BACK DOOR

THE STORY

　　Writer Hsu Tien-ho and his wife have been married for a number of years. They are a happy middle-aged couple, but they find a vacuum in their lives, because they have no children.

　　Mrs. Hsu knows that she cannot have any children, there is an emptiness in her heart which can only be filled by a child.

　　She often stands by her window looking out at a small girl playing with a kitten outside the rear entrance of the house opposite.

　　The child's name is Ya Lin, a sweet charming girl of six or seven. She is the daughter, of Ho Tse-mei.

　　One day Ya Lin while playing with her kitten sees that the newspaper and milk had been left outside the Hsu residence for sometime without anyone coming out for them. She goes up and ring the bell to call attention to it.

　　Just then Chang Ma, the servant of the Ho family. comes out to call Ya Lin in for breakfast.

　　The servant of the Hsu family comes out at the same time to answer the bell, and the two servants fall to talking about Ya Lin.

　　Chang Ma tells the other servant Wang Ma, that Ya Lin has no one to look after her. because her parents are divorced, and her step-mother is more interested in mahjong than Ya Lin.

　　Wong Ma returns and tells her mistress about Ya Lin, Mrs. Hsu after consulting her husband decides to approach Mrs. Ho, to ask him whether they could adopt Ya Lin.

　　Mr. Ho agrees, and they pick Ya Lin's birthday as the date for the little girl to movie in with her foster parents. Mr. Hsu is overjoyed and she and her husband throws a big party to celebrate the occasion.

　　The vacuum in the lives of Mr. and Mrs. Hsu is now filled with the sweet innocent laughter and childish patter of Ya Lin, and the three happy together.

　　One day when on returning happily home after a fishing trip, they are greeted by an uninvited guest. Ya Lin seeing the guest rushes into her arms. The guest is her own

　　Miss Shi, the mother of Ya Lin, wants the little girl to go home with her. Both Mr. and Mrs. Hsu refuse to agree, and Miss Shi goes away disappointed.

　　Feeling sorry for Miss Shi, Mrs. Hsu invites the latter out and apologizes to her for separating her from her daughter. She invites Miss Shi to visit them so that the latter could see her daughter.

　　In the meantime Mrs. Hsu who has grown to be fond of Miss Shi, decides to find a match for her. A young friend of theirs, Ying Tso-chuan has recently returned from abroad, and Mrs. Hsu brings Tso-chuang and Miss Shi together.

　　The two young persons fall in love and are about to become married, when Miss Shi is suddenly stricken with appendicitis.

　　Mrs. Hsu rushes to the hospital to see her, but Ya Lin hearing that her mother is in hospital insists on going with Mrs. Hsu.

　　Unable to refuse the girl, Mrs. Hsu takes her along. When Ya Lin sees her mother, she refuses to return home with Mrs. Hsu and insists on staying with her mother.

　　It is with a pang of sorrow that Mrs Asu walks out of the hospital. She realizes that Ya Lin needs her mother as much as the mother needs her daughter and that her love for Ya Lin could not be stronger than a natural mother's love. She suppresses her own sorrow and disappointment and allows Ya Lin to return to her mother.