Chapter 114: 038 A Zheng 5
She quickly ran upstairs, paper bag in hand, discarded her old, sweat-smelling underwear, and swapped her white linen dress for a maroon corduroy shirt and white trousers. Her hair, jaggedly cropped by the doctor, was still slightly damp. The inch above her neck had been shaved off, leaving a cool, open space outside her shirt. Mary and Lily were so engrossed in their conversation with Mrs. Hogg downstairs that they hadn't noticed she had slipped away.
She walked downstairs easily. Xie Zeyi's car was parked outside the front garden. She shook her wet short hair and got into the car.
The car started moving and she waved quickly towards the white building of the Red Cross Hospital.
Xie Zeyi also smiled, "It's too early to leave, but you still have to come back in the evening."
She opened the car window, letting the wind pour in through the cracks. She tucked her hands into her hair and hummed a tune she didn't know where. She hadn't had such cumbersome long hair before. She'd wake up, wash it, rub it, and rush to catch the last tram before class. The wind had dried her hair along the way. In the winter, when it snowed heavily, she'd arrive at the lab with her hair covered in icicles. But the heater dried them quickly. She often had little joys that were unknown to others and couldn't be expressed to others, but she somehow felt Xie Zeyi could understand. Even if he couldn't, he'd probably already accepted her as a psychopath.
Driving towards Zhangjiagang, because the roads of the old world lacked urban drainage systems, puddles of varying sizes would occasionally form on the roadside when it rained. Most of the shops with English-lettered signs were closed. Protest signs, large and small, were plastered on the glass windows along the street, but they were too far away to be seen clearly. She opened the window to peek out, but as she did so, two or three students suddenly rushed out of the alley, startling Chu Wang and her own scream. Fortunately, Xie Zeyi braked in time, controlling the car with his right hand while still reaching out with his left to shield her forehead from slamming headfirst into the windshield.
Several students ran over in panic. After a few meters, one student turned back, apologized, and threw a piece of paper at the car window. The two looked ahead and saw the narrow riverside street bustling with students. Seeing they couldn't drive through, they got out, parked in front of a roadside grocery store, and walked along the river.
Chu Wang glanced at the protest poster in his hand, which read:
Shanghai is Shanghai for the Chinese!
However, since the imperialists forced the opening of the port, the Chinese in the Shanghai Concession have been silently crouching under the oppression of imperialism, and are worse than slaves!
We can no longer tolerate this! We are ready to sacrifice everything, brave all difficulties and dangers, and spearhead the national revolution against imperialism throughout China!
Abolish unequal treaties!
Take back the leased territory and cancel consular jurisdiction!
Let Japanese capitalists move their factories back home!
We hope all Chinese people in Shanghai will unite!
We hope that the 400 million oppressed compatriots across China will hear this news!
…
After reading it, she folded the protest sign and put it in her shirt pocket, then walked on in silence with Xie Zeyi. Normally, she would have thought he and she were just one of a kind; but it was only at that moment that she suddenly realized he was one of the students' targets. If he weren't wearing his uniform today, she would have been the target of their anger, along with her. But without it, he was just like everyone else.
Everyone who had a place in the concession was well-dressed. From their attire, it was clear at a glance who was an invader, who was a capitalist, and who was a second-class citizen. Discrimination and oppression were everywhere and tangible. In the past, it was the inspectors who would beat up rickshaw drivers at will, and the nameless corpses in the Suzhou River; today, all the anger of discrimination and oppression erupted, in the roars of students and the foreign shops that were too frightened to open their doors due to the national unrest. They were all tangible. She was inexplicably moved by the tangibility of this discrimination and anger - unlike a hundred years later, the invisible discrimination that existed in group work and working relationships, which made it impossible to find, understand, or vent. Therefore, many times she waved her fist at the rioting crowd from afar, muttering, "Shanghai is the Shanghai of the Chinese!" "Japanese capitalists, move your factories back home!"
