Dreams of the Red Phoenix (35 page)

“Not to worry,” Kathryn said. “The other ladies and I will
share our new outfits. We had a chance to shop in Shanghai be
fore boarding. Everything was contraband, our money going to
the White Russian mafia, I'm sure. It felt criminal to contribute
to the downfall of this sorry country.” Then she dipped nearer
and whispered in Shirley's ear, “You'll have to give the ladies an
other chance. Teetotalers, I'm afraid, but not so bad otherwise.
I hope you'll join me for a little toast up on the main deck? You
always were more game than anyone else. I'm sure that's what
made you such an excellent spy.” She pressed a finger to her lips.

Shirley saw Charles flinch at the mention of spying. She re
membered the tantrums he had staged as a child and the silent
brewing that had taken place before they occurred. She had al
ways known him so well—sometimes better than he knew him
self—and yet not any longer. She couldn't be sure what he was
thinking now.

“I just wish you'd told me sooner,” Kathryn continued. “I do
so love a story.”

Shirley didn't bother to correct her friend's mistaken notion.
It was Charles she needed to get to. Shirley reached across to pat
his chest with an open palm, but he pulled back, leaving her hand
stalled in the air.

“You must explain absolutely everything once we get away
from this dreadful place,” Kathryn carried on. “Charles and I
have been trying to piece it together, but now that you're here,
you can fill us in on the true goings-on.”

Shirley wished Kathryn would stop talking and finally spoke up.
“What a handsome new suit, Charles,” she said. “You look sharp.”

He straightened the lapels of his seersucker but did not reply.

“I was so worried about you,” Shirley continued. “You have
no idea how frightened I was that we might never see each other
again.”

“Don't be overly dramatic, Mother. We would have found one
another eventually, although I was set to make the trip without
you. When you didn't return to the mission, I assumed you'd de
cided to stay with the Reds.”

The coolness of his tone rocked Shirley back onto her heels.
“No,” she said. “I always wanted us to be together.”

He offered a sharp laugh. “Is that why you went off on the
back of Captain Hsu's mule?” he asked. “I watched you out my
window that night. You looked perfectly content to be leaving.”

Shirley's face went hot, and her dizziness returned.

“Kathryn and I both tried to convince you to leave your clin
ic,” he continued. “But being Florence Nightingale seemed more
important to you.”

“That's not true, Charles. You're what's important to me.”

“Or maybe you didn't want to give up the perks of being a
spy? I saw them drop you off down at the port in a fancy black
car. Everyone knows those are only used by top officials.”

“I got here the only way I could,” she said, her gaze lowered
and shoulders hunched.

The crew of Swedish sailors positioned around the ship shout
ed suddenly in various languages for the passengers to prepare
for departure. The gangplank rose with a deafening clatter. The
second horn blared, more a warning than a hopeful call. Below in
the port, traffic remained stalled as trucks, carts, rickshaws, and
tens of thousands of Chinese on foot blocked the way. Sirens and
shouting rose from the crush below, frenzied and wild.

Farther up a boulevard that led away from the ship, Shirley
thought she saw the black sedan that had dropped her off as it
wedged back through the throng. She would never have made
it on time if General Shiga hadn't arranged her ride. When the
train from Peking had finally squealed to a halt in the Shanghai
station and the panicked passengers elbowed their way down the
iron steps, Shirley had stumbled through great clouds of steam
and out onto the platform. She stood stunned and knocked about
by the Chinese until a Japanese soldier took her elbow and pulled
her through the crowd and into a waiting sedan. As she settled
on the slick leather seat, the driver stepped on the gas and cut a
swath through the mobs. Chinese of all ages pressed against the
car windows.

At first, she made herself look into their terrified faces. But
there were too many of them for her to help, too many to even
comprehend. She had squeezed her husband's passport to her
chest and found herself praying. She hardly knew how any
longer and wasn't sure to whom she prayed—God or Jesus,
her husband or Captain Hsu. She prayed for forgiveness, even
though she felt she did not deserve it. Still, she whispered her
prayer and hoped that her words could be heard above the muf
fled cries beyond the closed windows that kept her safe inside
the Japanese car.

Earlier, on the train, she had been taken to a private section at
the back and given a Western-style meal. When the silver dome
was removed from her dinner plate, she almost fainted at the
sight of steak pooling in its own blood. A formal card accompa
nied the dish:
Compliments of General Shiga
. The note written in
elegant English penmanship promised that he would look her
up the next time he was in the States. Below his name he had
written,
Princeton, '15
, a final seal of their secret, insidious pact.

“Charles-Boy,” she said now, “I brought you some steak. I
thought you might be starved.” She pulled a white cloth napkin
from deep in the pocket of her raincoat and began to unfold it.

“Don't call me that. Don't ever call me that. That was Lian's
name for me, not yours.”

“But are you hungry?” Shirley tried again. “I have something
for you.” She held out the steak on the napkin in her open palm.

