by Cao Xueqin
‘Whatever subject one chooses for a poem,’ said Bao-chai, ‘it is important that one’s treatment of it should be original. If one merely plods along in the footsteps of earlier poets, it doesn’t matter how fine the language is, the lack of originality will prevent it from being a really good poem. Thus, many poets have taken Lady Bright as their theme, but the best ones have always contrived to give the subject a new turn, one emphasizing the sad fate of Lady Bright herself, another the wickedness of the painter Ma Yan-shou, another the frivolousness of the Han emperor who employed him to paint portraits of court ladies rather than portraits of distinguished statesmen and soldiers, and so on. Further new twists were given to this theme by Wang An-shi:
What brush could ever capture a beauty’s breathing grace? The painter did not merit death who botched that lovely face.
and by Ou-yang Xiu:
A prince so ill able to control what went on under his nose Must hope in vain to impose his rule on remote barbarian foes.
Cousin Lin shows the same originality as these two poets, by presenting each of her subjects in a novel and interesting light –’
Before she could continue with her disquisition, a servant came in to announce that Jia Lian was back. His arrival at the Ning mansion had been reported some time ago and he was expected any moment at Rong-guo House. Bao-yu at once got up and, hurrying out to the front part of the mansion, waited inside the main gate for his cousin to arrive. He did not have to wait long. Within moments Jia Lian was dismounting from his horse and stepping through the gateway. Bao-yu advanced to meet him, touched hand and knee to the ground in greeting, and wished good health, first, as was good manners, to his grandmother and mother, from whom Jia Lian had come, and then to Jia Lian himself. The cousins then went inside together, hand in hand. Li Wan, Xi-feng, Bao-chai, Dai-yu, Ying-chun, Tan-chun and Xi-chun were already waiting for Jia Lian in the hall. After each of them had greeted him individually, he gave them his news.
‘Grandmother will be arriving here early tomorrow. She’s been keeping very well on the journey. Today she sent me on ahead to make sure that everything here is all right. I shall be leaving again tomorrow at four o’clock in the morning and going out of the city to meet her.’
They asked him a few questions about the journey, but because they knew how tired he must be after so much travel, soon left him so that he could go back to his own room and get some rest. About the remainder of that day our narrative is silent.
Grandmother Jia and Lady Wang arrived home round about lunchtime the following day. When the initial greetings were over, the old lady sat for a while and sipped a cup of tea before taking Lady Wang and the others with her to Ning-guo House. A great wailing rose up as she arrived. Jia She and Jia Lian had gone there after seeing the old lady home, and as she and her party entered the room in which the coffin stood, the two of them advanced to meet her at the head of a number of weeping clansmen, and supported her one on each side as she approached the coffin. At the foot of it Cousin Zhen and Jia Rong knelt down, pressing their heads against her skirts and weeping piteously. To people of advancing years even simulated grief is distressing, and Grandmother Jia, an arm about each head, wept very bitterly herself. Jia She and Jia Lian did their best to comfort her, and at last, when her grief had somewhat abated, she moved on, to the right of the coffin-screens, where You-shi and her daughter-in-law were waiting for her. Here there was more clinging and weeping, after which those present came forward one by one to salute Grandmother Jia and welcome her in a more normal fashion.
Cousin Zhen, fearing that Grandmother Jia, who had still not rested properly after her tiring journey, would become distressed if she were to sit much longer in such melancholy surroundings, strongly urged her not to stay. When at last he had prevailed on her to go and she was back in her own apartment at Rong-guo House, it became evident that the shock of mourning, following so soon upon the discomforts of travel, had indeed had an adverse effect on her ageing constitution. By nightfall she was showing all the symptoms of incipient illness: heaviness in the head, a constricted feeling in the chest, a blocked-up nose and hoarseness of the voice. The doctor was summoned immediately and half that night and the whole of the following day taken up with consultations, prescriptions and the preparation and administering of medicine. Fortunately the illness had not yet established itself in her system and responded rapidly to treatment. There was a slight outbreak of perspiration round about midnight of the second night and after that her pulse and temperature both returned to normal. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief; though to be on the safe side they kept up the dosage for another day.
