Chapter 22
The cook had made beef noodle soup, the hot broth topped with slices of tender meat and slivered scallions, a dish of cucumber
pickles on the side. The cook mentioned to her that Master Liu had ordered this meal especially because he remembered it was
Lisan’s favorite noodle dish. It had never occurred to her that he even knew this or that he cared enough to remember.
What did her father know about her?
Lisan said nothing during lunch and listened to Yao and Master Liu talk about penjing and the Soochow garden where Yao used to work. They said nothing about Prince Tsai until the dishes had been cleared away,
a spoonful of Dragon Well tea set to steep in Master Liu’s favorite teapot, and the door to the small dining room firmly shut.
“Does he ever ask about me?” she said, hands clenched tightly in her lap.
“In every letter,” Master Liu said. “We don’t mention you in business correspondence. Yao is the intermediary for personal
letters. So your father knows about you. He knows that history was always your favorite subject. How you cried so hard when
your cat died that you were sick for days. He asks every so often if you still miss your cat. He knows you love beef noodle
soup and the smell of freshly cut grass.”
Lisan wanted to reach over and grasp his hand.
Master Liu was the one passing on this information to her father.
He was the one who knew her well. Absent-minded though he appeared to be, distant though his affection seemed, he had been her protector all these years.
Caretaker, guardian. And father. He had taken the place of her father.
Prince Tsai was the parent of her blood but she didn’t remember anything of him.
He’d gone away for her protection, so they’d never be seen together and recognized as father and daughter, a sacrifice she didn’t doubt was hard on him, knowing that Master Liu was watching his daughter grow up and he was not.
“Yao tells me my father is missing,” she said. “Is he in danger?”
Master Liu looked even wearier. “As Mr. Zheng, he has been raising money from overseas Chinese. His last telegram said he
was going to Mexico. There are towns in Mexico where Chinese have prospered.”
But it wasn’t easy or safe for Chinese to travel in America, even though the prince carried all the right papers and licenses
identifying him as a merchant, the agent of a Chinese import company, with ample cash and bank accounts at well-respected
banks. He’d cut off his queue when he left China and dressed in suits like any Western businessman. He telegrammed once a
week. But Master Liu had not heard from Prince Tsai in three weeks, so Fourth Uncle had hired the Pinkerton Detective Agency
to search for her father in Mexico.
Master Liu showed Lisan the telegram from “Zheng” that stated his intention of visiting the towns of Ensenada and Torreón.
Lisan looked up from the paper. “If Masako Kyo hadn’t confronted me, when were you going to tell me about my father? When
was I going to meet him?”
“Your father decided it would be this year, whether or not you regained your memories,” he said.
Her father felt it was time. His plan was for the two of them, father and daughter, to settle in Canada and make it their home.
Unlike America, Canada still accepted Chinese immigrants, and “Mr. Zheng” had decided to move to a well-established Chinatown in a city called Victoria, on the west coast.
For years, Master Liu had kept a set of forged identity papers in readiness for the day Lisan joined her father.
“I was expecting a telegram from him any day now, once he came back from Mexico, and when that happened I would tell you everything.
But nothing’s arrived and . . .” Master Liu’s voice trailed off and he shook his head. Obviously, he feared the worst.
“So what now?” she said. “Do I carry on as though nothing has changed? Do I come back here to hide for the rest of my life?
Or do I leave China and wait for my father to be found?”
Father. Still such a strange word on her tongue, taking up an even stranger place in her heart. It seemed impossibly cruel that he
had disappeared just as she learned of his existence.
“Master Liu and your Fourth Uncle have been making arrangements all this time,” Yao said, “getting in touch with contacts
in Canada.”
“Fourth Uncle’s been monopolizing the telegraph machine at Xinwen Bao,” Master Liu said. “A newspaper in the family can be so useful. We must proceed assuming your father is all right. In a week’s
time you’ll get on board a freighter to Victoria, Canada—a ship of the Jade Star Line, which our family owns. Your father—or
one of our contacts—will meet you in Victoria. Since Masako Kyo knows who you are, we need to get you out of China.”
“What if something has . . . happened to my father?” she said. “What then? What would I do all by myself in Canada?”
“You won’t be alone,” Yao said. “I’m going too. I’m coming to Canada with you, to join you and your father. I have papers
that say I have an uncle who runs a broom manufacturing company over there. It’s a company owned by the Lius.”