“Where'd you get that?” he asked. “No one has food like that
anymore. Not even the fine hotels along the Bund.”

Kathryn leaned in and said, “I'll eat it if he doesn't want to.”

“Don't take it,” he said fiercely to her. “It's poisoned.”

Shirley wrapped the steak and stuffed it back into her pocket.
“Don't be so righteous, son,” she said, and tried to stand taller
but couldn't muster the strength. “I just thought you might be
hungry.”

He glared down at her. “It's corrupt, Mother. That steak is
corrupt. Like the black car you arrived in. You left me to join the
Reds, but now you show up in an official's car with a Japanese
driver. I saw him when he opened the door for you.” Charles
shook his head in disgust. “I don't know what you've been up to.
I don't even know whose side you're on, anyway. I think you're
on no one's side but your own, that's what I think.”

“Jesus, Charles,” Kathryn said and swatted his arm, “That's
enough. If you were my son, I'd wash your mouth out with soap.”

“It's all right, Kathryn,” Shirley said.

Charles was correct, she thought. She had made a decision for
no one's benefit but her own and her family's, and at the expense
of others. What she had done was a sin, and she didn't need her
husband here to remind her of that fact. Though not a highly
religious person, she now understood in a biblical sense that she
had crossed over into some vast, desolate valley and must spend
the rest of her days wending her way back. Any mild impulse
she had felt to do good for others seemed trivial in light of her
treachery toward Captain Hsu. She would have to carry on his,
and her husband's, good works in repentance.

“I didn't see her get out of any car,” Kathryn said as she swung
toward Charles and rubbed a finger on his lapel. “You must have
eagle eyes, Charlie. How did you spot your mother with the
thousands of people down there? I think you were looking for
her awfully hard.” Then she turned to Shirley and leaned on her
arm. “You see?” she said. “There's a good sign. Your son was
searching for you, right at the same moment you were searching
for him. Come on, now, you two, time to make up.”

Charles's jaw remained set, and his arms stayed crossed tight
ly over his ribs.

“Is that true?” Shirley asked as she gazed up at him. “You
were looking for me, son?”

Charles put his fine new shoe up on the ship's railing and
shrugged.

“Who knows, Charles,” Kathryn said in a slurred but cheerful
tone as nudged closer to him, “someday you may even be proud
of your mother. She's our own Mata Hari.”

Shirley wanted to peel her friend off her son and might have
done so, but Charles elbowed Kathryn away himself, and rath
er harshly. Shirley wondered what had gone on between them,
though, whatever it was, he had no business treating a lady like
that. Then something occurred to her about her boy that seemed
even more disturbing and wrong.

“Charles, let me get this straight,” Shirley began. “You saw
me from up here on the ship, and yet you didn't come to greet
me? What if I hadn't found you in this crowd? Would you have
simply waited until we bumped into one another like a couple of
strangers?”

“Of course we'd find each other, Mother. We're going to be on
this damn boat together for over a month.”

With his raised chin and imperious tone, Shirley realized that
he sounded just like her at her worst. Charles was behaving arro
gantly, dismissing her in the way that she had dismissed others in
the past. “Do you know that I would have left the ship if I hadn't
found you? Then what would have become of us?”

“Well, I wasn't going to give up my spot here at the stern,”
Charles explained. “We nabbed it two hours ago, and I've had to
push people away ever since. We'll get the best view as we leave
old Shanghai, won't we, Kathryn?”

Kathryn nodded, but Shirley sensed that her friend was as
perturbed as she was.

“You couldn't be bothered to meet me after all I went through
to get here?” Shirley asked again. “I sacrifice any last vestige of
goodness and now receive this in return?”

Before Charles could reply, a sudden giddiness began to over
take her, and she started to laugh. He seemed startled by her out
burst, and although Shirley tried to control herself, a strange and
pleasing lightness rippled through her body for the first time in
weeks, perhaps months. She had lost her husband, betrayed her
Chinese friend, and come frighteningly close to losing her son as
well. It was all too much.

But she had not lost her son. And she would not ever risk
that again. From now on, she had no intention of letting him go
astray.

“Oh, thank heavens,” she sputtered, “I see now. I understand.
You still need me. I believe you really do. You may be a young
man,” she said as she straightened her spine, pulled back her
shoulders, and spoke as sternly as she could, “but your behavior,
Charles Carson, is completely unacceptable. Do you hear me, my
boy?”

He lowered his chin in direct proportion to how high she
raised hers.

“I don't ever,” she said and poked his chest with a finger, “ever
want to hear that you have disregarded other people as if you
couldn't be bothered with them. You learned that from me, and
it is high time you unlearned it.”

The cocky, know-it-all expression slipped from his face. Be
fore her stood the good boy that he truly was.

“It isn't right for us to put ourselves first at the expense of
others,” she said. “Do you understand me?”