The Warning Voice

by Cao Xueqin

  ‘But caltrop-flowers are sweet-smelling,’ said Caltrop. ‘A lot of water-plants are. Even lotus-leaves and lotus-pods have a certain fragrance – not to be compared with the scent of flowers, perhaps; but in very still weather, especially very early in the morning or very late at night, they have a delicious, cool fragrance that is in some ways superior to that of flowers. Even caltrops themselves and cock’s heads and the roots and leaves of reed-grass have a lovely fresh scent after dew or rain; it makes you feel good just to smell it.’

  ‘To hear you speak,’ said Jin-gui, ‘anyone would think that orchid and cassia were not particularly fragrant.’

  Caltrop, warming to the argument, momentarily forgot Jin-gui’s taboo.

  ‘Ah now, orchid and cassia are quite different,’ she began; but before she could get any further, Moonbeam was pointing a finger in her face and crowing over her in malicious triumph:

  ‘You’ll catch it now! That’s the mistress’s name you’ve just said.’

  Caltrop was overcome with confusion and hurriedly apologized for her lapse.

  ‘I’m truly sorry, madam. It was a slip of the tongue. I hope you won’t hold it against me.’

  Jin-gui smiled magnanimously.

  ‘Oh, that doesn’t matter. You don’t need to worry about that. About this name of yours, though: I really don’t think that “Caltrop” is very appropriate. I should like to change it, but I don’t know whether you would be willing to let me.’

  ‘Oh, madam, what a thing to say!’ said Caltrop, smiling. ‘I am your chattel, to do with exactly as you wish; who am I to be willing or unwilling? If you wish to change my name, my name already is whatever you wish to change it to!’

  Jin-gui smiled, somewhat unpleasantly.

  ‘You may say that, but I fear your Miss Bao may be rather less happy about it.’

  ‘Ah no, madam. You see, when I was bought by the family, I used first to work for Mrs Xue: that’s how Miss Bao came to give me my name, not because I was Miss Bao’s own maid. Then after that I served the master. Miss Bao has nothing to do with me – especially now you are here. In any case, she’s a very sensible young lady – not at all the sort of person to make a fuss about a little thing like this.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Jin-gui: ‘in that case, since a water-lily is a much more appropriate flower to name someone after than a caltrop, I think we ought to call you “Lily”.’

  ‘Very good, madam, let that be my name then,’ said Caltrop, smiling.

  “Lily” she became then from that moment. Bao-chai, when she heard about it, appeared totally unconcerned.

  Xue Pan was in some respects like the general of old in whom ‘conquest did but breed appetite for further conquest’, for when, after his marriage to Jin-gui, he discovered that she had an attractive, rather coquettish maid called Moonbeam, he was continually calling to her to bring him things – cups of tea and the like – so as to have an opportunity of flirting with her. Moonbeam perfectly well understood what he was up to but had to behave circumspectly from fear of Jin-gui, whom she studied carefully for some sign which would indicate how she wanted her to respond.

  Jin-gui had indeed noticed Xue Pan’s interest in her maid and reasoned within herself as follows.

  ‘I’ve been wanting to deal with Caltrop, but so far haven’t found a way of getting at her. Since he’s already taken a fancy to Moonbeam, I might just as well let him have Moonbeam, because he’s sure to grow cooler towards Caltrop as a consequence and I shall be able to take advantage of that in order to get rid of Caltrop; and with Caltrop out of the way, settling Moonbeam’s hash ought to be easy, because Moonbeam is my own servant.’

  Having decided on a strategy, she had only to await a suitable opportunity of putting it into practice. Such an opportunity occurred one evening when Xue Pan, having drunk himself into a state of cheerful inebriation, called as was his wont to Moonbeam to bring him some tea. While Moonbeam was handing him the cup, he deliberately gave her fingers a squeeze; Moonbeam, with a very unnatural affectation of modesty, drew back her hand; and since neither of them had their minds on what they were doing, the cup crashed to the floor, splashing hot tea over Moonbeam’s skirt and everything else round about. Xue Pan tried to cover up his embarrassment by pretending that Moonbeam had not handed him the cup properly, while Moonbeam for her part said that the master had not ‘taken a proper hold’.

