by Ling Zhang
Ah-Yuen had grown tall, sprouting like new grass after a spring shower. Seated next to his father, he clearly took after him, though he was much thinner. He shared his father’s love of guns and knew all the foreign and local makes. Mr. Auyung lent him books to read on armaments too. Mr. Auyung compared China to a lion with a festering boil on its body. If the boil did not heal in time then the lion would never get to its feet again. What was to be done? Mr. Auyung asked his students. Open a school and educate all the people so that they wake up, everyone answered in unison. Everyone, that is, but Ah-Yuen.
Ah-Yuen said running a school was a long-term project, like administering Chinese medicine to someone with an acute disease. If the medicine was too slow-acting then the lion might die first. A quick surgical operation, such as Western doctors performed, was what was needed in order to save the lion, according to Ah-Yuen. Military might was the only way to expel Westerners and Japanese and put China back on its feet. Ah-Yuen excelled in his studies and always came first in every subject. But when he engaged in heated discussions he was full of bravura, a quality which Kam Sau found both attractive and alarming at the same time.
Ah-Yuen’s father had lived with the Fongs for many years, so many that he had carried Kam Shan and Kam Ho around on his back as babies. He used to call the boys the “young masters” until Six Fingers had finally persuaded him to address them by their given names. When the Fongs’ first steward, Ha Kau, died, Mak Dau took over responsibility for the house and farm. He was, however, still a servant; he and his family ate with the other servants, and they washed their laundry in a different pool from the Fongs.
Ah-Yuen, born the son of a servant, should have remained a servant too, according to the old way of doing things. But Six Fingers had, with a slight nudge, set his life on a different course: she had sent him, as well as her daughter, to the best school for miles around. Six Fingers’ decision opened the boy’s eyes to the big, wide world beyond the narrow confines of their home village. Ah-Yuen was actually more mentally agile and shrewder than Kam Sau. Where she scurried along, he raced ahead, showing Kam Sau the way.
Ah-Yuen was always attentive to Kam Sau but never humble in the way that his father was. Kam Sau knew that her mother wanted Ah-Yuen as a live-in son-in-law and was smoothing the way forward for him, enabling him to walk tall, so that by the time he went in through the door of her bridal chamber he would be a respectable young gentleman. To move into the bride’s house may have lowered him in the eyes of society but not in the eyes of his future mother-in-law. Six Fingers was infinitely clever. What she wanted, she made sure she got.
By the time Kam Sau got downstairs, her mother had lit the stove and was gently reheating the pigs’ trotters of the night before. As the jelly softened and melted, the most delicious smell wafted through the house. While Six Fingers waited for the dish to be ready, she felt in her pocket for a bamboo comb to do her daughter’s hair. She undid the braids and Kam Sau’s gleaming thick hair tumbled over her knees. The sharp teeth of the comb cut through the hair as easily as butter, and the steady strokes gave Kam Sau a feeling of languorous pleasure.
She rested against her mother and asked idly: “Are you giving my sister-in-law a bowl of the trotters?” She meant her brother Kam Ho’s wife. “Huh, she can come down on her own two feet, can’t she? A hungry rat will find its own food.” There was a giggle from Kam Sau. “You’ve really got it in for her, Mum,” she said. “She’s carrying the next Fong grandchild. Whatever happens, I’m going to treat her well,” said her mother, “but have you ever seen anyone as dumb as her? The tree in the courtyard has more life in it than she does. When Kam Ho left to go back to Gold Mountain and we all took him to the entrance of the village, even Mak Dau’s wife said: ‘Write to us, Kam Ho, when you arrive so your mum doesn’t worry.’ But that dope did not even open her mouth until the very last moment, and then what she said was complete crap.”
Kam Sau burst out laughing. “You never used to talk like that, Mum! You’re worse than the servants now.” “You know what she said?” Six Fingers continued. “She blurted out that her brother needed to fork out for a dowry at the end of the year. If that isn’t crap, I don’t know what is. Your brother sends home every cent he earns in Gold Mountain to support the rest of us, and she wants him to support her family as well.”
“Well, dumb or not, you chose this daughter-in-law. My brother had never even seen her when he led her into the bridal chamber. You’ve only yourself to blame.”
