Chapter 19
It was only after Lisan left the house that Caroline admitted to herself what a relief it was to be completely alone. Much
as she liked Lisan, her sincerity and forthright manner, Caroline needed to be alone and think through what might come next.
At breakfast that morning she had pressed Thomas about Mason and they’d argued.
“It’s a good thing you told me about the house, sweetheart,” Thomas said, “forewarned is forearmed. But I believe Uncle Mason’s
intentions are good. He must have a plan to buy back the house from this Liu person. I’ve decided not to bring it up, not
unless it becomes necessary. I don’t want to embarrass him. We are his family and all he has in this world now.”
“It isn’t just about the house, Thomas,” she pleaded. “What else might be going on with Mason? What if there are more issues
with the railway business than he says?”
“Caroline,” he said, with just a touch of impatience, “the railway venture is sound. I’ve looked into all its aspects myself.
And if you’re worried then I can tell you that once I’ve put money from your inheritance into the business, I’ll have more
than enough of a controlling stake to make all the decisions. Mason will be just a very minor shareholder.”
He wouldn’t take any money from her, not just yet, Thomas said.
First, he would make a trip to the north with an engineer and a surveyor, travel along the path of the proposed rail line and map the terrain.
It was the sort of due diligence she’d come to expect from Thomas when it came to his business ventures; yet he still seemed to have a blind spot when it came to Mason Burnett.
But Mason wasn’t her biggest problem, not at the moment.
She looked around the small parlor, her favorite room. She always kept the drapes pulled back to allow in as much daylight
as possible and had made the space more welcoming with plants brought in from the hothouse: a small plumeria tree, orchids
and ginger lilies arranged on a wrought iron table, all potted in blue-and-white porcelain of varying sizes. Her favorite
was a miniature Japanese white pine, which Lisan told her was fifty years old, a marvel of botany.
She liked the furnishings in this room, less formal, more delicate in scale, the upholstery all in light-colored fabrics.
It must’ve been Rosalie’s room. Rosalie Roussel, the mysterious woman Mason never mentioned, his son’s wife. She wondered
what this room had witnessed in the weeks and days before Rosalie left, whether Rosalie had found solace in this cozy space.
Had she sat in this chair, deciding what to do about her future? Would she tie her fate to the man she’d married or strike
out on her own? Had there been one incident that made her decide to run away from Charles or had there been a series of escalating
events?
Even though Rosalie had abandoned her husband, Caroline’s sympathies lay with the young wife.
Outside, a high wind pushed a bank of clouds together, dimming the day.
Despite the cup of hot tea in her hands, Caroline shivered.
Rather than ring for the youngest houseboy, she added more wood to the fireplace herself.
She stood beside the mantel and held her hands out to the heat.
Dampness seemed to have settled into her bones.
All of Shanghai was cold and damp right now, though many of her guests had assured her this was preferable to the summers, when clammy air worked in tandem with stifling heat, bringing days of unbearable humidity, insects, the miasma of unsavory smells from the river, and outbreaks of disease.
Illnesses borne by parasites and infections that could kill.
Worst of all were the vermin. The house servants had put rat poison in the attic, and for good measure, she’d also had them
set traps and lay down more poison under large pieces of furniture in each of the rooms, as inconspicuously as possible. She
shuddered at the memory of the rat in the attic.
“Speaking of rats,” she murmured to herself, and turned her attention to the envelope in her skirt pocket. Andrew Grey and
the immediate threat he represented far surpassed any menace from Mason Burnett.
The note was written on pale blue hotel stationery, Les Trois Lanternes on the Rue Voisin, an address in the French Concession.
Grey’s words were polite and innocuous, thanking the Stantons for the party and concluding with the statement that he looked
forward to their next meeting, which he hoped would be soon, just name the date and place. Bland words for what amounted to
a summons, for that’s what it was. He was telling her to choose a time and place.
“What should I do?” Caroline murmured, looking out the window. Opening a drawer of the walnut desk, she took out some stationery,
folded a sheet of paper into an envelope and put a stamp on the envelope. She tucked it in her handbag and after a moment’s
thought, dropped her diary into her bag as well. She selected her plainest coat and a hat with a wide, low brim, and pinned
a veil onto the hat.
