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Chapter 3

 

 

 

            As so often happened, the vision began with little warning.  One minute Caine was stirring his dinner in the electric wok, cheerfully humming to himself and thinking of nothing more profound than whether to lower the temperature a bit. The next minute he was feeling a prickle of apprehension.  An awareness of danger.  Nearby, but not in this room or building.

            Peter?

            Suddenly Caine’s head was full of rapid-fire images, confusing and terrifying:  cruel, leering male faces--Chinese faces; a golden dragon, breathing orange fire; a dark street lined with old houses; a swinging stick; street lights and treetops spinning crazily; guttural, snarling voices; hands chopping, fists punching--one fist so real as it drove toward his head that he instinctively threw up his left arm to ward off the blow before the fist vanished; cold concrete pavement; sounds of retching.  Out of the maelstrom one image stood out clearly for several seconds:  his son’s face, scared and angry and contorted with pain.  He heard Peter call out to him, mind to mind; the desperate cry left Caine chilled and shaking.  Then he saw Peter’s bleeding form crumple unconscious to the ground, only to be struck repeatedly with a long stick and kicked with hard shoes until an outraged shriek cut through the twilight and the vision switched off as rapidly as it had begun.

            Caine blinked to clear his head, feeling nauseated and giddy.  His heart was beating fast, and he was short-winded, as if he had not taken a breath during the vision.  He found that he had dropped the wooden spatula and was gripping the edge of the counter with both hands.  He had the presence of mind to turn off the wok before seeking a chair at the small kitchen table.  After several deep breaths he leaned his elbows on the tabletop and rested his forehead against clenched hands.

            The vision had been of the present time, not the future; of that, Caine was certain.  He could feel the disharmony, as if in the middle of a piano sonata someone had slammed his hands down on the keyboard. Peter had been attacked, beaten. The assault had been entirely unexpected; hence Caine’s failure to sense the danger in time. How far away was he, though, and how badly injured?

            Caine closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind, then reach out and make some kind of contact with his son.  At first there was nothing, a void, a frightening blankness filling him with fear, but presently he sensed a glimmer of life-force, a thin current of energy that left him weak with relief.  Peter was not dead, not comatose, perhaps even regaining consciousness. This would not be like the other time, with the skull fracture, when the blankness had persisted until after Caine had reached the hospital.

            What to do? Find Peter, of course. But where?  Probably Peter was not capable of driving himself anywhere, even if he had his car.  Perhaps someone had seen the attack and had called for help.  Caine briefly considered taking a chance once more on meeting him at the hospital, but he rejected the idea.  He wanted to find his son and help him as quickly as possible, on the streets if necessary.  He knew, somehow, that the distance was not great.

            Caine retrieved his pouch, slipped it over his head, and headed for the stairs.  Halfway down, he sensed a change and paused, “listening,” trying to attune himself to the vibrations in the chi, somewhat like a spider that feels a touch on the far side of its web.  He perceived . . . movement in his direction.  Caine’s awareness of his son’s presence slowly grew stronger, as did his awareness of horrific pain.  He waited, controlling his impatience and attempting to project some kind of calming reassurance: Hold on, my son.  We will be together soon, and I will help you.

            Finally, as he became certain that this place was Peter’s destination, Caine continued down the stairs, to wait in the alley for his son’s arrival by whatever conveyance he had found.

 

                                    *                                        *                                        *         

 

            “Pull all the way around . . . by the back door,” Peter mumbled through bloodied lips, and Jennifer maneuvered the Stealth through the alley slowly, cautiously, trying as she had all along not to jostle him.  She parked so that the door on his side was next to the steps, cut the engine, pulled the keys, and got out.  As she hurried around the car, wondering whether she should dash up the stairs and bring his father down or try to help Peter climb the stairs on his own, a figure detached itself from the shadows and stepped up to the passenger door.  Jennifer started in fear and yelped.

            With relief she saw that it was Peter’s father, but she was too upset to question why he had been standing there.  “My god, Mr. Caine, you frightened me.  Please help Peter.  He’s badly hurt.”  But Caine was already opening the car door as if he knew.

            “What happened to him?” he asked, stooping down beside his son.

            “Five men jumped him right outside my mother’s house,” she began.  She had rehearsed this speech in her mind over and over while driving here, planning to get through it without breaking down, but now she could feel the tears welling up and her throat tightening painfully as she remembered what had happened.  Her voice strained, she choked out, “They used a baseball bat to bring him down, then just beat the shit out of him.”  Unthinkingly she had let the vulgarity slip out.  Too late to call it back now.  She plunged on, “He wanted me to bring him to you.”

            Caine saw that Peter was turned sideways, facing the door, keeping his arms wrapped around his middle.  The dome light was feeble, but it enabled Caine to see that on the left side of his face his eye was blackened shut, cheek and jaw swollen, lips puffy; that blood oozed from an eyebrow cut, from nose and mouth, trailing down his chin and the front of his blue shirt; and that there were tears on his cheeks.

            “Dad?” The word was barely audible.  Peter swallowed convulsively.

            “I am here.”  Caine lightly brushed the hair back off Peter’s forehead.  His son’s pain resonated through his body, and it was pervasive, not localized.  He had never experienced anything like it; it made him cold with fear.  He said, “Can you talk?  Tell me where you are hurt.”

            The answer was indistinct, and Caine had to lean closer, catching a sour whiff of vomit from Peter’s shirt.  “My back . . . ribs . . . shoulder. . . . All over. . . . Oh, god . . .”  The words trailed off into a moan.

            “Peter, you should be in a hospital, where they can x-ray--”

            “No, no!”  Frantically Peter’s left hand clutched at his father’s shirt.  “Please, Pop . . . no hospital. . . . Safer . . . here.”  That effort exhausted him, and he curled more tightly against the seatback, pulling his arm back against his side and stomach.  His breath came in quick, uneven gasps.

            Puzzled, Caine looked questioningly at Jennifer, who stammered, “I think . . . he believes the men who beat him were sent by the businessman we’re doing an exposé on.  That they’re really after me.”

            The explanation did not satisfy.  If the attackers were after Jennifer, why had they beaten Peter and left her unscathed?  Or was she?  He asked her, “Are you hurt?”  When she shook her head, he turned back to his son rather than pursue the question now.  “Peter, before I try to move you, I need to know about possible fractures.”

            Between clenched teeth, Peter managed to say, “Just my ribs.”

            Caine began to unbutton Peter’s shirt.  “Where?”

            Wincing, Peter slowly moved his left arm away from his side.  “On the left.”

            Caine slipped his hand under the shirt, and his sensitive fingers searched for heat, unevenness along the bone, a disturbance in the chi.  Almost immediately Peter flinched.  “There!  Ah!  Christ!”

            An electric current sparked from his son’s body to the priest’s.  He controlled his own urge to jerk away and withdrew his hand slowly.  “Yes, at least one rib is cracked.  The other side?”  A headshake for an answer.  “All right, we will go upstairs.  But after I examine you, I reserve the right to come back here and call for help on your radio.”

            Reluctantly Peter nodded.  Caine straightened up and said to Jennifer, “Tell me how and where they hit him, as best you can remember.”

