“We can’t leave without you,” both Pearl and Grace said. “You are an old man!”
“The Lord won’t let anything happen to me.” Absalom was confident. “He needs me to do his work.”
The air smelled like it was burning. The streets of Nanking had turned ghostly. Businesses were closed. Nearly all foreigners had already fled. Pearl and Absalom hid inside their house. Although Pearl ’s servants were willing to stay on, Pearl insisted that they leave. She promised that she would hire them back once the danger was over. The servants departed. They knew that if they stayed, they could be killed for having served the foreigners.
Papa and I got busy trying to fill the water jars and stockpile food. Each day we checked on Pearl ’s family. Pearl told me that Absalom had become a problem. He refused to stay inside. He believed that what was happening was perfect for his work. “Desperate people turn to God,” he said.
Pearl and Grace came to Papa for help. They begged him to find a way to stop Absalom.
Papa challenged Absalom on his Chinese translations of the Bible. The two men argued loudly.
“It’s not an error,” Papa insisted. “Some of the stories just don’t make sense in Chinese.”
Eventually, Absalom decided to sit down and work on his revisions.
In only a few days, the streets were filled with strangers. The boarded-up shops were broken into. People were running and others chasing. Screams and shouts could be heard day and night. I could hear the sound of distant gunshots.
I visited the university, wondering what had happened there. The campus was as quiet as a cemetery. I went to the science building and saw windows with bullet holes in them. Then I saw bloodstains on the sidewalk.
“Help!” I heard a voice.
To my horror, I found a foreigner hiding behind the bushes in a pool of blood. He had been shot in the chest. “Help!” the man cried, struggling to speak. “I am the dean of the school and I… am an American missionary.”
Before I could ask for his name, he passed out.
“Sir! Sir!” I knelt and shook him.
The man died in my arms. The sound of gunshots was so near now that I listened for the whistling of bullets. I set the dead man down and covered him with my blouse. I walked toward the town. The wind felt cool on my face. It was an otherwise perfect spring day with camellias blossoming.
There was a woman running toward me. Her arms were waving frantically in the air.
I recognized her. “Lilac!”
“The mobs have come!” Lilac yelled. “They are looking for foreigners! They have already killed one. I heard that he was the dean of the university.”
“Lilac, that man died in my arms!”
Lilac saw the blood on my hands and clothes. The color drained from her face.
We took shortcuts through the hills toward Pearl ’s house. I regretted not insisting that Pearl and her family leave days ago. Panic began to overtake me as I pictured the mob. Lilac told me that she had witnessed the murders of Chinese Christians, our friends and neighbors.
Pearl felt fortunate that everyone in the family had survived so far. The house had been looted three times by soldiers and groups of angry men. Every valuable thing had been taken. The last group had left disappointed because nothing was left.
Absalom’s forehead was bleeding. He had tried to stop the mob and had been knocked down. Even that hadn’t stopped Absalom from continuing to reason with the intruders. He was determined to show God’s grace. It had been Papa who had offered his last money to the looters so they would leave.
Pearl was devastated to learn that the dean of the university, a personal friend, had been killed.
“More soldiers will be coming to Nanking,” Papa predicted.
Pearl and Grace held their children. Grace wept. The sisters wondered if it would be wise to separate the family.
Papa told Pearl that soldiers and mobs were everywhere and that it wasn’t safe to be outside. “They will shoot the moment they see a foreigner.”
Absalom talked again about faith in God.
Pearl turned away.
Absalom suggested that they all pray together. “Let us properly prepare to meet our fate.”
No one responded.
Absalom went to his room and closed the door.
Pearl and Grace looked at each other. Their eyes were filled with tears.
I was afraid. No one knew what to do.
Pearl took a pen and paper and began to write quickly.
“I’m going to the pier,” she announced. “Perhaps a foreign ship might take pity on us. It won’t hurt to try. I am writing down all our names.”
“Let me do it,” I volunteered. “You’d be a walking target with your blonde hair.”
Pearl gave me the folded letter. “Give this to anyone whom you think could help us.”
“Let me go,” Papa offered. “The soldiers will rape Willow. Besides, she is pregnant.”
“No, Papa,” I said. “You are old…”
Before I could say more, Papa took the letter from Pearl and left the house. I had never seen him run so fast. His small frame bounded like a deer as he moved out of sight.
We dared not light candles. The children were asleep. Pearl and Grace stood behind the front door. They listened to every sound. I was exhausted from carrying water to the house and tried to sleep on a straw mat on the floor. I thought about Dick and Papa and prayed for their safety.
Hours later, a loud banging on the door woke me from a deep sleep.
Thinking it was the mob, everyone jumped up.
“Who is it?” Pearl asked.
“Open the door, please! It’s me, Soo-ching!”
“Do I know you?” asked Pearl.
“Yes, I delivered my son in your backyard!”
“What?”
“My name is Soo-ching, and my son’s name is Confucius!”
“Oh, Confucius, yes, I remember!” Pearl opened the door.
A heavy manure stink came with her into the room.
“What has happened to you, Soo-ching?” Pearl asked.
“I poured a bucket of feces over myself for safety,” she said.
“How can I help you?” Pearl asked.
“Help me? No, I’m here to help you! Because tomorrow you will be dead!”
“What do you mean, Soo-ching?”
“I was forced to cook for the soldiers. They are preparing a celebration banquet for tomorrow. I asked what for, and they said they were going to kill all the foreigners in Nanking, tomorrow!”
Pearl’s face turned pale.
“I come to offer you a hiding place, Mrs. Pearl,” Soo-ching said.
“How kind of you, Soo-ching!” Pearl cried.
“Buddha blesses you, Pearl. You offered me a drop of water when I was dying of thirst. Now it is my turn to offer you a flowing creek.” Soo-ching turned to introduce her son. “Confucius, come and pay your respect.”
Confucius, a stick-thin, cross-eyed boy, bowed to Pearl.
With tears in their eyes, Pearl ’s family, including Absalom, gathered. They followed Soo-ching and arrived at her thatched hut.
The moment Soo-ching opened the door, mosquitoes came swarming out like brown balls. They targeted our faces, arms, and legs. Their buzzing was like ten erhus playing at the same time.
“Everyone stays away because of the stink,” Soo-ching said.
As soon as Pearl, Grace, Absalom, and the children had let themselves into the hut, Soo-ching moved bales of hay against the door to seal it shut and make it difficult to open. She brought buckets of donkey piss and slopped it on the hard-packed ground before the door.
Papa showed up exhausted. He hadn’t been able to find any help. I asked what he’d done with Pearl ’s letter. He told me that he had given it to Carpenter Chan. “He’ll find a boat if there is a boat to be found.”
I was upset. “ Pearl has been waiting for your return.”
Papa said that it was time for us to think about our own survival. “Have you heard anything from your husband?” he asked. “I thought he would come to fetch you.”