We left for Wuhan that night on Mao's private train, arriving around noon the next day. The new glucose-filled capsules had already arrived from Beijing by plane and were delivered by the Office of Confidential Secretaries, together with the Chairman's daily batch of party documents. Nurse Wu and I moved into the guesthouse together with the rest of Mao's staff—attendants, confidential secretaries, and female companions.

The atmosphere of the inner court was different now. Wang Dongxing had always wanted to know all he could about what Mao was thinking and doing, but Zhang Yaoci wanted to avoid involvement. In the face of so much political tension, he was trying to protect himself by keeping his distance from Mao. He would not allow me to brief him on Mao's health, insisting that he was responsible only for the Chairman's security. If he were to know anything about Mao's health, he could be held responsible if anything went wrong.

Qu Qiyu, the section chief of security guards, on the other hand, was maneuvering to learn all he could about Mao, trying to get closer to the Chairman. He hovered around Mao's women, milking them for information, and he manipulated access to Mao, trying to make certain that nurse Wu and I would always have to go through him. I found his arrogance and pushiness distasteful.

I supervised the experiment with Mao's sleeping pills, and the method seemed to work. After five days, he was weaned of the excessively heavy dosage and back to his earlier dose. My presence was no longer needed. The time had come for nurse Wu and me to return to Shixi. I was anxious to be gone. The atmosphere in Group One was too tense, and our work with the “four cleanups” campaign was not complete.

Zhang Yaoci, however, wanted us to stay. He was still worried about the Chairman's health and was afraid of being held responsible should anything go wrong. He did not like Qu Qiyu, either. With me and nurse Wu around, he could stay informed about the Chairman without a commensurate increase in responsibility, and we served as a sort of buffer against the arrogance of Qu Qiyu.

But we had to return. I went to tell Mao, explaining that his health and dosage of sleeping pills were both back to normal and that Wu Xujun and I still had work to do for the “four cleanups” campaign. “If you need us, you can send for us and we will be back immediately,” I said.

Mao did not want me to go. “The ‘four cleanups' is no longer the most important matter,” he said. “Something else is happening now. You should stay here. It will be good for you. I may need you to do something for me in a while.”

I was shocked. The “four cleanups” campaign had been a gigantic undertaking, one of the largest since land reform, with hundreds of thousands of urban cadres being sent into villages all over the country. Now the socialist education campaign was no longer important. That explained why Mao did not want to discuss the movement with Wang Dongxing. But I was still in the dark about this new, more important undertaking.

I hesitated. Mao wanted me to stay, and he had confidence in my medical abilities. He would protect me and keep me safe if I confined my work to my medical practice with him. But the atmosphere around him was tense, and Qu Qiyu was the type of power-hungry person who liked to stir up trouble. Work in Group One would be fraught with booby traps. I was conflicted, weighing the costs of my choices. In the end, difficult though life in the countryside was, I decided it was safer politically there. I wanted to return to Shixi.

“Wu Xujun and I have nothing with us but the clothes on our backs,” I explained to Mao. “It's not very convenient for us here. We have to return for our clothes.”

“No problem,” Mao replied. I was to tell Zhang Yaoci to have our city clothes sent from Beijing. Mao would let us know later if he thought we should go back to the countryside. As so often in my life, I had no choice but to stay.

The aura of impending change was almost palpable. Mao withdrew into his room, waited on by his female attendants, and beyond them Qu Qiyu built another impenetrable shield surrounding the Chairman. I stayed away from the duty office, visiting Mao only when he called, hovering on the periphery, wondering what was going to happen.