He was coming with her. She hadn’t realized until that moment just how unmoored the thought of leaving China made her feel, or how fiercely she’d been pushing away the fear that she might never see Yao again. But Yao would be there too, someone familiar. Someone who made her feel safe.
She sighed. But it was Prince Tsai, not her, who held Yao’s loyalty and affection. She was merely his duty.
“And even if something has happened to your father,” Master Liu said, “I will always take care of you. You’ll never be in
need of money or help. You are my dearest friend’s only child and have been my daughter these past years.” His voice broke
for a moment and he looked away quickly, taking off his glasses to polish them. “You simply cannot stay in China much longer,
my dear. I can’t risk your safety.”
“You think you’re insignificant, Lisan,” Yao spoke up, “and though we live here in Shanghai, which seems to revolve around
money, entertainment, and gambling as if nothing has changed, everyone knows our country is about to experience enormous,
possibly violent, change. There are people who stand to lose everything, and are therefore willing to do anything to gain
some advantage. They would not consider you insignificant.”
She nodded, remembering Master Liu’s words. China stands on the edge and any small nudge could tip it in any direction. Any one person, any one incident.
“I want to go back to Lennox Manor,” she said. The statement startled her; it was as though someone else had spoken the words.
As soon as Master Liu made it clear that she had to leave Shanghai, she had felt the pull again, the compulsion to return
to the mansion on Brenan Road. A feeling of obligation, of unfinished business. Back to working for Mrs. Stanton until they
put her on board a ship heading for a foreign country and a father she didn’t know.
“Yes, I think the best thing is for you to continue there as though nothing has happened,” Master Liu said. “We should know the prince’s situation soon, and when we do, we’ll know what to do.”
“What about Masako Kyo?” Yao said. “She’s in Peking now. Should we worry about what she’ll do when Lisan goes missing?”
“She has a reputation for being annoyingly persistent,” Master Liu said, with a sigh, “but my Fourth Brother claims he can
deal with her. It’s best we don’t ask how he will do that.”
Lisan ran to her room. She packed up her belongings and put on her coat. When she opened the bedroom door, Yao was there in
the hallway.
“Leaving right now?” he said, taking in her coat, the valise.
“I’ve been away from my job for two days,” she said. “Mrs. Stanton has been very kind, giving me extra time off, and I should
get back.”
“I should get back too,” he said. “Are you taking a rickshaw? It’s cold and it’s pouring with rain. Let’s ask Master Liu if
he’ll let us borrow his car and driver. I don’t want to catch a cold before we go.”
When they neared Lennox Manor, Yao got out of the motorcar. “Let’s arrive separately,” he said. “I’ll walk the rest of the
way. And Lisan, try and carry on as though everything is normal. There’s nothing either of us can do until Master Liu and
his brother find your father.”
He opened the umbrella and began trudging down the road. As the automobile drove past him, Yao gave her an encouraging smile.
As though everything is normal. What was normal now? Lisan got out at the front gate, tapped at the gatekeeper’s door to let her in. “What was that automobile?”
he said, craning his neck as Master Liu’s motorcar drove away. “Are you rich?”
“No, not at all,” she said, and walked past him, through the gates.
Almost as soon as she set foot on the driveway, she felt it. The sensation of being drawn to the house, of a task left undone,
and it was stronger than ever; there was now an undertone of urgency to the feeling. It had become more insistent.
Come find me.
What made Charles, if he was the one behind the dreams, think she was in any way equipped to search for a woman who had wanted
to leave him and leave Shanghai behind? And why was she even thinking about ghosts as though she could reason with them?
She entered the house through the servants’ entrance, where Xiao Wu rushed up as though he’d been watching for her. Every
inch of his small person quivered in agitation. “Master Thomas is very, very sick,” he said. “The doctor has come. Missy Caroline
is with him almost all the time.”
She had him take her bag to her room and hurried upstairs to see Caroline. She reached Thomas’s bedroom door at the same time
as Little Liao and Da Wu.
“We’re taking turns changing sheets and replacing the chamber pots,” Little Liao said, “several times a day, and whenever
Missy Caroline rings for it. Aiya, the laundry!”
“There’s something truly wrong,” Da Wu said. “We’ve all been talking about it. This isn’t just a stomach upset, but the foreign