            Fighting back tears again, she said, “Someone hit him on the back of the shoulder with the bat--” She gestured to her own right shoulder to illustrate.  “--and he fell.  It looked like he couldn’t lift his arm for a while.  They picked him up and held him and punched his face and stomach . . . and . . . kicked him between the legs.”  She took a shaky breath.  “And when he doubled up on the ground . . . they kept kicking him and . . . hit him with the bat again . . .until he passed out.”

            Ordinarily Caine would have taken her in his arms to comfort her, but there was too much pain coursing through his own body for him to be able to comfort anyone.  Before he could do anything else, he had to go through a chigung exercise to focus his energy and tune the level of pain reception down to a manageable, if uncomfortable, tingle.  After hearing Jennifer’s account, he suspected that they had a long night ahead of them, and he could not afford to be incapacitated by his own sensitivity to his child’s agony.  Finally, he bent down, held out his hands, and coaxed, “Come, my son.  Give me your hand, and I will help you stand.”

            “Mr. Caine,” Jennifer broke in urgently, “you should know also that he already threw up a couple of times, when they kicked him in the groin and when he first stood up.”

            Caine nodded to show that he had heard.  Peter slowly extended his hands, chewing on his lip, and began to inch toward the door.  When he got his feet on the ground and tried to stand, pain sliced through his ribs, making him stagger and swear, “Sonofabitch!”  Caine had to catch him by his right arm to keep him on his feet, and that sent hot agony reverberating through the injured shoulder.  He yelled and grabbed the car door with his left hand for support.

            It was hard for Caine to know where to touch him.  He slipped his right arm around Peter’s stomach to steady him, trying not to contact the cracked rib, and told him soothingly to take his time.  After several minutes Peter got his breathing under control sufficiently for speech.  “We’d better go . . . while I can still walk.”

            “Yes.  You must put one arm around my shoulders, my son.  Which one?”

            Trial and error.  Peter found that he could not raise his left arm high enough without excruciating pain in his ribs, and so it was the right arm that Caine lifted carefully to drape across his own shoulders, a movement that made Peter drag in a shuddering breath. 

            Then Caine tried to slide his left arm around Peter’s waist to support him.

            Peter’s whole body jerked violently, and forks of intense pain seemed likely to cut him in half.  He cried out, “Ah!  Dad!  Don’t! . . . Please. . . . Oh, my god . . .”  His stomach turned over, bile rose in his throat, burning his esophagus when he swallowed it back down and making him choke, which caused more pain.  Everything in his field of vision faded to a gray haze, and he wished he could lose consciousness at the same time that he knew he mustn’t, while the pain took forever to fade to a deep, deep throbbing in the small of his back and around his left side.

            Caine had pulled his arm away from Peter’s back as soon as he had felt the shock, but the damage was already done.  He had sensed the swelling but did not like to think what injury could cause pain that severely.  All he could do to hold Peter up was to take hold of his leather belt and trousers waistband.  He did not know what he would do if Peter fainted--which seemed distinctly possible for several more minutes.

            Seeing Peter’s suffering and hearing his cries made Jennifer cringe.  “Isn’t there anything I can do to help you with him?” she asked anxiously.

            “Not until we get upstairs,” Caine replied.  “If you have the keys in hand, lock the car, and open the back door for us.  Peter, tell me when you are ready.”

            Peter whispered, “Go,” and clamped his teeth together.

            Jennifer followed his orders and hurried to reach the building’s back door ahead of them.  She was grateful that Caine was there to handle his son, for she knew she could not have gotten him up the stairs alone, but she doubted that the Shaolin was going to be able to do it, either.

            There were only three steps up to the concrete platform by the door, yet by the time they gained the top Caine knew Peter was in distress by the change in his breathing.  “Dad,” Peter gulped, “I feel sick. . . . It’ll hurt . . .”

            Caine quickly turned Peter’s back to the brick wall by the door and lowered his arm.  “Peter, lean on the wall.  Jennifer, can you hold him over here?”  Without waiting for her, however--for he could feel the spasm beginning--he rubbed his hands together rapidly and placed one on Peter’s stomach and the other on his throat and concentrated on sending his chi strength into his son’s tortured body. 

            Jennifer gripped Peter’s left arm at the elbow and found muscles and tendons rock-hard from his effort to suppress the gag reflex.  He had broken out in a sweat.  Having seen how terrible the pain had been, the last time he had vomited, she prayed that whatever the priest was doing would work.  She watched him with a sense of wonder; he was so calm, so gentle, so utterly focused on his son.  In a few minutes she could feel the tension in Peter’s arm beginning to loosen.

            Caine kept his hands in place until he was sure the paroxysm had been averted permanently.  Then he said softly, “It is over.  It will not happen again.  Do you believe me?”

            Peter had tears in his eyes.  He nodded slightly, panting, and the look he gave Caine was one of gratitude.  Then he gazed at Jennifer as if just realizing she was holding his arm, and he tried to smile and muttered through swollen lips, “Real fun date . . . right, Jenn?”

            They needed to go on.  Caine said to Jennifer, “Open the door for us, please,” and when she moved away from Peter, he stepped back in to take hold of him as before.  This time, having his right arm raised made Peter groan, but Caine did not touch his back.

            The stairwell stretched forbiddingly into the gloom, the light bulbs in the fixtures being inadequate for the job.  Each flight had two sets of steps with a small landing between them, and each flight led to a hallway.  They started to climb slowly, and no matter which leg Peter lifted, pain pierced his back and groin, interrupting his breathing.  Nor could he take more than a shallow breath without being cruelly stabbed on the left side--and the higher they climbed, the more he needed to take deeper breaths.  Before they even reached the first landing, he was dizzy, sweating, gasping for air.

            On the landing Caine silently gathered Peter against his breast, holding him under the arms just tightly enough for support without too much pressure.  His hands rubbed lightly, comfortingly, across Peter’s back below the shoulder blades--until they found that the shirt was torn and there was an area with a sticky, wet texture, an abrasion Caine had not known about before.  Peter did not even seem to feel the contact, a minor spark of discomfort in an electrical storm of suffering.  Wearily he laid his head on his father’s left shoulder.

            It was the labored respiration that worried Caine most right now.  Stair climbing was hard enough on the heart and lungs of a healthy person.  If Peter could not draw enough air into his lungs, he was liable to pass out, making the job of getting him up to the apartment much more difficult, maybe impossible.  “Breathe with me, Peter,” Caine murmured to him.  “Slower. . . . Slower. . . .That’s it.  Now deeper. . . .”

            Peter stiffened within Caine’s embrace.  “That hurts . . . Father . . . I can’t--”

            “All right.  Shhh.  Hold tight, son.  I will ease it.”  Shifting Peter’s weight to his left arm, Caine slid his hand under Peter’s shirt again.  This time he explored the center of his back until he found the correct acupressure points.  Firm pressure there would relieve the worst pain for a few minutes.  Presently he felt Peter go slightly limp in his arms, and Peter’s faint gasp against his shoulder was one of wondering relief.  “How . . . did you--?”

            “Shhh.  Do not talk.  Save your breath for the climb.  Come, before the effect wears off.”