Xie Zeyi watched her go crazy from time to time, and just smiled beside her. Because of martial law, a tram stopped by the river. In the sunset, two cold and shiny tracks stretched side by side with the river into the distance, the edge of the city where prosperity and poverty intersected. The tram had probably stopped for too long, and the driver fell asleep, but the people in the carriage were quite quiet. In the first-class carriage, businessmen in suits and ties were reading newspapers or doing Sudoku puzzles, and in the second-class carriage, people who knew each other and those who didn't knew each other were chatting with each other; suddenly, a red-haired businessman inside noticed Xie Zeyi, and when the two approached, he whispered: "Mr. Xie? Oh, it's really you. I heard that the docks, Zhabei and Baoshan Road were in chaos. I thought the Municipal Council had been dispatched in full force."
People started looking out from the first-class carriage one after another.
Xie Zeyi smiled and said, "Good afternoon, Mr. Rockhold. I heard the shop was closed, so I took the opportunity to go out for a walk and just happened to accompany the lady to buy some Western pastries."
"I heard the General Labor Union has been mobilized, and there's been a lot of commotion. Residents near the Commercial Press heard a lot of gunfire at noon, and they've blocked off that side. We can't go out in front either. I just came from the Cheeseland area, and it's almost blocked off there too. I don't know if it's too late to go now."
The tram stopped at the roadside, indicating that the connecting power lines were also cut; it also indicated that one or more places in Shanghai were experiencing a catastrophe. The two thanked Mr. Rockhold, and someone in the second-class compartment started to jeer, "It's time to eat Western pastries! Drive away the foreigners, or there will be no more Western pastries!"
Chu Wang heard this and actually ran down the street, with Xie Zeyi following behind with a smile. Seeing the Cheeselin Coffee Shop right before her, the White Russian owner yelled at her, "Watch out for the puddles!"
Night had fallen, and due to the power outage caused by martial law, the neon lights of the tall buildings were dark. She almost didn't notice the puddle of water directly across from her. As she got closer, she spotted a bright shadow on the ground, forming a wide puddle outside the low-lying Cheeseland store. Suddenly, her hand was taken. She tilted her head, and Xie Zeyi lifted her right hand, looking down at her, counting, "Three, two—"
The two of them stepped out together, carrying her with a small skip across the puddle.
After jumping over, the shop owner and his staff laughed. The baker, a young Czech man, poked his head out from holding a tray of freshly risen dough and shouted in broken English, "Power outage! The electric oven won't light." Seeing her frustration, he smiled and said, "The charcoal oven is still working, it's just not as fluffy as usual."
While she was waiting anxiously in front of the oven, a handsome Czech boy started chatting with her in English with a very cute accent.
Xie Zeyi stood nearby and chatted with the Belarusian boss, glancing towards the oven from time to time.
A batch of butter croissants came out of the oven, and she muttered, "Six, six, put them in three bags!"
While the clerk was packing paper bags, the Czech boy was carving a flower on the baked honey chestnut cake. Suddenly, his right hand, like a magic trick, handed her a small rose petal-shaped hot cross bun and said, "For the cutest lady today."
The White Russian boss chuckled and said, "Henry, don't think Mr. Xie can't see you hitting on his girlfriend."
After she took the hot cross bun, she waved her hand and said, "We are not that kind of relationship." She turned her head to glance at Xie Zeyi and said, "See, there are always people who misunderstand."
The Czech boy turned away, his ears red. The waiter asked for him, "Excuse me, what is your relationship?"
Xie Zeyi looked at her with a smile and said, "Give me five minutes to think of something suitable to say in the Cheeselin shop."
The White Russian boss and his men started to make a fuss.
She ran out with three paper bags in her hands.
The White Russian boss was shouting: "This is the last batch of croissants. Starting tomorrow, there will be no more for a long time!"
