The look on his face was both grave and questioning, his entire attention was fixed upon her. If her mother had been there, she would’ve cautioned Lian against getting too close. But her mother wasn’t there for comfort or caution. And what if her mother was wrong? Lian’s classmates were friendly and kind, especially Meirong. And Shao had been nothing but courteous and thoughtful.

He put an arm around her and she allowed herself to lean against him. The vault of her heart opened, just a little.

CLASSES WERE BACK in session. Students sat on stone floors for their lectures then gathered to study in the library at rickety tables built from sawhorses and planks. All the chairs had been collected to use in the library, so they ate their meals standing up, holding a bowl and chopsticks. Shoveling rice into their mouths as quickly as possible so they could go back for seconds.

Like everyone else, Lian and Meirong walked to Shiama every day after classes, not to shop but to read the newspapers. Shiama, the larger of the two towns, had a post office. Its manager pasted up newspapers on the outside walls, papers from Shanghai, Wuhan, and Nanking. They were always at least two days old, but it was better than nothing. Many of the townsfolk couldn’t read, but during these extraordinary times, everyone deserved to know the news and there was no shortage of volunteers to read articles out loud. The students were only too glad to do so when asked. They read avidly, not just for news of the war’s progress but also to gain some sense of which routes were still safe, which railways still available.

Lian devoured the headlines but was also drawn to smaller articles, descriptions of refugees on the road. Men and women swarming railway tracks, hoping to catch a ride that would save them hundreds of miles of walking. Families crammed into freight cars, those outside hanging on to doorframes and handholds, those inside packed together so tightly they stood upright despite their exhaustion. Reports of underequipped and undertrained soldiers being sent to the front lines. Photos of disheveled recruits in military camps outside the city of Changsha, some not even in uniform.

The papers from Shanghai shocked them. An editorial in Xinwen Bao left the students speechless.

Some of Shanghai’s foreign residents treat the war as spectacle. Never before has a great metropolis given its residents a ringside seat at a killing contest involving nearly a million men. They stand on apartment roofs and watch as Japanese airplanes dive on our soldiers in the trenches. From the safety of Bubbling Well Road, guests at the Park Hotel’s popular dining room gaze out through large picture windows and sip cocktails while commenting on the marksmanship of the Japanese batteries. One gets the impression the audience is disappointed their views of bloodshed are obscured by buildings and barricades.