            At each landing and hallway, Caine stopped and ministered to his son to ward off a collapse.  Each time Jennifer watched in awe as he used his skills, his strength, and his powers of persuasion to keep Peter going.  Each time it took Peter a little longer before he could continue, until at last, with one final set of stairs to climb, all three of them knew that he could not take even one more step under his own power.  His legs were rubbery, his good eye was glazed with pain and fatigue, his whole frame shivered, and he had begun to mumble things that made no sense, mixing English and Chinese phrases.

            “What now?” Jennifer asked.  “You take his shoulders and I take his feet?”

            By now even Caine was breathing hard and perspiring in the stuffy stairwell, and also wondering why his friend the Ancient had not arrived yet.  “No,” he replied, “I will carry him.  But I need you to go on ahead and make sure that the pallet on the window ledge is ready to lay him on.  You recall the place that I mean?”

            “Yes, of course.”

            “Good.  Find another blanket or two to make thicker padding.  And some extra pillows.”

            “Right.”  She hesitated.  “Are you sure you can manage him alone?  He’s a big boy.”

            “Do not worry.  Please, just go quickly and do as I asked.”

            She ran, grateful to have something useful to do.  At the top of the stairs, she paused for one quick peek downward and saw both of them still leaning against the wall in the corner of the landing.  Peter’s right arm remained on his father’s shoulder because leaving it there hurt less than lowering it and raising it again. 

            Peter tried to pull his wits together enough to say something coherent.  “You can’t . . . be serious.”

            “About what?”  Caine fished a handkerchief out of his rear jeans pocket and wiped Peter’s forehead and neck, then his own.

            “Carrying me.”

            “Let me worry about that.”  As he said that, Caine was considering alternatives and reaching a decision.  He knew that a fireman’s carry, which he had used when Peter had been forcibly OD’ed by Clarence Choi, would not be suitable here because it would put pressure on Peter’s ribs and abdomen, where there might be internal injuries.  He gazed up the stairs, gauging the strength he would need to arm-carry his 175-pound son up that last flight to safe haven.  “My son, can you stand by yourself for a minute or two?”

            “Yeah . . . I think so,” Peter said breathlessly, as Caine gently lowered his arm, “but, Pop, . . . don’t do it . . . alone. . . .”  His head was whirling, his consciousness beginning to drift again.  Through a haze of distortion he watched Caine make circular chigung movements with his arms and take several deep breaths, and to his astonishment it seemed as if his father were actually growing larger before his eyes--or else Peter was shrinking, back to the size he had been at about ten years of age, when he had twisted an ankle severely and his father had carried him back to the temple.  “Father . . . no . . . I’m too heavy,” he whispered, as he had protested then.  “Put me down, Father. . . . I can walk. . . . Put me down.”

            Caine knew Peter was hallucinating; he even recognized the reference.  He also knew he had better move fast, before the young man passed out and became a helpless dead weight.  “Hush, Peter.  Put your arms around my neck and hold on.  Both arms, if you can manage it. . . . That’s it.  Tighter. . . . Here we go.”

            Caine bent to slide his right arm behind Peter’s knees and scoop him up.  He was lifting a burden equal to his own weight, and even with Peter still conscious and clinging tightly against his chest, even with all the training and practice he had had in using his strength efficiently, he briefly wondered if he had bitten off more than he could chew this time.  Yet there was no acceptable alternative.  With a final inhalation he started up the stairs, concentrating on breathing correctly and on feeding more power to his thigh muscles with each step.  When he reached the top, his legs were quivering and his arms and shoulders cramped with the strain, yet there was a feeling of exhilaration at having made it, and rather than set Peter down, he kept riding the adrenalin high and carried him all the way down the hall into his workroom and across to the window platform.

            Though Jennifer was not in the room just then, she had come through creatively, he noted.  From a storeroom she had scavenged a thick quilted mover’s blanket and spread that over the pallet first; then she had doubled the old patchwork quilt and laid it on top and added two pillows to the one that Caine usually kept there.  She had also pulled the pallet right up to the edge of the platform so that it would be accessible.  Caine planned to set his son down as gently as possible, but then keep him sitting up long enough to take his shirt off and have a look at his back.  Peter grimaced when the first contusion on his buttocks hit the pallet and swore vehemently when more of his weight settled down.  He seemed reluctant to let go, and Caine finally had to disengage his son’s arms himself.  The next problem was that Caine himself really needed some recovery time after his exertions, yet he was uncertain whether Peter could sit up unsupported for long.  He worked quickly to finish unbuttoning his son’s shirt and cuffs and began to slide the shirt back off Peter’s shoulders.  The great bulge of the contusion on the trapezius muscle became visible immediately, the vivid purple and red markings spreading over the top toward his collarbone as well as toward his neck and arm.  Knowing that Peter’s scapula was pinned and wired together because of a bullet wound a year ago, Caine was concerned about whether the bat had cracked the bone again.

            Lo Si chose that moment to make his appearance, gliding into the room noiselessly to say, “Kwai Chang Caine, what has happened to your son?”

            Caine looked around in relief.  “A savage beating, Master.  Thank you for coming.  I need your help.”

            “I was at the senior citizens’ center,” the Ancient explained.  “I came as fast as I could.  What should I do?”

            “Hold him steady while I take off his shirt and check his back.  He has a broken rib on his left side as well as this injury to his right shoulder.  I am not sure what else right now.”

            Without a word the old man stepped forward and supported Peter with an arm across his chest.  As he watched Caine’s hands continuing to push Peter’s shirt down, Lo Si suddenly grabbed Caine’s wrist.  “My dear friend,” he said kindly, “you are trembling.”

            Caine could hardly deny what was so obvious.  “Fatigue, Master.  I had to carry him up the last flight.”

            “I see.  I am sorry I did not come sooner,” the Ancient apologized, releasing him.

            Caine pulled the sleeve off Peter’s right arm but left the shirt hanging off his left arm for now.  He could make out a large dark area on the lower left side of his son’s back, as well as numerous other dark patches, but the overhead light was too far away for good illumination.  “Wait,” he said, “until I bring a lamp over here.” Taking the gooseneck lamp off a table, he climbed up on the platform and plugged the cord in behind the corner cabinet, then knelt down next to his son and turned the lamp so that the light would fall directly on Peter’s back.  When he snapped it on, his breath caught in his throat, and he shivered with a sympathetic reaction.

            A massive black and purple hematoma covered the whole left side of Peter’s lower back approximately over his left kidney.  Caine wondered if someone had simply rammed the end of the bat into him to cause such an injury.  If so, there was a chance that more ribs were broken there, or that the articulation between ribs and spine had been damaged.  Still worse, though, was the possibility that the force of the blow had not only bruised the kidney--practically a certainty--but had ruptured something besides just small blood vessels.  Such a trauma would be beyond Caine’s ability to heal and would require transporting Peter to the hospital promptly.  Yet there was no way to know whether it had in fact happened except to observe him for a while.

            Caine’s expression, as he stared at Peter’s back, alarmed the Ancient.  From his position, he could not see the injury.  “What is it, Kwai Chang Caine?”

