Songs of Willow Frost

by Jamie Ford

  “On the stage you get one chance to get your lines right—to get your dance moves just perfect,” Colin reassured her. “With movies, they can roll the camera again and again until they get it just so. Trust me. You’ll do fine.”

  Liu Song wished she felt as confident. Colin had found bit parts here and there all over the Northwest. He’d encouraged her to audition. But he knew what to expect. Liu Song put on a brave face. “Is the studio you’re working for around here?”

  “It’s not a studio, exactly,” Colin said. “The local unions produce small movies and shorts to further their cause. Ever since Upton Sinclair signed on to write screenplays for the railway unions, labor films have been all the rage. This one is called The New Disciple. It’s a political film in the form of a love story. I’m just a walk-on, but it’s a real photoplay—a real movie. Even if it’s not quite a real set. It’s a wonderful place for you to learn the ropes, I think.”

  As they turned the corner Liu Song saw a throng of people crowding the sidewalk in front of a large display window. The painted marquee read, ALL ROADS LEAD TO RHODES. The retailer’s storefront was so crowded Liu Song could hardly see inside. At first she assumed that the store must have received a new shipment of console radios, which were growing in popularity, but as they crossed the street and got closer, she saw that the window display had been decorated like a living room with sofa, chairs, lamps, potted plants, and even a high-walled backdrop with curtained windows and a wooden fireplace. Instead of mannequins, a film crew in shirtsleeves and hanging suspenders were setting up lights and giant reflectors. A cameraman stretched a measuring tape from the lens of a large movie camera to the middle of the set. Liu Song stared wide-eyed as Colin led her inside and through the housewares department to where a small corner of the store had been roped off. A security guard stopped them until he found Colin’s name on a clipboard, then he stepped aside and tipped his hat. A production assistant ushered them to a busy area behind the set where they sat on a bench with other extras and bit players.

  Liu Song pointed to a pair of tall folding chairs in front of them. The canvas chair backs faced in their direction as a makeup artist attended to the occupants.

  “Those are the stars: Pell Trenton and Norris Johnson,” Colin whispered.

  Liu Song read their names, which were written in grease pencil on the backs of the chairs. Even from behind she could admire Pell’s dashing, broad-shouldered physique and Norris’s elegantly styled hair and long gown.

  “I’m so grateful you’re here,” Colin said. “You calm my nerves.”

  Liu Song felt the opposite. She wished he could return the favor as she forced a smile. “How many movies have you been in now?”

  “Five,” Colin said. “Each time as an extra. Today I play a servant in a rich man’s house. I don’t get a credit, but at least I appear on-screen quite a bit—that is, if I don’t end up on the cutting room floor when they edit everything together. And of course I get another notch on my résumé.”

  The production assistant wandered back and shouted for stand-ins. Liu Song had no idea what he meant. Colin smiled and took her hand as he stood up, waved, and quickly volunteered the two of them.

  “What are we doing?” Liu Song felt lost. “I have no idea what …”

  Colin whispered in her ear as they were being led onto the set. “The director has called for stand-ins. They need two extras in front of the camera for a practice run. We’ll just be in for a few minutes so the camera operator can adjust the timing and measure the lens’s focal length. We stand in until they’re ready to roll film. This way the stars look fresh for the camera instead of melting. It’s fun, you’ll see. Just mind that you don’t look directly into the lights—they can do permanent damage. Miriam Cooper burned her eyes by looking into the lights on the set of Kindred of the Dust.”

  Liu Song hardly understood a word he said. She wondered if this was what it was like for her mother, stepping onstage for the very first time. But this audience was a film crew who seemed unimpressed. To the crew, she and Colin were merely placeholders, living statues that they casually regarded as they moved lights, adjusted reflectors, and took measurements.

  Liu Song felt heat radiating from the lights. Then her heart skipped a beat as she saw the director, a tall man with a tiny megaphone, take his seat next to an olive-skinned gentleman with a pencil-thin mustache who peered through the camera.

  “Hey, Chop Suey, you do speak English, don’t you?” the director asked.

