Shanghai Girls (Shanghai Girls 1)

I hold my breath, petrified.

May darts across the room to my side. She begins to speak. Every statement of fact comes out as a question. “We didn’t know our father owed money to the Green Gang? We thought he only owed money to an Overseas Chinese? We thought Old Man Louie was unimportant, just a visitor?”

“Good daughters to a worthless man are a waste,” the leader declares conversationally. He stands and strides to the middle of the room. His helpers come to his side. To Baba, he says, “You were allowed to stay in this house as long as you sent your daughters to their new homes. Since you have not done so, this is no longer your home. You must leave. And you must pay your debt. Shall I take your daughters with me now? We will find a good use for them.”

Afraid of what Baba will say, I j

ump in. “It’s not too late for us to go to America. There are other ships.”

“Pockmarked Huang doesn’t like liars. You have already been dishonest, and you are probably lying to me now.”

“We promise we’ll do what you say,” May mutters.

Like a cobra, the leader’s hand strikes out, grabs May’s hair, and yanks her to him. He brings her face close to his. He smiles and says, “Your family is broke. You should be living on the street. Please, I ask you again, wouldn’t it be better to come with us now? We like beautiful girls.”

“I have their tickets” comes a small voice. “I’ll make sure they leave and the deal you arranged for my husband to honor his debts is completed.”

At first I’m not even sure who spoke. None of us are. We all look around until we come to my mother, who has not said a word since the men entered our home. I see hardness in her that I’ve never seen before. Maybe we’re all like that with our mothers. They seem ordinary until one day they’re extraordinary.

“I have the tickets,” she repeats. She has to be lying. I threw them out, along with our immigration papers and the coaching book Sam gave me.

“What good are those tickets now? Your daughters missed their boat.”

“We will exchange them and the girls will go to their husbands.” Mama wrings a handkerchief in her hands. “I will see to it. And then my husband and I will leave this house. You tell that to Pockmarked Huang. If he doesn’t like it, then let him come here and discuss it with me, a woman—”

The sickening sound of a pistol being cocked stops my mother’s words. The leader holds up a hand, alerting his men to be ready. Silence hangs like a shroud over the room. Outside, ambulances scream and machine guns rattle and cough.

Then he snorts lightly. “Madame Chin, you know what will happen if we find you’re lying to us.”

When neither of our parents says anything, May finds the courage to ask, “How long do we have?”

“Until tomorrow,” he growls. Then he laughs roughly as he realizes the near impossibility of his demand. “It won’t be easy to leave the city though. If one good thing has come from today’s disaster, it is that many of the foreign devils will leave us. They will have first priority on the ships.”

His men begin to move toward May and me. This is it. We’re going to be the Green Gang’s property now. May grabs my hand. Then a miracle: the leader grinds out a new offer.

“I will give you three days. Be on your way to America by then, even if you have to swim. We will return tomorrow—and every day—to make sure you don’t forget what you must do.”

With the threat laid down and a deadline given, the three men leave, but not before they tip over a couple of lamps and use the club to smash Mama’s few vases and trinkets that have not yet been taken to the pawnshop.

As soon as they’re gone, May sinks to the floor. None of us move to help her.

“You lied to us,” I say to Baba. “You lied to us about Old Man Louie and the reason for our marriages—”

“I didn’t want you to worry about the Green Gang,” he admits feebly.

This response maddens and exasperates me. “You didn’t want us to worry?”

He flinches, but then he deflects my anger with a question of his own. “What difference does it make now?”

There’s a long moment of silence as we think about that. I don’t know what goes through Mama’s and May’s minds, but I can think of many things we might have done differently if we’d known the truth. I still believe that May and I wouldn’t have gotten on the ship to take us to our husbands, but we would have done something: run away, hidden ourselves at the mission, begged Z.G. until he agreed to help us …

“I’ve had to carry this burden too long.” Baba turns to my mother and asks pitiably, “What will we do now?”

Mama looks at him with scathing contempt. “We’re going to do what we can to save our lives,” she says, looping her handkerchief through her jade bracelet.

“Are you going to send us to Los Angeles?” May’s voice quavers.

“She can’t,” I say. “I threw away the tickets.”