by Helen Zia
Around this time, Benny’s mother decided that her eleven-year-old boy should live as a boarder on the St. John’s campus, to protect him from the crime and violence that his father encountered each day. Many other students became boarders at Shanghai’s exclusive missionary schools for the same reasons. An older St. John’s student, Tao-Fu Ying, actually had a bodyguard following him on campus. The big White Russian sat by Tao-Fu in class, in the lunchroom, even accompanying him to the movies when he went on a date. The other boys laughed and poked fun at Tao-Fu and his huge White Russian shadow. There was nothing Tao-Fu could do but grit his teeth and bear it, for he, like Benny, was the Number One Son of a wealthy comprador family, and its patriarch insisted that his grandson and heir be protected at all times.
For the most part, the serene missionary school campus insulated Benny from the waves of terrorism and crime that swept Shanghai, including its foreign concessions. The Japanese military occupation force violently quashed resistance by arresting, torturing, and assassinating its critics. Journalists, officials, and bankers were particular targets: Banks deemed to be China partisans had bombs tossed into their lobbies, while judges were routinely shot to death as they headed to their courthouses. In 1938, six journalists were decapitated, and their heads were put on display at busy locations in the French Concession. Reporters like William Yukon Chang, a Hawaii-born Chinese whose parents sent him to study at St. John’s University, never knew when he might receive packages containing dismembered body parts or bullets as warnings. On July 16, 1940, Samuel Chang, a high-ranking editor and America-trained graduate of Haverford College, was gunned down as he ate lunch at a German restaurant on Nanjing Road. No voice of resistance was safe.
At the same time, the Japanese occupiers sought local Chinese leaders to be their surrogates and do their bidding. The Chinese people derisively called such officials hanjian—traitors, puppets, collaborators. Meanwhile, Nationalist underground agents countered with their own assassinations of hanjian and Japanese alike. Terror reigned on Shanghai’s streets to intimidate the populace into submission. Amid such turmoil, ordinary crime burgeoned as criminals with no political agendas staged their own gunfights in the streets, disappearing into the maelstrom.
Part of the problem lay in the disorder and chaos created by the occupation itself. Nearly three years after taking Shanghai, Tokyo had not yet found anyone to run the city as its mayor. Japan’s top choice had been Green Gang boss Du Yuesheng. But Du was loyal to Chiang Kai-shek and declared that he would never work for the “bandy-legged dwarves,” referring to the gaiter-wrapped calves of the short-statured Japanese soldiers. Du declined the job and fled to Hong Kong, fearing retaliation. The Japanese finally persuaded Fu Xiaoan, a respected elder Buddhist leader and a vocal critic of Chiang, to become Shanghai’s collaborationist mayor. Almost immediately, Nationalist secret agents made assassination attempts against Fu. In 1940, the Nationalists managed to enlist the aid of Fu’s longtime cook, who was so trusted that he slipped past bodyguards into the mayor’s bedroom on the night of October 11, 1940, and hacked him to death with a meat cleaver.
But it would take another event, in 1940, to make a significant impact on Benny’s world. Japan’s machinations finally bore fruit to find a suitable “puppet” to act as president over all of Japanese-occupied China: Wang Jingwei, the charismatic leader of the Nationalist Party’s left wing and Generalissimo Chiang’s main internal party rival. Wang Jingwei had once been hit by an assassin’s bullet supposedly intended for Chiang, though Wang’s wife always believed Chiang had ordered her husband killed.
Wang advocated making peace with Japan. He asserted that it made economic sense and would save countless Chinese lives if China joined Japan’s much-vaunted Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in opposition to Western imperialism. He didn’t believe China could win the war and felt that Japan would help them get rid of the “white devils”—the Americans and Europeans who had bullied the country for a century with their gunboats, opium, and colonial arrogance.