She screamed, forgetting about the puddle outside the door, and stepped into the middle of the puddle with her leather shoes; but she didn't expect the water to be so deep, and the mud splashed all over her body.
Xie Zeyi hurried over, squatted down and touched her socks, "They're soaked." He gestured for her to lift her feet and took off her soaked leather shoes. He pulled the white socks out of her trouser legs and stuffed them in his hands. He put his arms around her shoulders and knees, strode over the puddle, and returned to the direction of the parked car. "It's okay, we'll be back in the car soon... Go back and change out of this clothes and take a hot shower, so you won't catch a cold."
Her soaked feet were cold, dangling in the air as he strode through the black night of martial law and power outage. Clutching the warm paper bag, she said, "It won't taste good if it gets cold. I want to go back to the hospital and bring some to Mrs. Hogg and Miss Xu." She added, "I don't know if there'll be electricity if I go home now."
He hummed, then said, "I'll take you home first. I'll go back and bring some clean clothes."
The afternoon students had long since departed. The streets were deserted, cars parked lonely on the roadside, and only a few dim residential lights shone on. The car was strewn with protest posters. He opened the passenger door and placed her in the seat. After brushing the posters off the windshield, he closed the door and slowly drove off.
There were one or two lights on the roadside, and there was no moon; the car was moving with great effort for fear of hitting passers-by.
In the confined space between the two of them, she was constantly worried he'd make some unexpected confession. Her heart was hanging in the air the entire way, but when she saw the white walls of the aid center gleaming in the streetlights from afar, she finally breathed a sigh of relief.
Just below the white wall, she saw two black Ford cars with seven or eight people in black military uniforms standing outside. Among them were two familiar faces: Julcha and Bian Jieming. When their cars drove in, all the British soldiers looked over - they were waiting for him.
The car stopped, and she stared at Zhu Ercha, opened the door, and walked out barefoot. Xie Zeyi already knew what was waiting for him. The car stopped, and he chased after her, shoes in hand, but she pushed him aside. She walked barefoot up the steps of the rescue center, and Zhu Ercha's gray-blue eyes followed her.
She heard Xie Zeyi's voice coming from behind her: "Please give me a little more time, sir. I will go back to Fu Kaisen Road once, and then go to the Municipal Council with you."
Zhu Ercha stared at her and said to Xie Zeyi in joking English, "You risked your life to compensate her, but your Chinese girl doesn't seem to appreciate it."
She also stared at Zhu Ercha and asked, "Where do you want him to go?"
Zhu Ercha first said to her in fluent Chinese, "Of course, we should go back to where the British belong." Then, with a raised eyebrow, he said to Xie Zeyi in English, "You promised me that 'hiding Chinese orphans and taking people to the spinning mill were purely your personal actions and had nothing to do with the Municipal Council.' That Japanese major and his entire family have already arrived in China, ready to apologize to the Japanese Empire for his personal actions. What about you, Zoe?"
"I mean what I say, sir."
Chu Wang took a step in front of him, looked up at Zhu Ercha, and asked in Chinese: "What did he do wrong?"
"The envoys from the six nations will arrive tomorrow, ma'am," Zhu Ercha said with a smile. "The Japanese have explained to you, so what should we explain to the Japanese?"
"The Japanese's explanation? Using Sakuma's personal behavior to make excuses for the Emperor? What a bullshit explanation!" She was so angry that her eyes turned red.
Zhu Er checked the gauze on her head and smiled, "If Sakuma and Fujima are not responsible for their personal actions, then who will be responsible?"
Who would be held responsible? Would Emperor Hirohito and all of Japan bow their heads and admit their mistakes to China? Before Hiroshima and Nagasaki were razed to the ground, that country even tried to commit suicide! An apology? She felt a little desperate.
Zhu Ercha added, "If it weren't for Zoe's personal behavior, the concession wouldn't have reached this point today."
She could hardly contain her laughter.
