He had scarcely gone when Megan heard a timid knock on her door. She
called but as no one came in she went to open it herself. Mah-li
stood outside wearing her little fur-collared coat and carrying a
blue embroidered bag in her hands. She stood quite stiffly, holding
her bag and looking at Megan with such a strained, empty smile of
politeness that Megan put her arm comfortingly about her shoulders
and drew her into the room. Mah-li shrank from her a little, and
when Megan closed the door behind her and turned to her again she did
not renew her gesture but invited Mah-li by a wave of the hand to sit
down by the table.
"I am so glad you came," she said. "I have been hoping all morning
you would, but I did not know how to get any word to you."
Mah-li sat on the edge of her chair and her eyes fixed themselves on
a corner of the room.
"Yes," she said, "I came to say good-by to you. I am leaving in a
few moments."
"Leaving! My dear child, it isn't possible, is it?" She did not
like to ask if the General was sending her away.
Mah-li nodded.
Megan sat considering her. She felt only indulgence for Mah-li, and
her imagination returned to the glimpse of two delicate painted faces
seen for a moment in one shaft of sunlight. She could not blame her
for a lapse from so problematic a duty. A feeling that this kind of
love, anti-social as it is, has in it something too sacred to be
bound by law is strong in the West, where the rights of the
individual are of such transcendent importance and where society
seems to be created for the good of man, rather than man for the good
of society. There was nothing in Megan's tradition nor in her
experience to make her capable of censoring Mah-li, the rebel, too
severely.
"Well," she said, "it may be the best thing in the end. You could
not have been happy here. I have wanted to tell you from the first
that if I could help you in any way I would. And now I am sure I
can. You must come to me when I get back to Shanghai. We can plan
then what is best for you and what will make you happy."
Mah-li looked up and a little puzzled frown gathered between her
perfect eyebrows.
"Yes, I told you I would be married in Shanghai and perhaps now I
shall have a home there. But wherever I am, it will be the same. I
will look out for you. You mustn't worry about that at all. You can
stay with me until you choose the sort of life you want to lead.
There are so many occupations for women these days, even in China.
They don't have to be the slaves of fantastic customs any longer, and
you mustn't feel that this one experience has ended things for you.
Not at all. You will start out all fresh in a new world and with a
real friend to help you. For I want you to consider me your friend,
Mah-li. Will you?"
The inadequacy of words became almost terrifying to Megan. With all
the affection and help she wished to pour out on Mah-li she could
only flounder about in phrases that seemed to bend under her. But
she felt Mah-li must be aware of the warmth of her intention.
"You are very kind," said Mah-li.
"I suppose," said Megan, "that you are an expert with your needle and
can make all those fascinating embroideries such as I saw in
Shanghai. And then you type, you tell me. That might be something
you would like to follow up. And speaking English so well, I have an
idea we could find you some very interesting secretarial work."
Mah-li looked into the corner again and a smile curled her lips, a
timid smile, but one holding the ghost of mockery. Megan stopped,
for she could not continue to ignore the fact that Mah-li, as she
stood, was a piece of pure decoration, made only to give pleasure.
It was with relief that she thought again of Captain Li.
"Is Captain Li a Christian?" she asked, not that it seemed likely but
as a means of introducing him into the field.
"Oh, no," said Mah-li, and she added, "He is a scholar."
Megan ignored this jibe, if it really was meant as such, and thought
for a moment of just how she had better present Captain Li as a
solution of Mah-li's future. She found, as she considered him, that
he was a more delicate problem than she had first believed.
"I suppose you will expect to see Captain Li again," she said
hesitatingly. "You will expect to--that is, you will--well, will you
see him again?"
Having on Mah-li's behalf abolished the fantastic custom of
concubinage with one wave of the hand, she now was not sure where to
place her. Marriage with the young captain did not seem to offer the
inevitable solution. She found him increasingly difficult to talk
about.
"I don't know," said Mah-li.
