So: she came.
Hu Tao, the dissident’s daughter.
In reality she didn’t have much choice. If the city’s Magnate sends you an invitation to his New Year party, you need a good reason to refuse it. Though I suppose mourning may suffice.
I mix her drink. I measure the powder carefully: she is slight.
Her hands tremble as she takes the glass. I smile. The shy ones are the best.
The glass slips and shatters on the marble floor. I curse inwardly, but etiquette demands I hand her mine.
Ah-Mei cleans up, then discreetly withdraws. Simple servant-girls: what treasures!
“I’m so sorry!” Hu Tao blushes. “Please, let me get you another.”
I watch her go to the buffet and mix bitters. She stands erect in straight silk – high-collared, floor-length: a classic. She brings the glass – bows as she hands it me. I notice she has removed her long jewelled hair-pin. One frost-white hair gleams among the otherwise perfect raven black. I believe that is my doing.
She raises her drink to mine:
“Drain the glass dry!”
I taste exquisite bitters: the rim of the glass frosted with a circle of salt.
She smiles. “A true Revolutionary can endure bitterness.” It is her challenge. I run my finger slowly round the rim and lick the salt with pleasure.
She hides her disgust well.
***
It is late. She has declined my offer and departed: in mourning. A good line, but it will not last forever. The wait will make the conquest all the sweeter.
My neck – my face – grate tired and stiff as I climb into bed.
I am woken by pain shooting across my shoulders. My back aches; I shudder. My teeth grit. This is not good.
I ring for Ah-Mei.
“Fetch the doctor.”
She stays put.
“Half the city’s in lock-down. Explosion at the Laboratory: a spark, from the New Year fireworks. Doctors are treating hundreds who inhaled the fumes.”
Her voice is frost.
“I know who cut safety costs on his newly-acquired asset: my son’s workplace.”
The shock sets the convulsions off anew. I am racked with pain.
“Hu Tao wishes you peaceful ‘Year of the Dog.’ She asked me to prepare your suicide note. I have practiced your signature and borrowed your seal. You will die with your reputation in mud, where it belongs.”
***
She bows before her father’s portrait. She places the letter in the metal stand between the two smoking joss-sticks and lights the paper.
“Dear father,
You have been vindicated: your concerns for the Laboratory’s safety justified.
Thank you for teaching me the preparation of Strychnine crystals. I have put the knowledge to good use: he is gone.
Now at last we can bring you home. Home, from the bitter Northern mines where they sent you for speaking out: voicing your fears. Where they told me they couldn’t even bury you, in that earth gripped year-round in frost.”
She turns: bows to the tiny, white-haired figure beside her.
Her mother smiles as Hu Tao hands back the glittering, hollow hairpin.