She had to stop running. Suling rested against a tall fence, doubled over from the stitch in her side. Her thighs and calves burned. She’d always thought her legs were strong from walking up and down the steep streets of Chinatown every day of her life but running was a different matter. The moon was a thin sliver of waning brightness so feeble a mere haze of passing cloud doused its light. Nob Hill was quiet, the neighborhoods nearly empty of automobiles and carriages. Its wealthy residents were probably all at the opera, eager to appear cultured or at least to say they had seen the great Caruso. Fortunately, it was all downhill now to Washington Square Park, which wasn’t very far from the convent at the corner of Filbert and Stockton. Suling took a deep breath and set off again.
She paused when she saw the bell tower of Sts. Peter and Paul, the Roman Catholic church near St. Christina’s Convent. She had no plan, she realized, only some vague notion of pounding on the door and demanding to see Regina Reynolds. Or Nellie Doyle. And then—then what? The moon finally peeked out as she approached St. Christina’s. Under its cold silver light, the convent hospital loomed large and intimidating, a long stone building with tall arched windows that ran the width of the second and third stories, iron bars across the windows on the ground floor. Up on the second floor, someone was walking along the corridor with a lamp, illuminating each window for a moment, a narrow Gothic arch of light.
The deep portico at the entrance was dimly lit by a small electric bulb. Suling pulled on the chain, heard the loud clanging inside. After a few minutes, the panel behind the small grilled opening in the heavy door opened a crack.
“It’s very late, visiting hours are over. Come back in the morning,” a young woman’s voice said. The small gap didn’t let Suling see her face.
“Please, I’m looking for a friend, a patient,” Suling said.
“Come back in the morning,” the voice repeated. “And a girl shouldn’t be out on the streets this time of night. Go home, my dear.”
“Please, Sister,” Suling said. “Can you at least tell me if Regina Reynolds is in this hospital?” She moved directly under the light. The panel opened wide and through the grille Suling looked at a nun’s face.
“Oh. You’re a boy,” the nun said. “What was that name again?”
“Regina Reynolds,” Suling said. “Please, is she here?”
From behind the nun, “Who’s ringing the bell at this hour, Sister Anne?”
“It’s a Chinese boy, Sister Margaret, asking for a Regina Reynolds.”
An older woman’s face moved into view behind the grille.
“Or Nellie Doyle,” Suling called in desperation. “Have you a Nellie Doyle in the hospital? Curly black hair, green eyes. She would’ve come here in February, the middle of February.”
“Why, that sounds like . . .” Sister Anne began, but the older nun interrupted.
“Go home,” she said. “Get out or I call police. Police, you savvy?” The panel shut.
Suling sank to the stone floor of the portico. The younger nun had been about to say something about Reggie, she was sure of it, but the senior nun had cut her off. Suling was willing to bet Reggie was in there. She could try again in the morning, perhaps get in through the servants’ door, pretend to be picking up laundry. Then she remembered that the convent ran its own laundry business.
She wanted to curl up on the threshold and weep, but she couldn’t stay in case the older nun made good on her threat to call the police. Suling wiped her eyes and nose on a sleeve, slung the laundry bag over one shoulder, and crossed Filbert Street to the church. It was an awkward building, with additions and enlargements that marred the original architecture. Its portico was squat and ugly, but more welcoming than the asylum’s, with two wide marble benches facing each other like an offer of rest.
Perched at the end of one bench, Suling gazed across the street. The windows on the upper floors were utterly dark now. She tried not to think of Reggie locked in a cell. Did her room look down into a courtyard or was she in some windowless room? If Suling couldn’t get into the asylum tomorrow morning, she would have to get help. Not from Gemma. She needed someone who had authority, a reputation. Donaldina Cameron at the Mission Home. Reggie wasn’t Chinese, but she was a woman in need of protection; surely Miss Cameron wouldn’t refuse.
It meant going back to Chinatown, possibly running into her uncle or Dr. Ouyang, or any number of people who might inform them. But this was Reggie. Suling would risk anything.
A thousand worries churned through Suling’s mind, but exhaustion took over and she sank down on the bench, pulled her jacket tighter around her. She wished her mother were still alive. Ming Lee would reassure her that all would be well. That it was all right to love Reggie. Suling’s eyes closed, her mind wandered; she remembered a day when she had been at Madam Ning’s with her mother, helping fit Hyacinth for a gown.
She recalled the dress clearly, pale blue satin with tiny pink rosettes embroidered on a skirt that ballooned out over Hyacinth’s knees. Hyacinth was just stepping out of the dress when Butterfly burst in, screaming. The two women argued, then fell into each other’s arms, kissed passionately, and left the room together. Suling gave her mother a querying look, but it was Madam Ning who spoke.
“Have you spoken to your daughter about Butterfly and Hyacinth, Ming Lee?” she asked, and not waiting for Suling’s mother to reply, she turned to Suling. “Do you find it strange that two women should be in love? Or two men, perhaps?”
“I’m . . . not sure,” Suling said. “I thought that since Butterfly and Hyacinth entertain men . . .”
Chinese and American men. Men of every nationality, since the world passed through San Francisco. Men who paid just to enter the Palace of Endless Joy’s glossy doors, then paid even more when they selected one of the eight beauties. Suling was sixteen and understood this. In theory.
“That’s what they do professionally,” Madam Ning said, “and nothing to do with who they love. Little Coral, our youngest, loves a man from her hometown because they speak the same dialect. As for Butterfly, she’s had enough of men. It’s as simple as that.” She chuckled.
“Love is hard enough to find in this world,” Ming Lee said. “If the gods have tied their fates together with a red silk thread, who are we to judge Butterfly and Hyacinth?”
“A silk thread?” Suling said.
“There’s an invisible thread of red silk,” Ming Lee said, “that the gods tie to the fingers of two people whose destinies are meant to be joined. The thread brings them together eventually, no matter how far apart they are. No matter what hardships they face, no matter how much strain is put on that thread, it will not break.”
No, my mother wouldn’t mind, Suling thought, falling asleep. She would know that Reggie and I are joined by that red silk thread. Right now, that thread was being tested and strained but it would not break.