On his side, on his back, he turned, and back again.”
“It is beautiful,” Tso-tze said, “although I do not quite follow its meaning. Is it about love?”
“The Shr Jing abounds in love poetry and also songs of the seasons and war and statecraft.” She nestled the book upon her womb. “Wu Lin-kua is not to be mocked again.”
And she read some more, and for hours. Each day was now filled with less work and more reading. Mi Tso-tze sometimes listened and sometimes slept. When Lao Lao first saw this, he shuddered.
“The sky shall fall upon us, mistress,” he said. “We are doomed if you keep on with this.”
“You best get indoors then, Lao Lao,” she said.
Lao Lao moaned and ran away. But in time, he came to ignore the fact that his mistress had learned what only men should know, although he could not read or write a single character. Snapdragon did not make any fuss. Certainly, Lao Lao had told her, but she could not see it for herself. Mo Li made it a point to close her eyes to it, although she probably gossiped in the Jade Heart kitchen. Chi Lin did not care who knew now. She was about to give the household a man child and, if that did not give her easement to read harmlessly, she had underestimated her growing status.
2
Summer made bolder still with high heat and stickiness. Rain came more frequently, a welcome to cool off the day. But Chi Lin worried that she was past her time, because the child did not come. Perhaps Heaven was peeved by her reading and Lao Lao was correct. She could not tell. But in the last days, she read less as an appeasement, just in case. One afternoon, after a cleansing morning rain, porters arrived in the courtyard with a chair. Willow stood nearby.
“Willow is here, mistress.”
“Willow?”
Chi Lin managed to get to the porch, where she received the handmaiden fondly. Willow had not been around to see her in at least a moon — perhaps two.
“Why has a chair be brought?” Chi Lin asked. “I am not to tour again, am I?”
“No, mistress,” Willow replied. “The Master of the House has visitors who have expressed a desire to visit with you.”
Chi Lin wondered. Was it her father? Perhaps her sister bound for the nunnery. Certainly not her crippled brother.
“Who is it, Willow? I am too tender to be left to guessing.”
“It is Commissioner Ai-lo Wun-kua and his wife.”
“Ah.”
This pleased Chi Lin, so much so, she groped for Tso-tze to help her to the chair. But after two steps, she halted.
“I would be pleased to see them,” she said. “The commissioner is a kind man.”
“But she will not be able to walk there and the chair will be a challenge,” Tso-tze snapped, quite put out that anyone would suggest such a thing.
“Please tell the Commissioner that I am well enough, but near to full term.”
“Past full term,” Tso-tze added.
“He will be disappointed,” Willow said. “But he cannot come here, surely.”
“Surely not,” Tso-tze snapped.
Chi Lin was disappointed. A conversation with Ai-lo Wun-kua would be stimulating indeed. What a disappointment that he could not enter the Silver Silence while she was in her condition. Chi Lin made it to the seat on the porch, and then watched the porters take away the chair, Willow in tow.
“It is for the best, mistress,” Tso-tze said.
“Perhaps.”
Less than an hour passed and the chair returned, this time filled with the Commissioner’s wife. Chi Lin was glad to see her. The woman wobbled in the chair, the porters having difficulty because she was a tall woman. But once the chair settled to the cobblestones, the Commissioner’s wife was out of the chair and approaching Chi Lin, hands outstretched.
“Child,” she said. “My husband is disappointed that you could not come see him in your father-in-law’s ke-ting, but I have come to you, as it is more appropriate.”
“Welcome, madam,” Chi Lin said, standing unsteadily with Mi Tso-tze help.
“My husband has brought you a gift, which perhaps is more proper to present to you here, in the quiet of your own pavilion.” She turned back to the chair and grabbed a thick bamboo scroll. “And here it is.”
Chi Lin squinted. Her father had many books in bamboo rolls, but the style of this one was older, paper and silk rag being more the fashion.
“Tso-tze,” Chi Lin said, and the maid fetched the roll, bowing to the Commissioner’s wife as she took it.
Chi Lin looked at the work, but could not discern which one it was.
“It is a fine rendition of the Chun-chiu,” the wife said.
