Dreams of the Red Phoenix (3 page)

“All right, then, a united front it is,” Shirley said and tried
to rally some enthusiasm. “They'll sweep the Japanese out in no
time.”

“Not likely. The Japanese are pouring in from the north.”

“From the north? You mean, near here?”

They both turned to gaze again at the courtyard.

“The young warlord, your Tupan Feng's nephew, has ap
pointed his usual cronies. They love to strut about, but rumor has
it they're as ineffectual and greedy as ever.”

Shirley gave a weak smile. “Old Tupan Feng finally has a rea
son to wear his dress uniform.”

“Skirmishes are taking place out there somewhere. Japanese
supply lines and railroads and such are being attacked by the Na
tionalist forces. Or perhaps the Communist ones. Honestly, it's
all a muddle to me.” Kathryn straightened Shirley's collar and
smoothed her flyaway hair. Their hands found one another again
and swung ever so slightly, as if they were the schoolgirls they
had once been together. “Some people say the Chinese don't care
who rules their country,” Kathryn continued. “I can't imagine
that's true at heart. They're just highly pragmatic. And the poor
peasants are worked to the bone and haven't time to look up from
their plows. I think they assume they'll remain miserable under
any government. While meanwhile, the higher-ups take Japa
nese bribes until a better option comes along. They're cagey, al
ways hedging their bets, but who can blame them, with so many
factions in our sorry little province?”

“I wonder what the Japanese are offering?”

“To let them live, I suppose,” Kathryn said with an arched
eyebrow. “The alternative, I gather, is not so good.”

“But the Japanese seem decent enough,” Shirley said. “One
of the young soldiers started sweeping our back steps after Cook
disappeared. I didn't see any harm in him doing it.”

“But have you asked yourself
why
Cook disappeared?”

Shirley didn't know what to say. She should have wondered.
Of course she should have. “Is it possible that he joined the Na
tionalist Army? He was always patriotic and absolutely hates the
Japanese.”

“True, but if he's like everyone else, he hated his own gov
ernment almost as much. And besides, if Cook had joined, they
would have sent him off with whatever feast they could man
age. Candles would be lit for him, and we'd probably know his
whereabouts.”

“Then perhaps he joined the Reds? I remember Caleb saying
they weren't far from here, up in the hills to the west, I think.”

“The Red Army has been around these parts for months, re
covering from their escapades across the country. It's possible that
Cook may have joined them and not the Whites. Did you know
that they call them the White Army?”

“Who?”

“The Nationalists. The ones who aren't Red. Although now
that they've supposedly combined forces, I assume they'll start
calling them the Pink Army! Oh, it's all so ridiculous. I can hard
ly believe we're stuck in the midst of it. Remember when our
greatest concern was which chapeaux to wear to Sunday service?”

Both women shook their heads.

“The point is,” Kathryn continued, “while we are still here,
we must do our best to help hold off the Japanese. Most likely, my
dear,
they
are the ones responsible for your cook's disappearance.”

Kathryn let go of Shirley's hand and patted her charming
cloche into place. She opened her purse and pulled out her lace
gloves in the same forest green as her hat. Shirley marveled at her
friend's style, even here in this distant outpost and with the oth
er American women so little inclined to care about such things.
Shirley felt certain she was the only one who saw Kathryn for
who she really was: a smart, snappy future career girl who had
made a wrong turn and wound up in China for her own stub
born reasons. Once she got back to America, she'd find a job
and a husband. The rest of the mission might be deluded into
thinking that Kathryn cared about China's endless troubles, but
Shirley knew better, because now that Caleb was gone, she felt
similarly worn out with the whole mess.

“I'm so sorry to have abandoned you these past weeks, my
love,” Shirley said as she bent to kiss her friend on both cheeks.
“Let's make a pact. We'll take tea with one another every after
noon until it's time for us to depart. We can start tomorrow. We'll
review the latest news and make our plans. There's much to be
discussed. As our professors used to say at Vassar when the bell
rang, ‘Ever more learning tomorrow, fine ladies!'”

“Yes, ever more learning. I remember it well. Now, get some
rest. Your eyes do look awfully puffy.”

As at so many partings since girlhood, the friends let go with
outstretched fingers. But at just that moment, from around the
corner came two young Japanese soldiers with an officer march
ing a few paces behind. The men halted before the moon gate in
front of the Carson home. The two younger men looked identi
cal, their khaki uniforms the same and their blank expressions in
the shadowed light unchanging, until Shirley realized that the
one on the right was the young fellow who had swept her back
steps. She offered a nod, but his expression remained unchanged.
The officer stepped forward through the gate, snapped his heels
together, and bowed quickly.

“Good evening, American madams,” he began in stilted En
glish. “I am Major Hattori, Fifth Division, Japanese Imperial
Army. Does American mother know whereabouts of boy with
red hair?”

Kathryn retreated up the steps and stood next to Shirley.

“Is everything all right?” Shirley asked. “He isn't hurt, is he? I
assume he's somewhere around the compound, but honestly, I'm
not sure where exactly.”