            Caine gently pulled Peter’s shirt off his left arm, tossed it aside, and said, “Here. I will hold him while you look at this.”  He supported Peter from the left side so that Lo Si could let go.  Wherever his arm touched a bruise on his son’s chest, he could feel the raging heat of inflammation.  Peter was trembling, and Caine could tell that the pain had him near tears by now.  He leaned his head against his father’s shoulder and whispered, “Dad . . . please . . .give me something. . . . It hurts . . . so bad.”

            “I will, my son,” Caine promised, stroking his hair, “as soon as I can.”.

            All the Ancient said when he saw the huge, ugly swelling was a breathless, “Aaiiee!” but he looked at Caine in consternation.

            A gasp of horror made both their heads turn.  Jennifer was standing there with her arms full of bedding, her eyes wide with shock at the sight of Peter’s injuries.  She had witnessed the beating, but his clothes had hidden the results from her until now.  She took it all in--the deep ominous bruising, the scrape on his left shoulder, the numerous other angry contusions on his back and arms--and the guilt and remorse nearly overwhelmed her.  “Oh m-m-my god, Peter,” she stammered.  “Mr. C-Caine, I’m so sorry about this.  It’s all my fault.”  Tears spilled over and rolled down her cheeks.

            “Do not blame yourself,” Caine said kindly.  “Please, put the blankets over here and bring us the blue ice packs from the kitchen freezer.  That would be a great help right now.”

            “Sure.”  Sniffing slightly, she left the bedding and hurried off, wiping her eyes on her sleeve.

            Lo Si regarded Caine curiously.  “She is involved in this?”

            “Possibly.  He was picking her up for a date when attacked.”

            The old man looked thoughtful but said no more on that subject.  “We must plan how to care for your son.  You do not intend to call 911?”

            “He does not wish it,” Caine replied unhappily.  “I may call later, but for now I will do what I can for him here.”

            “Then you will need all your skill and discipline tonight, my friend.  And something stronger than willow bark tea.”

            “I know, Master.”

            Jennifer came back with three ice packs.  “Good,” said Caine.  “Peter, we are going to lay you down with cold packs under your back and shoulder.  I know it will hurt at first, but then it should numb some of the pain and begin to reduce the swelling.  Do you understand?”

            “Yes,” Peter gasped.

            “All right.  Before we do that, I need to check these injuries.  Try to hold still for me.”  Caine’s thumb found the acupressure point again and dug in for several seconds, until he could sense, in Peter’s breathing, some degree of relief.  Still supporting him with his left arm, he used his right hand to explore the shoulder and kidney contusions.  Caine trusted his ability to detect invisible injuries like fractures and tears because of their heat and electrical discharge as well as their disruption of the flow of chi.  His touch was light and quick, yet Peter flinched and stifled a cry.  Finally, Caine said, “Master, will you help me with him?”

            The three of them worked together.  Jennifer placed one cold pack on a pillow and positioned it so that it would be under the small of his back; then she arranged the other two pillows for his head and shoulders, with another cold pack where the shoulder would come down.  Caine and the Ancient carefully laid Peter back.  Still, when Peter’s skin touched those icy surfaces, his back arched with agony and a sob broke from him.  His left hand desperately clutched the edge of the quilt and twisted it, his right hand pressed his stomach where it felt as if a sword might come through at any moment, and his whole body remained rigid while he continued to breathe in shuddery gasps. 

            “Peter, give me your hand,” Caine ordered quietly, prying his son’s fingers loose from the quilt.  Peter obeyed by grabbing his father’s hand with a grip so tight that it hurt.  Caine broke the grip so that he could check Peter’s pulse, which confirmed that his heart was working much too hard, under stress from so much pain.  Caine placed his other hand on his son’s chest, directly over the heart, closed his eyes, and focused his chi.  For several minutes there was no sound in the room except Peter’s breathing, ragged at first, then gradually evening out, though still shallow and quick.  Little by little his muscles lost much of their rigidity. 

            Caine drew his own hand back and said, “Peter, before I give you anything for the pain, I need to finish examining you so you can tell me what hurts the most.  This will not be easy, but if it becomes unbearable, tell me to stop.”  A faint nod told him Peter understood.  Caine asked Lo Si to bring some wet towels for cleaning the blood away.  While waiting, he turned the lamp so that it shone on Peter’s face and started by checking the blackened eye, which had a red film over the cornea but no damage that would blind him, and the cut inside his lip. After gently washing off the blood, Caine skimmed his fingers over Peter’s face to look for broken bones in his nose or cheek or jaw.  In this case he was relieved to find that the facial damage was confined to cuts and bruises.  Soon he looked up at Jennifer to say, “Now we will need that other cold pack.  Thank you.”  Taking it from her, he laid it gently over the eye and most of his cheek.  “Peter, you will need to hold this in place for a while, if you can stand it.”

            Until now Caine had been on the platform, kneeling beside his son.  Now he hopped down to the main floor, and the Ancient moved out of his way.

            Jennifer remarked, “I’m kind of surprised you have those freezer compresses, Mr. Caine.  A bit modern for your taste, aren’t they?”  She gazed around a room which seemed to her like something from a movie about time travel.

            Such words from another person might have been a taunt, but Caine knew that Jennifer was asking in all seriousness.  “Kung fu training often involves bruises and strains,” he explained patiently.  “Those compresses are a useful tool.”

            “However,” the Ancient broke in, “you do not have enough of them to do the job tonight.”

            “No,” Caine admitted.  “We will need more than that.  Jennifer, do you still want to help?”

            “Of course.  Any way I can.”

            “Then dump some ice cubes into a pan or basin, add water, and find more small cloths--washcloths or kitchen towels or some such.  We will need many cold compresses for the next several hours.”

            Jennifer nodded and headed back to the kitchen.  Lo Si said, “You will also need hot compresses later.  If you do not need me here, I will go and prepare the herbal mixture for those.”

            Caine bowed slightly to acknowledge the Ancient’s plan, then turned back to Peter, who began to speak urgently though haltingly, “Dad, . . . don’t let Jennifer . . . leave. . . . You’re the only one . . . who can protect her now. . . . They can’t jump you . . . the way they did me.”

            Caine’s hand cupped Peter’s unbruised cheek.  “Of course.”

            Despite this assurance, Peter mumbled, “I told her . . .I’d keep her safe . . .but I screwed up. . . .Should have sensed something. . . . Promise me?”

            “I will protect her,” Caine repeated.  Thinking to obtain some information to guide his examination, he asked, “Peter, do you remember the beating at all?”

            Peter’s head turned away, as if he could not meet his father’s eyes because of his shame at having been overtaken in such a way.  “No,” he whispered.  “Only the beginning. . . . Then everything gets . . . hazy.”  It wasn’t quite true.  He remembered what had happened when that knee connected with his genitals, but it wasn’t something he wanted to discuss or even think about.  Those two blows had hurt so much that he had hardly felt anything else for some time.

            If Caine was skeptical of Peter’s answer, he did not say so.  He began inspecting the multicolored knots someone’s shoes had raised on the muscles of Peter’s arms, and the bluish swelling on his left wrist and hand, which had been overlooked until now because of more serious concerns.  A major problem, Caine knew, was that Peter had very little body fat to cushion a blow or absorb internal bleeding.  Almost any hit would bruise a bone, crush muscle fibers, and break not only surface capillaries but also blood vessels deeper inside the muscles.  Right now, leaking blood and lymph from damaged tissues were still spreading far beyond the original points of injury, putting such pressure on nerves that every heartbeat was like a blow from a hammer.  The pain was bad enough now, but it was going to become much worse before morning.  And the longer Caine had his hands on his son, the more he would feel those hammer blows in his own body, and the more he would be assailed by images of the beating. 

