I ran down Kiukiang Road, across the hard uneven stones of Yunnan Road, pushed through more crowds along Nanking Road. When at last I reached Bubbling Well Road, my breath was already coming in gasps, but I was encouraged that I now had only this one long straight road, relatively free of people ....

Then at last I was going past the American consul's residence, and then the Robertsons' house. I turned off Bubbling Well Road into our road and a second wind took me the remaining distance to our gate.

I knew as soon as I turned through our gateway - though there was nothing obvious to tell me so - that I was too late, that the thing had finished long ago. I found the front door bolted. I ran to the back door, which opened for me, and ran through the house shouting for some reason not for my mother, but for Mei Li - perhaps even at that stage, I did not wish to acknowledge the implications of shouting for my mother.

The house appeared to be empty. Then as I was standing bewildered in the entrance hall, I heard a giggling sound ....

It dawned on me then that Mei Li was weepng, and I knew as I had known throughout that punishing run home, that my mother was gone.