“That was hardly your fault, was it?” George interjected. “Aren’t you being a little overly conscientious about this? Not that I don’t appreciate it, of course, but Dory didn’t care about your expenses. She could afford it. She just wanted the box. Her will is clear.”
“I suppose I’m fussing needlessly. I wonder if Burton Haldimand knows about the sale,” I said.
“Burton Haldimand?” Eva asked as George frowned and lightly pounded the arm of his chair with his fist.
“He’s… a rival for the boxes,” I said.
“The fellow from the Cottingham! Then you better get moving,” Eva said. “I thought it was disgraceful the way they treated Dory. From what she told me about how her so-called retirement was handled, I believe them to have been a little light in the due-process department. I told her she should sue, and I’d be only too happy to represent her, but she wouldn’t. She said if they didn’t want her, then she should just leave. True, she was pushing sixty at the time, but they still had to handle it properly. I told her she could at least get a better settlement. She said she didn’t need the money, which of course she didn’t. But let’s just make sure the Cottingham doesn’t get our Dory’s box.
“Now, as to how we can help here: Our firm has an office in Beijing, run by one of our senior partners, who has been in Beijing for five years now. Her name is Mira Tetford. She works with North American corporations that want to do business in China, and just about everybody does. Sign of the times. Here are her coordinates. She’ll arrange for someone to meet you at the airport if you let her know when you’re arriving, and she’ll arrange for your accommodation. She’ll also make sure the money is there for you, and provide a translator. Dory wanted you to fly business class by the way. Let us know when you want to go, and we’ll make the arrangements. You’ll do it?”
“Please,” George said. “I would be very grateful.”
“I’ll do it, yes,” I said.
“How about we get out of town?” I said to Rob about an hour later. “You know, go back to being our real selves for a few days, far away from the bad guys?”
“Okay,” he said. His enthusiasm was distinctly underwhelming.
“I have to go to Beijing.” I told him about Dory’s project. “Beijing,” he said. “Do I want to go to Beijing?”
“Probably not,” I said. “But you do want to fly to Taiwan.”
“Jennifer!” he said, his face brightening for the first time in about a month. “Brilliant idea! She’d like to see you, too, though.”
“And she will, once I get my work done in Beijing. But wouldn’t it be nice for the two of you to have some time to yourselves, just father and daughter?” By which I meant, of course, that Rob and I had been spending way too much time in the same room, and for all his talk about the two of us getting married, all this togetherness was putting a strain on our relationship. Not that this was a fair test exactly, given that under normal circumstances he’d be at work every day, not sitting around a tiny apartment that wasn’t even ours, getting more depressed by the minute. Still, we would definitely benefit from some time apart. I said none of this.
There isn’t much that gets past Rob, however. “You’re getting a little tired of life with the less-than-cheerful Herb Krahn,” he said. “You’re thinking it’s like living with a caged lion.”
“I won’t comment,” I said. “As long as you promise not to point out that Charlyn Krahn has not been the poster child for the perfect roomie herself.”
“Deal,” he laughed. It was good to hear him do that.
The next ten days were a flurry of activity. There were visas to be obtained, packing to be done, and shopping, too, given we couldn’t go back home to get what we needed. Fortunately we’d both taken our passports. It was not until the night before I left that it all caught up with me, the enormity of what I was undertaking. I sort of slumped on the bed beside my suitcase. “I don’t know about this,” I said.
“What’s bothering you?” Rob said.
“I don’t know.”
“Sure you do. I know we haven’t been talking much, even though we’ve been spending way more time together than usual, but let’s give it a try. You haven’t been sleeping well, and you’ve been a little cranky. It’s not like you. Usually you look forward to trips. Talk to me.”
“I am unsure about going back to China. I was there twenty years ago. I loved the people, I loved the sights, but I got out into the countryside and I saw how poor and oppressed the people were. I saw the ravages of the Cultural Revolution still affecting people years later, and I was upset, afterwards, about the massacre at Tian’anmen Square. I wondered if some of the young people I met had been injured or killed.”
“I expect things have changed a lot since then. You need to go and reassess.”
“True. I’m apprehensive about everything, though. I don’t know how to handle auctions in Beijing, particularly in Chinese.”
“I can certainly understand that. But they’re going to get you help with the language, aren’t they? The lawyer in Beijing?”
“Yes. I won’t know my way around, though, after all these years.”
“There will be maps, and you’ll have help. What else?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“You’ll have to do better than that.”
“I really don’t know. I just feel anxious about the whole thing. There is something wrong about this, an obsession of a dead woman. Yes, Dory was right in wanting to return the box to China, but if the Chinese government wants it to stay there, they can purchase it. George isn’t entirely comfortable with this, either. I can tell, even if I don’t know him at all well. He should just send the box he already owns, tell them about the other one on auction, and suggest there might be a third. Case closed.”
“They were married a long time, did you not tell me, thirty-five years or something like that? It would be difficult not to respect the wishes of a partner of thirty-odd years, and a dead one at that, even if you thought the idea was completely ridiculous. Relax. You’ll do fine. Everything will work out as it should,” he replied. “I’m anxious, too, you know.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know how I’ll manage without having you underfoot constantly.”
That’s one of the best things about Rob, the way he can make me laugh. The next morning we were on our way, Rob to Taiwan, and I settling down in business class en route to Beijing.
Despite my misgivings, I was looking forward to the flight, a little pampering in business class that I don’t normally enjoy, and a full day of no phones and no Clive. What more could I ask? Well, I could ask that Burton Haldimand be on another flight. Unfortunately, I heard his voice almost immediately upon boarding. He was asking for a blanket that had been sealed in plastic and some fresh orange juice.
“Hello, Burton,” I said as I walked past his seat to mine. He had already put a little sign up on the top of his seat to indicate he didn’t want to be interrupted for anything during the flight. Personally, I thought that would be a shame, missing the champagne.
“Lara! A pleasure to see you again. How are you feeling today? Over that cold?”
“Quite over it, thank you, Burton.” I had looked up the Yellow Emperor, not prepared to let Burton tease me about it again. The Medical Classic of the Yellow Emperor, or Huang Di Nei Jing, is the theoretical basis for traditional Chinese medicine, and is supposed to have been compiled something like two thousand years ago. The Yellow Emperor is one of the mythical founders of China, and the book expounds on medicine through a conversation between this mythical emperor and some wise men and doctors. Just so you know.