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figured out how many people lived in these tiny spaces. Some doubled up, using the same bed, one on the day shift and the other on the night shift, each twelve hours long.
    In Ma Li’s room a double bunk, one over the other, and a wooden crate were the only furniture. There was no room for anything more. Worn pieces of cotton held up with string screened the bunks. That was all the privacy they had.
    â€œWhere is she?” I pointed to the upper bunk.
    â€œMaybe still in jail. She’ll be out soon. We have sent people to open the jails and get all the political prisoners out.” Ma Li sat on her bunk and gave me the wooden crate to sit on.
    â€œThe room I had in the British Concession was much better. For a time that was fairly safe and the theater troupe had funds to pay us wages. But later on, as the Guomindang tried to trap as many radicals as it could, our money ran out. Anyway it was safer to live here.”
    Ma Li looked round at the rattrap she had been living in. “Fortunately my mother never saw this place. She would have had a fit. A year ago, when my father threatened to disown me, she came to see me and begged me to go home. ‘Why do you want to make your life so difficult?’ she said. And I told her, ‘Mama, I think your life is harder to endure.’ She understood what I meant. She had been active when she was young, but her dreams and plans had all faded away. Vanished. And she ended up just like the women she despised when she was young. She grew old and fat. She was always trying on some new kind of perfume or skin freshener. All the trouble she took with her dresses just made her look more ridiculous. Did you ever see a fat dummy in a department store show window? They are all skinny; yet she used to buy those same dresses and have them remade to fit her bulky figure.”
    â€œThere’s no air in this room.” I reached out and pushed open the small window. A thick board had been nailed between the window and the sill of the window in the house opposite.
    â€œThat’s our outdoor kitchen. We put our little stove up there when it’s not raining.”
    â€œI could never have followed your example two years ago,” I admitted, “but now it’s different.”
    â€œNow you have a good chance to strike out on your own. Listen to this: The new cultural department that’s to be set up in Shanghai has a plan to combine a number of small theatrical troupes like mine into one large theater with several touring companies. We’ll need many new people.”
    I shook my head. “My uncle has arranged for my aunt and me to leave for Hong Kong while he stays on here to see how matters work out. I’ll wait in Hong Kong while Bob Lu finishes his last year of college here. Then we’ll get married and go to the United States. He’ll work there for his Ph.D.”
    â€œAnd what are you expected to do?”
    â€œJust be his wife. Did you know Lily is going to marry the banker Mr. Chang? They plan to go to the Philippines. My aunt thinks that Lily is doing the right thing.”
    â€œWhat do you think?”
    â€œIt’s probably the right thing for her.”
    Ma Li tossed her head contemptuously. Out of curiosity I stood on the box to peep into the upper bunk.
    â€œWhy don’t you strike a bargain with your aunt and uncle? Take a job and wait for Bob Lu here, then join them later in Hong Kong. That way you’ll be able to see for yourself how things work out. You can make up your own mind what you want to do. How about that?”
    â€œThat’s a great idea!” I gestured too emphatically and tumbled backwards off the rickety box. When I looked up there was no bunk, no books, no Ma Li. I was in another tiny room. Ma Li’s hand stretched out to me through the door I had unwittingly fallen through and she pulled me to my feet.
    My uncle and aunt were not happy about the prospect of a long separation, but