Ha Jin - A Map of Betrayal - A Novel

Gary walked to the front with a slight spring in his step, his legs shaking a little, which was unusual for a man of his experience. It was George Thomas’s heartfelt words that had unnerved him, but he forced a smile and hugged Thomas. They held each other tightly for a few seconds while applause broke out. Gary was moved, his eyes wet. He turned to speak to the audience. “I’m greatly honored by this award and touched by what George just said. Twenty-three years is a long time in a person’s life, and for me, it has also been a transformative period, during which I first became a refugee, then an immigrant, and then a U.S. citizen. This country took me in and gave me a family and a home. I pride myself on serving this nation and on doing my part to make it a safer, better place for ourselves and for our children. I hope I will be able to work for another twenty-three years, so I take this award as an encouragement and reassurance. Thank you, George. Thank you all.” He veered and hurried off the platform, his legs shaking violently now, and the faces before him were swimming. Somehow he was touched by his own little speech, which had come from deep within and caught him by surprise. His head was reeling with emotion. Indeed, after living in America for seventeen years, he’d begun to view it as his second country.

A reception followed on the seventh floor. Though this was just a work event, there were cocktails and wine at a bar, and also cheese and hors d’oeuvres carried around by six waitresses. People were trading pleasantries and making small talk, the whole lounge buzzing and humming. Gary reminded himself not to drink too much, because he’d have to pick up his daughter at the train station that evening. The girl was coming home from her prep school to have a molar pulled. Gary held a flute of champagne but only sipped it. Now and then he picked up a meatball or a giant olive stuffed with sun-dried tomato from the salvers floating around. He chatted at length with David Shuman about the Red model drama currently in vogue in China. David particularly liked the play called Taking the Tiger Mountain by Strategies , not for the lyrics or the subject matter but for the music and the scenery. He had watched the films of many contemporary Chinese plays and was becoming an expert on the revolutionary drama, even able to sing snatches of Beijing opera. He often chanted in Gary’s presence: “Before going to the torture chamber / Let me drink a bowl of wine poured by you, my mother / To make me bold and unbreakable.” Or: “Ah, this little rascal / Who has no manners whatsoever.” It was too bad that David couldn’t visit China (his name had appeared on Beijing’s blacklist). Swirling his wine, he again brought up the topic of the Chinese government’s recent objection to him as a member of an unofficial cultural delegation. Gary consoled him, saying, “Who knows, you might become a big diplomat someday. Life is unpredictable. Just follow your own interests and hang in there. I’m sure good opportunities will present themselves.”

“Thanks,” David said. “Besides, I enjoy what I’ve been doing and I’m paid to specialize in Chinese affairs. You can’t beat that.”

By now Gary’s life was peaceful and materially comfortable. The previous fall his daughter had gone to prep school, and she was doing well there and should have no difficulty getting into a good college. Whenever he went to Boston on business, he’d rent a car and drive forty miles to Groton so he could spend a bit of time with Lilian. He loved her and would spare no cost for her education. If someday he returned to China, he hoped she would often visit him there. She was his deepest attachment to this land.

Before Christmas in 1972, Gary was informed by the CIA that he’d been given a thirteen-hundred-dollar raise. In the previous years his salary had been increased by three or four hundred dollars annually, just enough to keep up with inflation. This time the big raise delighted both him and Nellie. When she asked him why they were so generous to him, he merely said, “I worked hard and deserve it.”

She smiled, rolling her eyes while stroking his hairless wrist. “You’re such an arrogant man,” she told him.

I still often heard from my niece Juli after her reunion with her parents in Fushan. She had just opened an electronics shop selling DVDs, video games, cell phones. She had attempted to order some iPads, but at the moment they were in short supply because too many young people were crazy about this new Apple product. There were some pirated iPads available, but they were almost as expensive as the genuine thing. Juli sent me a photo of her store, which was a few doors down the street from her mother’s seamstress shop. Her parents were happy to have her home and tried every way to make her stay. The family had just bought a car, a red low-end Chery, which looked like a mini-compact sedan and cost over fifty thousand yuan, about eight thousand dollars. (I wondered if that was how she had spent the settlement money from Wuping.) Juli was the only one in the family who could drive, so she made deliveries for her mother’s shop as well. She seemed to have calmed down and confided to me that she’d been giving two middle schoolers music lessons and was going to form a small band so they could perform in the evenings. She would just play the guitar because there were others who had better voices. “If the locals only could have more opportunities,” Juli wrote. “Some of them are more talented than those people in my band in Guangzhou.”

I was glad to see that she hadn’t lost her passion for music. On behalf of her parents, Juli invited me to visit them the next summer. “Maybe my brother will come home too,” she said. “We will have a big reunion.” The family was pleased to know Ben was in America, near me. Without a second thought I accepted their invitation and was amazed by my prompt response, since in general I wasn’t fond of travel. But I felt close to these relatives in China, even closer than to Aunt Marsha’s family. Perhaps my presence would help improve the family’s standing in the county town, because they could be known to have overseas relations, who are often viewed as opportunities. Unlike decades ago, nowadays officials try to cultivate foreign connections. Many of the rich send their children abroad for college, and people with enough means plan to emigrate because they feel insecure with their newfound wealth. In Beijing and Shanghai and Guangzhou it’s fashionable to greet rich friends by saying, “Done with the emigration paperwork yet?”

I’d been working on a syllabus for a new course in the fall and had also been reading the books I would assign my class. I enjoyed the summer’s peace and quiet, which was nourishing both mentally and physically, so I spent most of the daytime in my study while Henry was busy with the maintenance work. In late August he bought another five Intel chips for Ben. These were smaller than the previous batch but more expensive, costing nearly four thousand dollars total. The prospect of a bigger profit had Henry floating on air. He often whistled a tune while vacuuming the corridors of our building or wiping the windows in the lobby with a squeegee or hauling the wheeled trash cans between the backyard and the front street. But I was ill at ease about his little sideline, knowing Ben’s business was shady. I wondered if I should talk Henry out of it but decided not to. In his whole life seldom had he been able to make money so easily, and I wouldn’t spoil his mood. Let him be happy if he enjoyed helping Ben.

ON SUNDAY AFTERNOON BEFORE LABOR DAY, Ben called and asked if I’d heard from Sonya. “No,” I said. “What happened to her?”