, Charles thought. In the mov
ies, the leading man nonchalantly leans against something and
looks down at the girl, who gazes up at him with adoring eyes
while romantic music swells. Charles leaned against the wall of
the mud shack now and looked down at this girl, who in turn
looked down at her lap. He joined her on the bench and asked
her name.

“Li Juan.”

“That means beautiful,” he said.

She remained unsmiling, her head bent with strands of dark
hair draped over her sallow cheeks. He knew he should say her
name was perfect for her, but he couldn't make himself form
the compliment. “You seem sad. Are you missing someone?” he
asked.

She appeared startled by the question but then nodded.

“Did you lose someone?”

She nodded again.

“A parent?”

“My mother has been gone from me.”

Charles swallowed hard. The Chinese had strange ways of
saying things without coming out and saying them, but he sup
posed she meant that her mother had died. “I'm sorry.”

“My grandmother and I must leave again soon,” she said.

“But you just got here. It's too dangerous to go back to where
you came from.”

She shrugged.

Charles stood and said, “You need to stay with us. If Lian
doesn't want you in her quarters, come to the big house with me.
My mother's got the whole Red Army in there, so she won't even
notice.”

“The Red Army is at your house?”

“Just some injured soldiers disguised as peasants.” He sat
down again, closer to her this time. “I should be whispering
about that, shouldn't I? I'm lousy at this.”

She smiled, and he wondered if he could reach over and take
her thin hand in his again. He remembered how it had felt. But
then he glanced down the alley and noticed Lian headed toward
them at a rapid clip. As always, she took small steps but man
aged to move very fast. She was bent with a braided straw basket
on her back, held in place by a strap around her forehead. Such
baskets were used by laborers or farmers during harvest; bow-
legged men who came up from the coal mines, misshapen by the
weight of the rocks in similar baskets on their shoulders.

“Here, Lian, let me help you with that,” he said and went to
take it off her.

She shooed him away and set it down on the packed ground.
She wheezed, the humid, sunny day clearly getting to her. The
basket was filled with clothing and towels torn into strips and
used as bandages, now covered in dried blood.

“What are you doing here, Charles-Boy?” she asked.

“I saw that your chimney needed fixing,” he said and pointed
to the ladder.

Her eyes shifted from Charles to Li Juan and back. “You are
man of the house now, I see. You carry on Father's duties. Very
good. Soon you study for pulpit and join other ministers and visit
parishes that Father love so much. Excellent, Charles! Mother
will be most proud. Off you go. Time to study Good Book!”

“Esteemed Lian,” he said, and kicked a pebble up the alley,
“you of all people know that life's not for me.”

Li Juan sprang from the bench then, raced forward, and
threw her arms around Lian. She pressed her cheek against the
older woman's plentiful chest and cried out, “Ma-ma,” as if she
could hold back the word no longer. Charles wondered if he'd
heard right, but then she said it again.

Lian patted her on the head. “Sit down, little niece. Sit, tired
one. She is exhausted from many travels,” she explained to
Charles. “She does not know what she says.”

The old grandmother's screeching voice came from inside the
shack. “Is that my daughter I hear? Is that my Lian? I hope you
brought us warm buns to eat and a delicious feast of duck and
dumplings, but I suspect you did not. No matter. Come to Moth
er so I tell you all the things your daughter did wrong today. She
is sullen girl and of no help to me.”

Li Juan shouted at the open door in the country dialect, “I'm
worn out with you, Grandmother. Who wouldn't be with all
your complaining?”

Lian's hand shot out and swatted Li Juan's backside, but the
girl was quick and escaped a second hit. She hid behind Charles's
back, and her small, powerful fingers wrung his arm.