“The Spring and Autumn Annals,” Chi Lin replied, gasping with joy. “This is too kind of your husband.”
“Not so,” the woman said, now on the porch. “It is an essential work. I have read it through and find it most engrossing.”
Mi Tso-tze gazed at the woman as if she was some new species of water buffalo. Chi Lin touched the book and began to take it into her own hands, when she experienced a sharp pain, sharper than anything so far in her blossoming. Then a warm wetness cascaded from beneath.
“What is happening?” she asked, alarmed.
The Commissioner’s wife stared at the ground.
“You have let your water go,” she said, laughing. “It has started, and almost your time.” She looked to Tso-tze. “Take your mistress inside.” She yelled to the porters. “Return your chair and tell the Jade Heart hall that the baby comes.”
“Will they send someone?” Chi Lin asked.
“For what reason?” the wife asked. “Are you the Emperor’s wife?”
“But what shall I do?”
“What is natural? But have no fear. I have done this six times myself and can advise you as you go.”
Chi Lin suddenly experienced a horrific pain and felt the baby stir.
“He wants to come out,” the wife said. “That is all.” She turned to Tso-tze. “Do not stand there like sleeping ox. Get her inside, and then fetch clean rags and a knife.”
“A knife?” Chi Lin asked.
“You will see. Did not your mother teach you anything?”
Chi Lin shook her head, and then winced with pain. Tso-tze guided her inside.
3
In her lifetime, Chi Lin had been stung by a bee, scraped in a fall and even had had a stomach distemper, all of which were painful. But she had never been so overcome with pain as she was now. It came in spurts, not all at once — a pulsating fire that made her wish she never had seen Gao Lin and his manhood. Although she was inclined to sit on the chair or climb into bed, the Commissioner’s wife told her to squat near the table and hold briskly to its edge. Then she offered her own hand. With each wave of pain, Chi Lin saw red and gripped first the Commissioner’s wife’s hand, and then Tso-tze, who wept, for all it was worth.
When Lao Lao showed up, he was immediately chastised.
“Who is this?” the Commissioner’s wife shouted.
“It is the custodian of the hall,” Tso-tze replied.
“Leave, man. This is no place for you. Leave at once or Heaven will pollute your heart and the birth shall go awry.”
Lao Lao shook his hands and ran like lightning after thunder. Snapdragon, however, laughed and approached the table.
“The ghost baby will be born,” she said, and then began to dance. No one shooed her away, because her voice was overpowered by Chi Lin’s screams.
As the pain became ever-present, Chi Lin pushed as best she could, the Commissioner’s wife doing nothing more than allowing her wrists to be bruised, and occasionally looking underneath the squatting woman.
“You are doing well, Purple Sage,” she said. “You are lucky I am here to give you company. My six were born alone and I could not scream. It would have disturbed my lord. You can scream all you want. Your lord is far away at the Yellow Springs — if we are to subscribe to the current fiction.”
Chi Lin found the wife’s voice mere patter �
� no meaning and far from soothing, but she did note between pains that she was encouraged to continue and that there was progress. However, it seemed as if the baby would never come, that he liked his warm home inside her.
“It is time to leave,” she huffed. “You must leave me and take up your place.”
Then, one last excruciating bolt and the baby dropped free. Chi Lin felt the Commissioner’s wife groping beneath her, and then she heard Mi Tso-tze say what are you doing with the knife and the wife replying Does not any mother tell their daughters of these things? Then it was over. The baby cried, and Chi Lin was helped into bed.
4
Purple Sage was exhausted, a strange haze clouding her mind. She wanted to sleep, but instead she drifted in a dream world partially awake. Then she was astounded, because her son was thrust into her arms. She peered at him — his black eyes seeming to see her, but she knew better. His creamy skin was soft to her touch.
“He is fine,” she whispered.
“Yes, mistress. He will be a credit to the household.”
Then the truth rushed upon her. This little button who wiggled gently in her arms would find himself elsewhere. She wanted to lock him in her arms forever. Gently, she kissed his forehead, and then wept. She felt him released from her arms as the dream returned — the haze overcoming her. When she woke again, her son was no longer with her.