"But he knows you are being sent away, does he not?"
"He will see that I am not here," said Mah-li sensibly.
"Then surely he will realize that you are in trouble and that his
actions have put you in the way of being misunderstood by the
General. I believe the General even thinks that you gave information
about him to Captain Li. I am sure he believes it. Mr. Shultz
practically told him so before us all."
Mah-li's eyebrows contracted sharply.
"But as I said before, don't let that upset you too much," said Megan
hastily. "It will all come out all right when we can only think of
what is best to do for you. We don't want to act hastily. Captain
Li, you say, is a scholar. He comes of a powerful family, and I hope
he is a young man of principle and good character. Is he?"
Mah-li did not answer, and Megan realized that in her desire to help
and in her confusion she had stepped far over the line that Mah-li
appeared to believe should exist between them. She stopped, looking
anxiously at Mah-li's face. It was quite blank. She sat with her
hands clasped on the little blue embroidered bag which she pressed
against her stomach. She leaned against it as if for support. Megan
saw that the bag contained a hot-water bottle, the little red rubber
collar and nickel stopper of which protruded over the top. She
smiled suddenly at the combination. What a child Mah-li was! It
seemed once more clear to her that while she must treat her as a
child, with patience, with indulgence even, she must also handle her
with firmness.
"Mah-li," she said directly, "why is the General sending you away?"
Mah-li looked suddenly sick. She drew her shoulders together,
huddling forward over her hot-water bottle. She looked like a small
costly bird transported to an unfavorable climate.
"The General is sending me away," she said, "because Mr. Shultz told
him I got money from Captain Li for giving him information about the
General."
And looking up at Megan she smiled again her constrained formal smile
which Megan knew was meant to recall her to reticence. But she
disregarded it.
"Why does the General believe Mr. Shultz?"
Mah-li answered in a barely audible voice.
"The General believes him because he himself has not been generous to
me. He supposes I want the money. My mother and my grandparents
live in Soochow." She added, and Megan could scarcely catch the
words, "They are very poor."
For a moment Megan was tempted to transfer some of the responsibility
for Mah-li's conduct to filial devotion. It would be more Chinese.
But Mah-li's motives were not really important to her now; they
seemed only an indistinguishable part of the general romantic error
of her life. What was important now was that Mah-li should put
herself in her hands, confide herself and all her little complexities
to her, so that she might save her.
"Is it true, Mah-li," she demanded, "that you did sell information
about the General?"
Mah-li's eyes had such a look of withdrawal that it was as though her
face sank down through water, then she bent her head, looking into
her lap, but Megan pressed forward relentlessly.
"Tell me. It makes no difference to me what you did. It won't
change my feelings toward you if you sold him ten times over. I can
understand that you may have been driven to it. I only want to help
you. I want to do everything I can for you. I must make the General
see as I do, that you have never had a fair chance, and that you are
a child and haven't understood right and wrong any more than a child,
that he must forgive you and do what he can to help you. He also has
been to blame in his relations to you, so he ought to be all the more
willing to forgive. But you see, I can't talk to him, Mah-li, until
you tell me the truth. Try to tell me. I've told you it doesn't
matter, but just tell me. Why, Mah-li, you don't realize to what
extent I want to be your friend."
Mah-li did not raise her head. Megan saw her face foreshortened, and
her forehead was a dome of obstinacy. Her eyebrows raised slightly
but she made no answer, and Megan was unable to continue with any
assurance of being understood. She had no idea what to say now and a
definite irritation with Mah-li for not accepting her generosity
stole over her. Mah-li's every effort was to maintain, even with
desperation, the obscure balance necessary to her self-respect, or
perhaps only her vanity.
They sat in silence; Mah-li, reassured, raised her head and looked
now with polite inquiry toward Megan, waiting for her to continue.
Megan wished that she were actually a child and could be given one
efficacious slap. She thought of the rings.
"I have your jade," she said. "I would have sent them to you but I
thought it safer to wait until I saw you myself. I put them on so I
would be sure to have them ready."
