Last Night at the Telegraph Club(50)

“Is she new this year?”

“Oh no. We’ve been in school together forever but never really been friends until now.” She added, “Maybe because this year we’re the last two girls left in math. It’s us and all the boys.”

“I’m glad you have an ally. I was the only girl in most of my college math classes. You’ll have to get used to it if you’re going to major in math or engineering, but I know you won’t have any trouble.”

Her aunt was always supportive like this, always confident in Lily’s abilities and dreams, and now she knew about Kath—her ally, what a funny way to think of her—and Lily realized how unusual Aunt Judy was. Shirley thought Lily’s dreams were ridiculous; Kath didn’t tell her parents what she wanted to do because they would think she was crazy.

“Just between you and me, I think women are better than men at math,” Aunt Judy added slyly. “Don’t tell your uncle Francis.”

It seemed like such a grown-up joke to make. Lily swelled with pride at having been allowed to hear it. “I’m sure he already knows,” she said boldly.

Aunt Judy chuckled. “You’re probably right. Oh, I’d love to talk more but we’ll have to do it later. Go and get Eddie, will you?”

Later in the kitchen, as Lily peeled potatoes under her mother’s direction, she wondered again about the tone in Aunt Judy’s voice when she talked about Dr. von Braun. Last Chinese New Year, when Aunt Judy and Uncle Francis had been visiting, they stayed up late talking with Lily’s parents about China and the Communists. Lily had gone to bed by then, and she knew they all thought she was asleep because they’d never have discussed these things in the living room if they suspected she could hear them. Her parents hardly ever mentioned politics; even when they mentioned China they didn’t address its Communist rulers.

Uncle Francis brought up von Braun first. He seemed especially rankled by the welcome that the American government had rolled out for the former Nazi. “He worked against us in the war,” Uncle Francis said in a low, tight voice. “He should be in prison, not given free rein over the army’s missile project. And yet there he is—free! While Dr. Tsien is under house arrest.”

Lily hadn’t understood the whole story the night she overheard Uncle Francis, but later on she’d learned that Dr. Hsue-shen Tsien was one of the cofounders of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and he worked for the American military during the war even though he was a Chinese citizen. Now that China had been taken by the Communists, he had fallen under suspicion and was accused of spying.

“I believe the American government is doing its best,” Lily’s father said.

“How do you know that?” Uncle Francis asked. “Dr. Tsien is a good man. He does not deserve this. It’s not fair.”

“It’s not about fairness,” Aunt Judy said. “It’s about fear. They’re afraid of Dr. Tsien, because Communist China stands independent and could still have a claim on him. Nazi Germany is gone. Dr. von Braun has no loyalties left to claim.”

At first it had seemed far-fetched that Aunt Judy and Uncle Francis worked at a job that put them in the same circle as the famous German scientist, but then Lily remembered her family had unusual links to other powerful people, too. Her father had a friend in Berkeley who had been some kind of Kuomintang government official before the war, and now was petitioning Congress for American citizenship. Aunt Judy had described her mother—Lily’s grandmother, whom she’d never met—as an influential member of 1920s Shanghai society, who had been friendly with Soong Chingling, the wife of Sun Yat-sen.

The late-night conversation about Wernher von Braun and Hsue-shen Tsien fell in the same category: tantalizing glimpses into an adult world that seemed completely separate from the mundane reality of her daily life. It was disorienting when that world bled into this one.

Now, back in the kitchen, the turkey was beginning to scent the air. As Lily peeled potatoes, her mother sat down across from her with a basket of green beans and asked, “How’s Shirley? You saw her the other day, didn’t you?”

“Yes. Her entire family’s coming over for Thanksgiving dinner. They’re making three turkeys.”

“My goodness! I’m glad you and Shirley are talking again. You two had a fight, didn’t you?”

Lily was surprised. “How did you know?”

Her mother plucked the ends off the green beans briskly, snap-snap-snap. “You came home from school every day without visiting her.”

Lily cringed inwardly at how transparent she had been. “It wasn’t anything,” she said dismissively. “Just a silly disagreement.”

Her mother nodded. “Girls fight, especially at your age. It’s natural. I’m glad you’re over it. Shirley’s a good friend to you.”

Her mother’s characterization of their friendship irritated Lily—as if Lily should be grateful for Shirley’s friendship. “What happened with Papa and his papers?” Lily asked, changing the subject. “Did he get them back?”

Her mother paused briefly in her bean snapping. “Not yet,” she said. There was a finality to her tone that told Lily not to push. “You haven’t had anything more to do with the Man Ts’ing, have you?”

Lily shook her head. “No.”