She knew of course where the American was. They all knew that he lived in a little tent like any common soldier’s tent. It was under a banyan tree for coolness, and through the arches of this great tree with its hundred trunks she now walked. She was not afraid of the American, although she had never spoken to him. Gossip had made him known, the talk of men and the talk of women. She knew that he made friends easily with the common soldiers and not so well with the officers. “The old dislike of equality,” she thought with scorn. “The white men want us all to be common folk so that they can continue to be our lords.”
When she came to the white guard at the entrance of the tent she said curtly in English, “I come as a messenger from the Chinese General.”
“Righto,” the guard replied, without saluting, and went inside. In a moment he came back. “The boss says to come in,” he said. She went in and there she found the American sitting on a folding stool, eating a green-skinned melon. Inside the melon the meat was a clear golden yellow. He looked up, smiled and rose, the half-melon in his hands.
“I can’t shake hands,” he said in his slow pleasant voice, “but I’ll give you a piece of this.”
“No, thank you,” she said. She sat down on a second stool.
“It’s rather good,” he remarked, sitting down again.
“It looks so,” she agreed, “but I have only a message to give you from our General. He wishes me to say that he will march tomorrow and move to the Lashio Road.”
The American swallowed a mouthful of the golden juice. “I’ll be sorry if he’s made up his mind,” he drawled, “because if he does what he told me he wanted to do, he’s planning too narrow a front and he is putting his units at a disadvantage. Try to persuade him, young lady — I can’t. He doesn’t take my orders.”
“He is discouraged,” she said warmly. “We are all discouraged.”
He put the melon down on a small folding table and wiped his hands on a surprisingly white handkerchief.
“I know,” he said gently—“I know.”
She waited but he said no more. She could feel little separate withdrawals of his whole being, the eyes retreating first, the lips next, pressed firmly to silence, the shoulders stiffening, the hands busying themselves with folding the handkerchief.
“You all defend each other, you and the British,” she said suddenly.
He gave her a swift look from under his lids. “We’re strangers in a strange country,” he said.
“Are not we?” she replied.
“You are not so strange as we are,” he said.
She was suddenly ablaze with anger. “You white people,” she cried. “You sacrifice all other human beings on your own altars for yourselves.”
“I was twenty years in your country,” he reminded her.
“Always being a white man,” she retorted.
“For so I was born,” he replied.
She turned away her head, and rose, having fulfilled her mission. But he delayed her a moment more. “In spite of all that you are thinking,” he said, “I have never seen braver men than these British. They have known that they would have no reinforcements — that planes were not being sent, nor ships, nor additional troops — nothing. They have been fighting what is called a delaying action. Their lives are the scraps thrown to the advancing wolves that others might be saved.”
“You always make heroes out of yourselves,” she said harshly. “You forget that we should have had allies here in Burma instead of enemies, had white men been human beings all through these decades of your possession instead of always white heroes among dark savages.”
“Do not forget I am American,” he reminded her.
“I can only remember that you are white,” she retorted, and she bent her head away from him and went away.
She hastened, winged by fury, and was almost back to her own quarters before she remembered that she must return to the General. But when she reached his quarters he was busy with his commanders, and she was not taken inside. Instead he came out to her and she told him, standing in the presence of soldiers and guards, “I have delivered your message and he advises against it.”
“I will not heed his advice,” the General replied.
“Then tomorrow?” she inquired.
“At dawn,” he replied.
She nodded and made haste indeed now. For the severely wounded must be left behind, scattered as safely as could be in the homes of Chinese wherever they could be found, and those who were a little wounded must be made ready to be moved. Chung must be told first and then her women. All the hundred small things must be done when they marched again.
She frowned and the careworn look that was now natural to her came over her face. This time at least it would not be retreat. She was eager to be gone — yes, the General had decided wisely. They would form their own lines. How she had talked to the American! When she and Sheng met she would tell him, and he would say he was glad. But whether she had been right or wrong she did not know. The American was an honest man. But when honesty was blind, was it still honesty? She saw the honesty and Sheng saw the blindness. Sheng was right, Sheng was wiser than she.
“Oh, will they never see?” she muttered between her teeth. No, she knew they never would. These white men, retreating before the Japanese, would still not see. They would be planning even while they retreated, that they would come back again and be as they had always been, White Heroes.
She ground her even teeth together and pressed her red lips and felt her eyes grow hot. Upon the wings of her scorn she sped to do what must be done, and she bustled and hastened as she went, driving Chung at last to rebuke her thus, “You are as bad as a foreigner sometimes.”
She paused at this and after a moment she said, “Well, perhaps you are right.” And as though he had given her a medicine, she grew quieter, her step moved as swiftly but the haste was gone. Her voice lost its sharpness and was calm again. Now Pansiao, who had stayed out of her sight, came near her.
“Are we moving?” she asked in her soft voice.
“Yes, but this time nearer home,” Mayli replied. She thought as she spoke that the girl would be comforted, but instead a look of dismay came over Pansiao’s face.
“Doesn’t that please you?” Mayli asked. She was folding uniforms into a wicker basket.
“Yes, but—” Pansiao began and stopped.
“But what?” Mayli asked.
“Sheng,” Pansiao faltered, “how will he find us?”
Mayli paused for one instant. “I have been thinking of that,” she said. “See, we will leave a letter here with the woman who had the baby today. We are sending her home tonight and her husband is coming for her. I will give a letter to him and tell him he is to look for anyone Chinese coming here. It is natural that when Sheng finds us gone he will go to the Chinese.”
Still Pansiao was not satisfied. She hung her head and twisted her fingers and looked sidewise at Mayli now and then as she worked.
Mayli watched this for a while and then she said, “Speak what is behind your eyelids, for I can see something is there.”
“There is nothing behind my eyelids,” Pansiao said warmly. “Nothing, that is, but something that doesn’t matter. That is, it matters nothing to me. But if we leave a letter for Sheng—”
A guess darted into Mayli’s mind. “We ought to leave one for Charlie Li,” she said laughing.
She sharpened her two forefingers at Pansiao as though they were knives in the old childish gesture of derision by which girls tease each other, and Pansiao threw the end of her jacket over her face and ran away.