Undercover - In China - Book 7

Part 21 - Dr Zhang

We all breathed out a simultaneous gasp of relief as Dr Zhang descended the stairs.

Licia ran to meet him and hugged him with relief. He looked embarrassed. 'Let's find a more comfortable place to talk,' he said. 'Come on up.'

We climbed up the stairs, through the ceiling hatch, to a small attic lit by a burning wick in a pot of oil and a small brazier in the middle of the floor. It was furnished with a table, two small stools and a bed. 

 'Watch your heads on the roof beams,' Dr Zhang warned as he straightened up and promptly hit his head on a roof beam. He gestured for us to sit at the table. 

 'Ah-um. So, tell me what happened. Why are you here?'

'We came to tell you how to get back,' I said. 'Yonnie and Treeka told us Murga sent both you and Denny to Xiangyang and then blocked Mandia's software so that you can't get back the same way.'

'Murga? I should have guessed. I thought Oppy/Mandia had miscalculated the date and I was puzzled when I could not contact her.  Ah-um . . . But how are we going to get back to Silverwood School?'

Licia showed him the map. 'Yonnie and Treeka are repairing Mandia but they told us we must go back from the Immortal Mountain monastery near Jiangling.' 

 'Ah-um, that was my first attempt at time shifting. I set up a solar powered transponder there on my first visit but Oppy/Mandia lost the parameters somehow and I never was able to use it afterward.' 

 'You mean you have been here before?' Licia asked.

 'Ah-um, yes, several times. I established a base here and brought a few useful tools but, this visit, I just got here a few days ago.'

 'Have you seen Denny?' Miguel asked.

'Well, ah-um, no. I didn't know he was missing . . . I haven't seen him but, come to think of it, the abbot told me about a foreigner who appeared about three months ago. I can't be certain but the description certainly fitted Denny. Murga must have moved the time connect date so we didn't arrive at the same place and time.' 

 'What happened to Denny . . . the foreigner?' I asked.

'Ah-um, Yin Jia thinks he was conscripted into the Jingzhou army supply corps. I have been trying to find out where he was sent.'

Miguel asked, 'Why are we here, exactly?'

 Dr Zhang stroked his beard. 'Ah-um, 208 CE is one of the most romantic periods in China's history, the Three Kingdoms era. I have been studying it for years and the city of Xiangyang has been my base. 

 This all sounded crazy but it was no crazier than Murga, and Kozak, and the Titanic or HMS Curious, all of which we had encountered recently. 

 'Ah-um.' Dr Zhang hesitated. 'My immediate problem is how to explain your presence to Yin Jia.'

Licia suggested, 'You could tell him we're your students.'

'Good idea, Licia,' Dr Zhang laughed, 'but, most Chinese have never seen anyone who looked remotely like Ziff.' Dr Zhang laughed. 'Even if you did dye his hair black. Yin Jia asked me if I was willing to sell him the white ghost with the blue eyes of a Siamese cat . . . Ah-um. I told him you were not for sale.'

'You could tell him we are here to teach English?' Miguel suggested. 'Not bad, Miguel,' Dr Zhang replied. 'Except that only five people in this world speak English and four of them are in this room. English won't be invented for another nine hundred years.'

We were interrupted by loud knocking and two servants climbed through the trap door opening with food, a large pot of tea and what looked like several rolls of thick wall paper. It was freezing cold in the attic but, after we had eaten the hot rice porridge with pottery spoons and drank hot green tea, we began to feel a little warmer.