  Jin-gui hooted at them contemptuously.

  ‘You two really are a comedy! You must think I’m an idiot.’

  Xue Pan hung his head and laughed sheepishly and Moonbeam fled blushing from the room. When, not long after this, it was time to go to bed, Jin-gui tried to turn Xue Pan out of the bedroom and make him sleep elsewhere. She said she was tired of seeing him go around all the time looking as if he was wasting away with passion. Xue Pan smiled foolishly and said nothing.

  ‘If you want to do something, why don’t you tell me?’ she said. ‘All this groping in corners will get you nowhere.’

  Encouraged by her words and fortified by what he had drunk against any feeling of shame, he knelt down on the bed-covers beside her and seized her hand.

  ‘Listen, lover,’ he said: ‘if you will let me have your Moonbeam, I’ll give you anything you ask for – anything at all. If it’s human brains you want, I shall see that you have them.’

  ‘What nonsense you talk!’ said Jin-gui. ‘What do I care who you go to bed with? Just don’t make a fool of yourself by carrying on in front of the others, that’s all I ask.’

  Xue Pan was so pleased and grateful that it seemed he would never stop thanking her. That night he performed his conjugal duties with exemplary thoroughness. Every sinew was strained to give Jin-gui pleasure. He did not go out next morning, but hung around at home, waiting for an opportunity of exploiting his new-found licence.

  A little after midday Jin-gui rather pointedly went out in order to leave the coast clear. Xue Pan lost no time in setting to work on Moonbeam, who, since she now had a pretty good idea of her mistress’s intentions, put up only a token resistance to his advances. Carnal congress seemed imminent. But Jin-gui had been waiting for this moment only in order to frustrate it.

  Jin-gui had a maid called Orfie who had been with her in her mother’s house since she was a child. Orfie had lost both her parents when she was little and had no one else to look after her, so when she first entered service with the Xias, she was invariably referred to as ‘the little orphan’. Her name ‘Orfie’ was simply a convenient contraction of this. Orfie’s duties were normally of a rough and menial kind, but on this occasion she was employed by her mistress on a task requiring some finesse.

  ‘Orfie,’ said Jin-gui, ‘do you think you could tell Lily to fetch my handkerchief from my room and bring it to me? You needn’t let her know that it was I who sent you.’

  Orfie went off to look for Caltrop.

  ‘Miss Lily,’ she said when she had found her, ‘the mistress has left her handkerchief in her room. Why don’t you go and get it for her?’

  Caltrop had recently been puzzled by Jin-gui’s hostility, and, in her efforts to overcome it, was constantly thinking of things that she could do to please her. Since Orfie’s suggestion seemed to offer a means of winning favour, she sped off without a second thought to do the errand, bursting into the room at the very moment when Xue Pan and Moonbeam were in the interesting situation we have just described. She turned back, blushing to the tips of her ears, but not in time to escape the notice of the other two.

  Xue Pan himself was fairly unconcerned. Jin-gui was the only person he feared, and as Jin-gui had given her consent, he cared nothing about what anyone else might think. He had not even bothered to shut the door. But Moonbeam minded very much. Being by nature a disputatious, somewhat self-righteous young woman, she found it peculiarly galling that Caltrop of all people should have seen her at such a moment. Pushing Xue Pan away from her, she ran out of the room, protesting, with cries of angry complaint, that he had been attempting to
rape her.

  The effect of this upon Xue Pan was that all the excitement generated by his tussling with Moonbeam was transformed into animosity against Caltrop. He rushed outside and spat at her.

  ‘Little harlot! What do you mean by it, wandering around the place like a damned disembodied ghost?’

  He might have done her an injury, but Caltrop, sensing that she was in mortal danger, ran as fast as her legs would carry her and managed to get away. Abandoning the chase, he went back to look for Moonbeam but could find no trace of her. This increased his anger against Caltrop, whom he cursed once more in her absence. After dinner that evening, when he had once again drunk himself merry, he decided to take a bath. On testing the water with his foot and finding it to be too hot, he insisted that Caltrop had done it deliberately, intending to harm him, ran after her, stark naked as he was, and gave her a couple of kicks. Caltrop had long grown unused to such savage treatment; but things had now reached such a pass that she dared not complain and ran off to weep alone and nurse her injuries in silence.

