My three brothers were five, four and three. They blamed me for causing Mama’s () death and never forgave me. A year later, Father () remarried. Our stepmother, whom we called Niang (), was a seventeen‐year‐old Eurasian beauty fourteen years his junior. Father always introduced her to his friends as his French wife though she was actually half French and half Chinese. Besides Chinese, she spoke French and English. She was almost as tall as Father, stood very straight and dressed only in French clothes – many of which came from Paris. Her thick, wavy, black hair never had a curl out of place. Her large, dark‐brown eyes were fringed with long, thick lashes. She wore heavy make‐up, expensive French perfume and many diamonds and pearls. It was Grandmother Nai Nai who told us to call her Niang, another Chinese term for ‘mother’. One year after their wedding, they had a son (Fourth Brother) followed by a daughter (Little Sister). There were now seven of us: five children from Father’s first wife and two from our stepmother, Niang.
