Chapter 94: Night of Eighteen

As soon as she got home, she gave her child a hot bath before the power went out. During the bath, she checked her child's body and luckily found no other injection sites except the inside of his right elbow.

Bian Jieming mentioned casually that the child was brought back from a ship bound for Japan, which means that he was of research interest and was therefore taken to Japan for further investigation. This also suggests that the bacteria inoculated into the child were not contagious, or that the inoculation failed, or that the bacteria mutated during the inoculation process; or perhaps he was very "lucky" and was simply used as a blank control in the variable group.

Regardless of the situation, it at least shows that the "Chinese Ape" experiment already existed.

The child had fallen asleep, and she sat alone in the night, her scalp aching.

If there was anything more terrifying than war in the 20th century, it was epidemics. World War I killed 10 million people, while the Spanish flu, which began in 1918, killed over 30 million people in the Americas and Europe combined. In the first half of the 20th century alone, over 200 million people died from smallpox, three times the number killed in World Wars I and II combined. When she was taking bacteriological experiments, the textbook explained anthrax spores as follows: theoretically, one gram of anthrax spores could kill half of the American population, but the actual results in combat might be different. So, the Japanese, through repeated experiments on Chinese people, discovered a mineral called betonite, commonly known as bentonite. When mixed with bacterial spores and deployed via aircraft or sprayers, it could remain suspended in the air for a long time. The results achieved in combat were incredibly close to the theoretical results.

The textbook also contains an excerpt about a secret letter from the American "G Commissioner" (Bacteria Commissioner) after World War II:

"...Anthrax spores are extremely resistant to external influences, remaining dormant almost forever, never dying! We must not allow this factor to permanently siege, coerce, threaten, or even kill us. Therefore, for America's security, we urgently need to find an alternative country or region. Central and South America are clearly not suitable, as bacteria and viruses can easily spread to North America along land bridges. The most suitable candidates should be the South Asian subcontinent and China, with their vast territory, wide latitudes, warm and humid conditions, complex terrain, constant wars, dense populations, and low levels of human evolution and cultural literacy..."

Back then, whether it was the early or middle years of the 20th century, the war hadn't started yet or had already ended; it seemed too far away to her. But now, reflecting on this sentence: After 1945, the war had been won with great difficulty, and everyone on the Eastern Continent longed for a new and peaceful rebirth. When everyone was caught off guard, the wartime allies had secretly plotted against this group of simple, vibrant lives, and justifiably attributed it to "the low level of human evolution and cultural quality..."

In the history of bacteria, there is also a famous letter about Commissioner G, which was used by John Barker, Chairman of the American Chemical Experimental Group, to manipulate the International Military Tribunal for the Far East. It contains the following passage:

"Japan was the only country to have used biological weapons during World War II, and China was the only country to have suffered the devastation of biological weapons. You must pay full attention to this basic fact. You must pardon and protect biological warfare criminals like Shiro Ishii, gain experience and information from them, and do everything possible to save us time, money, and all other tangible and intangible resources. We must prevent China from being entangled in the crimes of the Japanese army in the past and build our first biological warfare bridgehead laboratory in Asia..."

Shiro Ishii was the technical director of the 1855th Unit. His greatest invention was a two-meter-tall, five-meter-long cholera culture dish, called the "Ishii Bomb." It was said that the cholera bacteria cultured inside it were "enough to kill the entire world in one fell swoop."

She touched her cold arm and glanced at the child lying on the sofa, breathing quietly. The child, labeled "Chinese ape" by Japanese medical students like a petri dish, suddenly remembered a photo she had seen in the library. It showed a man bound and lying on an operating table, with a Japanese soldier in a white smock, black-framed glasses, and rubber gloves preparing to operate on him. The caption beneath the photo read: "Carry out vivisection to the Chinese monkeys."

Currently, a hospital specializing in germ research is located in Hongkou. If they had achieved some success, even if it wasn't efficient enough, if they had even one-tenth the power of the Ishii bomb, the consequences would be unimaginable.