She slipped off the rings and handed them to Mah-li. Mah-li took
them without hesitation but she did not put them on. She looked at
them lying on her palm and Megan felt she was trying to make up her
mind to say something about them.
"You have told me," she said finally, "that you would be glad to do
me a favor. Did you really mean that?"
"Why, of course I did. I have just told you I would do anything for
you."
"Then I want you please to send these rings to my father and mother
for me. They are old people and poor. They live in Soochow. I have
written it down for you." She reached inside her coat and drew out a
slip of paper with a few Chinese characters on it. "Your friends in
Shanghai, who have lived in China for so long, will know how to send
a package there. Or that Doctor Strike who came that night to the
General. He is a very superior man," she added, obviously anxious to
please Megan by praising him. "I knew him when I was a little girl
in Soochow. He would tell you just what to do with them." She
handed the rings back and for a moment her fingers rested on Megan's
warm palm like cold little shells.
"You have a chill," Megan exclaimed, "you mustn't go out like that.
Let me order some hot tea for you."
"No, no, don't order anything. I ought to have gone earlier, and I
really am not cold. These spring days are sometimes a little chilly.
You see, I brought my hot-water bottle."
She touched the embroidered blue bag, and Megan once more smiled at
the combination of ornament and utility. But as she looked up she
surprised in Mah-li's eyes a wild uncovered gleam of fright. For a
whole moment it fluttered before her uncontrolled and Megan stared
back in dismay.
"My dear child," she cried, "you are ill, you mustn't go away at all.
Stay here with me. I'll arrange it somehow."
"No, no," said Mah-li, "that is impossible."
She ran one finger across her eyebrows to restore serenity to her
face. Megan could scarcely believe she had seen that look.
"I am not ill. I am tired; that is all."
She got up and drew her coat together. Megan got up too and
impulsively taking her hands drew her slightly resisting figure to
the window.
"Don't forget that I meant what I told you. I am your friend and am
here to help you."
Mah-li let her hands lie irresponsively in Megan's, but she turned
her face toward her with what seemed for the time a vague expectancy.
"And don't forget either," said Megan, emotion making her voice a
little husky, "that you have another Friend who is always with you.
Didn't they ever tell you these words of His at the Mission
schools?--'Come unto me all ye who are weary and heavy laden and I
will give you rest.'"
"Yes, I remember that," said Mah-li. "I embroidered it on a scroll
once and they framed it and hung it on the wall. But it never seemed
to me to be true. It was two thousand years ago He promised that and
the happiness and unhappiness of the world have not changed since.
No, the unhappiness is still poverty, sickness, dying and separation,
the happiness is still the friends around the rice bowl, the
acquiring of riches and honor, the son that is born. These things
are the same. He has not really changed the world. I think He only
used words of courtesy like any other man."
"But He was not man, Mah-li, He was God. And you are wrong; millions
have listened to Him and His love has transfigured the lives of half
the human race."
"Has it?" Mah-li turned away. A shadow of disappointment crossed
her face. Whatever she expected she had evidently not received. She
walked slowly to the door and when she reached it, Megan took her by
the shoulders and suddenly kissed her in an awkward school-girl
fashion on both cheeks. She felt the blunt little cheek-bones and
sniffed the perfume of Mah-li's young skin, that was strangely like
the aroma of fine old parchment, but when she looked at her she saw
that this intimacy brought them no closer together.
After Mah-li had left she stood wondering what she could have said or
done that would have proved more effective. The remembrance of
Mah-li's fingers clutched about the neck of the hot-water bottle
struck her to the heart. She could not rid herself of the idea that
Mah-li had come to her in the hope of something quite definite that
she had not received. But what more did Mah-li want? Had she looked
for a confirmation, or for a new formula, or only for some comforting
observance? Or had she too hoped for the miracle, and this time the
miracle had not been forthcoming?
[Illustration: Chapter XX headpiece]