Out of the whole family, only Kam Sau dared to be so blunt with Six Fingers. Her mother could only sigh in response: “She looked like a steady young woman in the photo, and when we visited their house, she was polite though she didn’t say much. Who would have thought that she would turn out so dumb? There was no point in her learning to read. The few characters she learned went in one ear and out the other.”
“What about ‘marriage for love,’ like Mr. Auyung’s always talking about?” said Kam Sau. “If my brother had got to know her first, he would never have settled for her.” “Well, men have nothing to fear, do they?” exclaimed her mother. “If they don’t like this one, they can find another one to marry. But women have to stick with what they’ve got, whether the man’s good or bad.” “That’s the old way of thinking, Mum,” said her daughter. “Even the Imperial concubine Wen Xiu fought for a divorce from the emperor Xuantong, so why can’t other women?”
Kam Sau raised her head to begin braiding her hair and saw shadows settle on her mother’s face. She smiled: “Did you and Dad really marry for love?” she asked. “My great-auntie says that Dad broke off his engagement to another girl for you, and had to pay her off with all the goods he’d brought back from Gold Mountain. Is it true?”
There was a long pause, then Six Fingers finally said reluctantly: “He paid by giving up a few Gold Mountain suitcases, but I nearly paid with my life, so we were even.” “So you and Dad married for love!” said Kam Sau with a triumphant smile. “But you wouldn’t let my brother marry for love. Mum, you’re a tyrant!”
Six Fingers didn’t understand what Kam Sau meant by “tyrant” but the rest was clear enough. “So what’s so great about marrying for love?” she demanded. “I was only eighteen when I married your father. In more than thirty years, he’s only visited three times. The last time he left, you were still in my belly. He’s over sixty now, and he refuses to come back to me without digging out that last gold ingot. Even if he was to come back tomorrow, all the sweet nectar’s gone, dried up. What’s the point in that, eh?”
Kam Sau’s smile faded at Six Fingers’ words and she could think of nothing to say. She had never seen her father. To her, he existed only in the photos and dollar letters he sent home from Gold Mountain. But sometimes, when her mother read her father’s letters home, she could see him pass like a light over her mother’s face.
They heard a heavy tread on the stairs. Kam Sau did not need to look round to know it was her sister-in-law, Ah-Hsien, coming down. She was heavily pregnant and walked as if she was dragging a wooden bucket behind her. By the time she arrived in the kitchen she was sweating profusely. She came to a halt, and asked: “Are the trotters ready?” Six Fingers gave a cool smile. “I assume you’re addressing the question to me? I happen to be your mother-in-law. But perhaps your mother didn’t teach you any manners.” “Yes, Mum,” said the girl woodenly.
Ah-Hsien was a mess; her eyes were full of sleepy dust, her tunic was buttoned up wrong so that one side of it hung down, and her feet were so swollen they threatened to split her cotton shoes. “Next time, wash your face and comb your hair before you come down, will you? How could you let the servants see you like that?” Ah-Hsien fixed her eyes on the floor and said nothing.
She was puffing and panting like an ox, and Kam Sau brought her stool to sit on. Ah-Hsien sat down heavily and one of the stool legs bent under her. Before she could stand up again, there was a crack and the leg snapped in two, dumping her on the floor like a sack of rice.
Six Fingers and Kam Sau rushed over to help her up, but Ah-Hsien sagged helplessly against them. As the deadweight of her body pulled the two of them down with her, Six Fingers shouted furiously: “Why did you choose the edge of the stool to sit on? Is there a louse waiting to bite your ass in the middle?” Before she had finished speaking, there was an exclamation from Kam Sau. Her hand trembled like a leaf as she pointed at Ah-Hsien’s trouser cuffs.
Something red was trickling down her legs and pooling on the floor beside them.
Blood.
In the early hours of the following morning, Ah-Hsien gave birth to a
baby boy called Fong Yiu Kei. He was the Fong family’s first grandson.
Year twenty-three of the Republic (1934)
Vancouver, British Columbia
Yin Ling was awakened by a crash. She had been dreaming of Johnny. She and Johnny were in Miss Watson’s etiquette class together.
