Honor and Duty (46 page)

“What if this changes who you are?”

Like going to West Point. “Then I’ll learn a new life.”

In an injured voice he said, “You are Chinese, and say this?”

“But sir, so many of our traditions have changed. Chinese used to listen to the
Sheng yu
, the Edicts, every fifteen days. The daughters of prosperous men had their feet bound. Times change.”

He made a dismissive Chinese sound—“Foot binding was
not
tradition. This is Western sensationalism, focusing on a stupid fad! Tradition is the
San-gahng
and the
Wu-lun
, the Three Bonds and the Five Relationships. The Five Virtues of benevolence, duty, ritual, wisdom, and faithfulness. Agree?”

I took a deep breath. The shark-fin soup was probably cold. I figured part of the test was to see if I could recite instead of eat. An old test. “
Gahng
and
lun
omitted mothers and sisters. And daughters.”

He sighed. “Should wives honor their husbands?” he asked.

“Yes, sir. And husbands should honor their wives.” He had
two mistresses. I felt smug until I realized that I felt a continuing loyalty to Christine. That made no sense.

His next question jarred me: “How would you discipline a disobedient child?” He looked at Pearl. She looked at her soup.

Edna was screaming at me to take Silly Dilly to the vet to be put to sleep. Edna had never known poverty, we were poor, and this was her response—to save fifty cents a day by killing the cat. My income alone would support a nation of pets, and there were scores of people who would take Silly Dilly, but Edna had decided, and she never recanted a decision. I could have our cat put to sleep, or Edna would mismanage Silly’s death.
Ch’a lu t’ung k’u.

I would never have children. “I can’t discuss parenting competently, sir,” I said, frowning.

He pursed his lips. Pearl smiled at me hopefully.

“Should college students be drafted?”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “All citizens should serve the country.”

“You are a political extremist,” he said. Now he frowned.

“No, sir. I’m an American.”

“This is a melodramatic answer,” he said.

“Being American is melodrama,” I said, tasting the soup. “Great soup,” I said, finishing it while he and Pearl watched me.

“Do you know that she has broken three”—he held up the last three fingers of his left hand—“engagements, and each time I lost the dowry?”

“I knew about the engagements. Not the dowries.”

He looked at Pearl. “Do you wish to marry her?” he asked

“I don’t know,” I said.

He peered at me like a squad leader finding rust in the rifle bore. He looked at Pearl. She smiled at him wanly, lifting an elegant eyebrow. He rubbed his hard, smooth forehead with the first two fingers of his right hand. “Your answer is insulting. She is engaged to a fine man from an excellent family in Macao, the result of months of search and interviews. You have no right in this house unless you provide cause for breaking the engagement.”

“I’m sorry. I meant no insult.” I adjusted my glasses. “I would like permission to continue to date your daughter. But the best cause for breaking the engagement is your daughter’s wish to break it.”

He wiped his mouth with a jade-colored napkin, which he crushed like something that had angered him, and left on the
table. “Why would you not want to marry my daughter?” He asked it with the same tone as “Why would you not want to breathe?”

“We’ve known each other for only two months.” Honor. I looked at Pearl. “I was in love with another girl for six years.” I let out my breath. “Whoever marries Pearl marries, I think, a lot more than Pearl.”

“You resist a Chinese family that would welcome you, while you are part of an army that restricts your freedom?” He laughed a joyless Chinese laugh. “I have read of West Point and its famous discipline. What if it orders you to kill Asians? Do you know the American army killed a million Chinese in the Korean War? How many of them do you think were named Ting and Yee?”

“I will go where the Army directs me. They have my promise.” I looked at Pearl. “It’s an honorable profession. It gives me a purpose in life.”

“Can you afford a girl like her?” he asked, his eyes alight. “With ‘purpose’?”

I knew it: a math question. The tip of my tongue emerged while I calculated. “Sir, for three dates, I’ve bought your daughter one corsage, three cherry Cokes, a ticket to an armed forces movie theater for one dollar, two dinners at a government hotel, and six hot dogs. We’re within budget.”

He tilted his head and moved his crushed napkin. “Six hot dogs?” he said.

I was trying to read book titles, but my view was constantly interrupted by paintings I later learned were Matisses, Vuillards, Maillols, and Picassos. My concentration was broken by Pearl’s clear voice. “He’s in awe of you. He’s proud that a Chinese is at West Point. He understands what it’s like to be a Chinese man in a Caucasian school. He admired your courage. You were wonderful. You were honest and strong. You saved me, I think, from the man from Macao.”

She crossed her legs beneath the long dress. I wanted to kiss her, but I could feel her father’s flat, refrigerated gaze on my desires. It was ten o’clock. I had no idea how I could sleep in this house. I wondered if they had a big weight room. I wondered if I could run back to the Academy from here.

“You did well, if somewhat sarcastically.”

“West Point,” I said.

“Many men are very interested in marrying me,” she said.

I looked at her. “This is news?”

“They think me attractive.”

“They never saw you eat a red hot.”

“You’re not avoiding me, are you?” she called.

I was on the other side of the room. If I went any farther, she’d have to phone me. I returned, which took a while, and sat next to her on the extravagantly soft burgundy sofa. I felt vulnerable, the way Pearl had looked coming down the staircase.

I realized that the company of Chinese women had caused me to cry. My muscles were of no use in these matters. She was more than the sum of chest-thumping intelligence and good looks. She sat there, so dignified, holding keys to a mythological past that I could not know, and a future that was filled with new days. She was, in so many respects, perfect for me. The money didn’t matter; she was a Chinese woman and we had walked in each other’s shoes. My heart quivered in fear. I’m a loser. I don’t want to lose her. No more questions about heart. I’ve already done too much.