…

She didn't know how long she sat in the darkness. The sky outside the linen curtains was turning pale, her stomach felt a hollow lurch, and a sweat broke out all over her body. Even when her mother came to cook, she was still a little dazed.

Perhaps Xie Zeyi had specifically instructed her before, so when her mother came in and saw her awake with a little meat ball lying next to her, she was a little surprised, but she didn't ask too much and went straight to the kitchen to cook.

She looked up at the copper telephone at the end of the corridor, and suddenly remembered a four-digit phone number that the operator had told her when she answered the phone one day.

The Xu family, a renowned Shanghai family of doctors, had a daughter who studied in Japan...

She was startled and raised herself up from the sofa, shaking the entire leather sofa. The child lying on the sofa rubbed his eyes and looked at her sleepily.

She ruffled the child's hair—she had already twisted it last night. It wasn't a pretty sight, but it was better than a breeding ground for fleas. She tucked him under the phone and dialed the Xu family number without hesitation.

It took some time to transfer the call, and it seemed that the Xu family's housekeeper answered the phone. Although it was very early, when he heard that it was Miss Xu's friend, he guessed it was an urgent matter, so he did not hesitate to call the lady to answer the phone.

Miss Xu's voice was quite spirited: "Hello, Miss Lin?"

"Morning, Miss Xu." She didn't bother with the polite nonsense. "I remember you always wanted to let people know that they were useless, right?"

Miss Xu was obviously in high spirits: "What's wrong?"

She then asked, "I would like to ask, what subject did Ms. Xu study when she was studying in Japan?"

"Medicine, of course. What's the matter?"

"Hmm. Have you heard of shirobomb?" She was not a pathology and bacteriology major, so she was not sure about the birth date of these terms.

"I only know Professor Ishii from the Faculty of Medicine at Kyoto University. What is that?"

She thought for a moment and then asked, "What about Salmonella typhi, cholerabacteria, bentonite... and ape?"

There was a long silence on the other end. Ms. Xu asked, "Where did you hear these terms?"

"I have a two-year-old boy here," she said, pulling the boy closer to the phone and whispering something to him. After getting a response, she put the phone to her ear and asked, "Can you understand what he's saying?"

"Hmm... I roughly understand. Maybe you're from Nantong County." Ms. Xu's tone was noticeably hurried. "Where are you?"

"You know my address. I'm waiting for you."

——

The journey from Penang to Shanghai would take four or five days on an ordinary cruise ship, but this light cruiser only takes forty hours.

The majority of the soldiers on board, regardless of their military rank, were junior officers. Over half were lieutenants, two were midshipmen, and Xie Zeyi was the only captain. The sun had already set over the sea, and in the distance, whales were spewing water in the afterglow. With the remaining ten hours of the journey, the British soldiers were seizing the opportunity to enjoy this final revelry. They brought their dinner from the cabin to the deck, even bringing out their record player. Music, fine wine, tropical fruits, and barbecue were all available, and the soldiers, still reasonably sober, danced. If there was anything missing for them, it was definitely women.

In stark contrast to the group on deck was Si Yansang, sitting in the corner. He wore a black vest over a light-colored shirt, sat under the light, holding a book. His eyesight was evidently failing, hence his slightly squinted eyes as he read. His demeanor betrayed him as a model student at a British boarding school. He was completely different from Xie Zeyi, the student whose mentor had gone to the school to offer him bail, only to have him rip off his vest and uniform, throw them on the ground, and then walk away.

There were also many officers on the ship who had attended private middle schools. They talked about the Chinese student named "Si": a regular student of Oxford and a visiting student of Cambridge, more famous in Cambridge than in Oxford, and he had been going from London to Cambridge every few days since middle school. It was said that because his girlfriend in China was good at writing poetry, he had been writing letters and poems to her for many years, just to please her.

Now Si Yansang sat in the corner, too quiet; bathed in orange light, like a painting.

