Four foreign merchants waited in the reception room, grinning and obviously too ignorant of Chinese ways to know that it was kept for the lowest-ranking guests. Little Pink and I entered in modest silence, and one of their number, the fattest by far, let out a great shout. ‘Ah, musiciennes,’ he called in heavy accents. ‘Come in, girls. Come in. We’ve been on the road for months!’
Two of his companions roared with laughter. The third, a man with a long arched nose, leaned back on his couch, pulling himself slightly away from the others. He lay on his side, and bent one leg upwards at the knee. His trousers fell in graceful folds: Ghalib. I knew then what song to sing.
Jujube scampered in to fill their wine cups, and I used the moment to tell Little Pink that I wanted to go first. Normally, she would have hurried to make the strongest possible impression, but these were only merchants, and outlanders besides. She shrugged.
The strings thrummed as I sang a song in Khotanese, an autumn love song by a woman whose lover departed when the poplar leaf buds opened in the spring. ‘You wind your way,’ I finished, ‘upon long roads across the sands. I drop my head, to think of lovers’ time-bound vows.’ I hadn’t let myself remember Collator Wu for days, but somehow that old song stirred feelings that surprised me. My eyes grew moist and I quickly put my lute aside and knelt to pour the guests another round of wine.
Little Pink cleared her throat, preparing to play her first melody, but the largest and loudest of the foreigners beat his palms together and insisted I sit next to him and drink a cup. ‘I want you to explain those words to me in Soghdian, you little deva. What language was that? Not Persian, and not quite Soghdian, and certainly not Chinese.’ He laughed at his own wit, and the two beside him joined in.
I’ll tell you, sir,’ I murmured, giving him the kind of look that quiets with promises for some future time. ‘Only first I really ought to pour for the other gentleman, and then perhaps after she has played a song you’d like my friend to sit with us as well. She’s quite talented.’
The fat man chuckled. ‘Now, she’s a Chinese girl, by the look of her. Yes, yes, let’s hear her play.’
I eased over to the fourth man, refilled his cup, and saw that it really was the Persian trader who had taken me over the sands of the Takla Makan. He caught my wrist. ‘Tell me your name,’ he said quietly, ‘and where it is I know you from.’ I gave him the same promise-look, though perhaps not as convincingly, for I could only think: So, he doesn’t remember me, completely forgetting how much I had changed during the six years that had passed. He looked no older to me, though a few grey hairs now curled through his beard.
For all my care to deflect attention onto her. Little Pink frowned briefly in our direction before she began to play. It was easy enough to stay then, kneeling at the little table by Ghalib’s couch, and when Little Pink had finished, to tell her that the first guest wanted to speak with her. She had already seen that he seemed the leader, and so presumably the richest, of the group. In a few minutes, she and the three men were chattering in a broken mixture of Chinese and Soghdian, and playing a finger-guessing game.
‘Here,’ I told Ghalib, ‘I’m known as Dragonfly. But my few friends call me a name you gave me one evening between the Keriya River and Dun-huang, when I was a child who’d learned to speak a Persian word or two.’
‘Parrot!’ he said. ‘The little girl who could out-talk Umar.’
To keep from discussing my life at Lutegarden, which the thought of Wu had suddenly made sad to me, I asked him how he came to Liang-jou.
‘And how I came to travel with these louts?’ He laughed. ‘More than once I’ve crossed the Pamirs and that awful desert, only to turn round at Dun-huang. It seemed an interesting idea –and a profitable one – to travel farther on the Road this time. I’m bound for Chang-an, to see the capital of the Tang. So quickly. Little Parrot, give me another cupful and teach me more Chinese!’
His smile broadened, pushing up his round cheeks. I bent my head as I poured, to hide my face. Here was a man who liked me, a man who perhaps needed someone to instruct him in Chinese, a man bound for Chang-an. When next I played, I chose another song of love; I kept my eyes downcast until the final line, when I raised them to join with his.
I was deep in conversation with Ghalib when Mama Chen returned. The other three visitors clustered round Little Pink, who was laughing and showing off her soft, pretty hands by spinning a top that kept whirling off the little table. Mama Chen asked them if they would like to meet another of the talented musicians of the house, who also spoke some Soghdian. Yes, yes, of course, they said, and send in more wine with her. So she left to dispatch Nephrite with her flute and to mark the hour on their bill. It was after candle-lighting time now; the fee would double.
Ghalib drank heartily, but less so than the others, and remained clearheaded when my own vision began to swirl. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘You’d better take a cup of tea now, girl.’ Soon the fat man grunted and heaved himself to his feet. I heard Nephrite and Little Pink making it very clear that the gentlemen could not stay the night – Mama Chen would not allow it – and the three, disgruntled, made ready to leave.
‘Let’s go, Ghalib,’ one of the other traders said, with a hiccup. ‘This is a high-class place. Afraid you’ll have to leave that child you’ve been talking to all evening.’
Mama Chen glided to meet them at the door of the reception room and to take care of the bill. One of the fat man’s friends looked shocked, but the leader only turned to him and said, ‘I told you this house was something special.’ I signalled to Mama Chen in the usual quiet way that I wished to accompany the guests through the lamplit garden to the street. Her eyes flickered with surprise, but she nodded assent, and said aloud that all of us should walk out to the gate to say goodbye. Little Pink’s face showed her annoyance, but soon she basked in the traders’ cries of admiration over the strange rock that stood like a miniature mountain range beside the lily pond.
‘Will you come back to see me?’ I asked Ghalib in an undertone.
Perhaps he would, he said. If he had time. He was leaving for Chang-an in two days and had a lot to do. I suggested that surely his friends could take care of things and he could slip away for a few hours at least. ‘Oh yes. Little Parrot,’ he said, and his eyes laughed at me like the eyes of a father amused by the transparent deceptions of a child. ‘I know what you mean. If I come, I’ll come alone. And bring a gift for your mama here.’
He left with the others. My heart sank. I had panicked when I learned how quickly he was leaving – why hadn’t he told me sooner? – and done the worst possible thing, suggested a private meeting before he could think that it was his idea.
The next day he didn’t come. Nephrite and Little Pink were summoned to a country outing, but no one at all, except Glory’s latest patron, visited Lutegarden, and no one sent for me. I went to bed early with a headache and thought of how I would have to build up a regular clientele again now that Wu had left me. Then I thought of Nanny’s easy ways with men. Wondering what wordless persuasions she would have used on Ghalib, I mumbled her name and began to cry. I was still awake when the first light broke.
Collator Wu Suffers
the Fate of the Faithless
The Ming dynasty marketplace again, a time closer to your own than to that of the Tang: The storyteller spreads his mat and strikes a gong three times. A gang of urchins gathers. Soon a crowd begins to form.’
The feng-huang bird once only takes a mate; The duck and drake together spend their days. Let the betrayer of his lover’s faith Beware the voice that calls beyond the grave.
This poem tells us of the fidelity of the feng-huang bird and of the mandarin duck and drake, who mate for life, and even when the mate dies take no other. As for humans, the Old Man in the Moon ties a thread between a man and a woman who are fated to wed, and no one should attempt to deny it. This is why the virtuous widow does not wish to remarry and why an upright man does not desert a wife unless she is guilty o
f one of the seven legal grounds for divorce. Indeed, even in the case of irregular liaisons, if fidelity is pledged, a certain obligation is incurred. Thus we are taught that heaven holds us to our promises. It is just as the following verse says:
A vow unkept is like a broken branch;
A false-tongued lover’s a chameleon.
Justice comes in this life or the next.
Good for good, and bad with bad repaid.
It is told how during the Great Tang a certain courtesan took in her former lover after he had been reduced to a sore-covered beggar and nursed him back to health. Encouraging him to study, she spent all her money on his education. The young gentleman came first in the Imperial Examination, and the courtesan fulfilled destiny by becoming his proper wife. Their sons became great officials, too, none ranking lower than prefect of Tai-yuan. All this from the loyalty of a prostitute! If one for whom the six marriage rites of welcome have not been performed can be so faithful, how much more so ought men and women united by formal vows.
Members of the audience, listen today while I tell the story-with-poems entitled ‘Collator Wu Suffers the Fate of the Faithless’. In this story, we will, at first, present only one person, whose name was Wu Jiao-shou. It is told how, in the seventh month of a particular year in the Kai-yuan reign period of the Tang dynasty’s Brilliant Emperor, this young man arrived in Liang-jou, having been posted there from Lo-yang. Followed by his groom, he rode into that northwestern city on his fine roan gelding, and the eyes of all who saw him turned to follow the noble-looking youth. How would you say he was dressed?
Supple leather boots clasp graceful calves.
A satin gown enfolds a strong, straight chest.
On one slim finger, a gleaming red-jade ring;
Above a proud dark eye, a black silk cap.
He brushes road dust settled on his sleeve.
Waves an undyed fan pulled from his sash.
Indeed the scion of a learned house.
He’s what they call ‘blue-green more deep than blue’.
Now, this Mr Wu was indeed an example of ‘blue-green deeper than blue’, a pupil who surpassed his masters. From his childhood he had been praised for his accomplishments by all around him, especially for the technical perfection and the emotional refinement of his poetry. He was the youngest child of an old couple who already had five daughters. Consequently, he had always had his way and had come to have one weakness: he thought that other people existed only to serve his needs. After he had settled in his lodgings in Liang-jou, and had made the customary salutations to his superiors in the government, he began at once the execution of his duties.
But even an upright young man like Wu Jiao-shou must rest, and eventually he began to wish for some relaxation. Some of his co-workers invited him to join them at a gambling party, but this virtuous fellow never indulged in such spendthrift pastimes. Then another group carried him off with them to an establishment in the Entertainment Quarter, a place called Lutegarden House, run by one Mama Chen.
When this avaricious old woman saw the fresh face of the young man, she knew he was just the naive sort of youth who could add greatly to her hoard of treasure. Coming into the room where the men were eating and listening to an ancient ode played upon the classical chyn, she hurried up behind him and exclaimed, ‘Imperial Emissary Gao! How delightful to see you again after these many months! Why didn’t that dolt of a gatekeeper tell me it was you come back to see us again? Surely you have returned to renew your friendship with the beautiful Miss Saffron! I’ll send her in immediately to entertain you with her flute.’
Wu turned quickly, and answered, his neck flushing a dull purple. ‘Is the good dame addressing me? I am not named Gao, and I could never presume to become an imperial emissary. I am a mere collator of texts, and my humble surname is Wu.’
‘Oh, a thousand pardons, exalted Master Wu! I am an old woman and my eyes grow dim. You resemble a noble lord who recently – I am ashamed to say it – carried on a bit of a romance with one of my ill-disciplined girls. But now that I see your fine, broad brow and flashing eyes, I see that you could never be that elderly gentleman. Ai yo! How embarrassed this foolish old woman is!’
‘Really, my good dame, think nothing of it,’ Wu replied.
‘No, you must let me make up for this rudeness in some way,’ she said. ‘Let me make a gift of a ewer of wine for you and your party. This is a poor place, but we do have a rather special jug or two tucked away. And perhaps you’d like to hear some music that’s a bit livelier? We’ve a girl here who’s an absolute enchantress when she plays barbarian music on the lute.’
Perhaps you are wondering how that old woman could be so forward. Now, wouldn’t you agree that
Like a creeping weasel intent upon a bird’s egg.
The avaricious owner of a winehouse seeks out gold.
These unprincipled creatures will stop at almost nothing if they can gain in the matter.
Wu protested, but the shameless woman insisted on presenting the party with wine, and sure enough the lute player arrived carrying it. The young gentleman could hardly send the girl away, and indeed her downcast eyes and maidenly modesty marked her as someone different from the usual run of courtesans.
Soon the wine’s heat warmed Wu beyond the warmth of the summer evening. He loosened the collar of his robe, and rested his usually erect head on one hand. The musiciennes joined the party, and the chyn player, who was rather bold, told anecdotes of several gay blades and flower-fair ladies of the quarter.
‘I don’t object to such goings-on,’ young Wu said as the group began another round of toasts, ‘but I fear I may never find a young woman suitable to accompany me.’ Just then, the lute player raised her eyes to meet his, and Wu’s hot blood stirred as the seeds planted by the romantic music and the risqué stories began to sprout.
Let us not become too wordy but rather tell of this young player on the lute. Her father, a brave and noble general, had been cruelly murdered in an uprising on the far frontier, and her mother, a most dutiful young woman, had been stolen away to be wed against her will to the Dragon Monarch’s son. So although she came of a good family, the girl – whose name was Dragonfly – had fallen into the profession and had no way to rescue herself. Yet she was still quite young and so far had managed to resist the pressure of greedy Mama Chen to take a lover. Her music was her great passion, and she worked hard at learning and composing lyrics to accompany the songs she played so bewitchingly on her lute.
Now, on the evening of the first day of the ninth month, when autumn coolness had at last freshened the hot air of the city, young Wu felt drawn to visit Dragonfly in private at the Lutegarden House. In part this was the work of loneliness and bad companions, and in part the natural response of a spirited young man to the girl’s refinement and her beauty. Do not forget, good members of the audience, that the clever and artistic courtesans of the Great Tang were a different thing from the singsong girls and prostitutes of our own depraved times.
Yet there was another force at work on the heartstrings of Collator Wu. As if Mama Chen’s sly tricks were not enough, a hungry ghost, the restless spirit of Dragonfly’s former nanny, had taken a fancy to him. This hussy had been condemned, as punishment for her lustful ways, to roam this world in disembodied form. At night the ghost sent disturbing visions of ‘making clouds and rain’ with Dragonfly to haunt the young man’s dreams. It was through such stimulation of lewd thoughts in innocent young folk that the ghost consoled itself for having lost the ability to enjoy sensual gratification. Indeed, in its perversity, this hungry ghost sent similar scandalous versions into the bedchamber where Dragonfly lay mourning her lowly position in society and wondering how she might retain her purity. So one thing led to another, and soon, with the connivance of Mama Chen, the scholar and the beauty became lovers. Wu pledged himself to rescue Dragonfly from her life as an entertainer and to marry her properly as soon as he had amassed the necessary funds. One evening in Dragonfly’s roo
m she ground some ink, and he took up her writing-brush and wrote out on a piece of white silk his promise of marriage.
But alas for those who make hasty vows! Nearly a year after the start of young Wu’s affair with Dragonfly, as he pored over some ancient scholarly texts one evening, he heard a strange pounding at the door of his lodgings. He opened it, and a ragged old man with eyes that protruded like those of a great fish burst into the room, hobbling with amazing speed on a crooked crutch.
‘Ah, Master Wu! Forgive my impolite entrance, but I have some words for you,’ he said. Then he dosed his bulging red eyes, and throwing back his head, chanted:
Tie not the knot you wish not to untie!
The white-silk vow becomes, I trow, silk-white.
The Fairy Maiden now a fair-made ghost.
The Turtle-Husband huddles in the night.
Having finished, the strange old man struck his crutch three times on the floor of Collator Wu’s room and disappeared. The young man rubbed his eyes and stared. After much thought, he could make nothing of it at all and returned to his studies. Thus, good members of the audience, do mortals ignore at their own peril warnings sent from the supernatural world.
Let us put down one strand and tell again of the mother of Dragonfly, now the wife of the Dragon Monarch’s son. Gathering her courage and her womanly wiles, she asked her husband’s uncle to take on the form of a giant carp and spy upon the happenings near the pond in the garden of Lutegarden House. And so she learned of the irregular relationship into which circumstance and the lasciviousness of the nanny’s hungry ghost had forced her daughter. She decided that since it was not within her power to put a stop to the affair, she would do the next best thing: test the faithfulness of her daughter’s lover.
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