  “And French, Latin, and a little bit of Italian,” Colin said. “Va bene?”

  “Great, an aristocrat,” the cameraman said. “Take two steps back, Your Majesty.”

  Colin smiled and pointed to two Xs on the floor marked with tape. “This is where we stand,” he told Liu Song. They moved back as five other extras stood in the background, pretending to talk and laugh politely.

  “The camera’s not rolling,” Colin said. “This is playacting, so you have nothing to worry about. But it’s good practice for a bigger opportunity that’s coming up.”

  Liu Song had sung before busloads of strangers. She’d wandered backstage during many of her father’s productions, so she’d grown accustomed to that type of performance. Filmmaking, on the other hand, was new, foreign, and yet deliriously intriguing. She drew a deep breath, swallowed, and nodded, wondering what else Colin might have in store.

  “Just another performance,” Colin said as he touched her arm and smiled reassuringly. “For now. This is the beginning for us. Someday William will see you on the screen in a real movie. Imagine how proud he’ll be.”

  Welfare

  (1924)

  When Liu Song arrived at Butterfield’s the next morning, she found a peculiar woman playing the piano and humming a strange hymn. Her hair was tinted a light shade of pink and pulled up so tightly that her eyebrows seemed to be jerked back in a look of perpetual surprise. Her eyes were blue, like ice, and her unpainted lips were like a slit that divided the vertical wrinkles on her face into northern and southern halves. The song she played was a lullaby, but to Liu Song the melody was a funeral march.

  “Hello, I’m Mrs. Peterson,” the woman said as she stepped from the piano and extended a limp, white-gloved handshake to Liu Song, letting go quickly as though she didn’t appreciate the touch of others. “I’m with the Child Welfare League and I’d like to ask you a few questions, if I may?”

  Liu Song felt ambushed and woefully unprepared. Was this Uncle Leo’s doing? Had he found out about William? “Do I have a choice?”

  “No.” Mrs. Peterson gazed back without emotion. “You don’t.”

  Mr. Butterfield parted the curtain that separated the showroom floor from the storeroom. He smiled and held up a cup of tea on an unmatched saucer. “Ah, Liu Song, I see you’ve met our special guest.” He offered the cup to Mrs. Peterson, who squinted at the coffee-stained china. She took one polite sip and then set the cup aside.

  “If this is about William,” Liu Song said in her best English, “I assure you, he’s doing very well. He’s very healthy, very fat. A happy boy.”

  The woman looked around the store, then back at Liu Song. “This is strictly routine. It’s my job to follow up with all single mothers when the child gets to an age of moral viability. It’s not just the feeding and clothing and diaper changing that the state worries about, but the social environment, the condition of the mother.” Mrs. Peterson cleared her throat. “And her circumstances.”

  “I can certainly vouch for her character,” Mr. Butterfield said. “Liu Song here is quite responsible. She’s both industrious and thrifty.”

  “And I’m sure you’ll appreciate that as one who profits from her talents.” Mrs. Peterson opened up a ledger and began writing in tiny, perfect penmanship. “Your testimony is appreciated, in direct proportion to how biased it is.”

  Liu Song looked at her employer and blinked, hoping he would understand how thankful she was, for the job, and for the effort.


  “You are an Oriental. Chinese, I presume. Where were you born?”

  Liu Song explained how she’d been born at home, in Seattle, with a midwife at her mother’s side. Liu Song didn’t have a copy of her birth certificate, but her mother had registered her at the King County Court House two months after she’d been born.

  “And do you have any family? Any relatives whom I could speak with? People who support you and how you intend to raise young …” The woman looked at her notes.

  “William,” Liu Song said. “And no, my mother died before William was born. The rest of my family … all of them are gone, taken by the flu, or moved away.” As she spoke, Liu Song realized just how terribly alone she was. William was everything to her. She felt such affection for Colin, but what she felt for her son was beyond comparison. She would live for Colin, but she would die for William.