I often hear that lieutenants and lower-ranking soldiers like to fool around. I didn't think so before, but now compared with that Chinese boy, he is indeed a bit unruly.

It is not acceptable in the UK to introduce yourself without being introduced by someone, otherwise it will be considered rude.

Xie Zeyi thought about it, walked through the crowd and sat down next to him.

Si Yansang closed the book, smiled and waited for him to speak.

He pointed to the closed book and asked, "Can I read it?"

"Of course," Si Yansang handed the book over, "please feel free to do as you please."

I took the book and saw on the cover: Madame Bovary. I opened a page and saw that the margins of the densely written French page were filled with Chinese characters. It turned out that it was a translation.

"I went against my father's wishes in my studies. He was used to being the patriarch of a feudal family and couldn't stand disobedience. He sent people to withhold money and food. Our life was very difficult for a time, and I had to make a living by occasionally translating." Si explained with a smile.

I flipped through the pages quickly, stopping at the page with the note. The bookmark marked the left side, filled with writing, while the right side remained clear. The bookmark seemed to be made of a photograph, a rather ingenious idea. Upon closer inspection, it was indeed a photograph.

There were four photos in total, all depicting the same person. The subject was a young girl, standing absentmindedly in a crowd, the crowd automatically oblivious to her. In the first three, she was gazing around, but in the last, she noticed the photographer, her eyes slightly widening, a look of surprise betraying a certain languid inertia.

The girl in the photo is not particularly outstanding, but she seems to be glowing in the photo. I don’t know if it’s because she looks good in the photo or because the person taking the photo put a lot of thought into her and paid special attention to her little movements, so she is shining.

Xie Zeyi also recognized this girl, but she wasn't like this now. But he had seen her then, too. She was a little too quiet and silent, a little dim and cunning.

As he watched, Si Yansang said, "After we said goodbye two years ago, I never expected that these four photos would be all I could think of in those two years. I wonder what she looks like now. Has Mr. Xie seen her?"

"She?" Xie Zeyi raised his head, sighed, narrowed his eyes and smiled.

She was incredibly lazy, beyond imagination, and therefore believed she couldn't survive without someone to serve her. When she smiled, her eyes curved, and her mouth dimpled, like a fox. But she didn't smile much, unless she had something to discuss with you.

Of course, he had also seen other kinds of smiles from her before: sharp, tender, radiant… ones that had enchanted him. Xie Zeyi was very happy to see her looking for something from him, even though he knew the smile he was expecting wasn't for him.

He smiled and thought for a while, then picked up a pen, picked up two blank pages of manuscript paper from the book, and asked, "May I?"

Yan Sang nodded in agreement.

He lowered his head and wrote quickly under the orange light.

It was a portrait sketch of a girl wearing a white fox fur coat, showing only half her back and a profile with her head turned. In the portrait, her eyes were downcast, and her slender right index finger touched the slender neck outside her coat.

Yan Sang watched with a smile. "What is she doing?" He asked this question when the sketch was already completed.

Xie Zeyi smiled and shook his head, then started drawing the second picture.

She was smiling. Directed at the audience, her smile seemed calm at first. But the brush that painted that smile refused to stop. Gradually, Yan Sang could see its transformation in the meticulous brushstrokes. The initial smile turned out to be just the tip of the iceberg. Even her eyes and eyebrows revealed the surging power hidden beneath the surface. It was as if she was completely infatuated, a surge of ambition.

The facial features in this frontal photo are not clearly outlined, and are even a little blurry. The smile hidden in the corners of the eyebrows and eyes is the entire spirit of this black and white portrait.

From the moment he started writing, Si Yansang still had a smile on his face. But as he continued to write, his expression gradually changed, and he looked at Xie Zeyi with a hint of disbelief.

After looking at him for a while, he said, "Mr. Xie, I heard that your father has very strict standards for your marriage partner. Is that true? I hope it's just a rumor."

Xie Zeyi thought for a moment and said, "That's true. Like you, my life was once in a difficult situation."

"So if your beloved doesn't meet your father's standards, what can you do for her?"

