Steve Cash - The Meq

Sailor asked me regularly if my dreams had revealed anything: a name, a place, or direction. But my dreams were as chaotic as the country we were in. Once, I dreamed Mama and Papa and I were staying in the Statler Hotel in St. Louis and we went to a baseball game in a rickshaw. The grandstands were full of screaming fans, but there were no players on the field. I turned and asked Mama what all the cheering was for and she said, “Watch. Just wait and watch, Z. It’s a good game!” When I looked back to the field, the bases were being swept away by torrential rain. It was raining everywhere, but we stayed completely dry. I watched and watched until I woke up.

Our search for Zeru-Meq became an endless cycle of discovery and disappointment, almost always ending with the revelation that he had been there the day before yesterday.

For three and a half years we ate simply, traveled lightly, and crisscrossed China in our hunt for the enigmatic Zeru-Meq. We went as far west as the isolated fishing village of Shigu, where the Yangtze makes an impossible hairpin turn from south to north within a few hundred yards. And we went as far east and south as the island-city of Macao, where we could finally take off our Buddhist robes and blend in with Macao’s large Portuguese population. And everywhere, at every temple, village, monastery, shipping dock, and gambling house we found only a trace, a poem, a riddle, or an odd anecdote concerning the missing Zeru-Meq. I was tired of tracking him. It seemed pointless, hopeless, and fatigue overtook perseverance more than once. Then something wonderful happened.

It was May 5, 1900. My birthday had come and gone the day before and would have passed unnoticed except that Sailor had mentioned it and reminded me that each one counted. “The Meq must count birthdays,” he said, “the way bankers count money or else we will own nothing of ourselves.”

We had recently left the town of Ch’u Fu, where Confucius had lived and was buried, and traveled north to T’ai An, which lies below T’ai Shan, another sacred Taoist mountain in the province of Shantung. The roads were heavy with traffic and there was generally more chaos than usual. We had heard rumors of revolution and violence throughout the province and that the Germans had taken control of Kiachow peninsula. We were taking tea at a monastery outside T’ai An and the monks were telling us what a dangerous future there was in store for China and the monasteries if the foreign devils came inland. I had learned enough Chinese to understand what was being said, but I was drifting and paying no attention. Half a mile from where I was sitting, a train had stopped on the tracks at a small crossroads. It was not a regular stop, and as I watched, I could see several men working on the wheel of the car just behind the engine. There was nothing unusual about that. But then I noticed, on the other side of the train and rising above it, one by one, Chinese kites. I had seen hundreds, maybe thousands, of kites in China, but these I had only seen in one other place. Kepa’s camp.

I got up without a word and started walking toward the train as if I was being reeled in by an invisible line. As I got closer, I could hear the voices of children laughing and shouting, some in Chinese and some in English. I knelt down and easily crawled under the train. On the other side, in the middle of an open field and twenty or so children, stood Owen Bramley patiently assembling his kites and helping the children to fly them.

I watched for a moment and then started toward him. He saw my bright red and gold robe immediately, but the hat must have fooled him. He turned back to his kites, then paused and slowly turned around again, staring at me and adjusting his glasses. He gave the kite he was holding to a boy about my size and walked to meet me.

“My God,” he said. “She was right. She said I would find you when I least expected it.”

He looked the same, maybe a little thinner, but then so was I. He wore the same white shirtsleeves, rolled up, and his trousers were held up by suspenders. He was grinning and shaking his head back and forth.

“How are you, Owen?”

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” he said, at the same time turning and looking around anxiously. “Come, let’s walk somewhere. I’ve got something for you.”

He took my arm and we walked about a hundred yards away from the tracks where a long, shaded walkway to the monastery’s Hall of Incense began. There were ancient cypress trees on both sides and it was paved with square-cut stones. We walked a short distance and stopped. We were standing between two massive stone lions, facing each other across the walkway. The late afternoon light was broken and made the lions look as freckled as Owen Bramley.

He unbuttoned his shirt and reached inside for something. “Carolina Covington gave this to me for me to give to you. I told her I would, but until now, I never knew how.” He grinned again and handed me a letter. It was coffee-stained and wrinkled, but still sealed and intact. There was only one thing scratched across the back. “Z.”

I know of nothing more treasured than a letter from someone you love. Its very presence has power. I held the letter from Carolina as if it were older and rarer than the bones of the one who had carved the stone lions I was standing between. I was astonished. I couldn’t move. I looked up at Owen Bramley.

“How did you. when were you. what are you doing here?” I stammered.

He laughed and took his glasses off, wiping them clean.

“I met her in St. Louis while visiting Solomon,” he said. “A remarkable woman, that one. When I told her I was coming to China, she took me in her confidence and entrusted me with the letter. She was ecstatic that I might see you, though privately, as I told you, I had my doubts. Anyway, there you are and here I am. How are you. progressing?”

“There are good days and bad,” I said, trying to be honest, but having no real way to answer him. “Why are you in China? I know it’s not just to find me.”

“Actually, I came as a favor for my parents to begin with, but now it has turned into something else. We have relatives, my aunt and uncle, the Reverend William and Daphne Croft from Cornwall, who moved to China thirty years ago as missionaries. When my parents heard the rumors of this uprising in China and that Christian missionaries were being slaughtered by the Boxers or whatever these hooligans are called, they asked me if I would help get the Crofts out of China. Of course I said I would, but I had no idea I’d be taking out twenty-nine children as well.” He paused for a moment and looked toward the train, which was close to being repaired. “Z, as a foreigner, you should be very careful in China these days. It is dangerous and it’s going to get worse. There may be a war.”

“The Chinese think we’re Tibetan Buddhists,” I said.

“Just don’t slip up. These Boxers are fanatics. I don’t trust a one of them. Tz’u-hsi, the Empress Dowager, thinks they might bring the old China back with their lunatic magic. She might be as crazy as they are. Anyway, it’s time to leave China, not stay. Have you thought about it?”

“No, it’s not possible. We still have unfinished business. But tell me, how is Pello and. how did Eder take the news?”

Just then, Sailor seemed to appear out of nowhere and walked up beside us. He acknowledged Owen Bramley with a nod and said, “Please, go on.”

Owen Bramley hesitated for a moment. Then he answered. “Pello is fine. He walks with a limp, but he is well and back at Kepa’s.” He turned to face Sailor directly. “Eder is. brokenhearted. Kepa said she is well, but very sad. However, Ray is with her and Nova keeps them both very much alive.”

Sailor looked down at the cracks between the ancient paving stones, then up to Owen Bramley. “Good,” he said.