“It’s not about fairness,” Aunt Judy said. “It’s about fear. They’re afraid of Dr. Tsien, because Communist China stands independent and could still have a claim on him. Nazi Germany is gone. Dr. von Braun has no loyalties left to claim.”
At first it had seemed far-fetched that Aunt Judy and Uncle Francis worked at a job that put them in the same circle as the famous German scientist, but then Lily remembered her family had unusual links to other powerful people, too. Her father had a friend in Berkeley who had been some kind of Kuomintang government official before the war, and now was petitioning Congress for American citizenship. Aunt Judy had described her mother—Lily’s grandmother, whom she’d never met—as an influential member of 1920s Shanghai society, who had been friendly with Soong Chingling, the wife of Sun Yat-sen.
The late-night conversation about Wernher von Braun and Hsue-shen Tsien fell in the same category: tantalizing glimpses into an adult world that seemed completely separate from the mundane reality of her daily life. It was disorienting when that world bled into this one.
Now, back in the kitchen, the turkey was beginning to scent the air. As Lily peeled potatoes, her mother sat down across from her with a basket of green beans and asked, “How’s Shirley? You saw her the other day, didn’t you?”
“Yes. Her entire family’s coming over for Thanksgiving dinner. They’re making three turkeys.”
“My goodness! I’m glad you and Shirley are talking again. You two had a fight, didn’t you?”
Lily was surprised. “How did you know?”
Her mother plucked the ends off the green beans briskly, snap-snap-snap. “You came home from school every day without visiting her.”
Lily cringed inwardly at how transparent she had been. “It wasn’t anything,” she said dismissively. “Just a silly disagreement.”
Her mother nodded. “Girls fight, especially at your age. It’s natural. I’m glad you’re over it. Shirley’s a good friend to you.”
Her mother’s characterization of their friendship irritated Lily—as if Lily should be grateful for Shirley’s friendship. “What happened with Papa and his papers?” Lily asked, changing the subject. “Did he get them back?”
Her mother paused briefly in her bean snapping. “Not yet,” she said. There was a finality to her tone that told Lily not to push. “You haven’t had anything more to do with the Man Ts’ing, have you?”
Lily shook her head. “No.”
—1952
Francis begins working as an engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Judy is hired as a computer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
—Feb. 13, 1953
JUDY takes Lily to the Morrison Planetarium at the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park.
Fighting ends in the Korean War.
—1954
The San Francisco Police Department launches a drive against so-called “sex deviates,” raiding gay bars and other known gay gathering places.
The U.S. Senate condemns Joseph McCarthy.
JUDY
Twenty-Two Months Earlier
Judy Fong climbed out of the taxicab and held the door open for her fifteen-year-old niece. Lily looked slightly anxious, but Lily often looked that way; Judy sometimes worried that Lily thought too much. She closed the taxi door and joined Lily on the sidewalk while they waited for Francis, Judy’s husband, to finish paying the driver.
The long driveway in front of the California Academy of Sciences was thronged with cars, their headlights creating a moving sea of light in the early evening darkness. It reminded Judy of another night, years ago in Chungking during the war. She had stepped out of the building that served as her college dormitory to see a seemingly endless convoy of vehicles rolling down the dark streets, their headlights like lanterns floating down a river. They were Chinese army trucks with soldiers packed inside, rifles in their hands. She had stood there on the front step of the dormitory until she grew stiff with cold, silently watching the young men peering out the backs of their trucks, their eyes reflecting the headlights.
Francis bounded up onto the sidewalk beside her and took her arm, slipping it through his. “Ready?”
She emerged from her memory with a start. “Yes,” she said. Sometimes, the past seemed to slide directly over the present, and when she came back to herself, the world she lived in now seemed like a fantasy.
The three of them turned to face the museum. The California Academy of Sciences, with its tall columns lit by white spotlights, was as grand as a Greek temple serenely overlooking Golden Gate Park. Judy couldn’t see the dome of the Morrison Planetarium from their vantage point, but she knew it rose from the roof just beyond the front facade of the building. Everybody had been talking about it since it opened last fall. It was said to be the most up-to-date planetarium in the country, maybe even the world, and tonight it was their destination.
“Let’s go,” Francis said, and led the way up the steps.
* * *
—
The interior of the planetarium was round, with the pale dome arcing high overhead, and all the seats circled the giant mechanical projector in the center of the room. Supported on two massive tripods, it looked like a cross between a robot and a huge, legless insect—or perhaps a robotic insect. There were dozens of lenses on it that resembled eyes facing every direction. Each lens would project a certain star or cluster of stars onto the dome.
Francis was enthusiastically explaining the whole setup to Lily as they made their way to their seats on the far side of the planetarium. “It was all made here at the Academy by American scientists,” Francis said, “so they didn’t have to source anything from German manufacturers behind the Iron Curtain. They learned about optics during the war when they ran an optical repair shop right here in the museum.”
Judy checked to make sure that Lily wasn’t simply feigning interest, but her niece seemed quite engaged.
“What did they repair?” Lily asked.