"To be honest," Julcha smiled at her, "if you succeed and bring us to court, or if you force the entire Municipal Council and foreign businesses in China to leave Chinese territory, what good will Zoe gain? Don't assume that just because he looks Chinese, he's truly Chinese. He's been involved in every blood debt, and do you think his end will be any better than the previous one? Madam, as a Chinese, which one do you hope for?"
She turned around and looked at Xie Zeyi, "Mr. Xie."
He carried her shoes and socks for her without saying a word.
She stared at him for a while, then turned around and ran towards the hospital barefoot.
She heard Julescha say to him, "I'll give you five hours at most, until dawn tomorrow morning."
When she ran to the third floor, she met Mary and Lily. They exclaimed, first asking her where she had been and then where her shoes and socks were. They scolded her for running away without permission, washed her calves and feet, changed her into a linen dress, and then sent her to bed.
She covered herself with a thin striped blanket and lay down with her back to the door.
After a long moment, a few inches of tungsten light filtered through the crack in the door before dimming again. The footsteps stopped beside her bed, and a pile of clothes was placed behind her on the pillow. The entire ward fell silent again.
She didn't speak, and neither did he.
She turned her back to him and asked, "Mr. Xie, what's the worst-case scenario for you?"
Xie Zeyi's voice echoed in the darkness, low and resonant. "In the worst-case scenario, the rights of Japan and the five powers in Shanghai remain sacrosanct, foreshadowing the third defeat of the Chinese in the Far East. Then, I'd probably become the scapegoat for all the anger the five powers in the Municipal Council have shown toward Japan, damned along with Sakuma, who apologized to the militarist state, for dereliction of duty. Or, like a stray dog, I'd be forced to return to Britain and seek political asylum. In the best-case scenario, it depends on whether your country is angry enough to escalate the situation to the point where the six-power envoys convene an international tribunal in Shanghai. By then... our trial wouldn't be far off."
She was puzzled. "Is it just because the entire Municipal Council and the Japanese Police Corporation share a common interest? But what fault have you done?"
He smiled.
She lowered her head and thought for a long time, then asked, "Mr. Xie, have you ever... killed anyone? An unarmed Chinese person?"
Xie Zeyi said, "I am their superior. Tolerating them is a sin, and so is to condone them. Every death in the past two years will be counted on me."
"But..." She thought for a moment, "Isn't Sir Xie enough to help you solve this matter?"
After a long silence in the darkness, Xie Zeyi asked, "Do you know what an accomplice of invasion is?"
Her voice was very soft. "You haven't done too many bad things, have you?"
He thought for a moment and said, "Most Chinese people in Britain behave well. Except for middle school students, they are almost the same as respectable British people. The word "discrimination" is too far away from me to understand why the Chinese are inferior to the British."
Her heart was in her throat, and she listened more attentively.
"Most Chinese in the United States come from the bottom of Chinese society. Coolie, cheap, ***, dirty, rat... all these words are inseparable from the Chinese. If you go to Chinatown in Los Angeles and San Francisco and see the Chinese in person, you will understand why the Chinese are far lower in status than black people. That was the first time I felt the shame that went deep into my bones. I don't know how to describe my feelings towards China... I often meet a hunchbacked coolie with tuberculosis. During the smallpox epidemic, when the army and doctors were dispatched to treat infectious patients, he still urinated and defecated in the street. His filth made him look like the source of all infectious diseases. The relief association warned him countless times, maybe his English was not good, or maybe he was too Stubborn. A father, overcome with grief after his daughter died of smallpox, beat him in the street, knocking out his broken teeth from smoking opium. His mouth, teeth, and body were covered in blood. He prostrated himself on the ground, begging for mercy, saying in the only English he knew that he had an 80-year-old mother waiting for him at home. He was dying in pain, kneeling on the ground, begging for someone to strangle his last breath. People hated his hopelessness and lamented his impending death, but watching from the sidelines seemed the best option. Should I feel heartbroken? But he wasn't my father. My father was the abuser, and he had committed even more sins. That's why, even though he disguised himself as a true Englishman, he remained a non-Christian, a Buddhist, for decades.
