A Good Fall by Ha Jin

place, about fifteen minutes’ walk. There were more pedestrians in downtown Flushing since the summer started, many of them foreign tourists or visitors from the suburban towns who came to shop or to dine in the small restaurants offering the foods of their left-behind homes. The store signs, most bearing Chinese characters, reminded me of a bustling shopping district in Shenyang. So many immigrants live and work here that you needn’t speak English to get around. I stopped at the newsstand manned by a Pakistani, picked up the day’s World Journal , and then turned onto Forty-first Avenue. A scrawny teenage girl strode toward me, dragged by a Doberman. The dog stopped at a maple sapling and urinated fitfully on the box encasing the base of the tree. The girl stood by, waiting for her dog to finish. Along the sidewalk every young tree was protected by the same tall red box.
    Folk Avenue was easy to find, just a few blocks from College Point Boulevard. Number 48 was a two-story brick bungalow with a glassed-in porch. Beside a two-car garage grew a large oak tree, and behind a small tool shed in the backyard stretched a high fence of wooden boards. Despite the close proximity of the downtown and the houses crowded together in the neighborhood, this property stood out idyllically. I rang the doorbell, and a slender woman of medium height in a shirtwaist dress answered. I was amazed when she introduced herself as Eileen Min and said we had spoken that morning. To my mind, it was unlikely that such a young-looking woman could have a daughter attending high school.
    She led me into her house. I was impressed by the furniture in the spacious living room, all redwood, elegant and delicate in design, like antiques. A vase of stargazer lilies sat on a credenza on the far side. On the wall above it hung a photo of a lean-faced man, middle-aged with mild eyes and a jutting forehead, his hairline receded to his crown. I sat on a leather sofa, and Eileen Min told me, “That’s my late husband. He died three months ago.”
    “I’m sorry,” I said.
    “Sami, pour some tea for Mr. Hong.” She said this to a teenage girl who was in a corner using a computer.
    “No need to trouble yourself,” I said to Sami, who rose without looking our way.
    The girl headed for the kitchen. She was wearing orange slippers, and her calf-length skirt showed her thin ankles. Like her mother, she was slim, but one or two inches shorter, and she too had a fine figure. She quickly returned with a cup of tea and put it beside me. “Thanks a lot,” I said.
    She didn’t say a word but looked me in the face, her eyebrows tilting a little toward her temples as if she were being naughty. Then she turned and entered a bedroom off the hall, her slippers squeaking on the glossy wood floor. She left her door ajar, apparently to listen in on our conversation. I produced my student ID card and my GRE scores. “These are my credentials,” I told Eileen.
    She examined the card. “So you’re a graduate student at Queens College. What’s this?”
    “The results of the test for graduate studies; every applicant must take it. See, I got 720 in English and 780 in math.”
    “What’s the perfect score?”
    “Eight hundred in each subject.”
    “That’s impressive. Forgive me for asking, but if you’re so strong in math, why didn’t you study science?”
    “Actually I was torn between history and biology during my freshman year at NYU.” I told her the truth. “Then I decided on history because I wouldn’t want to depend on a lab for my work. If you do history, all you need is time and a good library.”
    “Also brains. Is history what you’re studying now?”
    “Yes, American urban history.” I lifted the tea and took a sip. Then I caught Sami observing us from her room, through the gap at the door. She saw me noticing her and withdrew immediately.
    Eileen beamed, her face shiny with a pinkish sheen and her almond-shaped eyes glowing. She said, “I