God's Double Agent (30 page)

It felt like a noose was tightening around our necks. Little by little, our freedom was being squeezed from us. Our friends began getting harassed. Dragonfly, part of our Christian fellowship, came home one day to find his apartment had been sealed, making him homeless. He took off, fearing arrest. Two church friends were summoned to testify against us, and we were even
threatened. We were told we had to report every phone call, letter, or guest. And just in case we didn’t accurately report this information, they stationed guards at the entrance of our apartment building. Our rather large building was shaped like an “E” and had three exits. Much to the chagrin of the other residents, the police shut down all of the doors except the main entrance in the front. The guards on the first floor checked anyone entering the building who looked suspicious. Whenever Heidi and I left the premises, security sent an alert to our special agents, who would follow us around the city. They wanted to shut down our ministry and turn our neighbors against us.

They were successful.

One afternoon, Heidi emerged through the door holding a bag of groceries and looking completely flustered.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“You’d think if the agents were following me anyway, they’d offer to help carry my groceries,” she sighed. “I’m so tired.”

“It’s probably just the post-prison exhaustion,” I assured her. “You’ve been through a lot.”

“Yes, and my back hurts, and I just feel so uncomfortable.”

Our eyes met, and neither of us said a word. I took the bag of groceries and set it on the table. We sat down on the couch and held hands. I was the first to speak what both of us were thinking. “So, you’re fatigued and have a general feeling of discomfort?”

“Yes,” she said, very slowly.

“Do you think you could be—”

“After just once?”

We both felt children made a marriage complete. During our busy ministry time, however, we didn’t have time to think about anything more than smuggling Bibles and conducting our illegal religious training. Nevertheless, we wanted at least one child; China’s onerous one child policy didn’t give us the luxury of
dreaming of a large family. In China, the government heavily regulated pregnancies. To begin a family, couples were required to get a pregnancy permission card—a yellow card—before the woman could legally conceive. If a pregnancy occurred without the yellow card, the woman was likely to be arrested and forced to have an abortion. Tens of millions of babies were aborted per year, sometimes just days before they would’ve been born. And not only did family planning officials show up to do random searches for secret pregnancies, other citizens were expected to report women who looked pregnant.

We’d seen this firsthand. When my older brother’s wife got pregnant with her second child, for example, she left to live in a secret location to have the baby. When the family planning officials realized she’d mysteriously disappeared, they broke into their home, grabbed my brother, and put him in a prison in the village. There, the Communist Party had hired a few strong men to beat him up, trying to get him to disclose where my sister-in-law was hiding. So, while we were filled with joy over Heidi’s pregnancy, we were also filled with trepidation.

“Let’s don’t think about ‘what if,’” Heidi said. My wife believed in knowing all the facts before making decisions. However, I had a feeling our bedroom civil disobedience had been a roaring success. “Let’s find out for sure.”

We went to a local hospital, where Heidi had a pregnancy test. As we waited for the results, I imagined holding a tiny person in my arms. Tiny feet, little hands. An infant seemed so innocent, so precious. After a couple of minutes, the nurse came back out and said, “It’s positive!”

Heidi and I left the hospital immediately. Authorities didn’t care if you were pregnant. Women had abortions all the time. In fact, a friend of Heidi’s had eight abortions during grad school. If a woman tried to keep the baby, however, terrible things could happen. When we got back to our building, we passed the guards at the door and went up to our apartment.“I wonder if it will
be a boy or a girl?” Heidi asked, excitedly. “Where will we put a crib?” she said, looking around the little apartment. “Do you think the baby will look like me or you?”

Heidi, as she talked about the baby, seemed suddenly different to me. For the first time in our relationship, I was looking at the mother of my child instead of just my wife. I’d always been attracted to her intelligence, her kindness, and her dedication. But during that moment, I realized the same attributes that made her a great wife would also make her a great mother.

“But wait,” she suddenly said, yanked from her thoughts of diapers and baby bottles by the reality of the family planning laws. “I don’t have a yellow card! They’ll arrest me and kill our child!” she said.

“He’ll be fine,” I said. “Or, if it’s a girl,
she’ll
be fine. The Lord will provide a pathway.” I kept my voice calm. I regretted the dark shadow of the family planning system that hovered over the excitement of our good news, so I tried to figure out the best way to proceed. Since I wasn’t from Beijing, I talked to David Li, the friend who’d deposited money for me while I was in prison, and secretly told him of my predicament.

“Oh, you’re in big trouble,” he said. “You’ll both be arrested for noncompliance, and they’ll force Heidi to abort.”

“Isn’t there anything I can do? I’d like to see an actual doctor, to make sure the baby’s healthy.”

“You’ll land back in jail if you show up to a doctor without your yellow card,” he said. As I saw our options dwindle, I was filled with despair. I wanted to protect Heidi and our unborn child so much I couldn’t think clearly. Plus, even if we could figure out a way to have the baby safely, I couldn’t support a family.

“There’s got to be a back door solution,” I said.

“I know a doctor who might be able to help,” he said. “She’s a believer at a nearby hospital, so maybe she could do a check-up off the books. But it’s a risk.”

“How so?”