"Miss San, you probably don't know what kind of life I led before you came to Shanghai. When I pledged my soul and body to the colonists, I was already unforgivable. So, in the best case scenario, the six-nation investigation commissioner will come to ask you about everything that happened during this period, whether it was related to the spinning mill, Sakuma, or me. The arrival of the six-nation envoys also almost proves that the colonists and the unequal treaties are not far away from being driven out of this continent. Don't be afraid of cruelty. You know the rights you have and the weight of your testimony. Please add your part to their sins."
Her heart trembled, and a shudder spread throughout her body. She could clearly feel the indescribable feeling of pain and shock, which made her tears burst out, soaking the pillowcase.
She felt him stand up to adjust her quilt, and when he touched the wet spot, he paused and continued, "Tomorrow when the minister arrives, a small part of the port will be open. When the minister arrives, Mrs. Ge will be here soon."
She didn't speak.
He continued, "When I returned to Fu Kaisen Road, I saw Mr. Si waiting for you downstairs. If it's convenient, I'll ask him to come and see you tomorrow morning."
She still didn't speak.
He wiped the tears from her face with his fingertips and said softly, "Don't cry, I have nothing to sympathize with."
She always does things with a purpose and always knows what she wants. She stands on land, uses her feet and means of transportation to fight for it, and she always seems to get most of the things she wants.
But I don’t know since when, my entire fortune is placed in a small boat in the turbulent waves, and all I want and all I seek are like looking for a sword on a boat.
She shifted her body, looked up at him, and asked in a hoarse voice, "Mr. Xie, when you asked me to wait for you at the Cathay Hotel... Did you have anything to say to me then?"
He lowered his head and looked at her quietly, then said softly, "It's too late, it's time to go to bed." After thinking for a moment, he added, "I'll tell you later when I have the chance."
She still kept her eyes open and looked at him, waiting for his answer.
He was still sitting at the head of her bed, looking down at her, motionless. She saw those eyes and recalled the way he looked at her, as if he was looking at something extremely glaring, and had to squint slightly to see clearly.
He said, "Before you go to sleep, give me a goodnight kiss, okay?"
He didn't know when he had changed into that dark military uniform.
In the night, the outline and nose bridge like white stone sculptures, the deep eye sockets, the teardrop mole faintly visible in the eyelashes, the extremely light lip color... When she decided to take a good look at him, she almost forgot to answer.
When she saw his eyelashes drooping, almost hiding the loss in his eyes, she slowly raised herself up and knelt on the bed; carefully holding his shoulders with her left hand, she put her lips close to him and gently kissed his half-closed eyelids, which trembled slightly due to her approach.
When her lips left his eyes, he slowly opened them, his expression noticeably changing from disbelief to surprise.
She sat back on the bed, a little afraid to look at him.
The light from the garden streetlights poured in through the white gauze curtains, casting a crisscross of shadows throughout the solemn white ward. The wind blew in through the cracks in the open window, blowing a few stubborn strands of her short hair this way and that. She felt an itch and turned away, pulling back the gauze curtains, trying to close the window. The rain had stopped, the clouds had dispersed, and only now was there a faint glimpse of the moon, a thin veil. With her pillow pressed beneath her knees, as she turned away, she seemed to catch a fleeting glimpse of their reflections on the windowpane.
He was sitting at the head of the bed behind her. When she felt his cold hand covering her right cheek, she froze while trying to pull at the curtains; the hand, which should have been very gentle, suddenly turned her whole body around, facing him.
The gauze curtain, which was not very stable to begin with, was torn off in her panic and fell behind her like a fluorescent jellyfish in the night or a layer of mist on the retina.
Xie Zeyi kissed her.
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