Chi Lin heard voices at the far end of the hall. She tried to see and, at first, could only discern a cluster of women dressed in bright red robes — all but one, who wore a lilac tunic. She recognized her mother-in-law’s voice, gravelly and doting. Then there was Jasmine’s, proud and supercilious. Then came a soft voice. I shall regard your son as my son, it said. Chi Lin knew. This was the amah ceremony. Her brightest joy was being given over to the amah’s care. But the address of motherhood was directed at Jasmine not her. Chi Lin gasped, suppressed a tear and rolled over to hide the sight.
In her misty eyes, she awoke to see the Old Lady of the House standing over her. It was the first time this woman had set foot in the Silver Silence. Her mother-in-law smiled wanly. Beside her stood the Commissioner’s wife. Both women were gentle.
“Purple Sage,” the Old Lady said. “You have done well.”
“He is my child,” she whispered.
“In your heart,” her mother-in-law replied. “You will see him always, and you have earned the right to name him.”
“Ming-kuan,” Chi Lin said, without hesitation. She had considered this name for weeks. “Ming-kuan.”
“We shall see,” the Old Lady replied. “Rest now. You must become strong for the work. You are an honorable Auntie and all the children of the house look upon you as a blessing. You have done well. Very well, indeed.”
Chi Lin knew that now she would gain further status. But this was not what she wanted. She wanted her baby, to love and caress. She wanted to play with his little fingers as they budded and to see him crawl and walk and run. She knew she would, but as a household fixture not as an adoring mother. He would bow to her and call her Auntie, much like his brothers and sisters did.
She drifted into the haze again. She stirred. The hall was dark. She was alone.
“Mi Tso-tze.”
“Yes, mistress.”
Not alone. Her faithful maid servant had fallen asleep near the bed and stirred now. When her shadowy form loomed, Chi Lin grasped her wrist.
“I am sore, mistress,” Tso-tze said.
“How so?”
“You gripped me during your time. You do not recall it?”
Chi Lin recalled it. She released Tso-tze’s arm.
“I do recall it. I do. But what am I to do now? They have taken him away.”
Tso-tze remained silent. She stroked her mistresses’ shoulder. Chi Lin had nothing more to recall. So she returned to slumber in this Hall of Silver Silence.
Chapter Twenty
Mistress Purple Sage
1
Work can be a savior in times of stress and disappointment. It can distract and concentrate attention to details other than those of the heart. When the mind and fingers are engaged, striving for perfection, the heart can bear most anything. Thus, Chi Lin managed to bury her grief at losing her son to the First Wife through sewing and mending and feeding the worms. At first she took no notice of the improvement of her status in the house. The work was much the same as it was before, but she was no longer summoned and told where to report. When she appeared for the sewing, her mother-in-law was surprised to see her, but welcomed her nonetheless. The only formal task subject to a schedule was the tour of the ji-tzao, and that was under the First Wife’s jurisdiction.
As the seasons progressed, Chi Lin did notice changes. Her advice was sought by the servants about particular stitches which she had mastered. In the silk ji-tzao, the workers turned to her to direct their duties. She had become a driving force and supervised the business of the cocoons. On some days, when she thought of her child, she would think to remain in the Silver Silence and read or attend her personal sewing. But then she would always change her mind and head to the shrine, and then to her chores.
At the shrine she would linger, sometimes with Mi Tso-tze holding the san-tze, sometimes not, her maid having her own chores to attend to in her mistress’ absence. Chi Lin’s routine before Wu Hung-lin’s effigy was standard, but her words were not. She offered up prayers to him and asked advice, always awaiting an answer, but never to hear one. But she came to love the man, perhaps because he did not intrude upon her daily life and he never had befouled her flesh.
“We have added five golden koi to the pond today,” she told him. “The yuan-wei flowers are happy there. They are as purple as I am, although they have golden beards, which I have not.”
Chi Lin loved the pool and would sit there with her hand caressing the surface, all the while drifting back to her childhood and her days sitting beside the pond at home. She thought of her mother more and sometimes her poor sister, lost now to the nunnery.
Chi Lin rarely mentioned her son at the shrine until one morning when she made a full accounting to Wu Hung-lin of all his children.