A few days later it was Jia Jing’s ‘funeral’ – in this case no more than the re-depositing of his coffin in the family temple. Grandmother Jia was still not well enough to take part; Bao-yu stayed at home to look after his grandmother; and Xi-feng was still insufficiently recovered. Apart from them, all the other members of the Rong-guo family, Jia She, Jia Lian, Lady Xing and Lady Wang, together with all the men- and women-servants of their households, accompanied their Ning-guo cousins to the Temple of the Iron Threshold. They were back again that evening; but Cousin Zhen, You-shi and Jia Rong stayed on at the temple for the Hundred Days, at the end of which Jia Jing was to be taken to his final resting-place in Nanking. Old Mrs You and her two daughters remained all this while at the Ning-guo mansion to keep an eye on things.
Jia Lian had heard a good deal in the past about these two step-sisters of You-shi, though, to his great regret, he had never until very recently had an opportunity of meeting them. The opportunity had presented itself on the occasion of Jia Jing’s removal into the city. Since then they had become fairly well acquainted. Acquaintanceship in his case (Jia Lian being what he was) had been accompanied by the first stirrings of lust. He felt encouraged by an unsavoury rumour he had heard to the effect that his cousins Zhen and Rong, both father and son, had at one time or another enjoyed the sisters’ favours. Whenever he had a chance to, he flirted or made eyes at them – unsuccessfully in San-jie’s case, for she met all his advances with indifference, but with a more promising reaction from her sister. Unfortunately, with so many pairs of eyes watching, he could not follow up his success, apart from which he was a little scared that Cousin Zhen might be jealous. Between him and Er-jie it could be said that there was a silent understanding; but for the time being there could be nothing more.
This all changed after the funeral. Then, at Ning-guo House, apart from Mrs You and the two sisters and a few maids and older women employed to do the rough work, hardly anyone from the master apartment was left behind. All the personal maids, parlour maids and concubines stayed with their master and mistress at the temple. As for the married servants, their activities were confined to keeping watch at night and minding the gates by day; and since they had their own quarters outside, they had no reason to go inside the house except when they were on duty. This seemed to Jia Lian to be an excellent time to act. A pretended wish to keep Cousin Zhen company at the temple gave him an excuse for absenting himself from his own house, whilst the pretext of attending to household matters on Cousin Zhen’s behalf enabled him to make several trips back to Ning-guo House, thus providing him with further opportunities for pursuing his flirtation with Er-jie.
One day Yu Lu, a junior steward from Ning-guo House, came out to see Cousin Zhen about some business.
‘The total cost of the procession, including funeral furnishings and hire of labour, was one thousand one hundred and ten taels. Of that, five hundred taels have already been paid, leaving six hundred and ten taels outstanding. Yesterday I had the managers of both agencies round asking me for the rest of the money. I thought I’d better see you about it and ask you what I’m to do.’
‘Why didn’t you go straight to the counting-house and draw what’s wanted?’ said Cousin Zhen. ‘I don’t see why you should need to come bothering me about it.’
‘I did go to the counting-house, sir,’ said Yu Lu, ‘but since S
ir Jing passed away they have already paid out so much that they’ve barely got enough left to pay for the Hundred Days services and the expenses of your stay here in the temple. They couldn’t pay these bills without eating into what has been earmarked for something else. That’s why I’ve come out to see you. I wondered whether you would want me to pay them out of your personal account, or whether there’s some other account you could transfer the money from. If you will let me know what you want me to do, I’ll go ahead and do it.’
Cousin Zhen laughed.
‘The days when we had money lying around unused in private accounts have long since passed. You’ll have to borrow the money where you can.’
It was Yu Lu’s turn to laugh.
‘If it were one hundred or two hundred taels, sir, I might be able to manage something; but five or six hundred? Where would I get a sum like that at short notice?’
After thinking for a bit, Cousin Zhen turned to Jia Rong:
‘Go to your mother, Rong, and ask her for that five hundred taels the Zhens of Nanking sent us after the funeral. It hasn’t been handed in to the counting-house yet. And ask her to have a rake-around and see if she can’t raise the whole sum.’
