“Can’t.” Ying emptied my purse and slipped out.
After a while, Sinmay came in. “You have brought this on yourself. You are reckless, thoughtless. I warned you not to get involved with the foreigner!”
I was almost shot, and that was all he could say.
“Why did you visit Emily and send her for the treatment? Now she’s clean and left Shanghai! You should have had the decency to tell me what you were doing behind my back.” He stormed out.
Peiyu, on her small lotus feet, waddled in with her handkerchief, her face strained with fear. This was bad luck, she said. The calendar had said we needed to avoid leaving home that day, and she should have told me. She must plan something festive to drive away bad luck. The wedding must happen as soon as possible. Finally, she toddled out.
None of them asked how I was doing.
Insomnia. A plague. For hours I lay in bed, thoughts of whys, hows, and what-ifs swinging in my head like crazy legs in the ballroom. I heard groans vibrating in the ceiling, caught shadows lurking behind the wardrobes, and glimpsed shapes of people: Lanyu, Yamazaki, the three gangly boys, Cheng, and even Ernest. They were bleeding, covered with blood, yet they all danced to the sound of gunfire while the windows, the lights, and the broken glass cascaded in a waterfall of shards. Lanyu was digging at my eyes. “Save me, save me!”
And the music. It was so loud. Disjointed. Raging. It wouldn’t stop. Make it stop.
Silence was a noise with teeth; it gnawed on my skin and left deep marks. Silence was a noise with arms and legs; it crawled across the rafters and spread its spawns of spells. Silence was a noise with a face, a face of dust and doom, a face of motes and moans.
I was in a cold sweat; I couldn’t sleep. I was not as strong as I thought I was.
After two days, I got out of bed and stood in front of the mirror. What a mess I was. My face was pallid, eyelids swollen; my hair was tangled, on my cheek a black blossom of bloodstain. I washed up, put on a clean dress, and went to my club. It would be heartbreaking to see the damage, but I could still revive the business if I worked hard, and many people’s livelihoods depended on me. And Ernest. He must be anxious.
The three-story building looked haunted under the gray sky. People walked by it without a second glance. By now all of Shanghai had learned of the shooting; few would patronize the club at the risk of facing a Mauser.
In the atrium, my managers, the band, several dancers, the accountant, the busboys, the bellboys, and even the cleaning staff greeted me with relieved faces.
“The ballroom has been swept clean, Miss Shao.”
“And Lanyu. We gave her a decent burial.”
“Would you consider hiring more dancers?”
And the accountant murmured, holding a stack of bills: power bills, utility bills, payments for the band, rent, food, and drinks.
I did my best to stay calm. I would take care of my employees. They needed work and needed to be paid. But the moment I stepped inside the dark ballroom—the Japanese had cut off the electricity—I shivered, the image of the shooting clear in my mind.
I rushed out to the landing, where I froze. Two Japanese soldiers climbed up the stairs; they roughly pushed me aside and plastered two long strips of paper on the gilded doors of my club, making a huge X, under which, in red ink, was written the Japanese kanji ENTRY FORBIDDEN, UNDER INVESTIGATION.
They wouldn’t confiscate my club, a joint venture, but they had ordered my business to cease operations.
I held on to the stair banister, feeling dizzy. The drawer of my desk stored the contract I had bargained with Sassoon, the cash, and a few banknotes I’d saved. My club, which I had worked so hard to manage, my livelihood, was only a few steps ahead of me, but it might as well have been thousands of miles away.
In the atrium, I passed my employees, went out to the street, and got in my car. My legs were weak, but I held all my emotions tight inside, trying hard to stay strong.
“Aiyi, Aiyi!”
I rolled down the window of my Nash.
On the street stood Ernest, carrying a canvas bag, his fedora askew, his face flushed with joy. “You’re safe. Thank God. I’ve been waiting for you. I was so worried about you. Are you all right?”
Something in me fell apart. “They sealed up my club, Ernest. My business is gone.”
“You have me.” He looked at me. It was the same look he had when he said something like Love is stronger than death, when he said he’d care for me even if I were married a thousand times.
“But . . .” What would I do without my club? My business. It was my life.