Free Dreams of the Red Phoenix by Virginia Pye

never even met? Since his death, she had spent hours and days recollecting the man she had loved. So many moments with him drowning her mind in a ceaseless torrent until she felt there was nothing more to remember, noth ing more to know. But now the awkward, though reliable, man before her seemed to suggest a whole chapter of her husband’s life about which she knew nothing.
    She was about to ask more when Reverend Wells patted her sleeve and gestured for her to follow him into a quieter corner of the front hall. He lowered his voice even further, and she leaned in to listen.
    â€œThe other reason I came by, Mrs. Carson, was to tell you that your Lian’s family from the country has arrived here at the mis sion. It appears they want to join my household. I thought you should know.”
    Shirley stood upright. “How absurd. They should be here with us, of course. If they arrive on your doorstep, send them over to me right away.”
    â€œI’m sorry, this is awkward, Mrs. Carson, but Lian visited my wife late last evening and asked our permission.” He ducked and hedged again, “Apparently you had not invited them to join your household? I’m sure it was a simple misunderstanding.”
    Shirley was suddenly aware of Dao-Ming at her side. She shooed the girl away and glanced over at Lian, who chatted with the injured boy and his friends.
    â€œThank you for coming to tell me, Reverend. I’ll take care of it right away,” Shirley said. “I seem to have missed the cues Lian offered me last night. I’m not accustomed to the politeness of the Chinese. I was raised to speak up if I wanted something. Simply ask! The business of dropping hints, or even saying the exact opposite of what you want, is entirely lost on me. Caleb was a far more sympathetic soul and better at grasping the sub tleties of communication between native and foreigner. I’m abysmal at it.”
    She started to turn, intending to go immediately to Lian to straighten this out.
    â€œMrs. Carson,” the Reverend said as he took her elbow in a firm grip, “may I suggest that you let it rest for the moment? After I’ve gone, offer her family a gracious invitation. You don’t want it to seem that you have offered it under duress, do you?”
    Shirley looked down at him, and, as Caleb would have ad vised, she inhaled a long, careful breath. “Quite right. Good of you to remind me, Reverend. I have a hot head and can make terrible messes when I don’t control my impulses.”
    He shuffled from side to side and offered little reassuring noises. “Simple mistake,” he said. “We all do it. They are so very different from us.”
    Shirley made herself smile but understood that the problem was not with the Chinese—though they could be difficult to grasp—but with her own obtuseness. She had never been skilled at picking up social signals of any sort. She withered in the com pany of well-bred ladies who had been raised to chatter with one another on a different plain, hemming and hawing and never getting to any particular point. Shirley found taking tea with them most aggravating. The topic was always the weather, or their husbands’ sartorial habits, and nothing of any interest was ever said outright but only implied. Days later would she learn that factions had formed over the course of dull conversation and cucumber sandwiches.
    â€œMrs. Carson,” Reverend Wells interrupted her thoughts, “do you mind me asking, what you meant earlier by saying that you removed a bullet from that Chinese boy, per se?”
    â€œI meant precisely that. I say what I mean, Reverend, and I mean what I say. I’m simple that way.” She let out a sigh. “Per haps at some point, my husband mentioned to you that I am a trained nurse?”
    â€œAh,” he said as a bewildered look overcame his face and he shook his head. “So sorry, I don’t recall. He very