The Nine Fold Heaven. Mingmei Yip

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СКАЧАТЬ night, my baby, Jinjin, came to my dream. But one thing disturbed me—he’d not been growing.

      I asked, “Jinjin, how come you don’t grow but stay the same as the first time you visited me?”

      “Because I can’t.”

      “Why not?”

      “Because my mother abandoned me. She’s famous for being cruel and scheming. I tell you, Mama, people can survive without food, but not without love.”

      “Who told you this?”

      “My baba, who else?”

      “You met him?”

      He nodded, each thread of his lustrous, silky hair tugging at my heart.

      “Sometimes I’ll sneak out from my crib and crawl to where he sits. Baba has aged a lot because he’s very lonely and he misses you. I never talk to him because he doesn’t even know that I exist. So I can only watch and listen, but I heard him say this to himself.”

      Before I could respond, he went on. “Mama, though most of the time I think he is my father, other times I’m not so sure.”

      “How’s that?”

      He answered in a mocking tone. “Oh, you forget? You had others besides my baba, remember?”

      His saying this hurt so much that I was speechless.

      “But, Jinjin, I love you very much! In fact, you’re the one who’s taught me to love.”

      He didn’t respond to my declaration of love, but continued in his childish voice. “In a few months I’ll turn one year old, but sadly I’ll have to spend my birthday all by myself.”

      “But I can celebrate with you!”

      His expression turned sad. “How? I can’t always come to your dreams and I won’t let you in mine.”

      “But, Jinjin, why can’t you let me into your dreams?”

      “Because I can’t. I am no more than a dream myself. I am not real, Mama.”

      “No, Jinjin! You are a living being, my son! What makes you think you’re not real?”

      “Mama, I’m confused. When you gave birth to me, I heard someone say that I’m dead, a stillborn, what does that mean?”

      “But you’re not.”

      “How are you so sure?”

      “Because here you are in my dream and my life.”

      Just then I woke up, wetting my pillows with tears flowing like the Huangpu River.

      I wanted my real Jinjin in my arms—not merely in a dream.

      I had to go back to Shanghai to find him. Even if I’d get killed trying, so be it.

      But making unexpected, risky moves in a seemingly hopeless situation was part of my training as a spy. Besides looking for my baby, I also needed to find out what was left of the two rival gangs after the shoot-out. Was the Flying Dragons’ Master Lung really dead at last—or just nursing his wound somewhere, awaiting his comeback? Had my boss, the Red Demons’ Big Brother Wang, finally been able to take over Lung’s place to be Shanghai’s number one gangster head?

      The next few days, I shopped, packed, and booked a steamship ticket for Shanghai. Then, because I had no choice, I went to a hairdresser and had my waist-length hair cut off, replaced with a bob and thick bangs. I consoled myself thinking it made me look playful and even younger than my twenty years. I needed to look as different as possible from my days singing at Shanghai’s Bright Moon Nightclub, when I wore my hair permed to be as wavy as the ripples on the Huangpu River and swept to one side. Since arriving in Hong Kong, I had stopped putting on makeup and dressed mostly in a white blouse and dark skirt so I could pass as a university student, or a salesgirl.

      I was scared to be going back to Shanghai, but also energized to be back in action at last. After all, I’d been raised to be a spy, not to mope around doing nothing.

      PART TWO

      3

      Home to Heartbreak

      With light luggage, a heavy heart, but at least a thick purse, I dragged myself aboard the ship for the short trip back to Shanghai. In my modest stateroom, I unpacked my few belongings. Soon the ship was under way and I went up on deck to watch people. Some looked like harried businessmen, others, excited tourists, and yet others, happy families going home. But sadly, I felt none of their cheerfulness. I turned to look at the infinity of the turquoise sea, and into my mind popped the words of the Tang dynasty poet Wei Zhuang’s “Jiangnan, South of the River”:

      The Spring water is bluer than the sky,

      I listen to the soft rain, dozing off aboard the painted boat,

      By the fire sits a woman beautiful as the moon,

      Her pale wrists white as frost and snow.

      Don’t go back to your homeland, not until you’re old,

      Because returning home is heartbreaking.

      I had no idea why Wei thought that homecoming—to Shanghai, which is south of the river—was heartbreaking. And why it’d become bearable only after you gathered snow on your sideburns. Is it because only when we are old can we let go of painful memories?

      Finally, the next evening, with much shouting of the crew, the ship bumped against the same pier that I’d left in a hurry three months ago. With more shouting the ship was made fast and the gangplank was lowered with a crash. To take no chances of being recognized, I had disguised myself as a man. This way, I felt a little less anxious because I could not imagine anyone would recognize me as Shanghai’s most famous songstress. Just in case, I’d made up a man’s name—Shen Wei—and would pose as a university student returning home from overseas. I’d also made up a woman’s name—Jasmine Chen—for when I didn’t need to dress like a man.

      But I had no illusion that even with my new hairstyle, new name, and new gender, I was out of danger. I might not look like Camilla now, but I did not want to be looked at anyway. So as soon as I was off the ship, I hired a car to drive me to a slightly shabby hotel on Rue Lafayette in the French Concession. I hoped this busy street inside a foreign territory could give me some protection.

      After settled inside the hotel room, I washed, unpacked, and then took out a pen and paper to write down my plans. My first step would be simply to explore my surroundings and gather information. I needed to read the local newspapers to see what news there was about Master Lung, Big Brother Wang, Jinying, Gao—and myself. Then I’d quietly walk by the apartments of those I needed to visit—Jinying and Madame Lewinsky—to be sure they were not being watched by gang members. It was my singing teacher Lewinsky who’d helped me when I gave birth to Jinjin—and her who had told me he was stillborn. Too, I wanted to revisit the Bright Moon Nightclub where СКАЧАТЬ