Mrs. Pollifax on the China Station

of what
had to be the Drum Tower . Between this and
the bus lay a maze of mud-and-straw walls, interrupted here and there by alleys
leading into a mysterious interior. There was no barbershop; in fact, there
were no shops to be seen at all, there were only walls.
    No panic please, she told herself, and smiled at a small round-faced
child who grinned back at her. She called to Mr. Li, ”I’m going to take some
pictures of children, I’ll catch up with you in a minute.” Having said this she
knelt in the dust and began dramatically snapping pictures with a camera that
was completely empty of film. As the others moved away down the dusty lane she
slipped into the nearest alley and, with several of the children trailing her,
began to look for a barbershop.
    She was soon completely lost and gave herself up to the luxurious
feeling of being on her own again, free of the group but cherishing too the
assumption that somewhere—somehow—there would be a way out of this maze of
clay-colored walls. In the meantime it was fascinating to be inside them
instead of looking at them from the outside: to glance into dark rooms and tiny
courtyards, assess the herbs hung in doorways to dry, watch children squatting
in the dust to draw figures with a stick or a stone. She passed two ancient men
playing cards, one of them with a marvelous wisp of goatee on his chin, like a
mandarin; she smiled and nodded to them and received courtly bows in return.
Threading her way through one lane after another she turned left, then right,
stopping now and then to take a pretend-picture of a flower, a doorway, a
child, until at last she entered a much broader alley to find herself virtually
under the roofs of the Drum Tower but still inside
the compound’s walls.
    Here at least there were markets: stalls and shops carved into the clay
wall behind them, and people, far too many people. She walked slowly down this
wider road, nodding and smiling to passersby, trying not to notice the number
who came to their doors to watch her, or that slight edginess she felt at being
so conspicuous. She passed a bicycle repair shop; she passed a stall in which
an ancient sewing machine had been installed, and then a vendor of steaming
noodles.
    And then—quite suddenly—she found herself passing a barbershop.
    She tried not to stare. Her quick glance noted an exterior of crumbling
adobe that matched the wall into which it was set, a large, very dusty glass
window, an open door and a dim interior filled with men. Only the chair placed
near the window identified it, and the man with clippers bent over his customer
in the chair.
    Here is a barbershop, thought Mrs. Pollifax, but
not where I thought it would be, or where Carstairs and Bishop thought it would
be, either.
    She continued past it, glanced into a shop filled with women working at
a long workbench, and finding neither an exit from this alley or another
barbershop she stopped. She thought, ”If it’s not Guo Musu in there—well,
that’s why I was chosen, isn’t it? Because I stand up well under police
interrogations?”
    But for a moment she thought indignantly of Carstairs and Bishop,
neither of whom realized the quantities of people on the move in China in the
daytime, and the total lack of privacy anywhere. People on the street, people
crowded into a barber shop... they had certainly not considered the effect of
an American tourist plunging in among the crowds to ask for information. It was
outrageous and it might prove suicidal, but she was going to have to go into
that shop.
    She turned and retraced her steps to its door.
    A dozen men seated along the wall gaped at her as she walked inside. She
called out, ”Does anyone here speak English?” The barber was intent on guiding
clippers around the ears of his customer; he had scarcely glanced up at her
arrival and her heart sank at the lack of response. She began again. ”Does
anyone here—”
    The barber lifted his head and looked at her. ”I speak a little.” He was
a nondescript, sallow man, his face devoid of expression.
    ”I’m so glad,” she said with an enthusiasm she didn’t feel. ”I’m lost. I
wonder if you could come to the door—” here she pointed, ”and show me the way
to the Drum Tower ?”
    The man spoke to his companions in his own language; heads nodded and
the smiles blossomed so ardently that for a minute she feared they might all
jump up to help her. But the barber had put down his clippers and he joined her
alone