  Liu Song sat up straight, smiling—not too broadly, but not too meekly. She suddenly wished she’d dressed more modestly. She did her best to answer each probing, leading, condemning question without revealing something that would be sharpened and twisted and used against her. Her English was good, but she still had to stop and ask Mrs. Peterson to repeat the questions, again and again, not because she didn’t understand the wording but because she was afraid that she might answer incorrectly. Mr. Butterfield chirped up twice more, and twice he was politely dismissed.

  “Well, it’s nice to see that a girl like you can earn an honest living. It’s not entirely reputable, but it’s legal. And from the news clippings that your employer shared with me before you arrived, it appears you have a knack for this type of thing.” Mrs. Peterson spoke with grudging approval as she shook her head.

  Liu Song thanked her, feeling slighted but relieved.

  “Now.” Mrs. Peterson stood up and closed her ledger. “Seeing as how you are gainfully employed, all that’s left is a home interview and inspection. I’ll need your address. And how soon can I meet your son?”

  Liu Song had been afraid of that. She’d been able to support herself, to buy food and clothing, but she had little else—a bed, a lamp, an old davenport sofa with holes and tears that she’d tried to patch with what sewing supplies she could afford. William had a third-hand crib, a dresser with unmatched drawers, missing all but one knob, and a few toys.

  “How about next week?” Liu Song asked.

  “How about tomorrow?” Mrs. Peterson rebutted. “The sooner, the better.”

  Partially Pregnant

  (1924)

  Mrs. Peterson arrived the next day, twenty minutes early. Fortunately, Liu Song had expected she might and prepared accordingly. She had splurged on half a duck, and the bird was roasting in the oven, filling the tiny apartment with a comforting, savory aroma. Her furniture and decorations looked somewhat mismatched, but quaint, modest, and ordinary—exactly the image she wanted to portray.

  “You’ll do fine,” Colin had reassured her. “Just be yourself.”

  “And what if I’m not good enough?” Liu Song had asked.

  “You’re an actress—just play the part.”

  Liu Song wasn’t sure what would be more nerve-racking, standing in front of a packed theater or playing to an audience of one. But she smiled and invited the woman in nonetheless, just as the teakettle began to whistle. Liu Song didn’t ask, she went ahead and poured two cups and placed them on the newly installed coffee table, along with some black bean tea cookies, before offering Mrs. Peterson a seat on the sofa. Liu Song noticed an old theater handbill sticking out from behind the cushions and stuffed it back down just as William walked into the room. One shoe was untied, but aside from that he looked darling in his handsome blue coveralls.

  “Hi,” he said cheerfully as he waved and sat down on the floor where Liu Song had placed a brand-new toy train. She’d bought it after work today, specifically for William to have something new to play with while the home inspector visited.

  If Mrs. Peterson enjoyed children, it was hard to tell as she glanced at William with the same polite detachment that she used toward the furniture. Liu Song noticed that the woman kept her white gloves on and peeked at her fingertips whenever she touched something, searching for evidence of dust or dirt.

  “You have a lovely home,” Mrs. Peterson said in a blunt, matter-of-fact manner that made it seem as though she felt otherwise. “Just the two of you then?”

  Liu Song nodded and explained her arrangement with Mildred Chew, who was practically a part-time nanny, and how they’d once been classmates. Liu Song made sure to reference her own high school diploma, which she’d earned a year early.

  Liu Song followed Mrs. Peterson as she opened her ledger and walked about the tiny apartment, inspecting the bathroom, the screened-off bedroom Liu Song shared with William, the magazines—Life, Vogue, Collier’s—that were arranged on an end table. She seemed particularly interested in the Chinese curios and decorations that sat on a bookcase, the small family altar where Liu Song lit candles, burned incense, and offered bits of embroidery to honor her parents, and the mask Liu Song’s mother had worn. The woman touched it and flinched as though it might bite. She went on to check the windows, the radiator, the icebox; she even opened the oven, but she didn’t write anything in her book.

  “You’re welcome to stay for dinner,” Liu Song offered.

