A hand fell on her shoulder. It was Wong Wei. He had a flask in one hand and smelled as though somebody had thoroughly doused him with the contents of another.

“Tam Jing Fan! I’ve been calling your name from halfway across the ship!”

Inwardly she flinched. She still wasn’t used to answering to her brother’s name. She had to work on that. As always when she felt exposed, she scrambled to deflect attention from herself. Fortunately, that was never difficult with Wong Wei.

“A good haul tonight?” she asked, pointing her chin at the flask in his hand.

“The best!” Wong Wei saluted her with the flask. “Come, I never thanked you for helping me get onto the ship.”

He handed her the flask. It would be unmanly to refuse, so Ling Fan tipped it back and gulped twice.

“See? What did I say? The best!” Wong Wei smacked her cheerfully on the back as she coughed. She was amazed that fire didn’t spew out of her mouth; there was certainly enough blazing down her throat! After a third swallow, the fire faded into a fluid warmth that rooted in her stomach and spread outward to her limbs. She sat down, leaned her head against the bulwark, and watched the stars appear between the shreds of clouds.

“At least the stars are the same,” she remarked, the weight of homesickness in her voice. She expected Wong Wei to jump on her with a sarcastic retort, but he didn’t.

“On my last night at home, I was invited to my intended bride’s house for dinner.” Wong Wei’s voice was soft in the darkness. “I thought her father had accepted our intentions at last, but I was wrong. At the dinner table was Fee Gou, the son of the fishmonger. Mei’s father said . . .” He paused to take a long pull on his flask. “He said I had three years to prove myself.”

“Prove yourself?”

“Fee Gou’s father owns three fishing boats, you see, and they’re the wealthiest family in the village. Mei’s father doesn’t think I’m worthy of her hand. He thinks I’m too poor. But Mei’s a stubborn girl. She told him she wants to marry for love.” Ling Fan heard the smile in his voice.

“Her father gave me three years to make a fortune worthy of Mei.” He pulled the coin on its string out from under his shirt. It glinted dully against the dark sky. “That night, Mei and I went up in the hills behind our village. The stars were above our heads just like now. She said she knew we were destined to be together. She said she believed in me.” His voice thickened. “Nobody ever told me that before. Then she gave me this and told me that so long as I have this coin, I will never run out of luck while I’m in America.”