Instantly reviled by both Nationalists and Communists as a Benedict Arnold and, later, the Vidkun Quisling of China, Wang Jingwei quickly appointed a new mayor to replace Fu—someone who would have tremendous influence as the head of the biggest and most important city in occupied China. He chose his fellow left-wing Nationalist Chen Gongbo, who, in turn, needed someone to contain Shanghai’s vice and violence while squeezing revenue out of the lucrative gambling halls, opium dens, and brothels. That revenue was needed to finance Wang Jingwei’s puppet government, in the same way the Green Gang had supported Chiang Kai-shek’s.
For this important job, the new puppet mayor chose Police Chief Pan Da. Benny’s father was promoted once again, this time catapulted to the newly created position of police commissioner of the Western District of Shanghai. In his elevated role, he would keep 76 Jessfield Road as his headquarters. China’s darkest hour became Pan Da’s greatest opportunity.
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THE POSITION OF POLICE commissioner in charge of the Badlands raised the Pan family’s position in status-conscious Shanghai by several notches, bringing a whole new level of perks: new cars, a new home, bodyguards, chauffeurs, unlimited goods of every kind.
Commissioner Pan assigned some of his Special Police officers to locate a house suitable for a man of his rank. His special agents knew of an unoccupied estate at 40 Jessfield Road, only a block south of 76, just beyond the International Settlement. The elegant English-style mansion had belonged to Zhang Yuanji, one of the founders of Shanghai’s Commercial Press, well known to 76 for its anti-Japanese publications. After Shanghai fell to Japan, the owners had fled. To the victors and their collaborators at 76, such properties were fair game. Commissioner Pan Da sent a half dozen of his officers to seize the estate. When the plainclothes agents from 76 arrived, they ejected the absentee owner’s staff. One worker promptly went to the Shanghai Municipal Police, where the British inspector scrawled a handwritten message on the typed crime report: “Sir, these men are from 76.” The case went no further. Without delay, Benny’s family moved into the mansion at 40 Jessfield Road, so conveniently close to Pan Da’s station house and torture chambers.
Benny learned of his father’s big promotion when the family’s chauffeur came to pick him up at boarding school in a shiny 1940 Buick sedan. Benny let out a loud “Jiminy crickets!” and rushed over to examine the luxurious new car, running his fingers over the smooth black finish. The chauffeur followed Benny around the vehicle with a clean handkerchief, wiping away the boy’s prints before holding the door open. Hopping in, Benny admired the leather upholstery and quizzed the longtime family servant. “Where did this super car come from?”
“Young Master, your father is now the number one boss at 76. A big man must have a big car and a big house,” he said.
When the car turned off Jessfield Road, past a gated fence and onto a private drive, Benny’s jaw dropped in surprise. Set back against a large grassy lawn was an enormous three-story house with a separate wing for the servants and a carriage house that could hold three cars. Sure enough, there were two other cars inside: a Ford Willys GP “jeep” for the bodyguards now assigned to his family and his father’s old black sedan, now for his mother’s use. Benny jumped out of the car and bounded up the terra-cotta steps to the grand terrace flanked by tall Greek columns. Pushing open the massive carved wood doors, he stepped into a high-ceilinged foyer with gleaming wood floors. On either side was a large parlor lined by dark-stained bookshelves and wood paneling. Benny ran through the house, marveling at each room. He’d never seen such a cavernous dining room. A den and study were on the other side of the house, along with a billiard room and a covered porch overlooking the flower garden that extended nearly an acre, complete with a pond occupied by giant orange carp, he would soon discover.
As he rounded the wide, curving staircase, he almost ran into his mother outside one of
the large bedrooms. “Mother, do we really live here?” he asked, breathless.
His mother smiled broadly. “Yes, Long-Long. It’s still a bit dreary with all the dusty scrolls and antique statues. I’m getting rid of all that and planning to make the place much brighter. You’ll see.” Benny and his siblings, she said, would sleep on the third floor, just as they had at the Dasheng lilong.
That weekend, C. C. Pan was too busy organizing his newly created Western Shanghai Area Special Police Force to come home to the mansion. Benny was disappointed but not surprised, since his father’s important work increasingly kept him away from home.