“American mother does not know whereabouts of son. Very
bad. I have reports American boy is rude and should be pun
ished.”

“Oh, thank goodness,” Shirley said. “I thought he might be
injured.”

“From high on wall, American boy spits on Japanese soldier.”

“Good Lord,” Kathryn said under her breath.

Shirley raised her chin. “Why, that's terrible, Major. I'm aw
fully sorry. I will speak with him. But you must realize that boys
will be boys.”

Kathryn squeezed her hand.

“American boy learn bad manners at home. But bad boy not
reason for visit. I come to confiscate your two-way radio.”

“My what?” Shirley asked.

Kathryn whispered something she didn't catch.

“We believe radio in house used by Red Army. We intercept
signal. American missionary woman is spy!” He raised both his
voice and his eyebrows with his pronouncement.

Shirley burst out laughing. She pulled her hand free and ig
nored Kathryn's worried expression. Her friend quickly regained
her arm, but Shirley straightened her spine and thrust out her
chin. At five feet eleven inches, she would have been noticeably
taller than Major Hattori had they stood nose to nose. Looking
down at him from the porch she felt had an even better effect.

“Everyone knows that radios get terrible reception here,”
she said. “No signals can make it over the surrounding hills. My
husband tried to find my beloved opera on the dial but gave up
years ago. And perhaps you did not know this, Major, but he is
no longer with us. Our house is in mourning, so I will ask you to
respect our peace.”

Shirley's mind drifted for a brief moment into the chasm left
by Caleb's death. A familiar wafting loneliness sucked her down
ward. It swirled and engulfed her in its chilly calm. Her arms
went limp at her sides, and she had to work to keep her knees
from buckling. But instead of leaving her completely floored, as
it usually did, she could feel the sorrow somehow bolstering her
courage and helping her to rise back up again. It was as if the
undertow was buoying her, the way a candle sucks down heat
before flaring upward into light.

“I'm quite certain that my husband gave that old thing away
years ago,” she continued, her voice growing stronger. “Or if I do
still have it, I have no idea where it is.”

“Don't be foolish, my dear,” Kathryn whispered, her pret
ty cheeks flushed. “Give the man what he wants. These people
don't mess around.”

The officer marched up the steps and placed himself before
them. “Madam,” he said to Shirley, “bring radio to me.”

She had spotted his saber in its hilt at his side, his revolver
tucked into the leather case on his belt, and knew she was sup
posed to be impressed by them and by his crisp uniform and shiny
boots, but the fact that she literally towered over the man seemed
to contradict all that. She turned and strode into her house, call
ing back over her shoulder, “I shall return in a moment.”

Kathryn clasped her hands together and looked off at the
courtyard and then up at the black and starless sky, anywhere
but into the stony faces of the officer and his two soldiers, who
remained like sentries blocking the bottom step. “Reverend Car
son died quite recently, you see. Mrs. Carson really isn't herself.”

The major did not respond or acknowledge Kathryn's words,
and she wondered if perhaps his English was rudimentary. She
was about to try the local Chinese dialect when the screen door
flung open again and Shirley reappeared in a flurry, her black
satin mourning skirt swishing and her arms upraised. She had a
broom in one hand. With a dramatic gesture, she placed it on the
floorboards and began sweeping. As she did, she sang an off-key,
airy tune: “Don't sit under the apple tree with anyone else but
me. Anyone else but me. Anyone else but me.”

As Shirley continued to sweep and sing, Kathryn's jaw slack
ened. The broom whisked right up to the edge of the major's
polished boots and kept going, as if they were merely annoying
debris that had fallen onto the otherwise tidy porch.

Major Hattori shuffled back. “American woman most imper
tinent. She and son must be punished!”

Kathryn reached for the broom and tried to pull it away, but
Shirley held on and surprised them both with her strength. She
thought she must have been storing it up all those pointless, pain
ful weeks since Caleb's death, when she had repeatedly come
to the conclusion that there was no reason to go on living. For,
as she yanked the broom back from Kathryn, she remembered
her husband's words:
Face the foe
, he had said. A silly phrase he
had heard from British military passing through. He had meant
it tongue-in-cheek, spoken in a teasing and irreverent manner,
but Shirley had known that at heart, he had meant it. Caleb had
wanted her to be brave.

She planted the broom and announced, “You may go now,
Major Hattori. Good evening.”

Kathryn rocked back on her heels, and the major let out a
growl.

“I will return,” he said and hurried down the steps. His sol
diers followed closely at his heels as he strode across the court
yard and was gone.

Shirley let the broom fall from her hand, and Kathryn
caught it. Shirley's arms trembled, and she felt perspiration
snake down her sides. She leaned against the carved post and
gripped the railing.

“Good heavens, who ever knew I had that in me?”

Kathryn offered no congratulations and no reassurances. She
simply stared at Shirley with a concerned expression. Shirley
didn't expect her friend to understand. Kathryn had not endured
the hollow sensation that coursed through Shirley's veins all the
time now, its meaning only beginning to come clear to her.