Remember by Barbara Taylor Bradford Read Free Book Online

declined.
    Nicky leaned forward and said to Yoyo, “Did you find out anything?
    Where are those troops from? What’s happening?”
    Yoyo puffed on his cigarette for a second and then said, “Troops from far away. From outside Beijing. They march many hours. They told go on maneuvers. They told go stop troublemakers. They no understand.
    They afraid. They young boys. People lecture them.
    Tell them don’t hurt students. Soldiers don’t know this Beijing.
    Don’t know where this is. They no fight, Nicky. They too scared.”
    “Thank God for that, but what an anticlimax!” Nicky exclaimed.
    “Where are the helicopters?” Clee asked, looking up at the night sky, then at Yoyo.
    “No come now,” Yoyo said, sounding as though he knew what he was talking about. “No tear gas.”
    There was a small silence, which Nicky broke when she said, “The People’s Liberation Army came to Beijing to quell the student demonstrators, and were conquered by the citizens. Not a single shot was fired.”
    And several hours later that was how she began her nightly newscast to the United States.
    Saturday dawned bright and sunny.
    The young soldiers, still bewildered and now very dispirited, retreated down Changan Avenue, finally, in the middle of the morning.
    The Beijingers returned home or went to their places of work. The students retreated to their tents and buses for much-needed sleep, and an air of calm descended over Changan Avenue and Tiananmen Square—suddenly there was a semblance of order and normality.
    Nicky was convinced the tranquillity was illusory and that the situation had been contained only for a short while—a dozen or so hours at the most. The way she saw it, the Chinese government would take a hard line because it would perceive the army’s retreat as a humiliation. The officials would automatically blame the students, even though it had been ordinary citizens who had stood up to the troops and prevented them from entering the square. And they would act accordingly, with great force and violence.
    After snatching a few hours of sleep, and after her broadcast was finished, she had been in and out of the square all day.
    Instinctively she knew that belying the atmosphere of calm were tension and fear, and she voiced this thought to Clee as they sat in the Western Dining Room of the Beijing Hotel on Saturday afternoon.
    Leaning across the table, she added, “The crackdown’s still coming.
    I’m sure.”
    “Me too,” Clee said, and he took a sip of his coffee. Putting the cup down, he went on in a low tone. “The government wants those kids out of the square in the worst way now. They’re losing face in the West, and they can’t stand that. I’ll tell you something
    else, Nick—when it does happen, it’ll be fast. By Monday it’ll be all over, and the aftermath’s going to be pretty awful.
    Arrests, trials, repression, and Christ knows what else.”
    “I’m concerned about Yoyo,” Nicky confided. “He’s been in the thick of it, and he is one of the leaders. I wish we could get him out of Beijing.”
    “We can,” Clee said. “And incidentally, you just took the words right out of my mouth. I was about to tell you that I’ve been thinking about giving him money for an airline ticket to Hong Kong. We could take him along with us when we leave. He can stay there for a few days and decide what he wants to do.”
    “I’ll split the price of the ticket with you.”
    “You don’t have to,” he began, then seeing the determined look on her face, he finished, “Okay, it’s a deal.”
    “There’s another problem.”
    “What?”
    “Mai. Yoyo won’t leave Beijing without Mai.”
    “So we’ll give him enough for two plane tickets. I couldn’t live with myself if we left those two kids behind, and I know for sure you couldn’t, Nicky. Arch and the others will feel the same way, that it’s the least we can do.” He smiled at her. “So that’s it, then. Mai comes along as well. The more the