“Wu Lin-kua is becoming a fine scholar,” she said. “I have seen him improve steadily. It would be better if Chou-fa excelled at it, because the scholar’s lot will fall to him when Heaven sees fit to make your first son the Master of the House. As for Wu Ming-kuan, he took his first step last week. I was not there to see it, but I have watched him crawl and waddle in Jasmine’s ke-ting, a miracle of nature, which he has become.”
She grinned, but would speak no more of it because Tso-tze was there this day and Chi Lin feared to weep before her handmaiden, because Tso-tze would join her – most improper conduct at the shrine.
“The girls are well,” she continued and said no more on that score, because she worried about Sapphire, who was not well — shy and slow-witted, morose at times and, at other times, argumentative.
As another year drew to a close, Chi Lin was a constant figure in the household — a welcome sight to both servant and relative. She often conversed with Pearl and Jade, who were learning a range of useful pursuits for young ladies beyond their sewing. They applied themselves to painting and singing acquired from their mother. Their p’i-p’a playing skills were rudimentary, befitting their small and dainty hands, but it would come in time. Sapphire, on the other hand, spent her hours sitting alone in her mother’s unkempt ke-ting, playing with her dolls and occasionally wandering to the Jade Heart kitchen for a sweet bun, always getting under the kitchen staff’s feet. Chi Lin tried to take her in hand, engaging her in some sewing or even telling her a story. She suggested that she learn the ehr-hu like her mother. But Orchid, languid and silent, rarely noticed her daughter, leaving her care to the amah, who detested her duties and, when no one was looking, pinched the child. But Chi Lin was looking and took the amah to task several times until Jasmine scolded Purple Sage for interfering with affairs which did not concern her. Chi Lin desisted, not wishing
to anger the First Wife.
Chi Lin liked both boys, but not equally. She found Wu Chou-fa to have a jealous streak, complaining whenever he felt his brother received more attention — a gift from Wu T’ai-po or an extra bun at dinnertime. He tended to pout and kick the cat, when he thought no one was looking. Of course, Chi Lin was looking. She would shake her head, which Chou-fa respected, bowing and running away.
Wu Lin-kua was a brilliant boy, refined in his ways and superior to his brother in reading and writing, but he was not modest about it. He crowed often. But Chi Lin thought it appropriate for the future Master of the Wu House, who had sixteen wives as a marital goal. She also could not forget the gifts. Besides the Shr-ching, which was the first book she had acquired, once per moon a new book would show up on her doorstep. Where Lin-kua obtained these books, she knew not, but guessed that Master P’ing Chin had supplied them for favors or cash. It was common knowledge that Chi Lin was literate, but her value exceeded such disgrace. Everyone looked askance at the fault. What she did in the Silver Silence was her own business. However it did increase her respect from the Master of the House, who always nodded to her when she came into his view. In fact, besides books, there were other gifts — fruit, wall hangings, odd rocks for the poolscape and a Zhang puppy, which Lao Lao complained barked too much and Snapdragon complained because it defecated in places she managed to step into, blind as she was. Po Bo carried many gracious items in his carry pole into the Hall of Silver Silence. But, for Chi Lin, the greatest gift of all was the sight of Ming-kuan.
2
When Ming-kuan began to suckle on the amah’s breasts, Chi Lin sought to supervise. This she was denied, although it was appropriate, given her status as Auntie. But the First Wife frowned upon it. Chi Lin understood that it could mislead the household and eventually Ming-kuan on the relationship between Jasmine and Wu Hung-lin’s Third Son. So Chi Lin watched him from afar. Once a moon Jasmine permitted her to visit at the Blue Heaven Hall, where the amah would bring Ming-kuan, lift him in presentation and gave him up to the First Wife to cradle him. Chi Lin would then bow and say as she was instructed to say. What a fine son you have, Mei Lo. He is a credit to the household and to our husband. She was then allowed an approach, where she came within touching distance, but not allowed to touch. I am your Auntie Chi Lin, who will be at hand to serve you. Jasmine would smile, nod to the amah, who would quickly gather Ming-kuan back to her care and disappear from the hall. Chi Lin would then bow and thank Jasmine for her kindness, and then depart.
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