Homesick by Jean Fritz

trouble and he’d been our friend ever since. He must have seen what was going on and called the others. Forming a double line that led to the Dodge sedan, they hurried us and our baggage into the car while they stood guard. My father and the Jordans slid into the front seat, my mother, Lin Nai-Nai, and I into the back. The ricksha coolies stayed until we had the car started and were off the street. It was a grand rescue. I didn’t think there was a writer in the whole world who could have done better.
    But I was afraid something terrible might have happened to my mother. My father and the Jordans were all asking how she was and she said she was all right and she did seem to be. I put my hand on her knees and they weren’t even shaking. Maybe she was better already.
    As soon as we were inside the house, I let poor Kurry out of her basket and we all gave a big sigh, glad to be safe again.
    My father leaned against the door. “Well,” he said proudly, “that was a Narrow Squeak!” Probably he was already thinking what a good story this would make when he wrote home, but I planned to write first.
    Dear Grandma (I would say): We were almost murdered tonight but in the nick of time we were saved by a bunch of ricksha coolies. I was so scared that my knees were shaking, but don’t worry about us. Just remember that in China there are always ricksha coolies around.
    We went into the living room where my mother stretched out on the sofa and my father began talking about what had been going on in Hankow. Since the Jordans were leaving the next day, he wanted them to hear everything, so he went on and on, the way he did when he was taking Dr. Carhart’s place and preaching a sermon. I paid no attention; it was just more Chinese-fighting talk. Who was going to rule China. Who was going to beat whom. It was like a Victrola record that had been playing ever since I was born. Then suddenly my father interrupted the record to speak to me.
    â€œYou’ll be interested in this news, Jean,” he said. “The British School is not going to open this fall and Miss Williams has gone back to England.”
    â€œYou’re joking!” I cried.
    â€œCross my heart,” my father said.
    Like all good news, it was hard to believe. I tried to imagine it. No more Miss Williams ever. No more worrying about Ian Forbes or the king of England or prisoner’s base.
    â€œWe’ll have lessons together,” my mother said.
    I nodded, thinking how I’d study my favorite subjects: poetry and George Washington and the map of America. No complicated math problems, no French. My mother didn’t speak French and I had never seen her do anything but add and subtract in her account book. She said we wouldn’t start for two or three weeks to give her a chance to rest.
    I began to see that this war was going to mean more than just talk, but at first I didn’t connect Yang Sze-Fu’s fingernails with the war. Of course I was surprised the next morning when I noticed that the long, spiky nails on his pinkies were gone and were now the same length as his other nails.
    I asked Lin Nai-Nai. “How come Yang Sze-Fu cut his nails?”
    â€œHe’s a Communist,” Lin Nai-Nai said. “Communists don’t believe in long fingernails. They believe all people should be working people, no one pretending to be better than anyone else.”
    â€œAre you still interested in being a Communist?” I asked.
    â€œNo,” she said. “How can I like the Communists when they are attacking my city?”
    I had forgotten that Lin Nai-Nai’s family lived in Wuchang. Once long ago she had explained to me that she had disgraced her family when she had run away from her husband and they would never want to see her again. Now she was worried about them, and no wonder. My father had told me how Communist soldiers were trying to make the city of Wuchang surrender by starving it to