Xie Zeyi was in a daze for a moment before he realized that Si Yansang was already attacking him. He felt a little amused and asked with a smile, "What if it was you?"

"I would give up many things for her. I would be the enemy of anything that does not accept her, is hostile to her, or despises her. I would be the enemy of anything in the world that she hates or that hates her." Si Yansang stared at him and said, "What about you?"

Xie Zeyi did not answer directly, but only said: "What if it is you that she dislikes?"

Si Yansang was stunned.

"What are you going to do?"

Si Yansang thought about it and said with a decisive smile: "Absolutely impossible."

He tucked the portrait back into the notepad of his translation book and said, "There are so many beautiful and precious things in this world. If everything is worth giving up, if one day you even lose her, who will you expect to cherish you? If it were me, I wouldn't give up anything for her." Xie Zeyi lowered his eyelids, only half of his pupils visible, "but I won't let anything happen to hurt her."

What infuriated and frightened him most was the feeling that she seemed to be seeking some kind of harm, because she was a thoroughly Chinese person, filled with an uncontrollable and unrealistic patriotic passion, yet she knew full well that she was protected by "extraterritoriality."

Therefore, he gave her the maximum protection he could.

As they entered the customs area, the ship's horn blared, and several sailors opened two bottles of champagne to celebrate the successful Penang trip. Amid the clamor, Xie Zeyi said, "We've arrived. Have you decided to go see Miss San first?"

Amidst laughter, the sound of flutes, and the crash of waves, Xie Zeyi was surrounded and doused in champagne. The ship docked, stairs were erected, and two men dressed as sailors came running up from below, holding a fitness poster featuring a dark-skinned bodybuilder. They jokingly said to Xie Zeyi, "Seaside fitness club, abs, mermaid lines, only a hundred bucks a quarter!"

"Really? Thank you. But," he said calmly, his attitude rather provocative, "I happen to have them all."

All the sailors on the ship burst into laughter, and some of them, who were curious, reached out to tear off his military belt, almost as if they were going to strip him of his clothes and pants.

Xie Zeyi, the "bad student" who refused bail from his character advisor and was expelled from boarding school, was a completely different type of person from him. He had seen many of them, but few lived like him.

Several junior sailors carried his luggage and led him to the Royal Navy Dock. Once on the dock, he finally dismissed the group of officers surrounding Xie Zeyi. Two buttons on his shirt were ripped open, and he was holding the belt he had snatched back after countless hardships. He didn't care about his appearance at all, fastening it as he walked. After searching around for a while, he walked straight through the crowd to Si Yansang and asked, "Do you want to make a phone call at the dock, or come and see him directly?"

Bian Jieming's car pulled up to the door and he trotted over to help Si Yansang with his luggage. Upon seeing Si Yansang, he unexpectedly teased her with a rare enthusiasm: "Ohhhh look! A china boy!" This could be taken as him referring to a Chinese boy, or to Si Yansang, who had jet-black hair, skin as delicate as porcelain, and a temperament as gentle as jade.

Before he could answer, two Dodges drove up from outside the dock and stopped in front of the group.

A middle-aged man in a silk shirt and jacket got out of the leading car. Even though he was old, he had an extraordinary bearing and his manners were extremely dignified.

Upon seeing the man, Si Yansang and Xie Zeyi froze for a moment. Si Yansang, his lips bitten until they were white, called out respectfully, "Father, why are you here?"

Si Ying snorted and said coldly, "If I don't come, where do you decide to go?"

Xie Zeyi spoke in broken Cantonese and quickly explained, "We just brought the cruise ship back from Penang. Where else would Master Si have thought we'd send your son?"

Si Ying then looked him over briefly and said in a rather unfriendly tone, "No one else needs to worry about the Si family's affairs, right?"

Xie Zeyi said, "Master Si is right. Whether or not one should worry is one thing, but whether or not one can worry is another." He then turned his head and whispered to the pale-faced Si Yansang, "It seems your father is also very strict, no less so than my father."