Kang wondered whether Lao opened staff mail or just the ones for students. Perhaps some other unknown person was tasked with spying on the professors.

“Hmm.” Lao frowned and slit open an envelope with a razor-sharp letter opener. “This one is for that girl who was killed. Hu Lian. From her mother. With a return address. Now I know where to send the official letter of condolence.”

“I hope that letter takes its time arriving,” the professor said, “although mail to and from Chengtu has been relatively quick. The postal service seems nearly back to normal.”

“It helps that our campus address is now fixed,” Lao said. “And, of course, we benefit from the fact that many high-ranking officials have moved their families here. Did you know this Hu Lian well?”

Lao held the letter out to Kang.

My dearest daughter, good news. I am working at the Southern Baptist Mission refugee camp in exchange for meals and a place to sleep. Perhaps even some small wages soon. Such good fortune! Send mail to this address. I want to know all about your adventures. It’s such a comfort to know that by now you must be safely in Chengtu with your university . . .

Lao opened his desk drawer, took out some newly printed letterhead, and began to write. He copied the words from a draft, the same words he’d used before to the parents of other students killed in Shangtan. If nothing else, the man was conscientious when it came to duty. The professor took his small bundle of mail and hoped the letter to Lian’s mother would end up lost in a post office, abandoned at the bottom of some mailbag. At least until Lian had found her mother.

Chapter 34

The spring of 1938 arrived gently, mild and sunny, as if to apologize for the vicious cold that had gripped the city earlier. Green buds on sycamore trees that had resisted opening now unfurled into leaves the size of Lian’s palm. In gardens and parks, bright yellow shrubs of forsythia and the flutter of foliage gave back to Shanghai some of its charm and the illusion of peace.

Lian had been in Shanghai just over a week now and had gone to the Xinwen Bao office once to check for news of Meirong. She trudged up the apartment staircase, which echoed with muffled sounds of conversation, shouts, and arguments that drifted up from each floor as she climbed. There was hardly a family in Shanghai without friends or relatives squeezed into their homes. In private, behind closed doors and shuttered windows, people voiced the annoyance of sharing a home for months, the embarrassment of having nowhere else to go, the despair and worry over what was yet to come.