Jia Rong hurried off. In a very short time he was back again with his mother’s answer.
‘Mother says two hundred of the five hundred has already been spent. She sent the remaining three hundred back home for Grandmother You to take care of.’
‘In that case,’ said Cousin Zhen, ‘you’d better go back with Yu Lu to ask her for it and let him have it. While you’re about it, you’ll be able to see if everything at home is all right. And of course give my regards to your aunts. – Yu Lu, you’ll have to raise the rest of the money as best you can by borrowing.’
Jia Rong and Yu Lu promised to do his bidding, but just as they were about to withdraw Jia Lian walked into the room. Yu Lu stepped up to him smartly and dropped him a salute.
‘What’s happened?’ said Jia Lian.
Cousin Zhen proceeded to explain to him why Yu Lu was there. As he did so, it occurred to Jia Lian that this would be a good opportunity of going to the Ning-guo mansion and looking up Er-jie again.
‘It seems a pity to go straining one’s credit for so trifling a sum,’ he said. ‘I had a little windfall the other day that I haven’t made use of yet. Why don’t I let him have that to add to your three hundred and save him the trouble of borrowing?’
‘That will be splendid,’ said Cousin Zhen. ‘Perhaps you will authorize Rong to pick it up then, when he goes to collect the three hundred?’
‘I think it will be necessary to go for it myself,’ said Jia Lian hurriedly. ‘In any case I haven’t been home for some days. I really ought to drop in and pay my respects to Grandmother and Lady Wang and my parents. I shall be able to look in at your place too, Zhen, and make sure that your servants are behaving themselves. And pay my respects to your mother-in-law, of course.’
‘It means imposing on you once again,’ said Cousin Zhen, smiling. ‘I don’t know whether I should let you.’
‘For goodness’ sake!’ said Jia Lian. ‘One’s own cousin!’
‘Go with your uncle, then,’ Cousin Zhen instructed Jia Rong, ‘and when you see Lady Jia and the other ladies and Sir She to make your bow to them, remember to say that your mother and I send them our regards. And don’t forget to ask whether Lady Jia is quite better yet and whether or not she is still taking medicine.’
Having ‘yessir’-ed each one of these commands, Jia Rong followed his Uncle Lian outside. The two of them then took horse and, accompanied by Yu Lu and several pages, all on horseback, rode out towards the city. As Er-jie was very much on his mind, Jia Lian beguiled the journey by talking to his nephew about her as they rode along. He spoke approvingly of her good looks and gentle character. He remarked what perfect poise she had and what a soft and pleasing way of speaking. In fact, he concluded, everything about her excited one’s admiration and respect.
‘Everyone speaks so highly of your Aunt Feng, but to my mind she isn’t a patch on her.’
Jia Rong understood very well where this conversation was leading them.
‘If you love her so much, Uncle,’ he said, ‘why not let me be your matchmaker and arrange for you to have her as your Number Two?’
‘Is that a joke,’ said Jia Lian, ‘or are you in earnest?’
‘I’m being perfectly serious.’
Jia Lian laughed:
‘It’s certainly an attractive proposal. The only trouble is, I don’t think your Aunt Feng would ever stand for it. And besides, your Grandmother You might not be willing. And haven’t I heard somewhere that your Aunt Er is already engaged to someone?’
‘None of these is really a problem,’ said Jia Rong. ‘Aunt Er and Aunt San, although they took his surname, were not really my Grandpa You’s daughters. When Gran married my Grandpa You as his second wife, she brought them with her from a previous marriage. I’ve heard Gran say that when she was carrying Aunt Er, her first husband had an agreement with a friend of his called Zhang, who was a manager on one of the Imperial Farms and whose own wife was also pregnant at the time. They agreed that if the children their wives were carrying turned out to be a boy and a girl, they should be betrothed to each other. In that way Aunt Er was engaged to the Zhangs’ boy from the moment she was born. Later on the Zhangs lost all their money in a lawsuit, and Gran lost her first husband and married my Grandpa You, and for ten or fifteen years now she hasn’t heard a word from them. She often complains about the betrothal and says she wishes she could get it revoked; and Father is anxious to betroth Aunt Er to someone else. He’s only waiting until he has found the right person, and then he means to find out where the Zhangs are, hand them a small sum of money, and persuade them to sign a deed of revocation. The Zhangs are so poor, they are hardly likely to refuse. In fact, when they’ve seen the kind of people we are, they probably won’t dare. And whatever Father and Gran might have thought about Aunt Er becoming a Number Two in other circumstances, I’m sure they would have no objection in your case. The only difficulty as I see it is Aunt Feng.’
