She’s right. Our air force has already proven it’s inept, and we won’t be safe on the streets tonight if they take to the skies again. So we walk home. We’re both splattered with blood and plaster dust. Passersby pull away from us as though we’re bringing death with every step we take. I know Mama will lose control when she sees us, but I long for her concern and tears, followed by her inevitable anger that we placed ourselves in such danger.
We walk in the door and turn in to the salon. The dark green foreign-style drapes fringed with little velvet balls have been pulled shut. The bombing has disrupted the power lines, and the room is lit by soft, warm, and comforting candlelight. In the craziness of the day, I forgot about our boarders, but they haven’t forgotten about us. The cobbler sits on his haunches next to my father. The student hovers over Mama’s chair, trying to look reassuring. The two dancers stand with their backs against the wall nervously twisting their fingers. The policeman’s wife and two daughters perch on the stairs.
When Mama sees us, she covers her face and begins to cry. Baba pushes his way across the room, puts his arms around May, and half carries her to his chair. People cluster around her, pawing at her to make sure she’s unhurt—touching her face and patting her thighs and arms. Everyone chatters at once.
“Are you injured?”
“What happened?”
“We heard it was an enemy plane. Those monkey people are worse than turtles’ egg abortions!”
With all attention on May, the policeman’s wife and daughters come to me. I see dread in the woman’s eyes. The older girl pulls on my blouse. “Our baba hasn’t come home yet.” Her voice is hopeful and brave. “Tell us you saw him.”
I shake my head. The girl takes her little sister’s hand and skulks back to the stairs. Their mother’s eyes close in fear and worry.
Now that May and I are safe, the day’s events tumble through me. My sister’s fine and we made it home. The fear and excitement that kept me strong disappear. I feel empty, weak, and dizzy. The others must have noticed, because all of a sudden I feel hands on me, leading me to a chair. I let myself sink into the cushions. Someone brings a cup to my lips, and I sip lukewarm tea.
May, now standing, proudly lists what she considers to be my accomplishments. “Pearl didn’t cry. She didn’t give up. She looked for me and she found me. She took care of me. She brought me home. She—”
Someone or something pounds on the front door. Baba bunches his hands into balls, as if he knows what’s coming. We no longer have a houseboy to answer the door, but no one moves. We’re all afraid. Is it refugees begging for help? Have the dwarf bandits already marched into the city? Has the looting begun? Or have some clever souls already figured out they can get rich during the war by demanding protection money? We watch as May walks to the door—her hips swaying lightly—opens it, and then slowly takes several steps backward, her hands held before her as if in surrender.
The three men who enter are not in military uniform, but they’re immediately recognizable as dangerous nevertheless. They wear pointed leather shoes, the better to inflict damage with their kicks. Their shirts are made from fine black cotton, the better to hide bloodstains. They wear felt fedoras pulled low to shadow their features. One holds a pistol; another grips a club of some sort. The third carries his menace in his body, which is short but solid. I’ve lived in Shanghai almost my entire life and can spot—and then avoid—a member of the Green Gang on the street or in a club, but I never expected to see one, let alone three, in our home. I’ll say this: You’ve never seen a room empty faster. Our boarders—from the policeman’s daughters to the student and the dancing girls—scatter like leaves.
The three toughs ignore May and casually stroll into the salon. As warm as it is, I shiver.
“Mr. Chin?” the stocky man asks as he plants his feet in front of my father.
Baba—and I’ll never forget this—gulps and swallows, gulps and swallows again, like a fish gasping for air on a slab of hot concrete.
“You have a growth in your throat or what?”
The intruder’s mocking tone causes me to avert my eyes from my father’s face, and I see worse. His pants darken as his bladder lets go. The stocky man, the apparent leader of this small group, spits on the floor in disgust.
“You have failed to pay your debt to Pockmarked Huang. You cannot borrow money from him over many years to provide an extravagant life for your family and not pay it back. You cannot gamble in his establishments and not pay for your losses.”
This couldn’t be worse news. Pockmarked Huang’s control is so great that it’s said if a watch is stolen anywhere in the city, his minions will make sure it’s restored to its rightful owner within twenty-four hours—for a price, of course. He’s known to deliver coffins to people who have displeased him. He usually kills those who have cheated him in some way. We’re lucky we received this visit instead.
“Pockmarked Huang made a good arrangement for you to pay him back,” the gangster goes on. “It was complicated, but he was amenable. You had a debt and he was trying to decide what to do with you.” The thug pauses and stares at my father. “Are you going to explain this to them”—he motions to us casually, but somehow it still feels threatening—“or shall I?”
We wait for Baba to speak. When he doesn’t, the thug shifts his attention to the rest of us.
“There was an outstanding debt that needed to be paid,” he explains. “At the same moment, a merchant from America came to us looking to buy rickshaws for his business and wives for his sons. So Pockmarked Huang put together a three-way deal to benefit everyone.”
I don’t know about Mama and May, but I’m still hoping Baba will do or say something to make this horrible man and his sidekicks leave our home. Shouldn’t Baba do that—as a man, a father, and a husband?
The leader leans over Baba menacingly. “Our boss ordered you to fill Mr. Louie’s procurement needs by giving him your rickshaws and your daughters. No money would be paid by you, and you and your wife would be allowed to stay in your house. Mr. Louie would pay your debt to us with American dollars. Everyone would get what they needed, and everyone would live.”
I’m furious with my father for not telling us the truth, but that’s insignificant compared with the terror I feel, because now it’s not just my father who didn’t do what he was supposed to do. May and I were part of the deal. We too have crossed Pockmarked Huang. The gangster wastes no time getting to that point.
