Upstairs, the door to his mother’s room was slightly ajar. When she was awake, his father explained, she liked listening to what was going on in the house. Even before Shao entered the room he could smell the faint fragrance of her perfume, freesia and bergamot. The drapes were open. He couldn’t recall the last time he had seen this room so bright with daylight. The nurse sitting at his mother’s bedside stood up when he and his father entered. The trolley beside the nurse held a jug of water, folded white towels, small brown glass bottles.

Shao took the chair beside the bed while his father and the nurse whispered in conversation. His mother was beyond thin. If not for her clean face and hair, the fine cotton nightgown, she could’ve been one of the emaciated refugees they had seen on their travels. He took her hand and she opened her eyes briefly. Her eyes were unfocused, her smile merely polite, devoid of recognition.

“Let’s go down for lunch and you can come back,” his father said. “Your mother will be awake by then.”

The smells in the dining room, so familiar, almost made him swoon with hunger. After months of eating all his food piled into a single bowl of chipped enamel, the table’s place settings seemed extravagant. Linen napkins, ivory and silver chopsticks, porcelain spoons and bowls glazed in a design made exclusively for his family.

The head cook personally carried in a huge tureen. “Welcome home, Third Young Master!” he said, beaming.

Throughout lunch, family members from the other houses came by and put their heads in the door to greet him. Some stayed to eat and chat, their faces familiar and comforting. Here, it was easy pushing sad memories to the back of his mind. The numbing cold of the open road. The destruction after an air raid. Shao wanted to leave those memories behind, if only for a day.

His brother Tienming sat down briefly for some soup, then excused himself as soon as Shao gave him the letter from Mrs. Deng.

“Third Son,” his father said, at the end of the meal, “you’ve just recovered from fever. Stay at home and rest for a few days. Spend time with your mother.” It was a command, not a request. He couldn’t go out now. He would have to send Sparrow to check on Lian.

After his father left to return to work at Xinwen Bao, Shao sought out his brother. Tienming sat upstairs in their childhood playroom, his tall frame doubled up in a small chair by the window, as if he’d dropped into the seat forgetting he was no longer a boy. His hand clutched the letter from Mrs. Deng, his expression blank.