Jia Lian was so enraptured by the main part of what Jia Rong had been saying, that it is doubtful whether he heard those last words at all. For some moments he rode on in silence, a fatuous grin on his face. Meanwhile Jia Rong was thinking.
‘I’ll tell you what, Uncle,’ he said presently: ‘if you’ve got the nerve, there’s one way of doing this that would be absolutely fool-proof. It would involve you in spending a bit of money though.’
‘Never mind that, dear boy!’ said Jia Lian eagerly. ‘If you have a plan, just tell me what it is.’
‘Don’t say anything about this when we arrive,’ said Jia Rong, ‘but wait until I have had a chance to explain it all to Father and he can arrange it with my Gran. When it’s all settled, buy a little house somewhere in the streets at the back of our mansion, furnish it, install one or two married couples to look after it, and then all you have to do is choose the day: you can marry Aunt Er then and nobody be any the wiser. Of course, you’d have to impress on the servants that they are not to let on about it; but provided they don’t talk, there’s no reason why Aunt Feng tucked away in the inner courtyards should ever hear about it. And by the time you’ve been living together for a year or two, you ought to be able to ride the storm out even if your secret is blown. You’d have to face an explosion from Sir She, of course; but you can tell him that you did it for the family, because Aunt Feng is unable to have a son. And as for Aunt Feng herself, when she sees that the rice is cooked and knows that it can’t be uncooked, she’ll have to put up with it. That only leaves the old lady to square, and you should be able to do that easily enough with a bit of coaxing.’
There is an old saying, ‘Desire maketh the wise man a fool’. Jia Lian was so intoxicated by his desire for Er-jie that Jia Rong’s idiotic plan struck him as unassailable. The fact that he was in mourning, the fact that a secret marriage of the kind he wa
s contemplating was bigamous and illegal, the fact that he had an extremely strict father and an exceptionally jealous wife – all those things which ought to have given him pause were lightly brushed aside. Nor did it occur to him that Jia Rong’s counsel was by no means disinterested. Jia Rong had designs upon Er-jie himself, to which the presence of his father, when they were all together in the same house, was an impediment. If Jia Lian married Er-jie, she would have to live outside, and there would be unlimited opportunities for larks with her whenever Jia Lian was away. Blind to all this, Jia Lian thanked Jia Rong profusely and promised him a suitable reward.
‘If you can really arrange this for me, dear boy, I’ll buy you a pair of the prettiest little girls who are to be had and make you a present of them!’
They were by now approaching the gates of Ning-guo House.
‘You go in here and ask my Gran for the money to give to Yu Lu, Uncle. I’m going on to the other House to pay my respects to the old lady.’
Jia Lian smiled and nodded.
‘When you see her, don’t let on that I came here with you, will you?’
‘All right,’ said Jia Rong; then, leaning over, he added in a low voice in his uncle’s ear: ‘If you should happen to see Aunt Er today, don’t let impatience get the better of you! A scandal now will make it harder to arrange things later.’
‘Cheeky devil!’ said Jia Lian laughing. ‘Go on, be on your way now! I’ll be waiting for you here.’
While Jia Rong went on to the Rong mansion alone, Jia Lian turned into the gateway of Ning-guo House. The men-servants temporarily in charge there were waiting inside the gate to welcome him, with the other servants all lined up behind them. They clustered round him as he made his way up to the hall. There, for form’s sake, he asked them a few perfunctory questions before dismissing them and continuing on his way to the inner apartments.