All fifth graders had to take etiquette classes. Their teacher, Miss Watson, a woman with a face permanently taut with disapproval, was meticulous in her teaching of matters of etiquette, such as how to choose the right item of cutlery at a formal dinner party or an appropriate outfit for a social occasion. She also taught them to dance the waltz, foxtrot and tango. Yin Ling had little interest in her other school work, particularly science and history, and usually managed to doze off in the first fifteen minutes. She was reprimanded so often by her teachers that she learned to fall asleep with her eyes open so as not to attract unwanted attention.
But Yin Ling was an eager pupil in etiquette class.
Actually, Yin Ling was really only interested in one part of the classes—ballroom dancing.
Miss Watson made the girls and boys dance together, and she made them change partners with every new dance. They had had several weeks of her classes and would start tango next week. Each time they exchanged partners Yin Ling ended up with some sissy boy. But she carried on hoping secretly that one day she would get her heart’s desire.
Her heart’s desire was Johnny.
Johnny was the tallest, most muscular boy in the class. He had corncoloured hair with ungovernable curls, which turned into ringlets when they got wet in the rain. He hardly ever wore his school uniform properly. There was either a length of sleeve hanging down or the shirt would be open at the neck. Johnny was daring in other ways—he would sneak quick smoke during the break when Miss Watson went to powder her nose. When he smoked, he would half close his eyes, tilt his head back and look as if he had the whole world at his feet.
And then there was his guitar. When he played, the sound was like small hand plucking at the heartstrings. It drove all the girls crazy. Yin Ling knew quite well that every single one of them dreamed of taking his hand and dancing the tango. For her, the thought of being held in the crook of his arm while lifting one leg was worth dying for.
She did not dare think such thoughts in the daytime. She was just skinny little slit-eyed Chinese girl, and Johnny’s eyes would flit over her without pausing. But nighttime was different. Her dreams were like bulls on the rampage. For instance, that night she had been dreaming that in Miss Watson’s class, her hand had been put in Johnny’s. But before she had had time to look up at his hazel eyes, she had been shaken awake by that enormous crash.
She lay in bed with her hands clutched over her thudding heart, then realized it was her mother and father fighting.
Yin Ling had not had a chance to talk to her mother for a long time.
Sometimes they did not see each other from one week to the next. Her mother did not get home until after midnight from her shift at the Lychee Garden Restaurant and when Yin Ling got up to go to school in the mornings, her mother was still asleep. For months, Yin Ling had wanted her mother to take her to the department store in Dupont Street to buy a new overcoat. The coat she was wearing was a cut-down one of her mother’s; the cuffs were threadbare and there was a small, black hole on the pocket where her father’s cigarette had burned it. Her mother had Mondays off. So Monday evening was the only time when they could sit down together for a meal and talk.
Today was Monday.
But at tonight’s dinner, both Yin Ling and her mother, Cat Eyes, had been preoccupied. Normally her mother ate all her meals at the restaurant. When she did eat at home, the atmosphere at the dinner table was so tense that Yin Ling found it next to impossible to break it with a conversation, especially one involving money.
Her father’s leg was still no better. He could do no physical work at all, apart from taking the odd portrait photograph. The bits of cash he made scarcely covered his cigarettes each month. Her grandfather’s café was still going, but by the time he had paid the cook and the rent, the income was only enough to buy a ticket to the Cantonese opera.
Yin Ling had often heard her mother whispering quietly in her father’s ear about the café. “How come it never goes into the red?” she would say. “If it starts losing money, he’d have to shut up shop and be done with it.” His father would shout at her to keep her mouth shut, but Yin Ling knew that her father hoped that her grandfather would close the business too, although for a different reason. Her father wanted him to go back to Hoi Ping and settle down with her grandmother, while her mother wanted him to help out more around the house in Gold Mountain.
