“Can I see him?”
Minnie showed Ling to George’s room and Ling sucked in a breath. He was very pale except for the strange red burn marks creeping up his neck. Ling had never seen George so still. But no—he wasn’t completely still after all. Beneath the thin skin of his lids, his eyes moved rapidly. George wasn’t just sleeping; he was dreaming.
“Minnie,” Ling said, buoyed by fresh hope, “could I borrow something of George’s?”
Minnie’s pained face brightened. “Do you think you could find George in dreams?”
“I can try,” Ling said.
“They’ve burned most of his things, in case that’s how the sickness spreads.”
Ling hadn’t thought about that, and it gave her pause. What if dream walking with an object belonging to the sick could make her sick as well? But this was George. She couldn’t succumb to fear.
“Wait here.” Minnie disappeared into the apartment and then returned a moment later, breathless and secretive.
“Here. I saved this,” she whispered, lifting the edges of the handkerchief she carried. Inside was George’s prized track medal. He’d been so happy when he’d won it, his parents so proud, and even the announcer telling him he “ran pretty well for a Chinaman” hadn’t dimmed his pride completely.
Through the open door of George’s room, Ling could hear George’s mother weeping softly.
Ling tucked the track medal into her pocket.
“You should go. The doctor will be back soon,” Minnie warned. “Please find him, Ling. Please find my brother and tell him to come back to us.”
By the time Ling returned to the Tea House, her mother was frantic. “Where’ve you been?”
“My legs hurt. I couldn’t walk very fast in the cold,” Ling lied, taking some pleasure in the way the lie diffused her mother’s anger so quickly.
“I was worried about you. Things are getting worse here,” her mother said, looking out the restaurant’s front windows at the police and public health officials moving through the dirty patches of snow, knocking on doors. “There’s all sorts of people who’ve been requesting your services. They want you to speak to their dead relatives about this sleeping sickness business, to know what they should do. But I told them you’re not doing a bit of that until we know more about how this sickness is spread. You’re still getting your strength back.”
“I’m fine, Mama,” Ling said, George’s track medal heavy in her pocket.
Mrs. Chan placed her hands at her hips. “I’m your mother. I’ll decide if you’re fit enough. Oh!” She broke into a smile. “I almost forgot. You just missed your friend from the science club. The freckled one. Henry.”
“Henry was here?”
“Yes. He left you a note.” Her mother searched under a stack of receipts. “Is he Irish? Looks Irish. Ah. Here it is.”
Mrs. Chan handed over Henry’s folded note, which Ling had no doubt her mother had already read. She hoped that he hadn’t said anything too revealing. Taped to the letter was a ten-dollar bill.
Dear Miss Chan,
Greetings! I had great success in locating the Louis particle of which we spoke. In the interest of science, let us please repeat our experiment. If this suits you, I suggest that we perform the experiment this evening at precisely the same time and in the same manner as last evening. If you find this agreeable in the name of science, please ring me at the New Amsterdam Theatre, where I am attempting to steer those lost, immoral souls away from a life of sin. The money is a donation for the poor, naturally.
Sincerely,
Henry B. DuBois IV
Secretary and Chief Musical Director
Science Club
Nicely done, you idiot, Ling thought, smiling a bit.