  “Are you currently married?” Mrs. Peterson asked, ignoring Liu Song’s gesture of hospitality. “And if your husband is not around, have you been legally divorced?”

  William was crashing his wooden train into the leg of the table, making train noises and giggling. Liu Song picked him up, resting him on her hip, train and all, as he spun the toy’s wheels.

  “No,” she blurted. “Of course not. I’m not sure I understand …”

  Mrs. Peterson stared at her. “I am aware that you have been seeing someone.”

  “I have a friend. His name is Colin Kwan. I’m not sure how serious he is.”

  “Dadda,” William said, looking at the two women with rapt, curious eyes.

  A moment of silence lingered among the three of them. Liu Song smiled nervously and rocked her son, but she was painfully aware of Mrs. Peterson’s condemning gaze.

  “So, who is the father, exactly?” Mrs. Peterson looked into her ledger. “The birth certificate states that a Mr. Eng …”

  “It’s hard to explain,” Liu Song said. Please don’t ask me this.

  “It always is, dear.”

  William dropped the train and wiggled his feet to get down.

  “He’s not exactly anything …”

  “You can’t be partially pregnant, young lady. This Leo Eng is either the father or not the father. It would appear that he is your husband since you share the same last name, but it seems like this Colin fellow has a certain place in your life as well …”

  “Why do you need to know this?” Liu Song asked. “You can see that my son is perfectly healthy. I have a home. He is cared for …”

  “It’s not his physical well-being that we care about. It’s the morality of those he is raised by. You claim to be unmarried. You don’t want to talk about the father. You sing, act, and dance for a living. It’s not beyond reason to think that you’re compromised …”

  “I’m not.”

  “But you can see how it looks. You’re lucky that you’re an Oriental woman. In most situations a woman like you would lose the child immediately. But, seeing as how no one would adopt a yellow baby, well …”

  William walked over to Mrs. Peterson and offered her his train. He smiled and batted his eyes.

  The woman drew a deep breath and took the toy, thanking William. “Look, Miss Eng, I’m going to have to recommend the removal of your son until we can determine who the father is. You must respect his paternal rights.”

  William looked back at Liu Song and waved.

  “But if you could cooperate and tell me who this man is, the judge might be lenient in his final decision. What can you tell me? Or I could just go find this Mr. Eng
and get his side of the story—that’s how it works in many instances. You could still invoke the tender years doctrine, which would allow you to care for your son until he’s of age to be returned to his rightful father. But the problem is that if you don’t tell me who the father is, someone might assume you have other things to hide, that you’re not who you say you are, which may complicate things as far as your citizenship, and that of your son.”

  Liu Song swallowed hard as she watched William. “When my father died, my mother remarried another man, out of necessity—out of desperation. But later she fell ill as well and passed away. And this fellow, this man my mother married, he kept me for a while as a servant …” Liu Song looked down at her empty hands, her fingers appearing aged and wrinkled beyond her years. “He was my stepfather. His last name was Eng.”

  The point of Mrs. Peterson’s pencil broke, and she stared at the broken lead and the blemish on her paper. She adjusted her spectacles and wrinkled her nose. “And as far as you know this Eng person doesn’t even know he’s fathered this …”

  “His name is William,” Liu Song said. As she watched Mrs. Peterson, awaiting her reaction, she noticed that the woman’s hands seemed to shake and her fingers trembled ever so slightly. “And no, I don’t think he knows, nor do I think he cares.”

  Mrs. Peterson closed her ledger and drew a deep breath. She reached for the nearest teacup and took a long sip. Then she removed her glasses and folded them carefully, stowing them in a brass case. “Well, when your mother died he stopped being your stepfather and you stopped being his stepdaughter. Legally, I’m going to have to tell him. He’s still the father, and he still may want the child.”

  The woman frowned at William as though he were a stain on the carpet, a mess she had to clean up. Liu Song chewed her lip as the social worker removed her gloves and placed a hand on William’s head, brushing his dark cowlick to one side. The stern woman cocked her head as she observed him playing, then looked up and wiped her hand on her knee. “He’s the spitting image of you.”