Benny watched his mother with admiration as she stepped into her demanding new role. He had always known that his gracious mother was smart and capable. Now she managed an enormous house and grounds with many employees. She was redecorating the mansion with enthusiasm, consulting with famous designers and taking full advantage of her husband’s access to warehouses of loot “requisitioned” from those in disfavor with the political order. Most important, she wanted to make Police Commissioner Pan Da’s presence known in Shanghai society. She took charge of his social calendar and public face, organizing fancy dinners and inviting the influential people she felt her husband needed to know.
To kick off their entrée into Shanghai’s social elite, Benny’s mother planned a lavish party to celebrate her husband’s fortieth birthday, choosing to hold the special banquet at one of the best Cantonese restaurants in the International Settlement. Pan Da and his wife invited officials from the top echelons of the puppet elite to his birthday bash. Benny, who would be thirteen at the start of 1941, had never seen such an array of bejeweled socialites and cigar-puffing captains of industry and commerce. He watched the festivities from a table near the kitchen, seated with his siblings, Annie, Cecilia, Doreen, Edward, and Frances, in alphabetical order. All were on their best behavior. Benny beamed with pride as his father held court in full dress uniform, brass buttons and belt buckle shining, a glass of brandy in one hand and his silver cigarette holder in the other. Benny’s elegant mother, as beautiful as a movie star, exuded the charm and social graces she had learned at St. Mary’s Hall, easing the way for the family’s social ascent. When the Chinese band began playing the latest popular dance tunes, it was time for Benny and his siblings to go home with the chauffeur.
* * *
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THE PARTIES CONTINUED AT their mansion every Sunday, when Benny and his school-aged sisters came home from their boarding schools for the weekend. The newly inaugurated Sunday dinners brought Shanghai’s prominent and powerful to the Pan front parlor and dining room. With Pan Da’s bottomless purse, Benny’s mother spared no expense, serving Russian caviar and French foie gras, sparkling champagne and well-aged Scotch. She managed to procure the finest porcelain dishes, elaborate silver, and delicate etched glasses, all glimmering under the bright crystal chandeliers.
It was a great show, and Benny enjoyed being part of it. Wearing a proper suit and tie, he looked every bit the schoolboy of Eton, Exeter, or St. John’s, great-grandson of a Shanghai comprador, and eldest son of the police commissioner. Benny and his five siblings would troop down the wide, curving staircase to greet the guests before heading to the children’s table. As the Number One Son, he felt it was his responsibility to keep the others on point, at least until they were out of the guests’ sight. His mother, the perfect hostess, would flash him her biggest smile when they finished their bows and curtsies. How Benny loved seeing her eyes twinkle at him and her face light up.
Benny’s third sister, Doreen, had passed the difficult admissions exam for St. Mary’s. Of all his siblings, Benny felt closest to her, even though she was three years younger. Doreen, like Benny, enjoyed book learning while the two sisters closest to his age were more interested in shopping and parties. On Sundays, he and Doreen sat together, quietly practicing their English as they closely observed the dinner guests. Brother and sister played a game of guessing whether people were British or American, French or German or Jewish, just by looking at their pale faces. Benny swore he could tell them apart, but to Doreen they all looked alike.
Then there were the Japanese guests—not only the military officers with ominous-looking samurai swords, but civilians as well. The growing number of Japanese noncombatants far exceeded that of all the other foreigners in Shanghai combined. Initially Benny was perplexed by their presence. Here they were, welcome guests in his house, the military in dress uniforms, with everyone cheerfully eating and drinking. Benny would never have questioned his parents, but he had also heard the many anti-Japanese comments and ditties in his schoolyard, even though the American campus banned any activities involving China’s political situation. Benny couldn’t understand why his parents welcomed these Japanese into their home.
His father must have noticed Benny’s confusion. One Sunday, before the guests arrived, his father called him to his study. He glanced up from his work and began speaking as soon as the boy stepped into the dark-paneled room.
“Son, every man deserves to be judged on his own merits. Not all Japanese are bad; not every Chinese is good. These Japanese officials can make life easier for the Chinese in Shanghai. I hope to encourage them. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.” Benny nodded, grateful that his father seemed to have noticed his uncertainty.