  Meanwhile Jin-gui had secretly instructed Moonbeam to place herself at Xue Pan’s disposal that very night in Caltrop’s bedroom. She ordered Caltrop to move in with her, and when she refused, said she supposed that it was because she found her room dirty or was too lazy to wait on her at night. She pretended to think that it was Xue Pan who had inspired her refusal.

  ‘That master of yours is such a barbarian,’ she said. ‘He has only to look at a girl to want her for himself. Now he’s taken my maid away, yet he won’t let me have you in her place. What’s his idea, I wonder? Does he want to drive me to my death?’

  Xue Pan, for whose ears this was, of course, intended, became apprehensive that the difficulties Caltrop was making might once more prevent him from enjoying Moonbeam, and he came rushing into Caltrop’s room to rebuke her.

  ‘Don’t you realize, this is an honour your mistress is doing you? You do as you’re told and sleep with her, or I’ll give you a beating!’

  Caltrop had now no choice but to roll up her bedding and carry it into Jin-gui’s room. Jin-gui told her to make her bed up on the floor. This order too she had to obey. As soon as she had settled down for the night, Jin-gui called to her for some tea. Caltrop brought her the tea and lay down again. A little after that Jin-gui called to her to come and massage her legs. And so it went on, seven or eight times in the course of the night, so that it was impossible for Caltrop to get right off to sleep or even to rest properly.

  Now that Xue Pan had got Moonbeam, he was like a man who has come into possession of a priceless jewel. He forsook all other interests for her. This secretly enraged Jin-gui, who could not forbear some jealous mutterings when she was on her own.

  ‘Enjoy yourself while you can, my friend,’ she would say. ‘I shall get round to you in the end. And when I do, you had better not complain!’

  For the time being, however, she refrained from outbursts and set about laying a trap for Caltrop. About a fortnight after Caltrop moved into her room she suddenly pretended to be ill. She complained of agonizing pains in the heart and appeared unable to move her limbs. Nothing they did for her seemed to bring relief. The servants said it must have been brought on by something Caltrop had done to upset her.

  A couple of days later, as one of the maids was shaking out Jin-gui’s pillow, a cut-out paper mannikin fell out of it. It had the eight symbols of her nativity written on it and five needles sticking into it, one in the heart and one in each of the limbs. This item of news was thought sufficiently interesting to be reported to Aunt Xue, instantly throwing that poor lady into a highly inflammable state of nervous commotion. The effect the news had upon Xue Pan was even more violent. He was for having all the servants flogged immediately until one of them confessed to having planted the paper figure; but Jin-gui prevented him.

  ‘Why make the innocent suffer?’ she said. ‘I expect it’s Moonbeam who did it, to get me out of the way.’

  ‘That’s most unfair,’ said Xue Pan. ‘When, during this past week or two, has Moonbeam had the time to go inside your room?’

  ‘Who else could it have been then?’ said Jin-gui. ‘I suppose you don’t think I’d do it to myself? Moonbeam is the only one who’d dare go in my room.’

  ‘But Lily’s been in here with you all the time,’ said Xue Pan. ‘She must know, if anyone does. She’s the one to flog if we want to find out.’

  ‘What’s the good of flogging anyone?’ said Jin-gui. ‘They’ll never confess anything. If you ask me, you’d much better pretend you haven’t heard about it and let the matter drop. When all’s said and done, it doesn’t much matter if I die. You can always find yourself a better wife when you feel like it. If we’re going to be honest, the fact of the matter is, you all three hate me, don’t you?’

  She began crying bitterly. Xue Pan was so enraged that he snatched up a door-bar and rushed off in search of Caltrop straight away. He began hitting her with it as soon as he found her, on the head, on the face, on the body, shouting accusations at her but giving her no chance to deny them. Aunt Xue came running out in answer to Caltrop’s anguished cries and shouted to him to stop.

  ‘How can you beat the girl like that without first making an attempt to find out what has happened? She’s given us years of faithful service: it’s unthinkable that she’d do a thing like that. Time enough to start laying about you after you’ve made a serious attempt to get to the bottom of it.’