“While it’s true that our boss has profited nicely, there remains a problem,” he says. “Your daughters didn’t get on the boat. What kind of message will this send to others who owe Pockmarked Huang if he lets you get away with this?” The thug takes his eyes from my father and scans the room. He gestures first to me and then to May. “These are your daughters, yes?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. “They were supposed to meet their husbands in Hong Kong. Why didn’t that happen, Mr. Chin?”
“I—”
It’s a sad thing to know your father is weak, but it’s terrible to realize he’s pathetic.
Without thinking, I blurt, “It’s not his fault.”
The man’s cruel eyes turn to me. He comes to my chair, squats before me, puts his hands on my knees, and squeezes them hard. “How can this be, little girl?”
I hold my breath, petrified.
May darts across the room to my side. She begins to speak. Every statement of fact comes out as a question. “We didn’t know our father owed money to the Green Gang? We thought he only owed money to an Overseas Chinese? We thought Old Man Louie was unimportant, just a visitor?”
“Good daughters to a worthless man are a waste,” the leader declares conversationally. He stands and strides to the middle of the room. His helpers come to his side. To Baba, he says, “You were allowed to stay in this house as long as you sent your daughters to their new homes. Since you have not done so, this is no longer your home. You must leave. And you must pay your debt. Shall I take your daughters with me now? We will find a good use for them.”
Afraid of what Baba will say, I jump in. “It’s not too late for us to go to America. There are other ships.”
“Pockmarked Huang doesn’t like liars. You have already been dishonest, and you are probably lying to me now.”
“We promise we’ll do what you say,” May mutters.
Like a cobra, the leader’s hand strikes out, grabs May’s hair, and yanks her to him. He brings her face close to his. He smiles and says, “Your family is broke. You should be living on the street. Please, I ask you again, wouldn’t it be better to come with us now? We like beautiful girls.”
“I have their tickets” comes a small voice. “I’ll make sure they leave and the deal you arranged for my husband to honor his debts is completed.”
At first I’m not even sure who spoke. None of us are. We all look around until we come to my mother, who has not said a word since the men entered our home. I see hardness in her that I’ve never seen before. Maybe we’re all like that with our mothers. They seem ordinary until one day they’re extraordinary.
“I have the tickets,” she repeats. She has to be lying. I threw them out, along with our immigration papers and the coaching book Sam gave me.
“What good are those tickets now? Your daughters missed their boat.”
“We will exchange them and the girls will go to their husbands.” Mama wrings a handkerchief in her hands. “I will see to it. And then my husband and I will leave this house. You tell that to Pockmarked Huang. If he doesn’t like it, then let him come here and discuss it with me, a woman—”
The sickening sound of a pistol being cocked stops my mother’s words. The leader holds up a hand, alerting his men to be ready. Silence hangs like a shroud over the room. Outside, ambulances scream and machine guns rattle and cough.
Then he snorts lightly. “Madame Chin, you know what will happen if we find you’re lying to us.”
When neither of our parents says anything, May finds the courage to ask, “How long do we have?”
“Until tomorrow,” he growls. Then he laughs roughly as he realizes the near impossibility of his demand. “It won’t be easy to leave the city though. If one good thing has come from today’s disaster, it is that many of the foreign devils will leave us. They will have first priority on the ships.”
His men begin to move toward May and me. This is it. We’re going to be the Green Gang’s property now. May grabs my hand. Then a miracle: the leader grinds out a new offer.
“I will give you three days. Be on your way to America by then, even if you have to swim. We will return tomorrow—and every day—to make sure you don’t forget what you must do.”
With the threat laid down and a deadline given, the three men leave, but not before they tip over a couple of lamps and use the club to smash Mama’s few vases and trinkets that have not yet been taken to the pawnshop.
As soon as they’re gone, May sinks to the floor. None of us move to help her.
“You lied to us,” I say to Baba. “You lied to us about Old Man Louie and the reason for our marriages—”
“I didn’t want you to worry about the Green Gang,” he admits feebly.
This response maddens and exasperates me. “You didn’t want us to worry?”
He flinches, but then he deflects my anger with a question of his own. “What difference does it make now?”
There’s a long moment of silence as we think about that. I don’t know what goes through Mama’s and May’s minds, but I can think of many things we might have done differently if we’d known the truth. I still believe that May and I wouldn’t have gotten on the ship to take us to our husbands, but we would have done something: run away, hidden ourselves at the mission, begged Z.G. until he agreed to help us …
“I’ve had to carry this burden too long.” Baba turns to my mother and asks pitiably, “What will we do now?”
Mama looks at him with scathing contempt. “We’re going to do what we can to save our lives,” she says, looping her handkerchief through her jade bracelet.
“Are you going to send us to Los Angeles?” May’s voice quavers.
“She can’t,” I say. “I threw away the tickets.”
“I pulled them out of the trash,” Mama announces.
I slip down next to May. I can’t believe Mama is willing to ship us to America to cure my father’s and her problems. But then isn’t that the kind of thing Chinese parents have done with worthless daughters for thousands of years—abandoned them, sold them, used them?
Seeing the looks of betrayal and fear on our faces, Mama hurries on. “We’re going to trade in your tickets to America and buy passage to Hong Kong for all of us. We’ve got three days to find a ship. Hong Kong is a British colony, so we don’t have to worry about the Japanese attacking there. If we decide it’s safe to come back onto the mainland, we’ll take the ferry or train to Canton. Then we’ll go to Yin Bo, your father’s home village.” Her jade bracelet hits the side table with a resolute thunk. “The Green Gang won’t find us there.”