Sunday, 16 February

Twenty-first day of the first lunar month

I received a phone message from Dr. Wang Chonghui asking me to go to Chungking immediately as he had received instructions from the Generalissimo regarding Dai Defu’s case. I promised to go on Tuesday with Wu Shangying.

Bingkun wrote that the Bank of East Asia jade has been sold for $10,500 which was returned to the bank. Guo Song (郭松) has sent the jade ($15,000) back to Hong Kong. He is not so bad after all. I will be satisfied if I can get $10,000 for it. However, since Jincheng is willing to let me have back the Shanghai Bank jade, there might be a chance of raising enough to pay the Bank of East Asia debt. If there is to be a small deficit of a few thousand dollars Jincheng may advance it to me, and I need not have to sell our family property. In the future, I have to be very careful in trusting friends. Wu Shupeng wrote that he is in an awful fix. But it is all his own making. God cannot help those who do not want to help themselves. He never learnt from bitter experience. He is more or less tied down by another woman. I wrote to suggest he come immediately after the jade affair is settled.