            Caine’s fingers searched the collarbone and ribs, and he watched his son’s reactions to see if there were broken bones besides the cracked rib he knew about.  Though there were livid bumps all over Peter’s torso, he found no more fractures--a fact which was both pleasing and puzzling.

            “We must take off the rest of your clothes, Peter,” Caine said, already starting to untie his shoes and pull off those and the socks.  He proceeded to unfasten Peter’s slacks, saying, “Raise your hips a little.”

            Peter spread his palms flat on the quilt, clenched his teeth, and tried to comply.  The pain in his back and shoulder quickly became intolerable, and he could not hold back a choked sound.

            Caine worked fast, sliding first the trousers and then the briefs down off Peter’s hips and buttocks so that he could lower himself again.  What Caine saw, when the genital area was uncovered, sent a frisson of sympathy through him, but he was also relieved that the bruising was no worse than what he had seen in himself and dozens of other males in martial arts training.  Caine thought to apply a cold compress as soon as possible, for there was little else that could be done.  He finished pulling the trousers and underwear off and laid them aside.  Now, with the panorama of his son’s injuries spread before him, Caine’s eyes filled with tears.  Who would do this, deliberately, methodically, to another human being?  And why had it been done to Peter?

            Peter was still shivering from shock and needed to be covered quickly.  Caine had just picked up the sheet that was on top of the stack of bedding when Jennifer walked back into the room carrying the pan of ice water and some towels.  With one smooth motion Caine snapped the sheet open and swung it over his son’s nakedness.

            The sight caused only the briefest break in Jennifer’s stride.  She was tempted to tell him not to worry that she had seen Peter without his clothes before, but she decided to be discreet and demure this time.  More shocking than nudity was the extent of the visible marks all over him.  She shivered.

            “Where do you want these?” she asked, looking down at the pan.

            “There next to his head will be fine.”

            She placed the water and towels where Caine had indicated, then asked, “May I stay?”

            The priest was straightening the sheet and tucking it around Peter’s feet.  Quietly he answered, “It might be better if you do not.  With you watching, he may not admit that something hurts.”

            “Then is there anything else I can do to help?”

            “The Ancient may need some help with the herbs.”

            With a sigh Jennifer returned to the kitchen where Lo Si was working on several concoctions.

            Caine dipped a towel in the icy water and wrung it out.  Moving the sheet aside, he said, “Peter, hang on.  I am going to put this compress between your legs.”

            Peter tried to brace himself, but he could not have anticipated how much it would hurt.  Even under his father’s swift, gentle handling he writhed and whimpered until the heat of his body took the edge off the penetrating cold, and the pulsating pain diminished to a level that did not make his throat ache with suppressed cries.

            The freezer pack had slipped off Peter’s face during the undressing, and he had not picked it up again.  Caine replaced it with a cloth compress which followed the contours of the face better.  The delay gave Peter some recovery time and Caine a chance to think.  He decided that enough was enough.  If he gave Peter a sedative and painkiller now, there would still be time to finish this exam before the drug took effect.

            Caine unlocked the glass-doored cabinet in the corner and extracted one of several identical vials.  Returning to his son’s side, he said, “Peter, I will help you to lift your head so you can drink this.  Sip it slowly, because it has an alcohol base.”

            He made Peter drink all the liquid in the vial.  Afterward Peter lay back, grimacing, and asked, “What is it?  Smells awful.”

            “It is . . . what you asked for,” Caine replied, setting the empty vial on his worktable.  “It will ease your pain and help you sleep.”

            Peter closed his eyes.  “Thanks.”

            Pushing the sheet aside, Caine inspected the bruises that had blossomed on Peter’s thighs but found nothing unduly alarming and covered his legs again.  The last place to be examined was the area between ribcage and pubis, where internal damage could be lethal.  When Caine folded the sheet back, he noted several dark bruises on Peter’s abdomen, but the worst mark he could see was a black and blue contusion just over the hipbone on the left side.  He was relieved to find none as bad as the ones on his son’s back and arms and ribs.  Jennifer had said that the thugs had held Peter up and punched his face and stomach - - “stomach” likely meaning anywhere on the abdomen.  She had not reported how many blows had been delivered.  Peter’s young, well-conditioned body had a flat midsection and tough abdominal muscles.  If he had been able to tighten those muscles before a blow landed, he might have escaped serious internal injury. 

            Caine’s hands roamed lightly over the abdomen, searching for the heat or distension or rigidity that would signal a critical problem.  Nothing.  He closed his eyes and opened his mind to the images that had been trying to push into the foreground of his consciousness for some time, and again he saw his son struggling in the arms of three smaller men, who pushed him up against the tree.  Solid punches to the center of his abdomen bent Peter over, but it was the knee to the groin that buckled his legs and made him sick to his stomach, and a hard kick to his left ribs that knocked him onto his right side, where he simply curled into as tight a ball as he could, with his arms around his belly for protection.  That had left his back and his legs and arms vulnerable to more vicious blows and kicks . . .

            Caine came back to the present with an effort, feeling sickened himself from watching Peter be abused without being able to help him.  Some of the images were the same as the ones that had bombarded him two hours ago, alerting him to his son’s peril, but now they were far more vivid and longer lasting.  He had to take his hands off Peter and breathe deeply several times to redirect his consciousness and regain control.  When he thought he could keep his voice steady, he asked Peter some questions about pain in his abdomen and came to the conclusion that either Peter had been extremely lucky or his assailants had lacked the killer instinct.

            Caine slipped the freezer packs, which had warmed to the point of uselessness, out from under Peter’s back and shoulder.  He wrung out more cloth compresses and laid them on Peter’s ribs and hip and arms--wherever the bruising was worst--then pulled the sheet back over him and also covered him with a blanket.

            “How bad . . . am I?” Peter asked faintly while all this was going on.

            “With the right care, you should recover,” Caine answered gravely, “but it will take a few weeks.  Why will you not consider the hospital?”

            “Never get any rest . . . in a hospital. . . . Rather have you . . . take care of me. . . . Please . . . let me stay . . . “

            Peter’s faith in him was touching.  Though Caine had misgivings, he also knew that the hospital personnel would be doing much the same for Peter as he was doing.  The major difference was in the x-ray machines and lab tests and IV lines, which might or might not be necessary anyway.  Caine said, “Only as long as your injuries do not threaten your life.”  He slowly peeled the compress off Peter’s face, adding, “This eyebrow cut needs to be cleaned and bandaged, Peter.”

            “Stitches?” Peter mumbled.

            “Not by me,” his father answered.  “Tape may be enough.”  He found some gauze and a bottle of herbal wound wash that he and the Ancient preferred to use because of its antiseptic properties, and he set about the job of cleaning the cut and closing it with a small butterfly bandage.  Later he dragged a chair close to the platform and sat down.  “Are you feeling sleepy yet?”

