have a taste for lead.”
As if in response to his challenge, there was a knock at the door. Lydia jumped and gave a little squeal of fright
“Easy,” he said, standing.
“Don’t answer it, please,” she whispered, clutching at his sleeve as he moved toward the door. “It may be Ke Loo.”
“The mandarin?” He gave her a startled look. She nodded. “Wait here,” he said. He shook off her hand and took up a gun from the table nearby, holding it down at his side as he opened the door.
Lydia could not see who was there, nor hear the brief whispered conversation. She remembered that he had been expecting someone else when she had arrived, probably one of the singsong girls; she had seen them before, coming in and out of the house.
She blushed again, recalling too the sight of Peter MacNair when she had turned and seen him behind the door. She was certain that if she but closed her eyes she would see him again as clearly as before. Indeed, she was certain she could never see him again without also seeing that same image.
Apparently he had sent away whoever was outside, for he closed the door and turned back to the room.
“Now then,” he said, coming back to her, “what’s this about Ke Loo? Why should he be looking for you?”
She told him the rest, watching his face grow grimmer as she spoke. “I’m truly sorry to barge in on you like this,” she concluded, “but there was no one else to turn to. In my mother’s condition....” Her voice trailed off. Peter’s expression offered no encouragement.
“And now what?” he asked gruffly. “What the devil am I supposed to do with you?”
“I—I thought perhaps in a day or so this violence against the whites might settle down again.”
“It probably will. But Ke Loo won’t. I suppose you’re something of a novelty to him. They don’t see many white women this far into the interior, certainly none your age. And the Chinese marry very young girls. But I’ve had some dealings with that mandarin before, and I can tell you one thing, once he’s got his mind set on something, he’ll never quit till he has his way.”
“But surely you’ll be leaving here before too long.”
“Tomorrow, with any luck, or the next day,” he said.
“Couldn’t you take us with you then?”
“You think Ke Loo won’t be looking for you? He’ll have spies watching all along the roads for you—and there’s few things more conspicuous than a couple of American women in China. We wouldn’t get fifty miles before you’d be spotted, and then it’d be my neck as well as yours. No, thank you. I told you, I’m not afraid of these devils, but I’ve got no desire to get my throat cut either, especially when it wouldn’t do you a damn bit of good.”
Lydia sank into a chair, tears beginning to roll down her cheeks. It was all more than she could bear, everything that had happened to her. And now the man that she had been so sure would help them was being utterly cold and unfeeling.
“Here, none of that,” he said impatiently. She heard a rattle of china and a moment later he thrust something under her nose.
“Drink this,” he ordered.
“Wh-what is it?”
“Rice wine. A bit of Scotch whisky would do better, but this’ll help some. Go on, drink it, it’ll do you good. All in one swallow now.”
She did as he said, emptying the little porcelain cup in one swallow. The wine had a peculiar, medicinal taste and it burned as it went down, but almost at once she could feel a warm glow radiating from her stomach.
“Thank you,” she sniffled.
He turned wordlessly and went to stand at one of the shuttered windows, gazing out into the darkness. For a long moment the only sound was the patter of the rain outside. Then Sarah moved on the couch and moaned softly, bringing Lydia a renewed awareness of their plight.
“What are we going to do?” Lydia asked.
“I think you’ve got no choice but to spend the night here,” he said. “Your mother’s in no condition to go anywhere. You do realize that she....” He paused and did not finish what he had been going to say, though Lydia thought she knew: her mother was dying. The cholera was almost always fatal, and Mama had been so weak, from nursing Papa, and from worry. Already her face had that ghastly, fallen-in look.
“You’d better get her out of those wet clothes,” Peter said. “I’ll get her some blankets. Might as well leave her on the couch.”
They made Sarah as comfortable as possible on the couch. Once or twice Peter found her staring at him, though he couldn’t be sure, with her fever, whether she was even aware of what she was seeing.
“There’s another robe in the bedroom there,” he said to Lydia when they were finished. “You’re pretty wet yourself, there’s no sense in your getting a chill.”
He watched her disappear into the bedroom. A mere child, and in a damnable fix. He’d spoken only today to Colonel Wu, who was in charge of the local military, and the colonel had warned him in the plainest terms that it was impossible for him to guarantee anyone’s safety just now; his troops were exhausted and jittery from dealing with the cholera, and beginning as well to share the anti-white sentiment affecting the rest of the population. It was this conversation that had convinced MacNair to leave as soon as he could for the coast, where it would be safer.
But though he was confident of getting there on his own, being saddled with two women—or, more likely, one, since the mother looked as if she wouldn’t last the night—would slow him down considerably. Worse, there wasn’t a chance in hell of transporting even one of them undetected, and if Ke Loo was really determined to get his hands on the little one, he’d be madder than a wet hen. Mad enough, maybe, to have both their throats cut.
At the same time, he couldn’t very well go and leave her here, on her own. Sooner or later the Chinese would get around to this house, if they were killing whites. He’d been literally buying time, paying outrageous bribes to those Chinese with whom he’d been in contact, but that couldn’t last forever, and his supply of cash was running low.
He was startled by a feeble tugging at his sleeve, and he looked down to find Sarah trying to get his attention.
“You should sleep, Mrs. Holt,” he started to say, but she shook her head impatiently and gestured for him to bend closer.
“You must—help my daughter, please,” she whispered when he knelt by the couch.
“I’ll do my best for both of you,” he said.
She shook her head again. “No, don’t mind about me, I shall be glad to join my husband—soon, I think—but I want my daughter to live—I beg you....” Her eyes closed, and her hand dropped from his sleeve.
* * * * * * *
It was a relief to be out of her wet clothes. Dressed in the silk robe, Lydia paused to look at the wall of his bedroom.
Some artist,