Now that she had her own car, she could go to Shanghai anytime. Her driver was a broad, muscular man named Gu. Even when dressed in a forest green chauffeur’s uniform he looked like a bodyguard; she suspected Thomas had hired him for both purposes.
Her first destination was Dauphin Jewelers in the French Concession, where she dropped off a bracelet with a broken clasp.
The owner brought a tray of bracelets to show her, but she waved him off with a smile.
“I’m not in the mood to try on jewelry right now,” she said. “Another time, Monsieur.”
She put up her umbrella against the light drizzle and glanced back at the car. Gu was reading a newspaper and smoking a cigarette.
He would wait, uncomplaining and indifferent, until she returned. Caroline strolled around the block slowly, looking in shop
windows and reading menus posted outside restaurants. She widened her explorations along the side streets, away from the fashionable
Avenue Paul Brunat, umbrella pulled down low against the rain and against curious eyes.
Caroline found what she needed a few streets off Avenue Paul Brunat, a small and rather sad-looking café with a faded awning,
improbably called the Café Royale. It was empty. Adjusting her veil to cover more of her face, she ordered a hot chocolate
and some cake. When her order arrived, she found the beverage unexpectedly good, although the slice of vanilla cake tasted
dry, at least two days old. She wrote the address of the tea shop in her diary and penned a reply to Grey on the stationery
she’d brought from home. Just a date, time, and place. Three days from now at two o’clock in the afternoon, the Café Royale
on Rue Lemaire.
She dropped it in the mailbox on the corner, then returned to the car.
On the driveway of Lennox Manor, Caroline saw that Thomas’s motorcar was parked under the porte cochere, something unexpected because Thomas and Mason were supposed to be at a meeting with potential board members for the railway.
When her car pulled up behind it, she caught a glimpse of Thomas being helped up the steps into the house, a house servant propping him up on one side, another one carrying his briefcase.
“Why, Thomas,” she exclaimed, hurrying into the foyer after him, “what’s wrong? Are you ill?”
He waved off her concerns. “An upset stomach, nothing more. I’ve felt queasy all day and by the afternoon decided to come
home.”
“But have you called for a doctor? I’ll do that,” she said.
“Leave it, leave it,” he said, wincing. “Just something I ate.” Sweat beaded his face and he lurched against the staircase
railing, pushing aside the houseboy at his elbow. She gave a small cry as he vomited over the stairs, foul-smelling liquid
splattering the marble. Immediately, Head Servant Chin called out orders, and as Caroline followed Thomas into his bedroom,
a houseboy came running with a mop and wooden bucket.
“I’m calling a doctor,” she said. Mason’s doctor was listed in the address book by the telephone but first she helped the
houseboy take off Thomas’s soiled clothing and put him to bed in his nightshirt. For good measure, Caroline had them line
up two chamber pots beside the bed and ordered Chin to make sure they were replaced every hour.
“There’s no need to call a doctor,” Thomas said, wiping his mouth with a washcloth. “I’ve had food poisoning before and it
passes.” But his skin was the color of raw dough, and he convulsed with pain as he said this.
“You’ve no choice,” she said firmly. “I’m going to call. Where is Mason, by the way?”
“I asked him to chair the meeting with potential board members. It’s important.” Thomas retched into the chamber pot; she pressed a cool towel against his forehead as he sank back into the pillows.
This was a meeting he had not invited Mason to attend. He’d told Caroline this over breakfast to show he was taking her concerns
seriously. But now Mason would be representing Burnett and Stanton Ltd. and who knew what he would say, what he would promise.
But that wasn’t her first worry now.
Caroline found the number for Mason’s doctor, a Dr. Ellis, who reassured her over the phone that this was probably something
Thomas would get over on his own and that he would be at Lennox Manor as soon as he could.
She met Dr. Ellis at the door. He was a rotund and red-faced man who stared at Caroline with unconcealed curiosity. He’d arrived
in a rickshaw. “You can send away the rickshaw, Doctor,” she said. “My driver will take you back.
“Have you been here before, Dr. Ellis?” she asked, leading him up the staircase.
“Only once,” he said, “when Mason was a little under the weather. Is he here, by the way?” He spoke Mason’s name as though
they were old friends. “Not to worry, Mrs. Stanton. Newcomers to China frequently fall prey to all sorts of stomach upsets
that don’t bother the Chinese or longtime foreign residents. After a while the body adjusts to food and local germs.”