Her eyes were so warm, so close. She filled my vision and my mind. I looked at her mouth. “Are we through talking?” I asked. “Can we kiss now?”

“I hope we’re never through talking,” she said softly.

“Ach, zere may be no hope for you, young Chinese lady,” I said. “Unless, you take ze vater treatment. I have zis teacher, Mr. Flauck, who can help you change your life.”

“How,
Herr Doktor?
” she asked.

“You must close your eyes,” I said, moving closer.

“You may not kiss me until I know why you won’t court me.”

I took a deep breath. I could lose her because of honesty. Honor. “I’d be no good as a husband. Worse as a father.”

“How can you know that?” she asked.

“I know,” I said with great certainty.

“There are books that can help us,” she said. She was looking at my mouth. Her eyes were so large and bright, her eyelashes so long. “I’m smart, learn fast, and already know much. Let me help.”

“You can’t help me with your eyes open,” I said.

She closed them. She lifted her chin, her face so strong, so confident, so open, her lips expectant, her pallor gone.

“Don’t know if I’m good enough for you,” I said.

She opened her eyes. “For this I closed my eyes?” she asked.

“Okay. Close them again,” I said.

“Kai. Do you love me?”

Music played. I looked into her penetrating eyes. I looked at her with love and fear. She lifted her elegant chin, offering her mouth as she closed her eyes. Two tears clung to her eyelashes. I kissed her eyes, picking up the teardrops, then caressed her lips.

“Yes,” I whispered.

“Oh,” she whispered. “I love you. Merry, Merry Christmas, Ding Kai,” she said into my mouth, sealing my lips with hers.

28

West Point, January 4, 1967

“Major Maher speaking, sir.”

“Sir, this is Kai Ting. I’m on your team.”

“All right, Big Thunder! Good man. Happy New Year!”

“Same to you, sir. You sound cheerful.”

“Dammit—I love a good fight! Hell, I can’t wait! Congratulations on getting off the goddamn fence. Listen, watch your AO. Only speak to me when you’re secure. Remember—we’re dealing with a mutiny.”

I wasn’t sure how I was going to start. I didn’t know what was going to happen, but I knew that my comfort quotient was about to be kicked in the teeth. All the Academy buildings looked different. Somewhere, among us, cheaters lived and worked. Ts’ao Ts’ao was alive and living at West Point, cackling as he rubbed his hands.

I checked for messages in the orderly room. There was an envelope from the Catholic chaplin inviting me to a memorial service on Sunday for First Lieutenant Marco Matteo Fideli.

I had been staring at the Guan Yu figurine and the photo of Pearl on my desk when I realized that Clint had been trying to welcome me back from Christmas leave. Then Clint saw the note. Time stopped.

“Oh, man!” he cried. “Don’t do this to me! Not Fideli!”

I couldn’t say anything. I appreciated my immobility, and tried to hold on to it.

Pee Wee McCloud came in the door in a civvy sport coat, a new beard on his face. He looked at me with an infinite sadness, then crumpled the chaplain’s note he had received, and savagely hurled it into the wastecan. He grabbed me by the open collar to my dress gray and lifted my dead weight bodily from the bunk, carried me to Clint, who was at the window near Para-rat, and embraced both of us, their foreheads touching mine. Pee Wee’s shoulders shook and he wept. “He was too good,” he said, dragging out each word. “He’d be the guy to pull the others out of the bush. Can’t be dead. He and Mario were going to sing at Carnegie next year.”

Clint kept shaking his head, and then he began to cry. I did not want to be in this cluster of misery, but Pee Wee’s bulk pinned me. “It’s a battlefield mistake,” I tried.

No one bought it. Pee Wee growled, “We’re going to the funeral, Kai. Pay respects. Meet me in my room, thirteen hundred hours.”

The three of us trudged silently up Washington Road wearing full overcoats over full dress. Our galoshes made a unified scrunch in the fresh snow. Hundreds of cadets straggled behind. Pee Wee had timed it to allow family and officers to arrive first.

Mr. Fideli was a medium-sized man in a heavy black overcoat. He leaned heavily on Lieutenant Mario Fideli, all of his control swept away in a maelstrom of burst agony. A soft and gentle snow fell. Mrs. Fideli was a tall, patrician woman, struggling to retain control. She kept an arm around the waist of a young woman in black, speaking to her through their veils: Marco had a sister.

The chaplain spoke. A week ago, the Fideli brothers had been in a verdant jungle.… I jolted as the honor guard fired its salute, the sharp cracks of the M-14s echoing across the cold hills and the icy river. After honors, the guard captain passed the folded American flag to Mario. Mario gave it to the young woman in black.

The three of us sighed: the woman was Marco’s widow.
Somehow, in the last eighteen months, Marco had married. As the bugler sounded taps, she collapsed in Mario’s arms, her slight frame shuddering as she tried to stifle her wails. Her mother-in-law bowed her head and surrendered, weeping with her. I clamped my jaws together and tried to imagine the jungle that the Fidelis had left. Through the snow I saw the face of the enemy. The Vietcong and the NVA, victors over the Japanese and the French. I was a Chinese soldier preparing to fight Reds. I trembled with hate and blood lust. I would kill them all with fire and knife. I crept up on them and cut them down without mercy. The enemy looked like me.

“Mario,” I said later, “I’m sorry.”