“She’s supposed to call the police if anyone shows up without their yellow card.”

“Do you trust her?”

“I do.”

I had no choice, so I trusted her too.

I placed my hand on the small of Heidi’s back and ushered her into the brightly lit doctor’s office. The walls were a pale but cheery yellow, but nothing could calm my nerves. On the way up to the third floor of the hospital, I’d taken note of all the emergency exits in case we needed to make a quick escape.

Dear God
, I prayed,
please don’t let it come to that.

“What have we gotten ourselves into?” Heidi whispered as we waited to see the doctor.

When the doctor finally came in, she was holding a clipboard reviewing our medical information.

“It’s nice to meet you,” she said. “However, we’re missing some information.” I shifted in my seat and tightened my grip on Heidi’s hand. “Do you have your yellow card?”

“Well, I need to talk to you about that,” I said, lowering my voice. “We are friends of David Li, and he said you might be able to help us. Heidi got pregnant without a permit, and we were hoping you could check to make sure the baby is healthy.”

She immediately stood up, and put her hand on the doorknob like she was about to leave the room.

“You shouldn’t have come here,” she said. “Do you realize how dangerous this is? I’m obligated to call the police.” I looked at Heidi and it looked like all of the blood had run out of her face.

“I understand that,” I said, trying to keep the emotion out of my voice. “But David thought maybe you could do something for us.”

“If I ‘did something for you,’ I’d be arrested, would lose my medical license, and be thrown in prison,” she whispered.

“Do you at least have any advice for us?” I pled. “We won’t be able to keep this a secret forever. They’ll arrest us for sure as her belly grows.”

The doctor’s eyes softened when she looked at Heidi, who hadn’t said a word. I could see she had compassion, but was restricted by her very reasonable desire not to land in prison for two people she’d never seen before. She put the clipboard down and walked toward us. Her voice was so quiet that we had to lean in to hear her. “You are in grave danger. Even if you could hide the pregnancy in public, the family planning officers will stop by your house to check on you. If you’re already on their radar, there’s no way you can escape their reach.”

I listened intently, hoping to hear some sort of hope. I thought maybe she could direct us to another doctor, or a more rural province, or give us some direction at evading arrest and avoiding the forced abortion.

“What should we do?” I asked, desperation creeping into my voice.

“The only advice I have for you,” she whispered, “is to run.”

22

“How was the train ride?” I said, welcoming my dad into our little apartment. I took his suitcase from him and placed it alongside the wall. We had no guestroom, but we’d set up a nice place for him to sleep during his visit. Heidi poured him a cup of water. I swallowed hard as I saw him sitting there in our place, completely oblivious to our turmoil. We wanted to protect him from our illegal religious activities as much as possible, so he didn’t even know we had spent time in jail. We figured the less he knew, the better. If the police detected he knew any information, they might torture him to extract it. Instead of telling him we’d gotten into trouble, we acted as if nothing was wrong. It was our way of keeping him safe, and we were thankful not to burden him with our predicament. His visit would hopefully cause the police to let their guard down. An extended visit from my disabled father made us seem less mobile, less apt to try to escape. Mainly, though, I wanted to see him at least one more time. He sat at our table, sipped water, and told us about his trip on the train. I remembered the first time I’d ever seen a train. When I was a young boy, I had secretly stowed away on the same bus my father was on for a business trip. He discovered me, but only after we were too far away for him to send me back home. Instead of being angry, my dad let me enjoy the rare trip
outside our village. We stayed at a hotel, and he even let me see a train up close. I remember running my hand along the iron track, and wondering how far they could take me.

Everything was simpler then, but life had never been easy. I blinked back tears. Occasionally, during our visit, I excused myself to the restroom so I could collect myself. Even though the police had told us not to leave Beijing, that’s exactly what we needed to do. Just like the doctor had advised, we were going to run.

We enjoyed several weeks with my dad, carefully concealing Heidi’s pregnancy and just trying to act normal. Still, we jumped at every loud noise and were startled by every visitor. When the phone rang one afternoon while my father rested, we looked at each other with trepidation.

“You’re in danger,” a friend said, causing Heidi to immediately sit down at the table with me and lower the phone so I could listen in. On the other end of the line was a friend whose wife worked in the Public Security Bureau, or PSB, and he had inside information about the sarcastically titled “Old Friends Day.” In Beijing, the Communist Party had an annual tradition of rounding up former prisoners and putting them back into jail on October 1, Chinese National Day. This was simply a way for the government to flex its muscle and intimidate its citizens. Some prisoners would stay in jail for just weeks, and others would die there. The arbitrary nature of the Chinese legal system meant they did to you what they wanted. Heidi passed the phone to me.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“My wife saw a list of the former prisoners the police plan to round up,” he said into his receiver. “I’m sorry to tell you that your names are on it.” I let a few moments pass as a shudder ran through me. I didn’t want to go back to jail, especially now that I was about to become a father.

“Are you still there?”

“Sorry,” I mumbled. “When’s the round-up?”

Since it was already August, we weren’t sure when police would start rounding up people. Consequently, we decided it was time for my father to go back to his village. We had honored him the best we could with our hospitality; however, we had enormously heavy hearts as we helped him get back on the train.