            “Some,” Peter murmured. 

            Caine took Peter’s right hand and held it so that he could check the pulse.  He could feel the tension easing and heartbeat slowing as his potion muffled the pain.  He knew, though, that the dose had been intended for someone of smaller stature and would likely wear off faster in Peter’s case.  Still, Peter would have some relief and might sleep for a couple of hours.  The priest stayed there with his son’s hand enclosed in his own until Peter’s eyes remained shut and his respiration slowed and deepened for sleep.

            Caine rose and carried the three ice packs into the kitchen, where the Ancient and Jennifer sat at the small table, drinking tea.  After tossing the packs into the freezer and closing it, he placed his palm on the door, with his arm straight, and just leaned on the refrigerator.  After several seconds he closed his eyes and rested his head on his arm with a soft sigh.

            Jennifer was afraid to say anything to him, but the Ancient was not.  “How is he?”

            Caine lowered his arm and turned to face them.  In his expression Jennifer read sorrow and distress, which alarmed her until he spoke.  “I am not sure,” he said.  “We must watch him closely tonight.  Right now, he has terrible pain from deep bruising, but I could not find other kinds of internal injury.”  His eyes sought Jennifer’s.  “They seem to have wanted to hurt him, but not to kill him.”  She nodded slightly and raised her teacup to cover her nervousness.

            “Have you given him anything?” the Ancient asked.

            “The valerian-dogwood tincture.”

            Lo Si nodded approvingly.  “Then he will sleep.”

            “For a while.”

            The old man poured tea into an empty cup he had standing by.  “Have some tea, Kwai Chang.  You look as if you need it.”

            Caine did not move.  “I must change the cold compresses first.”

            “I will do that.”  The Ancient got to his feet.  “You sit down and rest for a few minutes.”

            Caine bowed and rather meekly obeyed.  He sat down sideways in the vacated chair and leaned back against the wall next to the table.  After several sips of tea, he looked at Jennifer, noticing for the first time the spots of dried blood on the front of her cream-colored blouse.  His son’s blood.  He deliberately tried not to think about it anymore.  “You are welcome to stay here tonight.  For as long as necessary, in fact.  Peter fears for your safety.”

            “I know.  Thank you.”  But she could only meet his direct gaze for a few seconds before looking away.  She felt her face growing hot with shame.

            Caine silently studied her as he swallowed more tea.  Finally, he said, “Do you have something to tell me?”

            Peter had always said it was futile to try to hide things from his father.  Jennifer nodded slowly, wishing that she was somewhere else, that she didn’t have to tell him the truth.  How could one explain such irrational bigotry?  This was the man who had helped to bring her grandfather’s murderer to justice.  Her family owed him a tremendous debt -- owed Peter, too, for saving her life.  Yet instead of honoring the Caines, Wayne offered insult in the form of a direct attack. 

            “This is hard for me to tell you,” she said at last.  Her voice was raspy, and she paused to clear her throat.  “There may be danger--I don’t know--but it doesn’t come from the men who beat Peter up.  I recognized the leader--my cousin, Sung Wen Ching.”  Off Caine’s look of surprise, she continued, “He leads the so-called Dragon’s Disciples group.  You’ve heard of them?  Fiercely nationalistic and conservative, inflexible, and apparently willing to use violence.”

            Caine nodded once.  “I know of them.”

            “Well, he doesn’t want me to even date anyone who isn’t full-blooded Chinese.  He doesn’t want me to be with Peter, even though he knows you are Shaolin and have a Chinese ancestor, even though I told him there had been no serious talk of marriage and he should mind his own damned business.  He ordered me to break off the relationship, I refused, and this was his answer--” Jennifer could feel the tears welling up as she spoke, her voice becoming shaky and unreliable.  “--to scare Peter off, to make me stop seeing him out of fear for his life, to punish both of us.”  She buried her face in her hands and tried not to sob.

            Caine stared at her in stunned silence, not trusting himself to say anything.  Should he laugh?  Cry?  Yell?  Throw something?  What would be an appropriate response to such an outrage?  To seek out Sung Wen Ching and beat him until he cried for mercy?  That was what Caine suddenly wanted to do.  He felt himself flush with fury and with the urge to do violence to someone or something.  His hands clenched into fists which shook slightly, and he bolted to his feet, unable to sit still any longer.  Folding his arms across his chest so that he would not punch anything, he paced the floor and tried to regain his composure, the center of stillness already eroded by Peter’s suffering.

            All the violence and evil you find in yourself, I have in me, perhaps more strongly.

            He remembered reading in the diary of his grandfather and namesake, who also was half Caucasian and half Chinese, about times when he had been abused by Western bigots because his skin was too yellow.  Caine’s father, Matthew, three-fourths white, one-fourth Chinese, and fair-haired as well, had told him about returning to China and being chased by a Chinese gang shouting, “Kill the foreign devil!” and of having a difficult time gaining admission to the Shaolin Temple despite his father’s being a graduate of it.  Caine himself had, on countless occasions, faced prejudice from persons in both cultures because he looked like an Occidental but behaved like an Oriental.  Apparently, however, the status his Shaolin brands gave him in Chinatown was not transferable to his son, whose Chinese blood was even thinner and whose behavior was definitely Western.  When, he wondered bitterly, would they be accepted simply as themselves, human beings, without regard to Chineseness or Americanness?  Was it so much to ask?

            Caine knew that his father and grandfather had survived their encounters with bigotry without sacrificing their beliefs about nonaggression.  But the first Kwai Chang had never actually seen Matthew mistreated, nor had Matthew ever witnessed Caine’s difficulties.  How would either of them have reacted if his son had been beaten the way Peter had been?  Would they have allowed the offense to go unpunished?  Was there no limit on the requirement to forgive?  Maybe it was time for a Caine to strike back at an enemy.

            Appalled by the rage in his heart and the brutality he was contemplating, Caine reached into the Tao Te Ching for words that could guide him back on course: The brave soldier is not violent; the good fighter does not lose his temper. . . . In hasty action, self-mastery is lost. . . . He who conquers himself is strong. . . . He who does not lose his center endures. . . . Requite hatred with virtue.”

            Caine stopped pacing, took a deep breath, and closed his eyes as he recited the words in his mind.  His serenity was gone; regaining it would be a struggle.  Even so, he knew he could not allow himself to slide into some bottomless abyss of vengeance and violence.  Somehow, he would have to set aside this hatred and wrath, this desire to maim Sung Wen Ching, and devise a more rational plan for dealing with him.  But that was for later.  Right now, his son needed his care.

            When Caine released his breath and opened his eyes, he found Jennifer staring at him with a frightened expression.  Softly he asked, “What is it?”

            Nervously she replied, “I’ve never seen you look like that before.”

            “Like what?”

            “Like you wanted to kill someone.  My cousin, for instance.”

            Caine uncrossed his arms and laced his fingers together in a more characteristic pose.  His eyes had lost the hot, murderous glint that had scared her, and his features had softened into benevolence again.  “I will not kill your cousin, Jennifer.” -- although it would be easy to do – “I will not even beat him.” -- although I would like to --“But I have a question for you:  Would you be willing to testify against him if he were arrested for this crime?”

