Andrea Barrett - The Middle Kingdom

‘Nice night,’ he called across the water. ‘Isn’t it.’

His face was Chinese, but his voice was absolutely American. He walked around the edge of the water, apparently unembarrassed by the scene I’d just witnessed, and when he reached my bench he asked if he could join me.

‘I thought you were a ghost,’ he said.

‘So why did you come over?’ His face was lean, high-cheekboned, clever. He wore a short-sleeved shirt that left his smooth forearms bare.

‘Needed the company,’ he said, and then he smiled and extended a hand toward me. ‘James Li,’ he said. ‘You must be here with the conference.’

‘Just a wife,’ I said. ‘Just one of the scientist’s wives, tagging along.’

He smiled as if I’d said something funny. ‘Just-a-wife,’ he said. ‘What brings a wife out here by herself in the small hours of the morning?’

‘I couldn’t sleep.’

‘Me either.’ He gestured toward the pond, where his rafts had sunk without a trace. ‘As you can see.’

‘What were you doing?’

He shrugged and looked over the water. ‘A little love charm,’ he said. ‘Something my mother taught me. You know how it is — love makes us stupid.’

Perhaps because it was dark and late and we were strangers, we talked easily after that. I told him his rafts reminded me of things Zillah and I had made as children. He told me his parents were Cantonese but that he’d been born in New Jersey and taught at Yale. ‘My father’s an epidemiologist,’ he said. ‘Very westernized. But my mother still keeps to the old ways. She was a midwife here, but she can’t practice in the States. Her English is still terrible. And she’s very superstitious.’ He paused and then laughed. ‘Not like me,’ he said. ‘Not much.’

His voice was low and peaceful, but despite that he seemed to burn next to me, as if he had a fever. ‘You were visiting?’ I asked.

‘These last two months,’ he said. ‘Giving some lectures in Fujian — my first time over here. I went to see my grandparents in Canton last week. All these places I’d only heard about from my mother. All these relatives. Everyone thought I was rich and all of them wanted something. I had to get out of there after a week, so I came up here.’

‘What’s here?’

‘Good question.’ He threw a pebble into the pond and we watched the rings spread from the center to the shore. ‘What’s here,’ he said, ‘is an old college love of mine I haven’t seen in years. Working this conference. I came to give a couple of lectures at one of the universities, and when I registered here I saw the conference program with Tinnie’s name on it. Who I haven’t been able to track down at all — and tomorrow I have to give two more lectures, but I heard there’s some big banquet tomorrow night and I got myself invited to that. Maybe I can hook up with Tinnie there.’

‘Pretty long shot,’ I said.

He nodded. ‘Hence the rafts. I’m as nervous as a girl.’

His feet sat square on the ground, his legs were completely still. ‘You don’t look like the nervous type,’ I said.

‘Everyone is — sooner or later.’ He plucked a few strands of grass from the ground and rolled them between his fingers. ‘So why were you crying?’ he said.

He seemed so kind, so gentle, so open, that I told him, or at least I tried. In broken sentences, digressions, allusions, confusions, I tried to describe how I’d met Dr Yu and her husband and Rocky and what had happened between us. ‘And then I got sick,’ I finished. ‘And now everything’s so complicated.’ I never mentioned Walter or the troubles we were having, but despite that James’s face darkened and grew thoughtful as we talked.

‘How did you get so involved with this family?’ he asked. ‘So fast?’

‘I don’t know. It just happened.’

‘What do you think they want from you?’

‘Do they have to want something?’

‘Of course they do,’ he said gently. ‘Your friend, this Dr Yu — why do you suppose she’s gone to all this trouble?’

I thought back to our first meeting. ‘She wanted to meet my husband,’ I said. ‘He’s sort of a big wheel here. And she was too shy to talk to him, so she tried me instead. But that was just at first.’

‘And after that?’

I shrugged. ‘We like each other.’

He plucked at the grass again. ‘People here,’ he said, ‘believe very much in the importance of personal connections. Everything works through this network of favors and obligations. You do me a favor, I do you one — when I was at my grandparents, I accepted meals and hospitality from all kinds of people, and I didn’t realize what I’d done until I was getting ready to leave. And then everyone wanted something — letters of recommendation, help emigrating, foreign exchange certificates, help buying a television set from the Friendship Store. You name it. And no one thought it was unusual to ask. I owed. Dr Yu has done you a lot of favors, and now she may believe you owe her in return.’

‘I wouldn’t mind that,’ I said. ‘What’s the harm?’

‘No harm,’ he said. ‘As long as you understand. But these connections aren’t casual, the way they can be in the States. My parents still get letters from people they knew thirty years ago, fourth cousins needing help, children of old friends needing a sponsor for a visa. And they’d never think of disregarding those obligations. All I’m saying is that you should be careful what you accept.’

‘It’s too late to be careful,’ I said.

‘Then be fair. Make sure you honor your debts.’

He stood and straightened the crease in his pants. ‘This Rocky,’ he said. ‘Are you in love with him? We could make another set of rafts. My mother swears by them.’

I thought about Rocky once more. ‘No,’ I said slowly. ‘He’s lovely, and I’m glad we met, but I’m not in love with him.’

‘One thing you don’t have to worry about, then. No love charm?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘But I hope yours worked.’

‘Tomorrow will tell,’ he said. ‘Wish me luck.’

‘Luck,’ I whispered. He vanished into the garden, following one of the paths that led to the top of a small hill with a view. Perhaps he meant to wait for the sunrise there. I sat alone for another few minutes, thinking about what he’d said and wondering if I could trust the advice of a man who called love to him with spells.

Walter and I woke so uneasy with each other that I almost welcomed our continued lack of privacy. We’d be alone together soon enough, and I dreaded what would happen once we boarded the plane home and left all this behind. All the noise, all the people, all the sights. Ah the buzz and clamor Walter had been swimming in. He’d be miserable when we got home, I could see that coming. Whenever he returned from a conference he went through weeks of withdrawal, and this time he’d have more to miss than usual and less to welcome him. But meanwhile we had Katherine and Quentin to distract us from each other. Katherine and Quentin had breakfast with us; they also had lunch with us. And after lunch, when the afternoon began to weigh so heavily that I suggested to Walter that we visit the Summer Palace, Katherine and Quentin came along as easily as if they’d been invited.

‘What a good idea,’ Katherine said. ‘We were so busy working when we were here that we hardly saw Beijing.’

I got stuck in the cab’s front seat while the other three nestled in back. ‘ Ni hau ,’ I said to the driver. The others seemed inclined to let me take charge of this expedition. ‘ Ni jiang Yingyu ma? ’ Do you speak English?

The driver smiled — a nice smile, although his teeth were cracked and stained. ‘ Wo shi Meiguo ren ,’ I said.