The Lady and the Panda by Vicki Croke Read Free Book Online

live giant panda was preposterous. None of the he-men who had gone off to do it had come close. And besides, what the heck was a panda, anyway?
    Harkness's best friend and staunchest ally tried to defend her. Hazel Perkins responded that had she no children herself, she too would takeup such an adventure. “I'd probably do wilder and more impractical things than hunting pandas,” she said loyally to the gathered crowd, but then added, “if there is anything more so.”
    Perkins may have been the only believer. The rest of the friends around Harkness that day would certainly not be the last to underestimate her in this venture. They and so many others could not see past the gaiety and good humor to the resolve that was as much a trait of Harkness as her trademark glossy black hair.
    Under cloudy skies, Ruth Harkness set off for adventure that late Friday afternoon aboard an oceangoing liner. She was among a throng of giddy passengers, many of whom stood huddled against the biting sea wind, watching the Statue of Liberty grow dim in the distance.
    The crossings to Europe and then China, the stays in London and Paris, would be a blur of late-night cocktail parties, masquerade competitions, and shipboard pranks. Harkness would keep the bars open till nearly dawn. She would throw recorked bottles containing funny notes overboard. And once, she and a group of revelers would even trap the ship's captain inside his sleeping cabin, staking a threatening pirate's note complete with skull and crossbones on his door with a big knife.
    Russell met her in London and then the two left for France, to join his family. At a magnificent château in the Rhône Valley, she discovered that the same Gerry Russell who needed her money to cover his trip to China was from a clan of titled parents and stepparents, whose friends were all a mess of “princes—counts—viscounts—marquises, etc, etc.” The country life of swimming, riding, and tennis reminded her of days with Bill's family, but then, anything and everything reminded her of him. “More than ever am I missing Bill,” she wrote.
    She was, by the time she boarded the
Tancred
in Marseilles and settled into a luxurious cabin, feeling unsure about Gerry Russell. “Sometimes I think I'm rather fond of Gerry in a protective way and then again I don't like him much,” she mused. He was outwardly courteous and considerate. But she began to wonder if he actually had “any depth of character.” He seemed to be missing a sense of determination.
    She had plenty of time to mull everything over as the
Tancred
plowedits way east over the next two weeks. From Suez on, she found herself in what she called a Somerset Maugham frame of mind—sipping cocktails on deck while being mesmerized by the “disturbingly beautiful” scenery that passed before her. At Port Said she watched the sun become an enormous red ball sinking lower and lower down behind the marshes. She stayed up on deck for hours, and long after darkness had fallen, she remained as the ship's powerful searchlights scanned the shore. Long after midnight, when the captain came out in his pajamas to sit beside her and speak of the solitary nature of a sailor's life, she couldn't help thinking of the loneliness of “all life.”
    The fabled Orient was striking a deep chord within her, one that intensified with the passing of each nautical mile. Every port seemed to strengthen a mystical connection, especially in Hong Kong, which was nothing short of a spiritual revelation.
    A WHISKEY SODA in one hand and a Chesterfield in the other, Ruth Harkness stepped from the shipowner's home out into the nighttime darkness of the tropical lawn. Her friend, the captain, had taken her swimming and shopping during the day, and then after a change of clothes to this small dinner party. The city was sweltering, but here, high on one of Hong Kong's magnificent peaks, the air was balmy. Harkness knew she was in for a beautiful view of the bay, for when