For many months afterward, every moment of pleasure for Lizzie was quickly followed by feelings of guilt. Where before she’d wished to return to her normal self as a matter of principle, now it was a matter of need. Another magical juncture she must find the strength to refuse. But how would she ever enjoy her dinner, her book, her Saturday ride again? She lost weight, though not to the point of being thin. She couldn’t sleep. Ti Wong was the only subject on which she could allow herself to be happy.
What a bright boy he turned out to be. She loved to hear how he’d wheedled Nell into letting him make popcorn or taffy. If any of the other children asked, Nell said it was too much mess. But Ti Wong was her pet, her favorite.
When he was still abed, letting Lizzie read him Sherlock Holmes mysteries and recovering his voice, she had told Nell that they needed to give more thought to his future. Nell was surprisingly agreeable, even to this. “What would you like to be when you grow up?” Lizzie had asked him.
She herself had already decided he’d be a doctor. A Fu pulse, he’d told her. Dr. Kearney could surely be co-opted into this project. He would see the value in a doctor who spoke Chinese but was trained in Western medicine, none of that hocus-pocus of spinning needles.
Ti Wong had answered he wanted to be a Pinkerton, but that could be changed. Would have to be changed. The Pinks wouldn’t take a Celestial.
And then, just when some routine was finally returning—classes, fights among the boys, quarrels among the girls all resumed—just when it seemed things could, in fact, go on Minna Graham came to the breakfast table, complaining of a headache. The light was dreadful bright, she told them. Her eyes hurt. She asked to go back to bed. Nell was too tired to deal with it. She suggested that Minna, unable to contract diphtheria and largely ignored during the epidemic, now wanted attention. This was agreed to be just like Minna Graham. She went so far as to break out in large red spots.
Measles, Dr. Kearney said. Two weeks later seven of the children, including Jenny Ijub, had rashes. New cases continued to appear throughout the month. Fortunately the strain involved was a light one. The new epidemic recalled the tragedies inevitably to everyone’s mind, but didn’t repeat them.