            Jennifer gazed at her hands and her empty teacup for a long time, recalling her shouted threat, I’ll see you in jail!  as well as Wayne’s cynical retort.  Finally, she answered, “Isn’t there any other way to handle it?”

            “My son is a policeman,” said Caine.  “The criminal justice system he has sworn to uphold is designed to deal with such matters.  The state prosecutes the offender so that personal vengeance is not necessary.  But if witnesses will not come forward, the system fails.  Should your cousin be permitted to commit such attacks with impunity?”

            “It isn’t as if he makes a habit of it,” Jennifer said miserably.  “If he is arrested and convicted, my family will be disgraced.  If I give evidence against him, they’ll probably disown me.  My uncle Louis certainly would never speak to me again.”

            Sternly Caine replied, “Whether arrested or not, Sung Wen Ching has already dishonored himself and your family with this cowardly attack on an innocent man.  Your testifying against him would restore some of that lost honor.”

            Ashamed of her own cowardice but unwilling to be disloyal, Jennifer shook her head and rationalized: “It won’t do any good.  It would be my word against his, and he and his friends would just alibi each other and thumb their noses at all of us.  I’d alienate my family to accomplish nothing, and it wouldn’t help Peter a bit.”

            Unfortunately, Caine conceded to himself, she was probably right.  Grimly he said, “Then I must find another way to . . . correct the situation.”

            Apprehensively Jennifer said, “You’ve never seemed like a man who would be interested in revenge.”

            Caine shook his head.  “Not revenge. . . . Restitution--for the insult to my family.”

            “Restitution?  Like what?”

            “I do not know.  I may speak to your uncle, Sung Lu Wei, as head of your family.”

            “Uncle Louis has very little control over Wen Ching,” Jennifer told him.  “Hasn’t for years.”

            “Then your cousin is a hypocrite,” Caine observed tartly, “for Chinese tradition requires a son to obey his father.  Does he expect you to follow tradition when he does not?”

            “I hope,” Jennifer replied, “that you will have the chance to point out that inconsistency to him.  I wish I had thought of it when I was talking to him, but at the time I was too mad and upset to think straight.”

            Caine decided that pursuing this line of conversation was probably futile at present.  They both needed to do some thinking about their positions and options first.  He came back to the table to see if there was any more tea, but what was left in the teapot had cooled.  He carried the teapot and the kettle to the sink, where he emptied and rinsed the one and filled the other.  When he put the kettle back on the burner to heat, he inspected the various concoctions the Ancient had made, finding them satisfactory.  He also rediscovered the electric wok containing the dinner he had been stir frying when he had sensed that Peter was in trouble.  There was enough for two people, for he had originally planned to put some away for another meal later.

            Caine glanced at Jennifer.  “Have you eaten dinner?”

            “Yes, sir.”

            “I have not.  Would you be interested in some fried rice with almonds?”

            “Perhaps . . . a small portion, thank you.”

            Smiling faintly and briefly, Caine added some water to the wok, stirred the contents, and turned the thermostat up to warm the food.  Neither of them spoke for several minutes, until Jennifer said, “Mr. Caine, please don’t tell Peter who really beat him up, and why.  Not yet.”

            “I cannot lie to my son, Jennifer.”

            “I don’t mean that you should.  Just please don’t volunteer the information.  The truth should come from me, but not until he’s feeling better.  Don’t you agree?”

            “Yes, I do.  I will not tell him.”

            The Ancient entered the kitchen again and asked, “Is there any more tea?”

            “I am making some,” Caine replied, nodding toward the teakettle.  “Do we need more ice yet?”

            “No.  But he is growing restless in spite of the sedative.” 

            Lo Si set about measuring tea leaves into the pot while Caine, frowning, pushed the rice mixture around in the wok until it was warm enough to eat.  He served Jennifer her portion on a dinner plate but scraped his own into a bowl from which he could eat while standing.  Lo Si, offered a portion, declined, saying he had already eaten.  The two men had a long conversation about the medicinal preparations they would need for treating Peter.  Jennifer listened while she ate but did not understand much of what they said.  Her thoughts kept returning to what Caine had said about restoring her family’s honor and to what she would like to tell Wayne the next time she saw him.

            After finishing her food, Jennifer collected the dishes and insisted on washing them and everything else stacked in the sink.  Caine went to check on Peter while the Ancient finished mixing an elixir.

            Caine could see that the potion he had given his son was beginning to lose effectiveness, as Peter began to twitch and moan in his sleep.  Beyond what his eyes and ears told him, Caine could also feel the rising discomfort.  When the priest moved the cold compresses from one contusion to another in the rotation, Peter, only semi-conscious, twisted and whimpered, “Don’t . . . hit me . . . any more . . . Don’t . . .”  Having envisioned the beating, Caine knew that Peter had never cried aloud like that when it was happening to him, and he supposed that the words he was hearing now were those that had been in Peter’s mind at the time.  No matter: it was hard to listen to them.

            Caine touched his son’s cheek and said softly, “No one will hit you, Peter,” in the hope that his voice would penetrate the clouds of confusion and fear to calm him.  Caine wondered what psychological effect this trauma would have on Peter, who had already experienced so much grief in his young life.  How often would Peter have nightmares about the beating?  How much more cynical and mistrustful would he become?  What would he do or say when he learned the real reason for the attack?  He could hardly emerge from this experience unchanged.

            Before pulling the covers back over Peter, Caine again palpated his abdomen.  Nothing had changed there except for the colors in the bruises.  Pulse and blood pressure and body temperature were, if not quite normal, at least stable.  He was not shivering.  He was not getting worse.  But his face, where it was not discolored, was pale.

            Peter stirred again and made a sound in his throat when the movement caused the pain to clutch at him.  His eyes tried to open, and the right one more or less succeeded.  His mouth formed the word, “Pop,” but no sound came out.  He licked dry lips and managed to whisper, “Thirsty.”

            As if on cue, the Ancient appeared with a tray holding several containers.  One was a mug, which he held out to Caine, who said, “Peter, you must sit up to drink this but let me do the lifting.”  Caine slipped an arm under Peter’s back and carefully levered him into a sitting position, then took the offered mug and held it to his lips.

            Peter swallowed some of the liquid and made a wry face.  “What is it?”

            “A mixture of several things, to relieve pain and inflammation, relax you, and prevent muscle cramps.  You must drink all of it.”

            Peter took the mug in his own hands and downed the contents as quickly as possible, trying not to taste it.  When he handed the mug back, he coughed and croaked, “The other stuff . . . smelled worse. . . but tasted better.”

            Caine passed the empty mug to the Ancient, who shrugged and handed him a glass of water, saying, “You can wash it down with this.”

            After that drink, Caine intended to help the patient lie down again, but Peter said hoarsely, “Dad, I have to take a leak.”

            Walking to the bathroom was out of the question.  They found a suitable container and helped him to use it--another ordeal that had him clinging to his father and trying not to cry out.  What scared him, however, was the streaks of blood in the urine.  Unwilling to put his fear into words, Peter looked at Caine with a mute appeal for some kind of reassurance. 

            Reading the fear in Peter’s eye, Caine suppressed his own worries enough to say, “It looks serious, but it may not be.  Minor kidney damage can sometimes cause more bleeding than major trauma.”