“Good. Now go and get dressed for dinner,” his father replied, his head already turned back to his work.
The exchange helped Benny feel more relaxed through the dinners. He tried to see the Japanese he met as individuals. At that night’s dinner, he observed how the Japanese officers were respectful of his father, how they toasted him when they drank, how attentive and polite they were to his mother. At the end of each dinner, the guests adjourned to the big parlor to take seats at the card tables that servants had set up. Commissioner Pan Da offered the men Cuban cigars. They puffed away and drank imported whiskey as they played poker and the women sat down to mah-jongg. The next morning, the children headed back to school. Benny rode in the car with Doreen since St. Mary’s was near St. John’s, while Annie and Cecilia went to Aurora Middle School of the Sacred Heart in the French Concession.
The glamour and sparkle of the Sunday banquets, the beautiful people with their finery and smart conversations, felt to Benny like a vision from a movie. Except that this movie was real. It was his family and his home. How lucky they were for all the good fortune that kept coming to them. Sure, there was a war going on somewhere away from them. But for Benny, it was the best of times.
SHANGHAI, LATE 1939
The teacher stood at the front of the class and wrote “三民主義”—San Min Zhu Yi—on the blackboard: Three Principles of the People, the guiding ideology of the Nationalist Party, outlined by Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the founding father of the Republic of China. After putting down the chalk, she picked up a long wooden ruler and began pacing the room, slowly scanning the students through her thick round spectacles. Suddenly she stopped and slammed her stick hard on a table. The students flinched, startled. Pointing her stick across the room, she demanded, “You. Bing. What are the Three Principles of the People?”
The girl rose slowly, smoothing out her uniform, a dark blue qipao that hung loosely over her small frame. Standing erect with her eyes straight ahead, she cleared her throat and started to answer, speaking softly.
“Stop mumbling! Speak up so that everyone can hear you,” barked her teacher. A girl nearby snickered.
“Yes, Teacher,” Bing replied, energetically. “The Three Principles are people’s self-determination, people’s democracy, and people’s livelihood.”
“That is correct. Very good, Bing. You may be seated.”
Buoyed by the praise, Bing sat down with a smile—after sending a hard look at the girl who had mocked her. She’d entered the class nearly a year before, after Mama Hsu, her second mother, had gone to Chongqing, the capi
tal of Free China. Bing’s new “elder sister,” Huiling Woo, had sent Bing back to school, as promised, to her great relief. But the other children all seemed to know one another. Some liked to pick on her, perhaps because her Suzhou accent marked her as an outsider, or because she struggled at times to keep up after having missed so much school, or because she was smaller than they were. Whatever the reason, Bing was determined not to let them distract her, for she didn’t take her schooling for granted.
Every day, she carefully practiced writing the assigned Chinese characters onto the square exercise grid, marking each stroke in the prescribed order to ensure a proper and balanced appearance. Sometimes her strict teacher complimented her penmanship. In occupied Shanghai, Bing was also required to study the Japanese language and the idea of the “Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere”—Japan’s ideological justification for war. But she didn’t object; she was happy to be back in school.
Being at home with Elder Sister’s mother, however, was a different story. Bing might have been content were it not for Ma’s quick temper and harsh tongue. Ma gave Bing a few chores to do before school—putting away the bedding, sweeping the dark wood floors, helping with breakfast. Ma wasn’t always cross. Sometimes she told Bing stories about ancient China, hardships under the reign of the last emperor, her own challenges in coming to live in Shanghai. Bing coveted those peaceful moments between Ma’s volatile flare-ups. She tried to make herself as quiet and unnoticed as possible, hoping not to provoke Ma by making a mistake.
Because to Ma, any mistake was unforgivable. And once she was angry, she carried on for hours, sometimes for days. No matter how hard Bing tried, the furies were never far away. Bing was unaccustomed to household chores, and now she had many. But her fingers weren’t clever, and the more Ma demanded of her, the more nervous Bing became. If she spilled some food or dropped something, Ma’s eyes instantly narrowed, and she fixed a terrifying glare on Bing, lashing out with a torrent of angry words:
