The Golden Lotus, Volume 2

by Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng

“There is no hurry,” Yueniang said. “Stay another day.”

  “My mother is not well,” Guijie said, “and there is no one to look after her. I will come and see you again in the fifth month.”

  She kowtowed to Ximen Qing. Yueniang gave her some cakes and a tael of silver. When she had had some tea, she went away.

  Ximen Qing had put on his ceremonial clothes and was on his way to the outer court when Ping’an came and said that General Jing had come. Ximen Qing went to greet him, and they made reverences to one another in the great hall.

  “I haven’t been to see you, and I have not yet congratulated you upon your promotion,” General Jing said.

  “And I have not called to thank you for sending me such a splendid present,” Ximen Qing replied.

  When they had exchanged greetings and taken tea, General Jing said: “I see your horse is waiting for you. Where are you going?”

  “Yesterday,” Ximen said, “Censor Song and their Excellencies An, Qian, and Huang, used my house for a reception to Cai the new Governor. Cai is the Imperial Tutor’s ninth son. He gave me a card, and I am going to call upon him. I must go now because he may be leaving at any moment.”

  “I have come to ask a favor of you,” General Jing said. “You know that Song’s term of office will expire early in the new year. I expect there will be an inspection of all the officers, and I have come to you in the hope that you will mention my name to him. I discovered that he was here yesterday, and that is why I have called. If any promotion comes to me, I shall owe it to you.”

  “We are good friends,” Ximen Qing said, “I shall be glad to do anything I can. Give me your record of service. He will be coming here for another party the day after tomorrow and I will speak to him then.”

  Jing rose and bowed. “I am very much obliged to you. Here is my record of service.” He took it from an attendant and handed it to Ximen Qing. It said:

  Jing Zhong, Garrison Commander of Qinghe, and officer in command of troops in various districts of Shandong. Thirty-two years of age. Born at Tanzhou. In consequence of the exploits of his ancestors, he was given the rank of captain. He passed through the military academy and has been promoted by degrees to his present post in command of troops in Jizhou, etc.

  When Ximen Qing had read this, Jing brought out a list of presents and asked him to accept them. Ximen saw: “Two hundred measures of fine rice.”

  “What is this?” he said, “I cannot possibly accept it. If I did, there would be no point whatever in our friendship.”

  “Siquan,” Jing said, “if you do not want it, you can give it to his Excellency. You must not refuse. If you do, I will never trouble you again.”

  After much demur, Ximen accepted. “When I have spoken to him, I will let you know,” he said.

  They drank tea again, and Jing went away. Ximen Qing mounted his horse and, with Qintong in attendance, went to see Governor Cai.

  When Ximen had gone, Yuxiao, who had helped him to dress, went to see Jinlian.

  “Mother,” she said, “why didn’t you stay longer in the inner court last night? Mother said several nasty things about you. She said that, as soon as you heard Father coming from the other court, you dashed after him. She said you got hold of him so tightly that you wouldn’t let him go, even to the Third Lady, whose birthday it was. And the Third Lady said she wasn’t going to enter into a competition with you; he might go to any room he liked.”

  “What can I do to clear myself?” Jinlian said. “They are not blind. Why couldn’t they see that he never came here at all?”

  “He comes to you so often,” Yuxiao said. “And now the Sixth Lady is dead, they don’t see where else he can go.”

  “Chickens cannot piddle, but they have to get rid of their water somehow,” Jinlian said. “One woman has died, but there is another to take her place.”

  “Mother was angry with you because you asked for the fur coat without speaking to her about it first. She scolded Father when he gave back the key. She said it was lucky for you the Sixth Lady was dead or you wouldn’t have had a chance to get the things. If she had been alive, you would only have been able to look at them.”

  “How absurd!” Jinlian said. “He is at liberty to do what he thinks fit. She is not my mother-in-law. It is not for her to control me. So she said I wouldn’t let him go, did she? Well, I didn’t put a cord about him. What nonsense!”

  “I have come to tell you this so that you will know how matters stand. You mustn’t mention it to anybody else. Guijie has gone, and the Great Lady is getting ready to go out. You will have to get ready too.”

  Yuxiao went away again. Jinlian decked herself with flowers and ornaments and powdered her face before the mirror. She told Chunmei to go and ask Yulou what color she was going to wear.

  “Since we are still in mourning, Father wishes us all to wear plain clothes,” Yulou said.

  The ladies decided to wear white hairnets with pearl bandeaux, and plain-colored clothes. Yueniang alone wore a white headdress with a gold top, an embroidered coat, and a green skirt. One large sedan chair and four small ones were waiting for them. They took leave of Aunt Wu, the nuns, and old woman Pan, and set out to Ying Bojue’s house to celebrate his baby’s first month.

  Ruyi’er and Yingchun had the food that Ximen Qing had left and a jar of Jinhua wine. They set out these things, took another pot of grape wine from the jar, and, at midday, invited old woman Pan, Chunmei, and Miss Yu to come and enjoy them. Miss Yu played and sang for them.

  “I understand that Miss Shen sings that song about hanging up the portraits very well,” Chunmei said, as they were enjoying their meal. “Why shouldn’t we send for her and get her to sing to us?”

  Yingchun was going to send Xiuchun but, at that moment, Chunhong came in to warm his hands at the fire.

  “Now, you thievish little Southerner,” Chunmei said to him, “didn’t you go with the ladies?”

  “No,” Chunhong said, “Father told Wang Jing to go and said I was to stay here.”

  “You must be frozen, you little Southerner, or you wouldn’t have come to warm your hands.” She asked Yingchun to give him some wine. “When he has had it,” she said, “we will get him to go for Miss Shen, and she shall come to sing for Grandmother.”

  When Chunhong had drunk his wine, he went to the inner court. Miss Shen was drinking tea with Aunt Wu, Ximen Dajie, Yuxiao, and the nuns.

  “Sister Shen,” Chunhong said, “my aunt wants you to go and sing for her.”

  “Your aunt is here,” Miss Shen said. “What are you talking about?”

  “I mean Aunt Chunmei,” the boy said.

  “Why does she want me?” Miss Shen said. “Miss Yu is there.”

  “Go, Miss Shen,” Aunt Wu said, “and come back to us later.” But Miss Shen would not go.

  Chunhong went back and told Chunmei that he could not persuade her to come.

  “Tell her I want her. Then she will come,” Chunmei said.

  “I did tell her, but she wouldn’t pay any attention. When I said my aunt wanted her, she cried: ‘What aunt are you talking about?’ I said: ‘Aunt Chunmei.’ Then she said: ‘Why should I bother about her? Miss Yu is there, and that’s enough. Who is she to have the audacity to send for me? I am busy. I’m singing for Aunt Wu.’ Aunt Wu told her to come, but she wouldn’t.”

  Chunmei flew into a temper. Her ears grew red, and her face became purple. Nobody could stop her. She rushed to Yueniang’s room, shook her finger at Miss Shen, and upbraided her.

  “How dare you say to the boy: ‘What aunt are you talking about?’ and: ‘How has she the audacity to send for me?’ Who are you? Are you a general’s wife that I have no right to send for you? You are just a thievish strumpet who runs around from one family to another. Before you have been here any time at all, you begin trying to give yourself airs. What songs do you think you know? You know about a couple of lines, one here and one there. The sort of stuff you sing is the veriest doggerel, never written down on paper. Yo
u know a few heathenish songs and a few crazy tunes, and you make all this fuss. I have heard some of the finest singers there are. You simply don’t count. That whore, Wang Liu’er, may think a lot about you, but, I assure you, I don’t. I don’t care how much you try to follow in her footsteps, I’m not afraid of you. Get out of here at once.”

  Aunt Wu checked her. “You must not be so uncivil,” she said.

  Miss Shen, surprised at being scolded in this way, could only blink. She was angry but she dared not speak. At last she said: “Sister seems to be very annoyed, but I didn’t say anything wrong to the boy. Why does she come and insult me like this? If this is no place for me, there are plenty of other places I can go to.”

  This made Chunmei more angry still. “You wandering vagabond of a strumpet! If you are such a high-principled woman, why do you go begging clothes and food outside your own family? Get out of here and never come back again.”

  “I don’t depend upon this place for my living,” Miss Shen said.

  “If you did, I should tell the boys to pull your hair out.”

  “You maid,” Aunt Wu said, “what makes you so uncivil today? Go to the other court.”

  Chunmei did not move. Miss Shen cried and got down from the bed. She said good-bye to Aunt Wu, packed her clothes, and went away without waiting for a sedan chair. Aunt Wu told Ping’an to send Huatong with her to Han Daoguo’s house.

  Chunmei, still fuming, went back to the outer court. Aunt Wu looked at Ximen Dajie and Yuxiao. “Chunmei must have been drinking,” she said. “She would not have been so unmannerly if she hadn’t. It made me very uncomfortable. She ought to have let Miss Shen go in her own good time. Why should she tell her to get out at once? She wouldn’t even let a boy take her away. It is too bad.”

  “I imagine they have been drinking,” Yuxiao said.

  When Chunmei got back to her party, she said: “I wish I had boxed her ears. Then she would have known what sort of woman I am. I wasn’t going to let her get away with behavior like that.”

  “You must remember that, when you cut one branch of a tree, you hurt the other branches,” Yingchun said. “Don’t forget Miss Yu is here.”

  Miss Yu is a very different sort,” Chunmei said. “She has been coming here for years and everybody likes her. She never refuses to sing if she is asked. She is not in the least like that strumpet. What songs does she know? Always the same few lines from the same few ditties, extremely vulgar, and not at all the sort of thing to be Song in a decent house like this. I don’t want to hear her sing. I believe she is trying to put herself in Miss Yu’s place.”

  “That is true enough,” Miss Yu said. “Last night, when the Great Lady asked me to sing, she took the lute away from me. But don’t be angry with her. She has no idea how she ought to behave here, and she doesn’t know the respect that is due to you.”

  “That’s what I told her,” Chunmei said. “I said: ‘Go and tell Han Daoguo’s wife. I don’t care.’”

  “Sister,” old woman Pan said, “why let yourself be so upset?”

  “Let me give you a cup of wine to make you calmer,” said Ruyi’er.

  “This daughter of mine always flies into a temper when she is provoked,” Yingchun said. “Now, Miss Yu, pick out one of your best songs and sing it for her.”

  Miss Yu took up her lute. “I will sing ‘Ying Ying Made Trouble in the Bedchamber’ for Grandmother and Sister Chunmei.”

  “Sing it well and you shall have some wine,” Ruyi’er told her.

  Yingchun took a cup of wine and said to Chunmei: “Now, Sister, no more tempers. Drink this cup of wine from your mother’s hand.”

  This made Chunmei laugh. “You little strumpet!” she said, “how dare you call yourself my mother? Miss Yu, don’t sing that song. Sing ‘The River Is in Flood, and the Water Has Reached My Door.’”

  Miss Yu took her lute and sang the first line: ‘The flowers are dainty and the moon delightful.’ They enjoyed their wine.

  When Ximen Qing returned from the wharf where he had visited Cai, Ping’an said: “A messenger has been from Captain He to ask you to go early to the office tomorrow. Some robbers have been arrested, and they are to be tried. Prefect Hu has sent a hundred copies of the new calendar; and General Jing, a pig, a jar of wine, and four packets of silver. I gave them to brother-in-law, and he took them to the inner court. We did not send a card in return because the servant said he would call again this evening. I gave a return card and a qian of silver to his Lordship Hu’s servant. Your kinsman, Master Qiao, has sent a card asking you to take wine with him tomorrow.”

  Then Daian came, bringing a return card from Song. “I took the things to his office,” the boy said. “His Excellency said he would settle up with you tomorrow, and he gave me and the men five qian of silver and a hundred copies of the new calendar.”

  Ximen Qing went into the great hall. Chunhong hurried to warn Chunmei and the others.

  “Are you still drinking?” he said. “Father has come back.”

  “What if he has, you little Southerner?” Chunmei said. “He won’t interfere with us. The ladies are not at home, and he won’t come here.”

  They went on drinking and joking, and nobody left the party. Ximen Qing went to Yueniang’s room. Aunt Wu and the nuns went to the adjoining room. Yuxiao took his clothes and got something ready for him to eat.

  Ximen Qing summoned Laixing and said to him: “You must see about preparing another feast. On the thirtieth, Censor Song is going to have a party here, and, on the first, the two eunuchs, Liu and Xue, Major Zhou and the others, are coming.”

  When Laixing had gone, Yuxiao asked Ximen what kind of wine he would like.

  “Open the jar that General Jing has just sent,” he told her. “I would like to taste it and see if it is any good.”

  Then Laian came and said he was going to take a man to meet Yueniang and the other ladies. Yuxiao asked him to unseal the jar. Then she poured out some wine and handed it to her master. It was a beautiful shade of green, and rather pungent. Ximen Qing asked for more. Food was brought, and he had his meal. Laian took some soldiers with lanterns to escort the ladies home.

  They came in, wearing their fur coats. Sun Xue’e was the only one to kowtow to Ximen and Wu Yueniang. Then she went to the other room to see Aunt Wu and the nuns. Yueniang sat down and said: “Mistress Ying seemed very glad to see us. Her neighbor, Madam Ma, and Brother Ying’s sister-in-law, Miss Du, and several other ladies were there, perhaps ten in all. There were two singing girls. The baby is big and chubby, but Chunhua seems thinner and darker than she used to be. Her long face is not very beautiful. It looks just like a donkey’s. She is not at all well, and the household is in a mess, for there are not enough people to look after it. When we came away, Brother Ying kowtowed and thanked us most effusively. He asked us to thank you for the presents you had sent.”

  “Did Chunhua dress and come out to see you?” Ximen Qing asked.

  “Of course, she did. She has eyes and a nose like everybody else. She is not a spirit. Why shouldn’t she come out to see us?”

  “Oh, the poor maid!” Ximen said. “If I put a few black beans on her, I’m sure some pig would run off with her.”

  “You shouldn’t talk like that,” Yueniang said. “You always try to make it appear that nobody is worth looking at except your own wives.”

  Wang Jing, who was standing beside them, said: “When Uncle Ying saw the ladies coming, he didn’t come out to welcome them. He ran to a little room and peeped through the window. I caught him there, and I said: ‘Old gentleman, you are lacking in propriety. ‘What are you looking for?’ He kicked me out.”

  “The rascal!” Ximen Qing said, laughing. “When he comes tomorrow, I will cover his face with dust.”

  “Yes,” Wang Jing said, and laughed too.

  Yueniang shouted at him. “Don’t tell such lies, you young rascal. He didn’t look at us at all. You are telling stories. We never saw him all day long, except when we were leaving and
he came to kowtow to us.”

  Wang Jing went away. Yueniang got up and went to see her sister-in-law and the nuns in the next room. Ximen Dajie, Yuxiao, and the maids and serving women came to kowtow to her.

  “Where is Miss Shen?” Yueniang said.

  Nobody answered. At last Yuxiao said: “Miss Shen has gone.”

  “Why didn’t she wait for me?” Yueniang asked.

  Aunt Wu saw that the business could not be kept hidden. She told Yueniang of the quarrel between Chunmei and Miss Shen. Yueniang was angry. “If she didn’t wish to sing, why should she?” she said. “The maid has no business to be so conceited and undisciplined as to curse her. The master of this house does not behave properly himself, and the maids do what they like. The whole household is topsy-turvy.” She turned to Jinlian: “You ought to keep her in order instead of letting her behave so outrageously.”

  “I have never seen such a blind mule as Miss Shen,” Jinlian said, laughing. “If the wind didn’t blow, the trees wouldn’t shake. She goes from one person’s door to another, and singing is her business. When she is asked to sing, she should do so with a good grace. If she made a fuss and gave herself airs, Chunmei was right to tell her what she thought about her.”

  “All very well,” Yueniang said, “but if she goes on like this, people, whether good or bad, simply won’t stand it. They’ll go away. You will do nothing to keep her in order.”

  “I don’t see why I should punish my maid because she put this blind strumpet in her place.”

  Yueniang grew angry. Her face flushed.

  “Very well, spoil your maid, and she will drive all our relatives and neighbors away.”

  She went to Ximen Qing, and he asked her what was the matter.

  “I expect you know,” Yueniang said. “You have such polite young ladies for your maids. Now, one of them has been cursing Miss Shen and making her go away.”

  “But why wouldn’t she sing for her?” Ximen said, smiling. “Don’t worry. Tomorrow, I’ll send her two taels of silver, and that will put matters right.”

  “Miss Shen’s box is still here. She didn’t take it away,” Yueniang said. She saw that Ximen Qing was laughing. “There you are, laughing, instead of sending for the maid and giving her a scolding. I don’t see anything to laugh at.”