            “Are you sure?” Peter gasped.

            No, he was not, but what he said was, “My son, considering the blow to your back, it would be more surprising if there were no blood in your urine.  Also, if you had a major kidney laceration, your blood pressure would probably be dropping and there would be other symptoms.  Come now and lie down again.”

            “Not . . . on my back, Pop. . . . Hurts too much.”

            What Peter found, however, was that no other position was any better.  On his stomach, the broken rib was like a blade through his chest.  On his left side both the rib and the bruise on his hip became unbearable.  When he tried the right side, the battered shoulder and arm could not take the pressure.  If he stayed in one position for long, the throbbing pain built until he could not lie still, and then when he moved the sharper pangs were even worse.  No change of position brought any relief.  For a short time, he was able to tolerate lying face down with his weight more on the right side, pillows cushioning his left ribs--long enough for his father to put cold compresses on his back and shoulder and to clean up the abrasion on his shoulder blade.  Before long, though, he made Caine remove the compresses so that he could turn onto his back again.  Caine tried to rearrange the pillows so that there would be less direct pressure on Peter’s kidney area and right shoulder.  Peter was sorry he had ever awakened and sat up and tried a different position.  Movement had simply rekindled the nerves that had once been lulled to sleep by his father’s potion.  Half to himself he muttered, “Why didn’t they . . . just go ahead . . . and kill me?”

            Caine used one of the compresses to wipe Peter’s perspiring face and throat.  “They wanted you to suffer, not to die--and they have succeeded. . . . Lie still, my son, and give the tea a chance to work.”

            Peter tried to follow the advice.  He tried not to tighten up, even though there was a deep, relentless ache in every part of his body between his face and his knees, overlaid with more pain that pulsed through his bones and muscles and joints.  He tried not to squirm under the onslaught, since moving only increased the pain.  He tried not to breathe too quickly in order not to hyperventilate.  He tried to swallow down the tightness in his throat and ignore the way his eyes kept filling up and the tears ran from the corners down across his temples and into his hair.

            It was more than his father could stand.  Caine used his own shirt sleeve to dry the tears.  Then he put his hand on Peter’s forehead, and after a few minutes Peter’s eyelids began to feel heavy, and his ability to focus his mind and complete a thought began to slip away.  The priest murmured, “My son, you must rest.  Let go of consciousness.  Let go of the pain.  Sleep now.”  His fingers lightly stroked Peter’s forehead until Peter’s eyes closed again.

            When Caine took his hand away, he stood quietly gazing at his son’s sleeping form for a while.  He had no illusions about what he had just done; the effect would be of short duration, just long enough, he hoped, for the herbal mixture to kick in.  He was simply relieved that it had worked, given the severity of the pain.  He sighed and looked around at the Ancient, finding approval in the old man’s eyes. 

            Lo Si said, “Next time he awakens, he must have a kidney tonic--han lian cao or dang gui.”

            Caine nodded agreement.  They both turned when they heard Jennifer’s shoes clatter on the brick floor.

            “How is he?” she asked.

            “Hurting.  But not in immediate danger,” Caine replied.  “You look tired, Jennifer.  You wish to go to sleep?”

            She smiled wanly.  “Very much.  Do you read minds, too?”

            “Not on purpose.  Come, I will show you where you may stay.”

            Caine led her to a back room that he had turned into a kind of dormitory for those who came to him for shelter.  Both Cheryl Hines and Ariel had used it frequently, though not recently, and each had left behind something of herself in making the place livable.  For Cheryl, it had been the lace curtains at the windows and a boudoir lamp with a frilly shade found at a Goodwill store.  Ariel had contributed an old rose-colored rug she had scrounged from a curbside trash pile.  The room was stuffy, and the first thing Caine did was open windows to let the cool night air in.  He showed Jennifer where to find bedding, towels, a toothbrush, and even a karate outfit she could use as pajamas.  All in all, the arrangement was better than she had expected. 

            Caine offered to help her make up the bed, but she declined with thanks.  He bowed and said, “Good night then,” and started to leave.

            “Caine?”

            It was the first time she had not used “Mister” in addressing him.  He turned back and waited.

            “Please don’t hate me.”

            Surprised, he answered quickly, “I do not.”  He wondered if he should tell her how delighted he would be to have her for a daughter-in-law.  “If I have given you that impression, I apologize.  You are not to blame for what your cousin did.”

            She rubbed her hands together tensely.  “I keep thinking there must have been something I could have said to him to prevent this from happening.”

            “That you would never see Peter again?  Would you be willing to say that?”

            She shook her head.  “No.  But maybe I should have said it anyway.”

            “Do you not think that Sung Wen Ching would have found out the truth?”

            “I suppose so.  But maybe it would have bought us some time.”

            Caine came back to take her hands, a gesture of comfort.  “It was not your fault, Jennifer.  Your cousin is the guilty party.”

            “I’m just so sorry that it happened.”

            “I know.  But blaming yourself will not help.  Put that aside and try to rest.”  He smiled a little and kept hold of her hand until she nodded.

            When he had left, Jennifer sat down for a while on the bare mattress.  Staying in a strange place always made her feel off-balance and uneasy, even when it was a place she had briefly visited before, and now she was anxious and depressed as well.  She wished she could go home.  How was she going to arrange a meeting with Chou if she could not be reached by telephone?  And yet, she wanted to stay near Peter, even if she could not do much for him.  She wished she could at least call her mother and reassure her about her safety and Peter’s condition.  In truth, though, she did not know much about Peter’s condition.  Not in any danger, Caine had said, but his worried expression had told her that he was far from certain.  Internal injuries did not always manifest themselves until many hours had passed.  What if Caine waited too long to call the paramedics, and Peter died?  The guilt would be a terrible burden for both of them to carry for the rest of their lives.  But surely Caine wouldn’t let things go that far.  Probably he was just waiting for a good excuse to call 911.

            She looked at her watch.  Nearly midnight.  Sighing, she rose and set about making the bed.  The whole time she was getting ready for sleep, she was trying to decide what to do.  She thought of Caine’s question: Could she give Peter up?  She had been attracted to him from the first, and the feeling certainly seemed to be mutual.  The longer she knew him, the more good qualities she found in him.  In fact, he seemed to be everything she had ever thought she wanted in a man.  She recalled how eagerly she had looked forward to seeing him again and how blissful their night together had been.  She knew she was falling in love with him.  How could she put the brakes on now?  Why should she?  What right did Wen Ching have to dictate to her about her choice of a mate?  What difference did it make how many Chinese genes either of them had?

            Finally, as she lay in bed in the dark, watching the curtains sway in the breeze, she thought about what she would have to say to Peter about who his assailants had been and why they had attacked him.  She could not picture the way he might react.  Would he be as enraged as his father had been, or just hurt about being thought unworthy?  Would he be the vengeful one?  Suppose he was repulsed by her and her whole family and disassociated himself from any contact with them.  How could she bear it if, the next time she looked into his beautiful eyes, she saw revulsion instead of affection?  How could she possibly make all of this up to him and get back into his good graces?

            Jennifer’s eyes began to sting with tears, and she turned her face into the pillow and cried quietly until she fell asleep, exhausted.

 


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