  When Jin-gui heard her mother-in-law saying this, she was afraid that Xue Pan might weaken. Her crying rose in pitch into a sort of plaintive yell.

  ‘You have monopolized Moonbeam now for over a fortnight and refused to let anyone but Lily sleep with me. You rush to Moonbeam’s defence when I say you ought to flog her, and now you get in a temper and start beating Lily. I don’t know why you don’t stop all this play-acting and get rid of me; then you will be free to pick a really rich, good-looking girl to marry.’

  Her words had the intended effect of further inflaming Xue Pan. Aunt Xue could see that her son was being manipulated and was thoroughly disgusted by the unscrupulous way in which Jin-gui maintained her hold on him. But what could she do? She knew the weakness of her son’s character and realized that his subservience to Jin-gui had already become a habit. Evidently he had seduced Jin-gui’s maid, that much was clear; yet Jin-gui was one moment accusing him of forcibly ‘monopolizing’ the girl, while the next moment she seemed to claim credit for deferring like a good wife to his wishes. And who could be responsible for the black magic? The proverb says that even the wisest judge will hesitate to pronounce on household matters. Adapting it to the present circumstances, it might be said that even a parent finds it difficult to pronounce on the marital problems of his offspring. Aunt Xue, certainly, felt quite helpless when confronted with those of her son. She could only shout at him in exasperation.

  ‘Worthless creature! Even a dog would behave in a more seemly manner than you do! Now, it seems, you have got your muddy paws onto your wife’s own maid that she brought with her from her home. You’ve heard her yourself accusing you of taking the girl away from her. How are you going to show your face anywhere when other people get to hear about it? And this other business: Heaven only knows who is responsible; yet here you go, lashing out at this poor child here before making the slightest effort to find out what really happened. We all know what a fickle creature you are, but really! What a return for the years of loyal service she has given you! I don’t care how dissatisfied you are with her, you ought not to beat her. I’ll get a dealer here right away and have her sold; that’s the only way to settle this. Then you won’t be troubled by her any more. Come, girl!’ she said to Caltrop, ‘get your things together and come with me.’ She turned to the other servants. ‘Quickly now, go and get the dealer! It doesn’t matter what we sell her for; just let’s get rid of this – this thorn in the flesh, and perhaps we shall have a bit of peace again in this household!’

  Xue Pan, seeing that h
is mother was really angry, stood with bowed head throughout this tirade and made no attempt to reply. It was Jin-gui’s strident wail from inside the window that answered her.

  ‘Whether you want to sell the girl or not, Mrs Xue, I think you might leave me out of it. Are you implying that I’m such a vinegar-wife that I can’t tolerate an inferior? And what do you mean, “thorn in the flesh”? Thorn in whose flesh? Even if I did hate her so much, I wouldn’t let him have my own maid to replace her with.’

  ‘What sort of manners are these?’ Aunt Xue was trembling all over and her voice was choking. ‘Since when did it become acceptable for a young woman to shout at her mother-in-law through the window? I was under the impression that you had been brought up in an educated household. All this shouting and screaming – I can’t make out what you are trying to say.’

  Xue Pan stamped his foot and shouted at Jin-gui despairingly.

  ‘Oh stop, stop! You’ll have everyone laughing at us.’

  Jin-gui, thinking, no doubt, that having gone so far she might as well go all the way, only shouted the louder.

  ‘Why should I care if people laugh at us? Your darling chamber-wife has been trying to do me in. Is this a time to start worrying about whether people are laughing at us or not? Why don’t you keep her and sell me instead? Everyone knows how rich the Xues are and how they make use of their money in order to trample on other people. And everyone knows about their fine relations who will always step in and slap anyone down for them who is giving them trouble. What are you waiting for? I don’t know why you married me in the first place if you find me so unsatisfactory. I’m sure I didn’t ask you to come running round to our house, begging and entreating my mother to let you have me as your wife.’

  She rolled about on the bed, weeping and screaming and beating her bosom. Xue Pan was beside himself. Whether he rebuked her, reasoned with her, beat her, or begged her to be silent, it seemed unlikely that anything he did would have much effect. He could only stump in and out of the room, sighing and groaning inarticulately, and concluded by exclaiming, with great bitterness, that he was ‘a very unlucky man’.