this rice changed his mind about crunchy food. Chushi told them stories, too. He loved to read, and every day he would act out parts he’d read the night before from Chinese novels. Tall, with a thin, long face and graceful hands, he imitated birds flying and oceans rolling.
Pearl translated, and Maisie and Felix sat, transfixed, eating and listening.
The story Pearl asked Chushi to tell again and again was “The Dream of the Red Chamber,” a kind of Chinese Romeo and Juliet story about star-crossed lovers from warring tribes.
“Ah,” Chushi always said, shaking his head, “you are a romantic, Zhenzhu.”
In the afternoon, the children often went to Horse Street. Wang Amah gave Maisie a hat like Pearl’s and tucked her mop of hair beneath it, muttering in Chinese as she did.
“Don’t eat that candy,” Pearl’s mother always ordered as they left the house.
Mrs. Sydenstricker seemed to have an unusually strong obsession with germs. Every day she washed the walls and floors of the house with a strong-smelling chemical. She fretted over Pearl and baby Grace, feeling their foreheads for fevers, listening to their chests, and watchingthem closely as if they might disappear.
One day as they ate the forbidden candy from its paper cones, Maisie asked Pearl why her mother didn’t want her to eat it. The candy was just crystallized sugar, like the rock candy Maisie and Felix liked to get at the little candy store in Cape May when their family went on vacation.
“She thinks it’s dirty,” Pearl said with a shrug.
Felix forced himself to swallow what was already in his mouth.
“Dirty?” he asked.
“She thinks everything in China is dirty,” Pearl said sadly. “My father doesn’t. If he were home more, I wouldn’t have to sneak like this.”
So far, Felix and Maisie hadn’t even met Pearl’s father. He was too busy trying to convert people up north to bother coming home for a visit.
“She worries about you a lot,” Felix said.
Pearl hesitated before she answered. “My father says we’ve had a cup full of sorrow. My sisters Maude and Edith and my brother Arthur, all of them older than me, went away too soon.”
When she saw the puzzled looks on Maisie’s and Felix’s faces, she added, “They died.”
“Died!” Maisie said, shocked.
“As did my brother Clyde,” Pearl said sadly.
“But how?” Maisie managed to ask.
“Mother blames China. The summer heat, the lack of hospitals.”
Felix blinked back tears. Four children? All dead? No wonder Pearl’s mother was such a worrier. For the first time since they’d arrived in China last week, when Felix looked at Maisie, she returned his glance.
“You can’t die from the heat, though, can you?” Felix said. As a worrier himself, and a bit of a hypochondriac, the idea that heat could actually kill you started a panic in his chest.
“Well,” Pearl said. “They died from diseases.”
Felix swallowed hard. The taste of the candy had turned sour in his mouth.
“Diphtheria, cholera, malaria…”
To Maisie, these sounded like diseases from novels, terrible but unreal.
Felix wondered if his vaccinations would hold up here. Every year when their mother took them to the pediatrician, there always seemed to be another booster shot waiting. Were any of them for cholera?
“Poor angels,” Pearl said.
Later that afternoon, when Pearl took her daily turn of rocking Grace on the veranda andMrs. Sydenstricker joined them there, Felix understood the sadness that marked her face.
Still, as she sewed a ruffle on the bottom of new curtains, when Pearl begged her, Mrs. Sydenstricker readily agreed to tell them her story about how she saved her home and children from a gang of men who believed Westerners’ presence in the valley had brought on the drought.
“This was in August,” Mrs. Sydenstricker began, “ten years ago. We went so long without rain that the rice withered in the fields. Absalom—Mr. Sydenstricker—was away from home as
Pearl translated, and Maisie and Felix sat, transfixed, eating and listening.
The story Pearl asked Chushi to tell again and again was “The Dream of the Red Chamber,” a kind of Chinese Romeo and Juliet story about star-crossed lovers from warring tribes.
“Ah,” Chushi always said, shaking his head, “you are a romantic, Zhenzhu.”
In the afternoon, the children often went to Horse Street. Wang Amah gave Maisie a hat like Pearl’s and tucked her mop of hair beneath it, muttering in Chinese as she did.
“Don’t eat that candy,” Pearl’s mother always ordered as they left the house.
Mrs. Sydenstricker seemed to have an unusually strong obsession with germs. Every day she washed the walls and floors of the house with a strong-smelling chemical. She fretted over Pearl and baby Grace, feeling their foreheads for fevers, listening to their chests, and watchingthem closely as if they might disappear.
One day as they ate the forbidden candy from its paper cones, Maisie asked Pearl why her mother didn’t want her to eat it. The candy was just crystallized sugar, like the rock candy Maisie and Felix liked to get at the little candy store in Cape May when their family went on vacation.
“She thinks it’s dirty,” Pearl said with a shrug.
Felix forced himself to swallow what was already in his mouth.
“Dirty?” he asked.
“She thinks everything in China is dirty,” Pearl said sadly. “My father doesn’t. If he were home more, I wouldn’t have to sneak like this.”
So far, Felix and Maisie hadn’t even met Pearl’s father. He was too busy trying to convert people up north to bother coming home for a visit.
“She worries about you a lot,” Felix said.
Pearl hesitated before she answered. “My father says we’ve had a cup full of sorrow. My sisters Maude and Edith and my brother Arthur, all of them older than me, went away too soon.”
When she saw the puzzled looks on Maisie’s and Felix’s faces, she added, “They died.”
“Died!” Maisie said, shocked.
“As did my brother Clyde,” Pearl said sadly.
“But how?” Maisie managed to ask.
“Mother blames China. The summer heat, the lack of hospitals.”
Felix blinked back tears. Four children? All dead? No wonder Pearl’s mother was such a worrier. For the first time since they’d arrived in China last week, when Felix looked at Maisie, she returned his glance.
“You can’t die from the heat, though, can you?” Felix said. As a worrier himself, and a bit of a hypochondriac, the idea that heat could actually kill you started a panic in his chest.
“Well,” Pearl said. “They died from diseases.”
Felix swallowed hard. The taste of the candy had turned sour in his mouth.
“Diphtheria, cholera, malaria…”
To Maisie, these sounded like diseases from novels, terrible but unreal.
Felix wondered if his vaccinations would hold up here. Every year when their mother took them to the pediatrician, there always seemed to be another booster shot waiting. Were any of them for cholera?
“Poor angels,” Pearl said.
Later that afternoon, when Pearl took her daily turn of rocking Grace on the veranda andMrs. Sydenstricker joined them there, Felix understood the sadness that marked her face.
Still, as she sewed a ruffle on the bottom of new curtains, when Pearl begged her, Mrs. Sydenstricker readily agreed to tell them her story about how she saved her home and children from a gang of men who believed Westerners’ presence in the valley had brought on the drought.
“This was in August,” Mrs. Sydenstricker began, “ten years ago. We went so long without rain that the rice withered in the fields. Absalom—Mr. Sydenstricker—was away from home as
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