The only person who earned a proper salary in the house was Cat Eyes. She was paid weekly and her cheque had to be split many different ways. One bit was set aside to be sent home to Granny. A letter would arrive from Yin Ling’s granny every couple of months, and every letter would say the same: the harvest was poor, they couldn’t collect the rents, there were so many mouths to feed, the cost of living had gone up. Cat Eyes could not read so Kam Shan read the letter out to his father in a loud voice which, Cat Eyes knew, was intended for her ears. Cat Eyes said nothing in front of her father-in-law but outside of his hearing, she would say to Kam Shan: “It would be cheaper to support a Buddhist monastery than your family.” Kam Shan was not pleased by such talk but he had to listen. Cat Eyes’ cheque fed, clothed and sheltered the whole family, an unpalatable fact which bowed Kam Shan’s shoulders.
Yin Ling’s mother might complain but at the end of every month, come rain or shine, she never failed to send money back to Hoi Ping. Some of what remained had to go towards paying Granddad’s debts. After the collapse of his farming business, Ah-Fat was left owing substantial amounts of money and from time to time the creditors would come calling.
Basic necessities such as food and utilities also made demands on Cat Eyes’ wages. By the time that cheque had been fought over, only a few cents remained. Cat Eyes hung on to them like grim death, and used them to buy a few nice bits and pieces for herself. If Yin Ling wanted a new overcoat, she would have to winkle the money out of her mother. To do that, she would have to catch her mother in an odd moment of generosity.
As soon as Cat Eyes sat down at the table, Yin Ling directed a sidelong glance at her. She was unable to make out what sort of mood her mother was in; those large, feline eyes, their irises overcast with green, moved so little they seemed to have been painted on her face. Yin Ling had only ever once in her life seen her mother laugh heartily. That was the day when her granddad had gone with her dad to Whitewater to see some old friends from his railroad-building days. Her mother happened to have a day off and had invited some of her restaurant friends over for a meal.
With no men in the house, the women let their hair down, drinking two bottles of Shaoxing rice wine between them. Cat Eyes’ face was flushed deep pink. She improvised a posy of flowers for her hair out of her folded apron, and launched with gusto into the opera aria “Peach Blossom Red,” making “orchid finger” gestures with her hands. Yin Ling was astonished that her mother could sing so beautifully. She never uttered a sound when Granddad put his Cantonese opera record on. Cat Eyes sang herself hoarse. Then the women sat down to play mahjong. Cat Eyes was on a winning streak that day and she swept the board. At the end, she tied her winning
s into a handkerchief and sent her daughter out to buy snacks for her friends to eat. To Yin Ling, her mother had seemed like a flower squashed under a boulder, bursting irrepressibly forth as the sun’s rays touched it.
But Yin Ling never saw her mother laugh like that again.
When her mother’s expression relaxed, and she sat down, she was good-looking woman. But she did not get a chance to sit down often. She was on her feet all day at the restaurant, and over the years had developed an unattractive slouch, making her look old and droopy.
Yin Ling noticed that her mother had changed into something different this evening. Normally when she was at home, she wore a grey cotton tunic buttoned down the front. She had two of these, so when she had one on, the other hung on the clothesline. But today she wore a green dress with dark-coloured flowers, and her waved hair was tucked neatly behind her ears and fastened on one side with a silver hair clip. It must mean she was going out tonight. And that could mean one of two things, either she was happy or she was depressed. Yin Ling watched her mother scooping the last grains of rice from her bowl. Finally she took the plunge.
“Mum, I want a new coat,” she muttered into her bowl.
The words seemed to bounce off the sides of the bowl, scaring her with their mighty echoes.
Her mother looked as taken aback as if Yin Ling had asked her for a mountain of gold or silver. She shot her a hard look and Yin Ling felt herself shrink like a snowman in sunshine.
“And I’d like a mink coat. Are you going to give me the money?” Cat Eyes finally said coldly.
“Why not have a look in the Christmas sales?” said Kam Shan, his head buried in his bowl as well. It was not clear whether he meant Yin Ling’s coat or her mother’s mink.
Cat Eyes put down her bowl. “Did you hear that, Yin Ling? Come Christmastime, you just need to ask your father for the money.”
Yin Ling knew there was absolutely no hope. She would have to wear that old overcoat to Miss Watson’s etiquette class for the whole winter and sit in front of Johnny, who would eye her shiny worn coat cuffs and mutter: “She’s just another Chink, they never change!”